Spacecraft of the future

[sozme]

I'm on to the outlining phase where I get into detail about the military-class spacecraft my protagonist flies around in. I can't find any good resources on speculative design of space ships 400 years into the future. So here are some questions:

1. What areas of the ship would imagine would exist 400 years into the future? (I.e. engineering bay, combat information center, medical bay, etc.)

2. What types of personnel would be necessary to man the ship? (I.e. astrogation, pilot, etc.) What would their specific functions be?

I have some of this sorted out, but certainly not all.

 

[tinkerdan]

Have you read any of David Weber's Honor Harrington series.

That asked; there are plenty of other authors out there with notions about how the ships are constructed and though you won't want to copy exactly you may want to extrapolate from those. Really we make ships that are not military at the moment because we haven't had a need to militarize outer space. There might be stuff on the drawing boards somewhere but they won't see much light until we have that need.

The same thing goes for space battles. You can read all sorts of speculation in the Military SFF that are out there, but the truth is that most are based loosely on naval engagements on water and we won't have a real clue about space battles until we have a few.

You will need thick hulls or some sort of shielding against any weapons you can dream up.

Even some of those games out there could give you some ideas.

 

[paranoid marvin]

If there aren't already militarised spacecraft - albeit rudimentary in design - I'll eat my hat.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

There were. Only one is in service, it's remote or pre-programmed and no humans. It's like a mini-space shuttle. It has a loading bay. No doubt to retrieve low orbit spy satellites.

Many of the actual space shuttle flights were military. It was a daft design for purely civilian use. That's why the Russians built the 'Buran'. But by 1991 it was pointless.

Military doesn't always mean weapons and armour. Most realistic probably is to base the tactics, weapons and layout on a Submarine. Cramped, has to have all its own resources (nuke ones can stay under for months) and fires torpedos (later ones missiles). Unless you have fantasy weapons not invented yet, self propelled torpedo style missiles are simplest. A projectile weapon (guns, shells, rail gun etc) has the problem of the reaction of craft firing it. Lasers are less useful than people imagine, a quite cheap missile will work even better in space than on earth, and sadly we have seen how effective cheap missiles are compared to China's Satellite destroying laser and USA massive high power aircraft mounted laser. USA demonstrated a Satellite destroying missile launched from a ship. Far better than massive land mounted laser.
A guy with a suitcase missile can take out the most armoured tank.
Armour is pretty much only use against anti personnel land mines, machine guns, rifles and grenades.
Your only real anti-missile strategy is to hit it with metal chaff (there is such a machine that launches a "wall of chaff") or an anti-missile missile. Patriot in 1991 was rubbish.
The UK lost HMS Sheffield to an Exocet missile in 1982 Falklands War. The UK only had one system able to shoot down Exocets (maybe only sometimes). The Sheffield may not have had it. I forget what it was. It was made by Shortts in Belfast, perhaps the Sea Cat. The UK also had the Exocet and Hawker Siddeley Dynamics Sea Dart

What we are short of at the minute are any decent spacecraft of any kind. At the minute we can only launch satellites as high as geo orbit (22,500 miles) and unmanned probes out of Earth orbit. The Space station is only 259 miles to 265 mile high orbit. Right now only the Russians can take people to it. The ESA automated space truck (next launch 29th July 2014 see www.arianespace.com can be adapted to take people. The SpaceX Capsule may soon be rates for passengers. But none of these are "proper" space craft. Like Apollo capsule + command + lander 3 piece system was.

 

[tinkerdan]

Yes well as soon as you point them out...

As I said there are most likely designs on the drawing board but the expense for militarized space craft is being put into current ground and air military which surely will morph somehow over to the military in space which will be based on the experience with the craft we have out there now.

In all fairness you could probably take present flight craft ideas and mix them with current understanding of space flight and make something but the actual prototypes begin to become rather expensive and unless it can be designed to make strikes from space to earth it wouldn't be cost effective and there are treaties that prevent a whole lot of that type of testing these days.

But there are always [theories].

 

[Ray McCarthy]

All known enemies are presently on the same ground

ICBMs do space to ground strikes. The Sputnik launch vehicle was an ICBM and the Sputnik was x10 the mass of the first US Satellites till they realised the Russians would not think WWIII was starting if they used a modified ICBM too.

I must watch Das Boot. Supposed to be the most realistic sub film. May give me ideas.

