Imperial Star Destroyer Quantification Thread

[Praeothmin 532]

Seriously. Fucking seriously. Are we actually discussing shit from Darksaber? From Kevin Anderson. From hackzilla. Really. Anything from that pos should be dismissed by default. I hate that fucker. (note to all. this is a rant about KJA, having nothing to do with current technical discussion. Carry on.)

 

 

 

While it may be shit to you, it remains part of the EU, a book that sold quite a few number of copies, that many people seem to like, and that is at the same level of canon as the Zahn books...

[Praeothmin 532]

Rough quantification of RotS destruction:

 

 

 

Trade Federation Cruiser is 1088 meters long according to SW.com.

 

 

 

In the following picture, the blasts are approximately 1/20th of the length of the ship, so about 50 meters across…

 

Nice Pic here

 

 

 

So, assuming Iron, a sphere 50 meters in diameter has volume of: 65450m³

 

 

 

Mass of hull sphere if Iron: 515091500kg

 

 

 

Vaporization is : 649984177111500J, or 155.349946728 KT

 

 

 

Since this is for a sphere, half of that would be for the half of the sphere inside the ship, and we assume a solid helf sphere 50 meters across = 78 KT

 

The actual density would be much less due to the interior of the ship being filled with passages, air vents, etc...

[Airlocke 12,014]

While it may be shit to you, it remains part of the EU, a book that sold quite a few number of copies, that many people seem to like, and that is at the same level of canon as the Zahn books...

 

 

 

Praoethmin. I was insulting the man as an author, not legitimately challenging it as canon. It is obviously just as canon as the rest of the EU. I just hate Anderson. This had nothing to do with your debate. As I have already mentioned. This was supposed to be an annoying/silly/slightly humorous addition to the debate. Yet, you are a moron and didn't actually read what I wrote, or care that I wasn't challenging your position. I hate to repeat and explain myself like this, it ruins everything.

[Airlocke 12,014]

Rough quantification of RotS destruction:

 

 

 

Trade Federation Cruiser is 1088 meters long according to SW.com.

 

 

 

In the following picture, the blasts are approximately 1/20th of the length of the ship, so about 50 meters across…

 

Nice Pic here

 

 

 

So, assuming Iron, a sphere 50 meters in diameter has volume of: 65450m³

 

 

 

Mass of hull sphere if Iron: 515091500kg

 

 

 

Vaporization is : 649984177111500J, or 155.349946728 KT

 

 

 

Since this is for a sphere, half of that would be for the half of the sphere inside the ship, and we assume a solid helf sphere 50 meters across = 78 KT

 

The actual density would be much less due to the interior of the ship being filled with passages, air vents, etc...

 

 

 

Those numbers are nice, I guess. But...who gives a fuck about iron? SW ships are made of durasteel. Steel would be a more useful quantification, though likely useless. I highly doubt that it is straight bog-standard steel.

[Airlocke 12,014]

Wookieepedia says that durasteel is likely 300,000 times stronger than steel. Whaddya say we bump this down to 30 times to get a low end and a high end? Sadly, I do not know how to do the calculations...Yeah, terrible, I know.

[Kor_Dahar_Master 0]

Rough quantification of RotS destruction:

 

 

 

Trade Federation Cruiser is 1088 meters long according to SW.com.

 

 

 

In the following picture, the blasts are approximately 1/20th of the length of the ship, so about 50 meters across…

 

Nice Pic here

 

 

 

So, assuming Iron, a sphere 50 meters in diameter has volume of: 65450m³

 

 

 

Mass of hull sphere if Iron: 515091500kg

 

 

 

Vaporization is : 649984177111500J, or 155.349946728 KT

 

 

 

Since this is for a sphere, half of that would be for the half of the sphere inside the ship, and we assume a solid helf sphere 50 meters across = 78 KT

 

The actual density would be much less due to the interior of the ship being filled with passages, air vents, etc...

