Possible New Fighter

[Rhinn Ikthoos]

I see how the Imps are turning out a new design each week, so I think I should try my hand at a rebel ship.

Class: HB-271 Bomber
Length: 20 meters
Crew: 1
Hull: 30 RU
Shields: 115 SBD
Speed: 85 MGLT
Equipment: x1 Hyperdrive
Weapons: Twin Laser Cannon, 16 Hard Points (12 Heavy Bombs, 4 Proton Torpedo Pods - 4 Torpedoes Each)


Description: With the Galactic Civil War heating up, anyone with the ability to create a fighter can make a pretty credit. Some of them are crappy paper boxes with an engine on them. Others match the Imperials in performance. One of the most success is by the Blitzkrieg Starfighter Corporation. Because of their size only 9 are allowed in a squadron. Deployed in a wing of three to provide supporting cover fire.

Based on the M12-L Kimogila heavy fighter, the HB-271 stripped all but the forward laser cannons off the ship. The Engineers also removed the concussion missile and torpedo launcher from the interior of the ship to make room for the heavy bombs. The bomb bays are able to accomodate bombs, free falling grenades and a host of other ordinance. The torpedo pods are moved to under the wings with two on each side. Each Pod contains 4 torpedoes, giving the ship a total of 16 torpedoes to fire.


So there is my first attempt at a bomber on this site. Suggestions and critiques are welcome.

[Vansen Tyree]

I like your premise. I do have a couple of niggles, though.

We've got Incom, Slayn & Korpil, and SoroSuub engineers working for the Alliance now. It seems that you're suggesting the Alliance "buys in" these craft from your Blitzkrieg Starfighter Corporation, rather than making the modifications in-house. I suppose that explains why a Hutt Fighter is the basis (the Rebels might choose to use a more familiar design as the basis), but it strikes me as odd.

My only other concern is if there is physically space on the hull to attatch all those weapons. Mounting the proton torpedos on the wing is a good call, but with four torpedoes in each pod, two pods on each wing, plus the launching mechanism... are the wings physically large enough to hold eight torpedoes each?

Maybe it'd be worth sticking with the hardpoint concept, rather than a launcher. Most of the launcher is the magazine / loading mechanism anyway (since the missiles are self-propelled and self-guided), so if you just mounted the torpedoes under the wing like a modern fighter, it might seem more plausible. You'd be able to mix and match that way too - swap in concussions for air-to-air if the mission profile called for it, focus on protons for taking out enemy starhips; etc.

Just my 0.02 Republic Credits. :)

[Xavier Synik]

the idea of hard points is an interesting one.

I'm wondernig if there are technological aspects of launchers that require them to be used vs hard points.

Another thought is whether or not there would be a limitation on a fighter to not be able to undergo any atmospheric entries (space to planet) due to extreme stresses on the hard points if they were holding weapons.

I think atmospheric exit (planet to space) would be okay since the stress wouldn't be the same.

I'm sure there are some sort of "technological advances" that allow it, but it's an interesting physics question.

[Captain Untouchable]

You're right, that is a very interesting physics question.


I'm wondernig if there are technological aspects of launchers that require them to be used vs hard points.

From what we've seen of launchers from canon, we can pretty much infer that they're normally self-propelled - every canon missile we've seen had been capable of steering or turning corners in space to a degree, and there's that streak of light afterwards, so it's probably a reasonable guess.

If you think of the missile launcher that we saw on Slave One in Episode II, that was basically a glorified rack that they were all lying in.

I would guess - and it is a guess - that the main advantage of launchers versus hardpoints is one of space. In order to use hardpoints, your weapons need to be spread out over a wide surface, parallel to each other: in line with the direction of flight. Effectively, you need wings to mount the hardpoints on, which broadens your craft, and presents potential issues for manoeuverability. With a launcher, on the other hand, you only need the launchers width, so it's a narrower profile?

I dunno. Like I say; total guess. :huh


Another thought is whether or not there would be a limitation on a fighter to not be able to undergo any atmospheric entries (space to planet) due to extreme stresses on the hard points if they were holding weapons.

