Whewould you hide?

Janet, a 'singleship' is a term used by author Larry Niven in his "Known Space" books. It refers to a small, one man (thence singleship) spacecraft, usually fusion powered, that was utilized primarily by 'Belters' for prospecting and travel between the many small worlds of the asteroid belt. Though he never specifically mentioned the cost of a singleship, one gets the impression, since many individuals owned them, that they were the equivalent to a car utilized for running around, to and fro-ing to work, etc. He also utilized larger 2 and 3 man ships, tugs, an array of military craft and suchlike for system travel. For interstellar travel the spacecraft tended to increase in size as per use of Bussard ram jets with electromagnetic interstellar hydrogen scoops. Later in the series, Niven introduces a number of alien species, and with them, the General Products hull, and more advanced engines such as hyperspace, etc.

As to your environs, The moons of Jupiter and Saturn encompass as many differing environments as there are worlds. Both planetary systems offer the possibility of plentiful fuels, depending on what you are envisioning as your fuel type. There is atmospheric skimming of hydrogen from the planets themselves, or splitting H2O into component parts on several of the moons. This also offers life support gasses. Down side: the sun is a long way off, and offers much less energy in the short run than in Earth orbit, though, one would surmise that bigger arrays would still yield ample energy for an installation (always assuming that you NEED it and don't have access to a nice fusion reactor for your base). As far as hiding, another good place that would possibly attract rebels would be the Oort Cloud, a vast spere of cometary masses, possible planets, etc. that extends outward from the edge of our own solar system until it encounters the Clouds of the nearest stars. Plusses are plentiful resources, negatives, once again power limitations and transit and communication times. Mercury, in my opinion, would be a hidey-hole of last resort. You'd need to dig in subsurface on the dark side and import all essentials. Proximity to the sun would hide electromagnetic emanations from your base, but it would hide them from YOUR side as well. Additionally, you'd need a good ship to get anywhere from Mercury as you have to climb out of the deepest gravity well in the system, all the while shielding from sheeting radiation. It would be extremely limiting as a rebel HQ.

One of the facets of Nivens' Belter civilization was his use of 'bubble worlds' as a method for sustaining Belters health in a lifestyle largely dominated by microgravity. These were rotating shells 'blown up' from nickel-iron asteroids and utilized for both farming, raising children in a gravity environment and providing for periodic opportunities for prospectors, etc. to spend extended periods in gravity to maintain musculo-skeletal tone so that, if necessary, they can function on a planetary surface. These were fashioned by drilling into the center of a large, Nickel-Iron asteroid, pumping in a quantity of water, sealing the shaft, adding a spin to the body and then bathing the entire asteroid in either focused sunlight from huge parabolic mirrors or by multiple laser beams. As the asteroid spins, it is heated evenly until it reaches the point that the water at its' center begins to boil. At this point, the pressure of the expanding steam inside the asteroid caused the entire mass to expand evenly into a gigantic soap bubble, which is then allowed to cool, tunneled into, filled with imported soil, seeded and fitted with a light source and henceforth provides a vast amount of livable, terraformable interior habitat that can be utilized as needed. I'm assuming that such a habitat could be manufactured in the belt where metal asteroids are common and plenty of energy available, and then tugged out to wherever it's needed, be it as an artificial satellite of one of the outer worlds or the Oort Cloud if the Belt were to 'exposed'.

Hope any of that helps. If you're talking 'slow' (your 'pods') you are probably talking some form of ion powered engines (unless you're planning to utilize a sail. You might look under the FILES section of the group pages under "Crookedman Files" where I've got a folder covering a lot of pretty much currently doable propulsion systems (though I haven't included anything on solar sails).

Good luck,
Victor

From: janet_baker76
Sent: Wednesday, August 04, 2010 10:03 AM
To: spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [spacesettlers] Re: Where would you hide?

Wow thanks Victor. I don't know what you mean by singleships. I was thinking of having my guys escape in something I was calling a pod, a slow cheap unit for housing miners. Is it like that? Would singleship be a better name--more known among spacers?

Also, what would the difference be between hiding in the jovian system, and hiding in Mercury's? Regarding light, energy, view? (hehe)

I won't bore you guys with the kind of economics I'm using, but it's basically private ownership with severe common-good restrictions on profit and monopoly applying--it's really the economics of the middle ages. One of the things about space exploration that interests me myself is its possible opportunity to try different economic systems, and to refine cultures (meaning, concentrate characteristics) rather than diluting them, the way the constant drumbeat of diversity insists. If 'claiming' asteroids isn't too far outside the lines of believability, I'll use that. (Man, you'd have to go back a long long way in Europe to find unclaimed land. That's why America was such a boost to capitalism.)

I recently changed my plot and everything, is why I'm asking these questions now, five years down the road, due to reading about Elizabethan England. They already plotted it for me. Heroines and heroes galore. If I had a planet I'd model it on Merry Old England (pre-Reformation).

Thanks again, Victor, and hello, all, and thanks to all for your answers.

--- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, "Victor Smith" wrote: