G'day,
A sort of new topic from Brian.
Cheers
Beth
> [quoted text omitted]
Hi Beth!
I've been going over the rules for Engineering Equipment in DS, and they seem
pretty sketchy. Whlie there are costs in place, and rules for their use, there
aren't any rules for capacity, except for Minelayers. I thought I'd try my
hand at them.
Bridging Equipment: Capacity: (Maximum Class of vehicle the bridge can
support) x 4
Excavation Equipment: Capacity: 8
Demolition: Capacity: 2 This allows a vehicle to engage in the demolition of
targets as per the engineering rules in the book. Essentially this is to
simulate a set of robotic arms, small RC drones, etc. for the placement of the
charges.
I was going to design a Demolition gun -- low velocity, high explosive
head, but realized that for clearing structures and obstacles, the game rules
turn the DFFG into a highly effective Breaching Gun.
Other support equipment: Recovery & Repair
Recovery Obviously, the rules cover the amount of capacity to carry a vehicle.
But what about that required to load a disabled vehicle onto the transporter,
or to tow it behind? I'm toying with 3 x
(vehicle class being recovered) for winch/crane gear
and 5 x (vehicle class being recovered) to tow it behind.
Hi Beth (and Brian),
> --On Wednesday, June 30, 2004 9:46 AM +1000 Beth.Fulton@csiro.au wrote:
> I've been going over the rules for Engineering Equipment in DS, and
...
> Bridging Equipment:
Looks good.
> Excavation Equipment:
I think that this is a bit too much. A lot of tanks have dozer blades hooked
on that can do the excavation per the rules, but still retain their turrets
and weapons. Unless there a ton of spare capacity, you can't have a dozer tank
very easily...
What about halving it?
> Demolition:
Could also represent a really short range bombard like ones used in WWII. They
lob a bomb less than 100m, so you have to be "in contact". 2 capacity looks
fine.
> I was going to design a Demolition gun -- low velocity, high explosive
I think that there is still value in having some kind of demolition gun, or
even a range of them... LVC/3, 4, and 5. Give it a very short range and
lots of valid chits so that it can boom things up, but only if it gets into
knife fight range, or is shooting at bunkers and the like.
> Other support equipment:
But
> what about that required to load a disabled
Well, if it's a true crane system, then yeah, it makes sense to give it a
capacity cost. But there are certainly examples of tanks being used with
tow cables to pull other tanks out of bogs, ditches, etc. <shrug>
> <Note from Beth: Based on the towed artillery rules wouldn't you just
That works for me, but I don't know that I'd allow it to load a disabled
vehicle onto a transport unless it had a crane, which took up capacity...
> Repair
8 is a significant amount of capacity, IMHO. OTOH, you can easily fit it onto
a size 3 chassis, so maybe it's not bad.:)
Nice work.
[quoted original message omitted]
> --- Beth.Fulton@csiro.au wrote:
> Excavation Equipment:
Depends--not all excavation equipment is created
equal. SEE trucks and the like with backhoes are pretty small. And there are
larger vehicles that are still nothing but excavation equipment.
> Demolition:
Huh? I'd have a demo gun--which would take more
capacity, but be much faster.
> Recovery
Look at the M88--it includes a good bit more capacity
than merely towing, yet it can tow an M-1.
> Repair
Again, depends. The typical mechanic vehicle is a contact truck, which is a
HMMWV, and used to be a CUTV.
Beth/Brian, I think you guys are making this too complex.
Size 3 AEV Tracked
Turret w/ main gun and front blade
Combat engineer kit (demolitions, etc).
Large Demolition gun is used for the destruction of the target building.
Size 3 AEV Tracked Raised superstructure and front blade Combat Engineer kit
(demolitions, etc)
Demolitions are performed with a carrot or explosives frame placed against the
structure to be blown.
One could postulate a smaller MICLC system with out the need for a larger
trailer if you have a stronger explosive. Fuel Air explosion over the field
sufficient to crush the mines?