 

 

 

If you do not mind me asking why you assume vaporisation to match the size of the external explosion?. I would think that a 50m visable explosive effect would only require a lot smaller vaporisation of material due to the fact that a cloud of gas created vaporising quantities of matter are going to be much larger than the matter itself.

 

 

 

I know we are not talking about water but about the ships hull/internal material but using water as a guide the volume of water vapour is more than three thousand times as large as the volume of liquid water at the same temperature and pressure.

[InvaderSkooj 1]

snip

 

As usual You refuse to provide evidence and ignore anything you don't like, this will be my last reply as continued debate is pointless

 

 

 

 

 

You claim it can be done with 36MT (give or take a few KT) per cannon, assuming each of an ISD's cannons fire 1 shot per second, for which, again, you failed to provide supporting evidence that all 100 cannons could fire at the same time. You say your estimates are not far out, except for the fact that HTLs are supposedly much more powerful then MTLs, which in turn are much more powerful then LTLs. So in fact, your calculations use a RoF far too high, and would leave the HTLs at levels far above your 36MT per cannon…

ISD mk II carries 64 heavy guns on the top of the hull, I assumed another 36 on the sides (rpg stats give a mk2 100 heavy guns) which were seen to be able to fire at an angle to the plane of the hull. An ISD with its top facing the planet and angled slightly away should be able to bring all 64 turret guns plus all its trench guns to bear on a large target such as a planet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I mentioned the "Nuclear Winter" paper which stated that a 5000MT war would be devastating to the human race. While the death toll in the articles (relating to the paper) to which I had access were exaggerated a bit, the facts remain that 5000MT over multiple days would be an ecological disaster.

 

 

 

I then pointed out how this is 47 times less energy then would be distributed by the 3 ISDs in 1 day, and that it could wipe human life of the planet, based on what 5000MT could do.

ie Provided no evidence that 259 gigatons would wipe out all life on a planet

 

 

 

 

 

p.742

 

The energy of the K/T impact is estimated at 108 MT

 

from the size of the Chicxulub crater, and a consistent value

 

of the size of the impactor (10–15-km diameter) is derived

 

from the observed extraterrestrial component in the boundary

 

layer. Immediate effects of the impact included blast and

 

the generation of tsunami (since the impact occurred in a

 

shallow sea). However, the primary agents of global stress

 

appear to have been a short-lived firestorm from atmospheric

 

heating of reentering ejecta followed by a persistent

 

(months to years) blackout due to particulates suspended

 

in the stratosphere. Other possibly important effects could

 

have included chemical changes in the oceans and atmosphere

 

and large climatic oscillations following the impact.

 

Toon et al. (1997) review all these environmental effects

 

and their dependence on impact energy. Their chief goal

 

was to provide relatively simple prescriptions for evaluating

 

the importance of impacting objects over a range of energies

 

and compositions. Since mass extinction events such

 

as the K/T impact are rare (intervals of tens to hundreds of

 

million years), we are especially interested in downscaling

 

to determine the thresholds for damage on timescales more

 

relevant to human history (cf. Toon et al., 1994, and Covey

 

et al., 1994, for earlier discussions).

 

The threshold for atmospheric penetration of impacts,

 

required for the blast effects to reach the ground, is at a

 

few megatons (Chyba et al., 1993; Hills and Goda, 1993;

 

Chyba, 1993). Below this energy, the atmosphere protects

 

us against all but the rare metallic projectiles. For impacts

 

above this threshold, the primary effects of both airbursts

 

and ground impacts are local blasts and earthquakes, together

 

with the setting of local fires. The Tunguska explosion

 

of an NEA ~60 m in diameter provides a relatively

 

small example. Such impacts cause little harm if they enter

 

over the oceans. However, at sizes of hundreds of meters,

 

oceanic impacts dominate the hazard calculations as a result

 

of impact-induced tsunami (Hills and Goda, 1993; Hills

 

et al., 1994; Hills and Mader, 1997; Toon et al., 1997;

 

Crawford, 1998; Ward and Asphaug, 2000). Tsunami waves

 

provide a relatively efficient way to carry the impact energy

 

to large distances. This fact, coupled with concentration of

 

human habitation near the shore, makes tsunami important

 

for energies of tens of thousands of megatons or greater

 

(NEA diameters of hundreds of meters). While there is considerable

 

uncertainty in both the height of the open-ocean

 

wave and the run-up as it reaches the shore, Toon et al.

