On Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 6:55 PM, Roger Burton West <[email protected]>wrote:
> On Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 06:43:54PM +0000, David Scheidt wrote: > > >Ignoring, for the moment, the woeful lack of understanding of economics > that > >the Traveller setting demonstrates, > > I think one has to consider as a guiding principle the idea that > imported goods are hugely expensive, but that local manufacture isn't > done because... well, the Empire tells people not to, or something. > That's the core impossibility. It's not just that, though that's a big part. It's also the complete failure to understand that much of technological progress isn't really technology. It's understanding. Give me a couple engineers, a time machine, and I'll advance any field of technology you care to name from its state in 1800 or 1850 to what it was a hundred years later in a year. Give me a reference library and a pile of four function calculators, and we'll do it even faster, and we'll advance everything else at the same time. (assuming, of course, we don't get shot as witches!) Lets consider how a little modern engineering can improve something. Lets consider an early TL7 automobile. A tl6/early TL7 automobile has essentially no safety features, for instance. Seat belts, padded dashboards, laminated safety glass, door latches designed not to pop open, seats with head rests, and quite a few other things, are well within the ability of TL 6. They don't even cost much, nor increase the complexity of the vehicle. If we decided we had to make cars using the methods of 1950, you can bet they'd still have head rests, seat belts, anti-burst door latches, dual system brakes, safety glass and padded dashes. All having those things requires is understanding that they're cheap, and they *greatly* increase safety. None of that requires any imported technology, and you've got a better than stock TL7 vehicle. if we're willing to add a bit to the cost of the vehicle, we can add things like disc brakes (which really aren't harder to make, they just require different design choices). We can improve the aerodynamics of the vehicle (which requires using a computer, but doesn't change how you build the car). With the same computer, you can figure out lots of weight savings (which saves fuel, and cost of building the vehicl.) If we're willing to have some later technology, Allow me two or three (really, two or three) transistors, and I can greatly improve the reliability of the engine (by replacing the wear prone points and condenser in the ignition system, with a magnetically triggered switch), increasing the maintance interval by a factor of two or more. Give me a handful more tranistors, and i'll build you an electronically controlled alternator that will last the life of the vehicle, replacing the brushes and commutator and moving coil of the generator and voltage regulator, which will give you another huge boost to the maintance interval. Twenty bucks (at radio shack, less in real life) worth of electronics that will save the owner thousands of dollars over the course its life. > > >They're still just as prone to drowning or dying of exposure as idiot > >passengers. (And they're likely to be exhausted, injured, and otherwise > not > >at their best. Design safety and survival equipment for idiots, and > you'll > >never go wrong.) > > Very much seconded. > > >Well once you've got GPS (and if you tell me that a planet that exists to > >support *ORBITAL* miners, and which has regular trade of bulky, heavy > things > >between surface and orbit doesn't have GPS, I'll laugh at you so hard I'll > >require supplemental oxygen.), it makes a whole lot of sense to use it. > > I agree that this would be a high priority for the limited import > budget, _if_ receivers could be built locally. (If not, inertial > platforms seem rather more likely.) I believe that even a basic GPS > receiver requires reasonably serious digital electronics. > A modern (2009) GPS chipset, which includes everything (other than an antenna) that you need to receive and decode GPS signals, is really cheap: about a us dollar a pop. (in large quantity, of course.) The package I'm familiar with is 15mmX15mm X 2, which is huge by the standards of now (current designs are 5X5X<1). That's, er 1.5X 10^-5 cubic feet. Pack 'em up for shipping, and you're talking 20 million or so in a dton. > > >The > >cost of modern (21st century earth) EPIRB is pretty low, and they're not > >exactly cutting edge tech. They consist of a GPS receiver, some control > >circuitry and a radio transmitter (and it's not a terribly sophisticated > >transmitter. it transmits a simple digital code at a fixed frequency at > low > >power (5W, with a low duty cycle). The packaging and relatively low > demand > >is what makes them cost anything at all. > > The GPS receiver is certainly the tricky bit to rig up with non-imported > components. If the code could be set up on magnetic tape or something of > that sort, a TL6 radio transmitter could do the job. An inertial > platform plus radio transmitter could certainly be built to work in a > similar way, though it would be bigger and prone to drifting. Inertial guidance is heavy and expensive. Doesn't become really practical until you've got gyroscopes on a chip, which is a fairly recent invention. (and gps receivers are cheaper....) -- David Scheidt [email protected] _______________________________________________ GurpsNet-L mailing list <[email protected]> http://mail.sjgames.com/mailman/listinfo/gurpsnet-l