> At 1:04 AM -0700 6/30/04, John Atkinson wrote:
Assuming 1/300 figs:
Size 3 AEV Tracked Recovery Vehicle Package
Can recover/repair an equivalent sized or smaller vehicle.
And dig emplacements
And a basic blade tank:
Size 3 Tank w/ Turret and class 4 gun.
Add a Dozer blade kit
> > Repair
CUCV? Civilain Utility Commercial Vehicle? A bit small for a lot of the kit,
but good for a basic mechanic and his tools for moderate repairs. A 2.5 ton or
5 ton with the shop van setup can carry a lot more parts. Then there's that
shop trailer setup that was built on the 1.5 ton trailers (M105 type). Still,
you could place a RV team in one, but they're going to need a larger vehicle
to handle lifting and such.
I'd make it a size 3 wheeled vehicle (5 ton) with a RV package. Includes a
heavy duty winch, light duty winch and crane for lifting heavy components).
Nothing says you can't break the package out among multiple vehicles however.
Add another Shop van and some light vehicles and you have a basic company
maintenance team. Mind you thats probably outside the scope of your typical DS
game.
> --- Ryan Gill <rmgill@mindspring.com> wrote:
> Demolitions are performed with a carrot or
???
WTF? Someone please explain how a vehicle-mounted
system will do THIS?
> One could postulate a smaller MICLC system with out
Nah, that's merely overpressure--MICLIC is obsolete
itself. Check the new Mongoose net charge--net with
multiple charges in a pattern. Mere overpressure can be dealt with with
baffles.
> Assuming 1/300 figs:
WTF? The M-88 does NOT have earth-moving capacity.
That spade is for stabilization when lifting heavy objects with the boom, not
digging holes. It can't do that.
> CUCV? Civilain Utility Commercial Vehicle? A bit
Yup.
> small for a lot of
Sure--if it's something that can be fixed with bit of
wrench-turning and some handy spare parts. Which most
things can be.
But then again, I'm not terribly familliar with BDAR techniques.
> At 5:37 PM -0700 6/30/04, John Atkinson wrote:
Hobart would be surprised. His chaps in the 79th did this John. And I sweare
I've seen it in some US Army FM.
In simple forms its, a wooden frame with the explosives built onto it. Using
the dozer blade its carried to the object and the blade lowered to place the
object against the wall to be breached with the explosives in contact. It was
found to be a very good manner of breaching a seawall or linear wall that was
under fire from defenses from inside an armored vehicle. Petards were far less
capable of removing such an object.
I basically assumed this and other tricks that engineers come up with for
putting explosives against a structure are what Jon had in mind with the
Combat engineer kit and it's ability to blow a mine field or structure if the
vehicle is in contact with the obstacle for a turn.
Obviously the engineer vehicle's functions are abstracted to a high detail,
but then so are the repair functions of the ARVs and many other functions of
the game.
> Nah, that's merely overpressure--MICLIC is obsolete
Well, there you go. What about an advanced binary explosive sprayed on the
field by the engineer vehicle and then detonated remotely.
> WTF? The M-88 does NOT have earth-moving capacity.
M88's can't be used for digging? The simple
little blade on a Swedish S-tank could be used by
the tank itself for digging a scrape, not narrow fighting emplacements, but
enough for the vehicle
itself. I'd always assumed the M-88 had that as a
tertiary ability if push came to shove. Otherwise why not build a larger set
of hydraulic rams that set smaller spades in the ground. That'd allow more
uneven ground and ersazt leveling of the ARV and stabilization when using the
main winch.
Any how, a bit of searching yields:
https://hosta.atsc.eustis.army.mil/cgi-bin/atdl.dll/accp/in0830/ch2.htm
(1) M88 Recovery Vehicle. While the M88 is not an engineer vehicle, its boom,
winch, blade, and towing capability can be very useful in augmenting
specialized engineer vehicles. The blade can push loose soil or rubble, and
back blade berms spread out soil from excavations. The blade cannot dig and is
not designed to do the work of a combat engineer vehicle (CEV), armored combat
earthmover (ACE), or D7 bulldozer. The winch, boom, and towing capability can
be used in construction or removal of log obstacles, abatis, and tetrahedrons.