 

(1997) conclude that large tsunami, occurring with average

 

frequency of tens of thousands of years, contribute much

 

more to the hazard than do terrestrial impacts in the same

 

energy range.

 

The global environmental stress from the K/T event was

 

dominated by a prompt firestorm followed by longer-lasting

 

dust loading of the atmosphere. There is direct evidence in

 

the boundary clay for the soot produced by burning a large

 

fraction of the terrestrial biomass. In addition, analogous

 

effects seen following the impacts of Comet Shoemaker-

 

Levy 9 with Jupiter in July 1994 have been extensively

 

modeled (Boslough et al., 1994; Zahnle and MacLow, 1994,

 

1995). A global firestorm can be ignited by hot debris falling

 

back into the atmosphere on ballistic trajectories from

 

the ejecta plume, as first suggested by Melosh et al. (1990).

 

Most of the energy is deposited in the mesosphere (where

 

meteors shine), with radiative heating of the lower atmosphere

 

and surface. Toon et al. conclude that while this mechanism

 

was important in the K/T event, where it was the probable

 

direct cause of the extinction of large land animals such

 

as the dinosaurs, it does not produce surface temperatures

 

high enough for ignition at impact energies below 107 MT.

 

Global darkness from the absorption of sunlight by

 

ejected dust was the prime agent of the K/T extinction as

 

suggested by Alvarez et al. (1980). Toon et al. (1997), drawing

 

in part on a large literature dealing with volcanic dust

 

and the stratospheric soot from nuclear war, calculated the

 

effects of dust loading on atmospheric circulation under

 

various scenarios. General circulation models (GCMs) permitted

 

them to follow the postimpact development of the

 

suspended dust and calculate the resulting surface temperatures.

 

As we might expect, the results depend in significant

 

ways on the target material (land or ocean) and the season

 

of impact, but less on exact geographic location, since the

 

dust cloud quickly expands to global scales. Since these

 

effects extend down to impacts as small as 105 MT, they

 

dominate in determining the threshold for global disaster,

 

defined by Chapman and Morrison (1994) as an environmental

 

catastrophe capable of killing 25% of the world’s

 

population, primarily from the agricultural losses of an “impact

 

winter.†Toon et al. (1997) conclude that the energy

 

range between 105 and 106 MT is transitional between regional

 

and global effects, with a mean value for the threshold

 

of global catastrophe near 106 MT energy, corresponding

 

to an NEA diameter of ~2 km.

 

Pope (2002) has recently questioned the assumptions

 

made by Toon et al. (1997) (and others previously) concerning

 

the quantity of submicrometer dust injected into the

 

stratosphere. This fine dust has not been measured directly

 

in the K/T boundary layer, and inferring its quantity indirectly

 

introduces substantial uncertainty into the estimate

 

of the threshold energy for a global catastrophe. This uncertainty

 

could be as great as a factor of ±10 in energy, corresponding

 

to a diameter for an asteroid of 1–4 km.

 

 

 

And I can't believe you think this describes "localized effects" I guess up in crazyland "global" means something entirely different than global

 

 

 

From Houghton -Mifflin onlin dictionary

 

1. Having the shape of a globe; spherical.
2. Of, relating to, or involving the entire earth; worldwide: global war; global monetary policies.
3. Comprehensive; total: "a . . . global, generalized sense of loss"(Maggie Scarf)

[Tyralak 12,068]

Let's back up for just a minute. Do we have the citations from the specific EU sources which describe a planetary bombardment? I think it would be a good idea to locate them and post them here, so we can dissect the EXACT language used.