 

[Michael Colton]

@OP, there are countless ways to envision the details of a spacecraft four centuries from now. It is difficult to give advice on it. There have been many different variations by a myriad of authors, films, games, etc.

The first question you have to ask yourself that is a precursor to both of the questions you asked in your post is: how much of the ship do you want to be automated in your universe? The more automation, the smaller the crew needed to fly it and the less areas you may need.

 

[Mirannan]

As has already been said, the design depends so much on available tech that it's impossible to be definitive. General tech level matters, as does the presence or absence of specific technologies.

For a good example of an ultratech sapient warship:

Black Angel

 

[Foxbat]

Might be worth having a read of Jack Campbell's Lost Fleet series. He's ex-US Navy and some of his ideas are pretty interesting. He covers points like tactics, ship types and logistics.

If you're talking large fleet battles a long way from home, logistics is probably the winner and loser of such battles.

 

[ralphkern]

The above are simple extrapolations of contemporary naval ships. Whilst they make for better reading for us the reality would, most likely, be totally different.

In four hundred years we would also have a corresponding increase in ancillary technologies, e.g. computing power. If humans are even along for the ride, they would be heavily interfaced with the ship.

Think about all you can do with a simple tablet wandering around the house. In twenty years we have gone from rotary phones to them. In twenty times as long as that it would have come on immeasurably.

Ships would be heavily decentralized. People can work where is most convenient on board. Maintenance and engineering would be conducted by Proxies (robots that may just be produced as and when needed).

Speculating even more, humans might not even bother to take their bodies, merely uploading into the ship which saves all kinds of plumbing and mass problems, not to mention the fact that they could just 'switch off' during long voyages and then download back into bodies that were created in situ on arrival at the destination.

In my book, starting around 2100, the crew of the ship use HUD's (eye implants) that overlay the information that crew member needs onto convenient surfaces and projects a console for them to work at. For example the pilot may need one set of displays whilst the systems engineer needs others.

I will admit that whilst my idea was to originally have them completely decentralized, but in the end for convenience in writing scenes, I designated areas such as the bridge or mess etc.

In relation to real world military space craft, you may want to read up on the Russian Polyus space station. It was eighty tonnes and was equipped with a one megawatt carbon dioxide laser (a test article). It also had a mine launcher and could exude a cloud of Barium particles which they thought would dissipate laser attacks on it. It was a prototype and doesn't seem intended in itself to be a weapon platform, merely to test those technologies. It would have formed the core of a second Soviet Space Station.

It was launched in 1987 but there was a problem with it. Due to practicalities it was stored 'upside down' in the launcher and when it deployed it couldn't correct itself and ended up in the Pacific ocean.

A fascinating, but strangely little known piece of space history, and for the fellow geeks on here well worth reading up on:

Polyus (spacecraft) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Polyus

 

[Gawian]

I think if it's a Deep Space Vessel, Battlestar Galactica might be a good idea.

They have Quarters. CIC. Engine Room. Various Rec Rooms. Even Weapon Manufacturing Centres. Water Processing and Storage.

It depends on how large the ship is. What it's purpose is. How advanced your tech level is.

For example, advanced ships with laser weaponry probably won't need Weapon Manufacturing. Whereas ships in Star Trek didn't need Water Storage because of the replicator systems they used.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

1. Whatever you want

2. Whatever you want.

Seriously, that's the fun of sci-fi - if you want a ship that's shaped like an elephant's ear and runs on solar energy, then you can have it. Ditto the crew. Provided you give me plausible reasons, there's no problem.

 

[paranoid marvin]

All known enemies are presently on the same ground

ICBMs do space to ground strikes. The Sputnik launch vehicle was an ICBM and the Sputnik was x10 the mass of the first US Satellites till they realised the Russians would not think WWIII was starting if they used a modified ICBM too.

I must watch Das Boot. Supposed to be the most realistic sub film. May give me ideas.

Das Boot is an excellent film, but is actually a tv series edited into a film. Watch the tv series if you want to get it all. Also watch with German language and English subtitles to get the most from it.

 

[paranoid marvin]

As for advancement of spacecraft, it is only warfare , or the threat of war, that truly propels technology beyond that which is commercially profitable. If it hadn't been for WWII we may not have rockets, or at least be quite some way behind were we had been. If it wasn't for the Cold War man may not have gine to the moon.