So it can do some of that. Just not scrapes....sounds like an annoying limit
if you need scrapes dug in hurry.
> > CUCV? Civilain Utility Commercial Vehicle? A bit
Bunches of these for sale. You lads wear them the hell out too.
> > small for a lot of
Power pack and drive line swaps need hoists and lifts.
G'day,
Ok this is Beth as Brian now;)
> [quoted text omitted]
> K.H.Ranitzsch wrote:
> That works for me, but I don't know that I'd allow it to load a
> Normally, you use a winch to pull a vehicle onto a >transport. Even if
Remember, this is for a setting in which Grav and GEV vehicles are common.
Unless you put some sort of "landing Gear" on their undercarriage, which seems
impractical, then rolling them is out of the question.
> A crane able to lift a damaged truck or a tank is a hefty >item, and
I never said anything about putting them on the same chassis, I was just
trying to establish how big they are.
> Well, if it's supposed to represent a field workshop with >all the
Capacity of 8 would represent a fairly big module, that means the garage
module (not the vehicle carrying it, just the module) would be as big as a
class 1 vehicle. The problem is, that as John A points out, there are varying
amounts of equipment fielded at different levels. I'm trying to come up with
something that's fair without adding TOO much more to the game.
> John Atkinson wrote:
> Depends--not all excavation equipment is created
True, but in game terms, unless you want to add rules that tie the amount of
excavation work a vehicle can do in a turn to the size of its equipment,
it's easier to just come up with one standard-capacity package for
excavation.
> SEE trucks and the like with backhoes are
A backhoe is still larger than an autocannon, right? A turreted RFAC 2 is
capacity 6. Even allowing that a backhoe arm & bucket IS smaller than the next
weapon up, that weapon's class 3, capacity 9. Unless you consoder a
backhoe to be a fixed weapon, in which case I could see it being 4-5
capacity. But that still leaves out a dozer blade, etc.
> And there are larger vehicles that are
True, but see above.
> Huh? I'd have a demo gun--which would take more
Actually, I would too. Based on the rules, it seems that DFFG's make perfect
Demo Guns within the DS 2 framework. But the rules say that an engineering
element that spends its combat action adjacet to a target can
demolish it -- the rules don't distinguish between an engineering
vehicle and foot engineers. That seemed odd.
> Look at the M88--it includes a good bit more capacity
That point has been made, and is valid for wheeled & Tracked vehicles. I'd
still feel less cheesy paying points for towing gear for a Grav force
though -- the extra capacity can be PSB'ed as a set of temporary grav
lifters that are set under the damaged vehicle.
> Again, depends. The typical mechanic vehicle is a
Again, a good point, but a bit too fine-grain for the game as it stands
> At 9:14 AM +1000 7/2/04, <Beth.Fulton@csiro.au> wrote:
For a grav ARV, i'd suggest that you have the following constraints.
Figure the Grav is created/caused by running
current through a set of coils. An ARV would float up (not roll of course) and
the team would see what had failed. If it were the coils, a coil swap would
work (nice thing is that it'd be simpler than a wheel station as there aren't
moving parts. There might be cooling tubes as well, but QD fittings on key
points are easy.). If it were the power pack or generator, then that'd be
swapped. Assume a vehicle is too combat damaged to swap coils on, hook up some
external
bolt/chain on coils that are connected externally
to the ARV/Transporter that then lifts the float
(not track or car) up and supports it that way. A
good parallelogram A-frame (2 A-frames, not one)
to hitch it to the ARV and you're good to go with towing it back to a repair
point while it's mission killed.
