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 Andrew1975 wrote:
Id rather have the infinite improbability drive. http://hitchhikers.wikia.com/wiki/Infinite_Improbability_Drive

Before we can make this we fist need an improbability drive to produce it. Unfortunately the chances of that happening are almost infinitely small.

 Hedgehog wrote:

 AustonT wrote:

 Hedgehog wrote:

 AustonT wrote:

 Hedgehog wrote:

 AustonT wrote:
Impellors and Warshawski sails will come first.

Hyper comes between the impellers and the sails, I believe...

Are you talking in the books or actual theory.

The books. I believe the invention/discovery order goes:

Impellers - hyper - hyper log - Warshawski detectors - Warshawski sails

There's a whole section about it at the end of one of the earlier books.

It's been a day or two but I'm pretty sure the only way to translate to FTL in honorverse was using sails, pretty sure that everything you posted between impeller and sails are just words from the glossary.

As far as I remember, you only use Warshawski sails when travelling in a grav wave in hyper - outside of grav waves you still accelerate using your impellers

The way I remember it is that sails are required to make the FTL translation as well as riding grav waves. Impellers are used in hyper to transit between grav waves. But comparing hyper travel under the wedge vs under sail is like comparing a big wheel to a Ferrari in terms of speed.
I do remember something something about translation to hyper under reactive power so I guess sails aren't essential.

AustonT is right.

Oh, and I love the Honor Harrington books. And I'm not sure she qualifies as a Mary-Sue.

Either way this would be cool. I can cross my fingers but I won't expect anything that works in my lifetime

In the Honorverse, the hyper generator isn't a drive, it is a means of accessing hyperspace, where all points are more closely spaced then they are in real space. It provides no accelleration - in fact, going into or out of hyperspace DEcellerates the ship significantly.

The early hyperships were fueled by reaction drives - perhaps ion drives of some sort. The amount of fuel carried linked to the loss of velocity going into/out of hyperspace made FTL speeds limited. The shearing power of grav waves made it incredibly dangerous.

The impeller drive was developed later, using two planes of inclined parallel gravitational forces to accellerate a ship in between them. This allowed continuous accelleration... up to the limits of the human body, anyway.

Inertial compensators allowed accellerations up to 600g to be maintained with no affect on the crew. A spinoff was artificial gravity.

Special detectors invented by Dr. Warchowski allowed the detection of grav waves in time to avoid them. She then went on to invent a way to create planes ofgravitational force perpendicular to the ship, allowing these to function as sails in grav waves - and allowing positivley stupendous accelleration for no internal energy cost.

... GEEEEEKKKK!!!!!

Very comprehensive!

AustonT, I think you might be thinking of wormholes - you need Warshawski sails to access to access those...

On a related note, have any of you played SITS at all?

 Hulksmash wrote:
Oh, and I love the Honor Harrington books. And I'm not sure she qualifies as a Mary-Sue.

The important question is how many of them have you read? It was an enjoyable series for a while, but eventually became an excellent case study in why even popular authors need an editor with the spine to stand up to the author and say "no".

Finally! The Nipponji are making mechanoid armored suits and Nasa is making a warp drive! What a wonderful age we live in.

Now if only they could make a robot that will spank me and call me names!

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

 SilverMK2 wrote:
Hopefully something like this will come about in my lifetime, but I am not going to hold my breath

I'll settle for a proof of concept personally.

Agreed. I get that same way when we are exploring another body in our solar system. Im not saying I want a 5 legged animal creature that drinks liquid nitrogen, just some bacterial proof is enough to make my mind swell

Chaos here we come, baby!