SOXBLOX

I'd point out that the F-35's RAM is baked in to the composite skin. Apparently it doesn't require anywhere near the same kind of maintenance as the F-22's coating. There's some process involving lasers that happens, but it's not even a monthly thing.

@Pthigrivi It would be kinda strange for the devs to focus on futuristic tech and fleshing out fuel types, and yet ignore life support. Without LS, kerballed missions really aren't any more complex or difficult than sample return missions.

In other words, you assume they would never actually be used to fight a war? If you want to win, you need offensive weapons. Also, did you read the pages I linked? Atomic Rockets goes verrrry deep on this, and concludes space fighters are quite useless. The stuff on fleet composition is definitely relevant, too.

This is interesting... The Lockheed Martin F-35, the much-criticized miracle jet, just won Switzerland's fighter procurement competition based on its technological merits and its low cost. Both up-front procurement costs and 30-year operating costs were determined to be lower than the next (undisclosed) competitor; the operating costs by over $2 billion. Here's the article.

I really like the idea of being able to attach notes to a craft. That way I can remember the purpose. And a full search feature would be epic.

That quote seems kinda squishy to me... It seems to leave room for any kind of LS that isn't necessary (with an arbitrary definition of necessary) but which might be useful. Maybe colonies will survive, but not grow, without LS?

Imma call USSF this now.

He could hunt down the Lutheran heretics...

I could *maybe* see this in a defense scenario. These fighters/corvettes (how small, exactly?) hang out around an outpost, or whatever. They can patrol a planet's gravity well, or maybe even a star system. But you cannot convince me any sane military would send swarms of fighters on an interstellar offensive. Even if they can carry a warp drive, be fitted with suitable sensors and computer banks, be equipped with enough weapons to fight until they are resupplied, and accommodate their crew properly, they won't have any inherent advantages over probably more capable medium-sized ships. And larger ships. Some great reading here. Also here.

NeRVa StARsHip? (We need a trefoil emoji. Pleeeaaase, mods?)

Well, you can use the gravimetric engineering technobabble from the warp drive to alter the ship's inertia... Then you could give it whatever turn rate you want. And warp fighters wouldn't be the meta, either. Warp drone swarms? Maybe. So yes, if you pack ship-destroying firepower into tiny, very common packages, big ships are vulnerable. But they can mount larger equipment, right? And more weapons. So they still have an edge. I am seeing some very strong historical parallels with PT boats and battleships here. Lots of people in the '20's said battleships were obsolete because of torpedo boats. Aaaand then they invented the (torpedo boat) destroyer. It all depends on what you're trying to fight.

That's hilarious. It's kinda fun to watch the bigwigs talk to each other. It makes them feel more human.

Ceres is basically made of water, and water is like gold in space. So if you want to colonize the Solar System, it's great. IDK on scientific exploration...

That crane is rather colorful. I guess that makes it a cranebow. Is this tower just a temporary design, or is it more permanent?

The hydrogen would cancel with only one antiproton and one antielectron. [Citation needed] Not sure what would happen to the former antioxygen atom, but its remaining parts should survive.

Wow... I hope they actually pull that off. USSF just recently announced it wanted to look at using orbits further out in cis-lunar space; this could help with that. If the DoD likes something, they'll usually throw a good bit of money at it. So, maybe it won't die.... Once again, the military advances space exploration.

The US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence requested a report from the DNI and the DoD on UFOs. It was released today after being anticipated (and hyped) for a while. We've had a lot of suspicious sightings over here which are likely drones and balloons from our friends in Beijing, come to benevolently observe our military's operations. It appeared no one in the chain of command was paying attention, so the Senate said, "Do something!" This report is the result. I don't think there's a Russian translation... Or a Chinese one.

Anyone else reading the UFO report? I'm on the first little bit...

I think constant high-g would be exhausting. In this scenario, every movement against the force of gravity takes three times the effort (duh). I would prefer ~1 g for comfort; of course, comfort is not always priority numero uno. So on a space passenger liner, 3 g would be overkill. But on a warship crewed by more physically fit folks, the advantages might be worth it.

The whole coast is "South Texas" to a Texan. IDK how others might see it. An equally common division is to call nearly the entire coast the "Gulf Coast", or something similar, but that almost universally includes Corpus Christi.

It would have to be higher than Heritage Plaza (232 m) in Houston.

Anyone wanna toast some marshmallows? Beautiful colors there towards the end...

Fascinating point. Y'know, I'll bet that's because uranium works just fine. Thorium is an alternative with only vague benefits, and which would require large investments to use. It's just a sort of economic inertia.

Better change your username, then. And yeah, if something like this existed, you could probably do a lot with it. You could theoretically make a 100% efficient machine, I think. But that breaks physics...

Buuuuuut, the problem is that you're reversing entropy by taking heat and turning it into "useful work", that is, useable energy. That totally circumvents thermodynamics. If you do that, you are instantly renouncing hard SF. You can try what I suggested above, or something along those lines, but the heat-converting property has got to go for it to be realistic. I would think that the loss of that property would be acceptable. I mean, it's kinda OP. So dropping it might be better for balance. You can still have an energy-dense superfuel, though. It just can't absorb heat and turn it into useable energy.