[Airlocke 12,014]

There was an orbital bombardment in The Rebel Dawn duology during the Yuuzhan Vong war. I believe it was from an SSD. I don't feel like finding the passage right now. The targets, however, were enemy ships flying above ground in the lower atmosphere, and the ground below them had already suffered TL damage(To clear away plant and animal life and create a wide open area around their base, to make it very hard to launch any kind of personnel attack on the base, make sure enemies would be in clear line of sight.) It is there, if anyone would like to look at it, though I doubt that it would provide accurate numbers. IIRC the TLs were scaled down to spare massive destruction during the clearing process....So, in other words, this entire post is worthless.

[Tyralak 12,068]

Not completely. It does narrow the field and gives rise to the interesting question if TLs have truly variable yields.

[Praeothmin 532]

Wookieepedia says that durasteel is likely 300,000 times stronger than steel. Whaddya say we bump this down to 30 times to get a low end and a high end? Sadly, I do not know how to do the calculations...Yeah, terrible, I know.

 

 

 

And the asteroid-destroying-a-bridge scene in TESB says it isn't...

 

You see, I like to use all the canon sources, EU included, when it does not contradict higher sources.

 

This clearly does.

 

Also, the 300 000 times stronger-then-steel "Durasteel" would have kept the Invisible hand in much better shape during it's crash landing, as well as the landing pad...

[Tyralak 12,068]

The 'Invisible Hand'? Is that kind of like giving yourself 'a stranger'?

[Kor_Dahar_Master 0]

The 'Invisible Hand'? Is that kind of like giving yourself 'a stranger'?

 

 

 

Naming what is pretty much a advanced naval ship The 'Invisible Hand' was either a joke or a terrible idea, if you do not know why ask a sailor what a "phantom flipper" is .

[Praeothmin 532]

As usual You refuse to provide evidence and ignore anything you don't like, this will be my last reply as continued debate is pointless

 

 

 

Says the guy who refuses Darksaber as valid because it goes against his trumped up numbers...

 

Yeah, I realize more and more how similar we are, as you also ignore what you don't like and cherry-pick facts to fit your arguments…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By the way, a few calcs for fun:

 

 

 

If Caamas is "Earth-like":

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Earth composed of 71% salt water Oceans, and 29% land masses.

 

 

 

Equatorial Radius : 6,378.1km

 

 

 

Surface Area : 510 072 000km²

 

 

 

Land Area : 148 940 000km²

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Air blast radius at 1 MT = 7.2km

 

 

 

Area affected: 162.86km²

 

 

 

Total affected area over land for 259200 MT= 42 213 312 km²

 

 

 

(1/4th of the surface of the planet)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thermal radiation radius = 11.2km

 

 

 

Area affected: 430.05km²

 

 

 

Total affected area over land for 259200 MT = 111 456 000 km²

 

 

 

(3/4 of the land area)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So with 259200MT, we cover 1/4 of the land area with destructive blasts powerful enough to raze buildings, and we cover 3/4 of the land area with fires intense enough to burn material.

 

 

 

We still ignore the falling debris, the firestorms, the poisonous gases, etc…

 

 

 

And that's only with my minimal interpretation, which I'm sure would eradicate human life on Earth.

 

 

 

You don't agree, and it really doesn't matter.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Where you assume all the cannons can fire at the same time (something we've never seen an ISD do), I use the lowest ROF of 1 shot per second.

 

 

 

But if I were to assume your ROF, this would simply make may calculated Firepower more valid then ever, since 32 cannons (one broadside of an ISD) would be firing 1 MT each, so that 32 times the Firepower would reach the surface, which means we would cover 32/4 of the land area (8 times the surface land) with destructive force sufficient to raze buildings, and 96/4 of the land area (24 times the surface land) with heat sufficient to ignite materials…

 

 

 

Even using 2 or 3 cannons per second, and still ignoring the MTLs and LTLs, we still cover the entire land surface of the planet with sufficient destructive force to eradicate all life.