That, I'm not sure I can come up with an answer for - I'd be equally concerned that the friction from reentry might cause problems, detonating your payload, and whatnot.

Maybe the deflector shields are somehow used, so that the heat is kept some meters from the hull?

[Rhinn Ikthoos]

I'm not a genius with photoshop, but I'm working on a mockup of the craft so I'll post it when I'm done.

EDIT: as far as the pods go, I'm thinking of the missile pods on Apache attack helicopters. My understanding is that each pod can fire, so that more firepower can be dished out quicker.

[Captain Untouchable]

Being able to fire four at once would certainly be beneficial.

Again... my big concern really is one of scale / space - are the wings physically wide enough to fit them on?

[Xavier Synik]

I'm working on trying to figure this out...

One question that I have that I can't find any info on is what the size of a proton torp is...

I always had it in my mind, and I think it comes from the old TIE Fighter games, that it was roughly (and I say that very loosely) the same shape of a lot of modern cruise missiles. Kinda a long body with a hump at the back where the engine was housed. Smaller then a cruise missile though. Maybe 2 or 3 feet long.

But... if you look on Wookiepedia it shows a conical object. Now my first thought was that this was just the warhead, but they show an image of them during the destroying of the Death Star (at least that's what it looks like it's from) and it shows the conical items with the typical tail that a lot of us think of...

So before trying to figure out whether things fit, I need to have some sort of idea of the size of these things.

Thoughts...

[Xavier Synik]

Also any thoughts on how long (nose to tail) the M12 would be. I can't find anything, since it's a bit more of an obscure ship from the looks of it.

Giving that the X-wing is 12.5m in length, I'm guessing that it's maybe 20m long.

edit: nevermind. didn't notice the length in the first post...

[Xavier Synik]

Alright so here's my thoughts after pulling together as much real and hypothetical data as I could.

I think the wings could support 4 hard points on each, that could hold racks of multiple bombs or torps on them, the Hellfire 4-missile pod used on the Apache for example for torpedos or missiles, or the bomb racks that are used by the A-10 for smaller bombs (I think they usually hang 3 from each).

My other thought is whether or not part of the belly could be hogged out and flattened a bit so that you could mount some more single bomb hard points on the belly of the ship.

Anyway from a capacity to carry the weapons I think that it can be done. though this doesn't address the atmospheric entry question, but that's beside the point.

[Nen Lev'i]

If the thing is 20 meters long, then yeah: I guess the wings can probably take it. I'm guessing by "pods" then, you're talking about something like [http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/File:Hailfire_homing_missiles.jpg]this[/url]?

But in fours, and with proton torps rather than concussion missiles, obviously.

With what you're saying about how they look, Xy - Concussion Missiles (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Concussion_missile) are generally the classic missile-looking dealios. Proton Torpedoes vary quite a lot - as well as those cone shaped ones, you've got the ones that the Naboo Fighters fire (which look like Fanta bottles, according to the exploded view in the Ep1 companion book thingy), and all kinds of other crap like that.

Generally, I think of cruise missiles as being like Sparrows (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIM-7_Sparrow) of Sidewinders (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIM-9_Sidewinder), whereas Proton Torpedos are more like AMRAAMs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIM-120_AMRAAM) or Hellfires (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AGM-114).

Basically, to me... Concussion Missiles are pointy and have tail fins like a rocket; Proton Torpedos are blunted, like a classic nautical torpedo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_24_Tigerfish) (but shorter).

[Kyran O'Hurn]

Sparrows and Sidewinders are different from cruise missiles but that's a different discussion.

Yes I went on the idea that the torpedos were more like Hellfires.

I was thinking the pods would be more like this (http://www.military.cz/usa/air/in_service/weapons/ag_missiles/agm_114/agm114_1.jpg).

Though I suppose they could carry more then 4, but I think any weapon racks that held more then 4 would be oddly balanced, but that's just my opinion and doesn't mean they can't be.

[Captain Untouchable]

Sparrows and Sidewinders are different from cruise missiles but that's a different discussion.