In fact, I modeled my Grav ARV with a crane, a short stubby box tube thing and
two long coils strapped to the top deck ala the Leopard ARVs with their power
packs stowed on top for a replacement of a pack in field.
> >A crane able to lift a damaged truck or a tank is a hefty >item, and
Tank Transporters usually have a winch provision for pulling a dead vehicle
onto a trailer. ARVs usually have a large winch capable of pulling the class
of vehicle it can recover on a 1:1 pull. They use 2:1 or 3:1 pulls for badly
stuck vehicles. In the case of the Hercules, its something like a 60,000 lb
winch. Can't recall off the top of my head. AFV interiors has a great article
on the M88 Hercules and it's fit.
> Capacity of 8 would represent a fairly big module, that means the
How big of a class is a 20' container? Is that size 2? Modern fold out
Containers are pretty fancy with compact storage inside and flexibility. A PLS
type system with a 30' container would be something like class 2.5 or 3.
You can fit 2 Ferret armored cars (class 1 size vehicles) into a 30'
container.
> John Atkinson wrote:
Depends. A Blade is easy to tack on. The Abrams can carry a blade no problem.
ITs the bigger stuff that costs more space. Screw auger, backhoe, front end
loader, etc.
> >SEE trucks and the like with backhoes are
Depends. There are little tiny jobbies on little 1 men vehicles. The US Army
fields a Short Wheel Base Unimog with a Front loader and rear mounted backhoe
that can self deploy at higher speeds (than a tractor) and handle most basic
jobs. Easily a class 2 truck with cargo space to spare.
> capacity 6. Even allowing that a backhoe arm & bucket IS smaller than
It can be fixed or turreted. I still think this is too complex. Whats wrong
with an AEV that has an AEV package on it that takes 80% capacity. It can dig
a position per turn for it's size. Size 4 AEV can dig 4 class 4 tank scrape
per turn or 8 class 2 scrapes in a turn.
A Blade allows a fixed size scrape and only does have the work. But also
allows proofing of minefields and clearing surface obstacles.
> Actually, I would too. Based on the rules, it seems that DFFG's make
Not really. Demo guns are really short ranged (Really effin short) and have a
bloody huge HE explosion that's not so good for armor. I'd just make it part
of the "blow a building in 1 turn" kit.
> That point has been made, and is valid for wheeled & Tracked vehicles.
I'd
> still feel less cheesy paying points for towing gear for a Grav force
You can generally tow your type or one or two other types assuming compatible
technology. Otherwise you drag it up on a trailer.
Tracks and wheels can flat or suspended tow other tracks and wheels of similar
or smaller sizes. Its hard for a GEV to be flat or suspended towed with out a
trailer or dolly supporting the other end. Grav could do so based on what I
said above as the higher tech level allows some fancy work with bolt on kit.
> The problem is, that as the rules stand, I can deck that vehicle out
Don't. Its cheesy. Don't. Look at modern examples and how far they have or
have not come with technology. The Brits (basically the fore fathers of the
Armored Engineer Vehicle) still have a basic set of classes:
ARV Tank chassis without turret and kit for recovering a given class of
vehicle. Able to recover classes of vehicles smaller than itself. Usually has
an MG or two for defense. Can seat a handy number of crew above a normal MBT
in a big roomy compartment that usually has the winch built into it for
protection and servicing.
AEV: A tank w/ a turreted demolition gun and
attachments for mission specific bits. Be they a fascine, dozer blade, Mine
Clearing Line Charges, Carrot, and a number of other things.
AVLB: a tank chassis with turret removed and perhaps an MG with the ability to
launch and recover a bridge of the same class as itself.
Now a class 2 AVLB is able to launch a class 2 Bridge. A Class 4 AVLB is able
to launch a class 4 bridge. The bridge is able to support what size it is or
smaller.
> As for the fact that all your examples are tracked or wheeled, that
Same class or smaller. Standard packages cost
80-100% of size of vehicle with wiggle room for
extra bits like stowage of a power pack or spaces for the tank crew to ride.