 

 

 

Of course, since you hate this fact, you'll ignore it in favor of your trumped up, unnecessary figures…

 

 

 

ISD mk II carries 64 heavy guns on the top of the hull, I assumed another 36 on the sides (rpg stats give a mk2 100 heavy guns) which were seen to be able to fire at an angle to the plane of the hull. An ISD with its top facing the planet and angled slightly away should be able to bring all 64 turret guns plus all its trench guns to bear on a large target such as a planet.

 

 

 

But nothing says it can fire all of them at the same time, and in fact we've seen much slower ROF in the movies…

 

 

 

ie Provided no evidence that 259 gigatons would wipe out all life on a planet

 

 

 

 

I have provided calculations which explain the kind of damage we would be facing, while you haven't proven it couldn't…

 

 

 

 

 

And I can't believe you think this describes "localized effects" I guess up in crazyland "global" means something entirely different than global

 

 

 

From Houghton -Mifflin onlin dictionary

 

1. Having the shape of a globe; spherical.
2. Of, relating to, or involving the entire earth; worldwide: global war; global monetary policies.
3. Comprehensive; total: "a . . . global, generalized sense of loss"(Maggie Scarf)

 

 

 

I specifically said "localized impacts", not effects.

 

 

 

I also specifically stated that since the "impacts" were localized, that their effects would not be evenly distributed all over the planet, unlike a Bombardment aiming to wipe out all life…

 

 

 

And did you even look at the numbers you're referring to?

 

 

 

108 KT, 107 KT, the document keeps mentioning KT events, not even MT…

 

 

 

And these events are estimated as capable of decimating 25% of the population of Earth…

 

 

 

I'm talking about 259200 MT distributed all over the damn planet…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But you're right, it is completely useless for us to continue this debate, no one will convince the other…

 

 

 

 

[Praeothmin 532]

Praoethmin. I was insulting the man as an author, not legitimately challenging it as canon. It is obviously just as canon as the rest of the EU. I just hate Anderson. This had nothing to do with your debate. As I have already mentioned. This was supposed to be an annoying/silly/slightly humorous addition to the debate. Yet, you are a moron and didn't actually read what I wrote, or care that I wasn't challenging your position. I hate to repeat and explain myself like this, it ruins everything.

 

 

 

Well, when your previous post starts with:

 

"Seriously, fucking seriously...", it tends to point towards you saying you're serious and it should be ignored because written by Anderson.

 

I replied because I've seen people in the vs debate ignore anything coming from Anderson's books, or (watch out, another hated author) Traviss's books, because the debater hated them...

 

 

 

And you are a moron because you've interrupted a very important debate for drivel like this...

[Airlocke 12,014]

And the asteroid-destroying-a-bridge scene in TESB says it isn't...

 

You see, I like to use all the canon sources, EU included, when it does not contradict higher sources.

 

This clearly does.

 

Also, the 300 000 times stronger-then-steel "Durasteel" would have kept the Invisible hand in much better shape during it's crash landing, as well as the landing pad...

 

 

 

Did you ignore that part where I suggested we use a smaller number for the calculations? I said that because this number is obviously not accurate. But you seem to want to cherry-pick from my posts so that you can get all pissy, go fuck yourself right up the ass.

[Praeothmin 532]

Did you ignore that part where I suggested we use a smaller number for the calculations? I said that because this number is obviously not accurate. But you seem to want to cherry-pick from my posts so that you can get all pissy, go fuck yourself right up the ass.

 

 

 

Yeah, sorry about that, stressful week and posting real quick between cases.

 

The suggestion is good, but 30 times may still be too high.

 

What was the Kinetic energy of the asteroid hitting the tower?

 

Would material 30 times stronger then steel crumble like that?

 

In fact, would any asteroid in the field, moving at the speeds we saw them move at in TESB pose a real threat to an unshielded vessel with such resistant armor?

[Praeothmin 532]

*Edit of my response to InvaderSkooj*

 

The document does mention MT, such as 107 or 108 MT, and also "Tens of Thousands".

 

We still talk about a localized impact, while my "Hundreds of Thousands", roughly 10 times their estimates (for the lowest example, 1 MT per second) are distributed all over the planet...