Military (or other departments linked) can only get the budgets they need at times like this. If the Soviet Union hadn't collapsed then it's quite possible (unless we hadn't all been blown to smithereens) that we would have spacecraft travelling to Mars by now.

As it is the only governments who can afford to fund this kind of thing can't justifiably spend the cash required, especially when all they would be doing is landing on dead lumps of rock.

In my opinion we should explore our own planet thoroughly before exploring others.

 

[Michael Colton]

As for advancement of spacecraft, it is only warfare , or the threat of war, that truly propels technology beyond that which is commercially profitable. If it hadn't been for WWII we may not have rockets, or at least be quite some way behind were we had been. If it wasn't for the Cold War man may not have gine to the moon.

Military (or other departments linked) can only get the budgets they need at times like this. If the Soviet Union hadn't collapsed then it's quite possible (unless we hadn't all been blown to smithereens) that we would have spacecraft travelling to Mars by now.

As it is the only governments who can afford to fund this kind of thing can't justifiably spend the cash required, especially when all they would be doing is landing on dead lumps of rock.

In my opinion we should explore our own planet thoroughly before exploring others.

This is part of why we are seeing more and more fiction, be it literary or television such as the new show Extant, that are having corporations be the driving force of technology, exploration, and other such things in future settings. The governmental approach may be losing its underpinnings.

 

[Spiegal]

This is part of why we are seeing more and more fiction, be it literary or television such as the new show Extant, that are having corporations be the driving force of technology, exploration, and other such things in future settings. The governmental approach may be losing its underpinnings.

Regarding industry driving exploration and advancement in space, need we look any further than SpaceX?

They turned a monopoly into a competitive marketplace and now we are going to see be seeing another leap in space technology. Making space profitable will likely push the government out of the equation and edge the company controlled dystopia ever closer!

By undercutting the government with their services they are paving the way for other companies to make spaceflight cheaper and cheaper whilst also providing a platform for scientists and engineers to research and use technologies that would never have been funded by the government.

The government wouldn't turn a profit but a company with a drive to make money definitely will, giving space exploration the longevity and competitiveness that drives innovation.

 

[Michael Colton]

Regarding industry driving exploration and advancement in space, need we look any further than SpaceX?

They turned a monopoly into a competitive marketplace and now we are going to see be seeing another leap in space technology. Making space profitable will likely push the government out of the equation and edge the company controlled dystopia ever closer!

By undercutting the government with their services they are paving the way for other companies to make spaceflight cheaper and cheaper whilst also providing a platform for scientists and engineers to research and use technologies that would never have been funded by the government.

The government wouldn't turn a profit but a company with a drive to make money definitely will, giving space exploration the longevity and competitiveness that drives innovation.

While I agree that astrophysics will continue to become more corporatized, I do feel obligated to mention that the lack of government funding is not universal between countries. Russia and France in particular still spend a significant amount of government funding, investment, or subsidies in these areas.

 

[Tyburn]

A little while ago I had a sort of vision of a spacecraft command centre of the future, still don't have a story to put it into but it was less like a submarine bridge and more like a lounge, with large comfortable chairs and every crew member had a tablet computer which connected them to the ship's systems. With this, all systems were interchangable - if the helm wanted a break they could just 'swipe' control over to someone else.

When a crewmember came into the command centre, they would pick up their tablet by the door, log in and be assigned their duties for the shift. I felt there was a lot of flexibility in this, as all command crew would be trained in each others roles, so could take over at a moment's notice as and when needed.

 

[Gramm838]

To my mind the issue that is common in SF but I don't think will be reality in even 400 years time is artificial gravity; in my scribblings the crew are simply locked in a box and operate the ship via a form of virtual reality. To get around, because their muscles have wasted away due to microgravity, they would need an exo-skeleton

 

[Vertigo]

Very much agree; two of the biggest bits of fantasy in most space opera is artificial gravity and FTL. And I actually think artificial gravity is the biggest felon here. There are only just so many forces in physics and none of the existing ones other than gravity itself could produce artificial gravity. And the only way you are going to get it is to have a huge mass (maybe carrying a contained black hole around with you) but that would then make your fuel requirements go through the roof. There is some vaguely theoretically possible physics that might make FTL possible - such as wormholes - but I can think if none that might make artificial gravity possible.

And incidentally anti-gravity is even worse from that perspective; if you could fly with some sort of anti-gravity then you would either be weightless inside your craft or you would have to have artificial gravity to have weight. And off we go around the roundabout...