Think sliding scale vs fixed cost.
> --- Ryan Gill <rmgill@mindspring.com> wrote:
> that'd be swapped. Assume a vehicle is too combat
The Traveller assumption was that your ARV would open the bay door below, and
settle down over the disabled vehicle. Then it would chain the wreck to the
recovery vehicle, and lift, closing the doors as soon as it lifted up. Since
it assumed that the bay would
be inside the 'contra-gravity field' and therefor be
pretty lightweight.
> Tank Transporters usually have a winch provision
Oh, you mean HETs, the low-boys. Yeah, they almost
always do if they are purpose-built military ones.
Ted could be more enlightening about contracted civillian HETs.
> Depends. A Blade is easy to tack on. The Abrams
A blade is easy to "tack on" but the hydraulics needed to dig properly with
them is no joke. A bladed Abrams might be good for pushing spoil.
> At 10:00 PM -0700 7/1/04, John Atkinson wrote:
Sounds like a dedicated vehicle chassis vs an adapted chassis also, sounds
more like a transporter.
> Oh, you mean HETs, the low-boys. Yeah, they almost
Even the 10 Ton Semi-tractors in military service
have a bloody huge winch. I think the one that Eastern Surplus had for sale
had a 20,000 lb front winch and a 50,000 lb rear winch. Even the 5 ton
wreckers have a 45,000 lb rear winch in addition to the crane and front
winches.
> Depends. A Blade is easy to tack on. The Abrams
I dunno. If it's designed in as a feature and the hydraulic pump is large
enough, adding an extra hydraulic component isn't so hard. Look at the Swedish
S tank. They have a fully retractable blade for digging their own scrapes sans
engineer support.
[quoted original message omitted]
> At 8:53 AM +0200 7/3/04, K.H.Ranitzsch wrote:
They're called service jacks and castors. Any truck repair shop will have
large jack stands and castor plates that are used to move a chassis around
that may have had it's wheel stations pulled. Not a big thing really.
Shop environments are a bit different than rough terrain wheels however.
> --- Ryan Gill <rmgill@mindspring.com> wrote:
> I dunno. If it's designed in as a feature and the
If the S-tank is the one I'm thinking of, it has a
hydraulic suspension. So they have a tank and a pump and so forth, and lines
running through the hull. Adding the doohickeys necessary to do a little
spoil-pushing or some light earth moving ain't all
that. I know there are turret hydraulics in the Abrahms, I don't know how easy
it would be to beef them up to also run a blade. However, there are normally
no hydraulics in the chassis, it's all turret. So it would not be a trivial
conversion.
> Ryan Gill wrote:
> A blade is easy to "tack on" but the hydraulics needed
If you want an example showing that "adding an extra hydraulic component
isn't so hard", you'll have to look somewhere else than the S-tank.
While it shows you is that you *can* design extra hydraulics into a tank if
you're really really determined to do so, it is also an excellent example
of just how !#!¤&/# difficult it can be.
According to those Swedish ex-S-tank crew members I've talked to, the
S-tank's hydraulics were very nice on the occasions when they actually
worked as they were supposed to... but unfortunately that wasn't too often
even in garrison, and of course field conditions made it a lot worse :-(
Regards,
> At 8:28 AM -0700 7/3/04, John Atkinson wrote:
Tank Destroyer. 4 Roadwheels, fixed main 105mm gun, 2 forward firing MGs and
TC mg.
http://tanks2go.com/Other_Countries/SWs103.htm
> and so forth, and lines running through the hull.
Granted, but point being, hydraulics tend to be a pretty easy thing to add (vs
a big front mounted PTO or something). If the design phase involves additional
provision if needed then all the better.
I've seen some interesting additions of kit to some military 2.5 tonners that
involved a larger power steering pump added (yep, 2.5 tons don't normally have
power steering) for powering a hydraulic winch.