I am well aware of that, and never said anything of the sort. ;)

Concussion Missiles are "fighter-on-fighter" weapons predominantly, hence my comparison to a couple of air-to-air missiles. Cruise missiles are a whole different kettle of fish; even if there is a Star Wars parallel (probably the Diamond Boron Missile is the closest?), I'm pretty sure it wouldn't make it into the standard loadout on a ship that a bunch of scummy, under-funded rebels are flying. :mneh

And that rack thing is exactly the sort of thing I had in mind; just didn't know where to find a picture of it. :)

Would it make sense to have eight Protons on each wing though, our would it be better to - like the A-10 Thunderbolt - throw in some Concussion / air-to-air ones as well? Eight Protons already outmatches an X-Wing, and if you threw in the air-to-air ones, you wouldn't need to expend them on air superiority targets.

[Xavier Synik]

Well I think that is the advantage that this kind of attack fighter would be compared to anything else that I know of (though there very well could be something out there).

That being that with the hard points you can make it mission specific. If you were going out on an anti-capital ship mission there may be the requirement for it to have nearly all of the weapon stations outfitted with Protons, if it was determined that this could be a ground assault platform (essentially saying that there was no problems that would be encountered during re-entry), then it's likely that it would be far more focued on ground attack bombs, and then you could do anything in between.

Only downside I see to this fighter is that it due to it's size, in the atmosphere I think it would be a bit of a pig to fly.

[Nen Lev'i]

Rather than repurposing it as an "Attack Starfighter", what if it was set up as an "Attack Airspeeder" instead? Stripping out the Hyperdrive would add extra internal capacity for the bombs... but if you kept the "space" systems, the thing could still bug out to orbit once deployed. Effectively, we would actually be making it a Star Wars Apache: a modern version of the LAAT/i, I suppose. That seems like a really good niche to pop it in.

Of course, it could still be deployed from ships as well, to do straffing runs on ships, asteroids, etc... we could just say that for technical reasons, it can't transition from zero atmosphere to atmosphere. It'd be a cool little quirk in the design, that makes it more fun to write.

Just a thought, anyhow - by no means a must. :)

Oh, and with all these weapons systems, you might wanna stick a gunner in there. Could be a bit much for a single pilot to cope with. :uhoh


Edit:

For the record, Rhinn; I hope you don't think we're needlessly bashing on your idea. On the contrary, I'm increasingly approaching "fantastic" in my assessment - I just want to toss out as many ideas as possible that might help / improve; if none of 'em stick, no worries. :)

[Xavier Synik]

Might as well design a new ship :p

gunner/bomber is probably a good idea.

Edit: I'm with him. Actually this might fit Sumor's need for a ground support fighter.

[Aros Indigu]

I'd fly it. I need a new assignment anyway. :)

[Rhinn Ikthoos]

Thank you for all your ideas. They are great. Some of the changes that I made on the craft are to keep it from being exactly like some of the future fighters (like the K-Wing). I do like the idea of hardpoint under the wings to make it more mission specific. I was also toying with a variant that carried only torpedoes. The launch bays would be stripped out to just house a grid of torpedo launchers. Each launcher has 1 torpedo. The grid would be 5 X 10 and they would launch down and at an angle. That plus the 4 hardpoints would provide a very powerful gunship.

I also like the idea of having a multiple crew, up to 4 members, pilot, two gunners, and a bombadier.

EDIT: I also can't wait for the E-Wing to come out. That's my favorite fighter.

[Droo]

K-Wing (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/K-wing)? I approve! :love

[Rhinn Ikthoos]

Well if Droo approves, then here we go...

*Slaps a hyperdrive on a K-Wing*

Here's our new bomber. You're welcome guys!


http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20080423161906/starwars/images/2/27/K-Wing_NEGVV.jpg

[Droo]

You have to admit that is one sexy piece of kit! :eek

[Captain Untouchable]

Sexy, but absolutely huge.



Like your mum.

:mischief

[Rhinn Ikthoos]

Damn Straight.:partyhard