Suffice to say, adding a blade to a line vehicle can be done on a broader
scope.
> At 5:33 PM +0200 7/3/04, Oerjan Ohlson wrote:
Again, I site my examples of folks on the MV list that have hacked new larger
or additional hydraulics into their very spartan Military Trucks. Bjorn has a
knuckle boom on his Deuce. Another chap added power steering and a hydraulic
winch to his. Another has fitted a dump hoist to his deuce. It's easier to add
hydraulics because you can route hoses around obstructions vs having to move
things around for power take off shafts and gear boxes. Sure, you have to fit
a tank and a cooler somewhere but an odd sized tank is easier to shoehorn into
a given space for a total x volume vs a gearbox that has to be a certain size
and arrangement due to mechanical restrictions. High output Hydraulic pumps
are also nice and compact.
> According to those Swedish ex-S-tank crew
Well, granted, the whole tank was hydraulics but there are enough dozers out
there that hydraulics make for easier bits of kit than say, autoloaders in
small spaces. Just look at the profusion of smaller sized hydraulic cranes on
service trucks and military logistics vehicles.
> --- Ryan Gill <rmgill@mindspring.com> wrote:
> Again, I site my examples of folks on the MV list
There is a huge difference between a single enthusiast playing games with his
(ONE) truck as a friggin' hobby, and trying to do the same thing inside a
verdammt tank, a couple hundred times, and then having
it maintained by 19-year old privates.
> his deuce. It's easier to add hydraulics because
Sure. If you have something nice and roomy and unconstricted like a verdammt
truck. Try it in a real fighting vehicle sometime.
> --- Ryan Gill <rmgill@mindspring.com> wrote:
> Tank Destroyer. 4 Roadwheels, fixed main 105mm
And everything but the headlights are hydraulic.
> Suffice to say, adding a blade to a line vehicle
Ummm, no. Have you ever worked on an earthmover? I spent a year as an ACE
crewman, and that's a lightweight earthmover.
If you want to add a blade that does serious
earth-moving, you are looking at a real serious
rebuild. Take the chassis, strip it out, redesign it, and rebuild it from the
hull up.
> At 5:43 PM -0700 7/4/04, John Atkinson wrote:
Hehe. Sounds kind of like a friend in Austrailia that has 5 Matilda Tanks
including one that has the hydraulics routed through one of the two driver's
vision devices for the Dozer blade.
> Sure. If you have something nice and roomy and
Heh...You forget, I have three AFVs...Yes its a hobby, but I'm paying with my
own funds and I don't have the resources of the Queen or Unclesam to cover the
costs so I do have a small clue here.
Besides, it's basic mechanics. Hoses and cables are easier to route than
pushrods and power take off shafts. Far easier. If it can be jury rigged into
a matilda (with less driver space than an M1), then it can work in something
designed to take it.
OH and Bjorn uses his deuce to assemble log cabins as part of a job.
http://www.mayapplebrandstedt.com/maybrand4.html
> Ryan Gill wrote:
> Heh...You forget, I have three AFVs...
Just out of curiousity, how much time do you run these AFVs in field
conditions?
Regards,
> At 7:05 AM +0200 7/5/04, Oerjan Ohlson wrote:
The dingo gets run around just about all of it's operating time in field
conditions (albeit
re-enacting tacticals, but last it was out I ran
it hard). The Ferret get's a good bit of road time (actually harder on the
drive train due to higher speeds) and the Humber is a work in progress. The
Bren carrier we use (among several) gets large amount of off road work over
rough terrain. Its not the type of duty cycle they had in war, however,
they're still run like the were in service with similar concern for service
and of course they're not terribly new.
I'm of the opinion that you're not showing it off unless you're using the
vehicle's best assets and showing it off. The Dingo was being run at speed off
road backwards in the field in front of the audience and I had it sideways
several times as I made turns.
Last I heard, Matthew uses his Matilda Dozer as a real dozer on his farm,
Wilson gearbox and all.