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Design Thread: Nostromo interiors and deck configurations
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Vader
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 25, 2011 5:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'll do mine in red, then:

3.3.1 - I don't remember the sequence of events exactly -- do we know for certain that the compartment Ripley ends up in actually is the forward landing gear bay? As opposed to, e.g., the starboard landing gear bay, which would be located closer to the Narcissus?

No, but my feeling is that we should keep it at the front landing leg. In the rush of the final events of the movie - getting from Bridge>Narcissus>Bridge>Store Room>Engine Room>Undercarraige Room>Narcissus etc....etc....
This path needs to be direct as possible. Going out to the Nacelle doesn't make sense to me. And I think the Nacelle will have other machinery etc that will take up space linked to the intakes, exhausts etc.


Agreed.


Speaking of 4.4.2 -- the more I think about this, the more I am convinced that this is done vertically, by winching the vehicles to the ground through the bottom of the hull.
Now, there are several ways to do this of course; some kind of a vertical airlock, like the one in Aliens that the Alien Queen is dumped out through, perhaps being the first to suggest itself ... but I think we may be "crossing the river for water" here, to quote a Swedish proverb.
The egress point has been staring us in the face all the time: the forward landing gear well! That's why C-deck has a huge access port into the gear well, and that's why there's a forest of chains there. When landed and with the bay doors open, you have direct access from C-Deck to the ground, using the chains for winching.

Agreed with the vertical idea; the winching of larger heavier equipment less so. Platforms that are lowered down from the Garage to me seem more likely...there are also two consoles side by side that could control something in the garage (see below).
Using the chains for lighter stuff, yes; or used for manual closing/opening something if machinery fails.


Thing is, using the gear well for all landed equipment access, large and small, is really the only thing that I can think of that would justify the large portal that Brett goes through on his ill-fated feline quest. The chains may well be only for lighter equipment; some heavier lift mechanism being just out of sight to hoist the heavier stuff.

Reason why I really can't believe in an elaborate vehicular exit system on the Nostromo is simply that the practical deployment of these vehicles are so very far down on the ship's design priority list. It's a commercial tug. It mainly lands at established ports, where ground transport is already provided. These vehicles are probably only to be deployed as a last recourse during tertiary detour missions such as the trip to LV-426, where they doubtless would have used them, had conditions on the planet permitted it.
I am more inclined to think that the vehicles are on board more as lip service to the investigation mandate than because they form an important part of the ship's equipment inventory. And as such, building in expensive design features, as any breach in the pressure hull must be, to accommodate them would make little sense.

Thinking further of the main usage of a "landed cargo ramp" on a ship like this, to restock the ship's supplies ... the port in the gear well would seem to allow all but direct access to the ship's stores. It would therefore make sense for the portal in the gear bay to be there for that use.
And it would also make sense for the same ramp to be used to deploy the vehicles.



4.4.4 - still confused. I mean, we see the ladderways/companionways all over the movie -- these are the ladders the crew uses to travel between decks and platforms.
I'm uncertain how these features belong in the "not identified but assumed" category.

I think what Fengiddel is getting at is that we do not know for sure right now - too early - of a) the location of all companionways and b) whether it is the primary means to get from deck to deck. I feel it is, but lets see how the design and spaces develop.

The companionways must be the primary, indeed only, means for crew to move from deck to deck, for a number of reasons:
  1. It is a common design feature on present-day commercial and military ships; even many passenger vessels. Companionways are all you get.
  2. In the movie we see the crew use them all the time. If they weren't the primary means, the crew wouldn't primarily use them.
  3. In fact, in the movie, we only see the crew use companionways. If there was something else, someone surely would have used it at some point!
There won't be any turbolifts...
Razz


6.8 - Not sure we're talking about the same Cobb drawing ... there is one where it is clear that the airlock is meant to descend all the way to the ground -- in effect, the airlock is the elevator.
Could someone please remind me of that drawing? Thanks. I hope I'll find it at my parents' home when I go there next week. If — if! — I recall it correctly, it's just a sketch of an airlock chamber suspended from the bottom of a ship's hull, with a shaft at the back, running to the ground underneath.


But the drawings where he studies the layout of airlock and Ash's blister around the landing gear leg also show a design where the airlock chamber must descend from the hull, as there is clearly no space for an antechamber right by the airlock.
Anyway; I believe the airlock antechamber, and hence the airlock (at least in its raised position), must be as close to the outer hull as possible, i.e. on C-Deck, or a platform of its own below C-Deck. To my mind, it would make little sense from a "design economy" standpoint to build the airlock chamber to travel through half the ship.

I feel there are other exciting design opportunities here that could be persued before going that route.

Agreed —I think we ought to avoid going that route at all costs... As I said, such a design would make little sense.


This would also make sense for 6.9 - if the lower airlock housing and the observation blister are at the same level, Ash will need to ascend a ladder to get to the antechamber level and the raised airlock chamber. Yes, we see Ash begin to go up it. And again, it would not make sense for this ladder to go through several decks.

I think this conveniently fits the events on-screen.


The whole double elevator thing still bothers me, but I suppose we might be able to invent some rationale for the airlock chamber to make sense to physically travel through the pressure hull during the pressurisation/de-pressurisation cycles...

Think of a separate room linked to the antechamber where the crew get suited up; equip weapons; gather equipment.
Then on their return, the unsuit, tend to work related injuries, etc.
Imagine a crewmember has messed up his knee outside. Cannot walk. Okay Ash, let's get him onto this platform here...(that looks like the one in the infirmary...)...which moves into this medical dumbwaiter lift, which gets him up to A Deck pronto where we can look at it properly.
Let's develop this more.


This would be convenient, true. However, I am more inclined to think that crew convenience, even in emergencies (like ... hey, a shuttle "lifeboat" with space for three?), is not a primary design consideration for the Company's shipbuilders. It barely is today...

A likelier scenario to my mind would be that the injured person would simply need to be hoisted up the companionways, or if in too bad shape for that, be winched through the decks on a stretcher at a vertical access points like the one I described earlier.




This is an early sketch for the lifeboat access, right? The one where the lifeboats swung out from the hull at launch?


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PostPosted: Mon Jul 25, 2011 10:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Turbolifts?!? tsk, tsk....

Here's an out-of-the-box idea for the smaller vehicle deployment....though there are doors at each side of the garage too to think about.



I think the Airlock drawing you're thinking of is the one by Stuart Rose who was in the Art Department. I based the airlock on the blueprints on it, but made it wider to incorporate a large bulkhead seen on one of the models and Ash's Observation Blister, still opting to keep the design aesthetic.

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Vader
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 26, 2011 11:47 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

You know, it could be Rose's illustration that has me confused ... but it doesn't quite ring a bell; my recollection has the image looking a bit different — other perspective, more angular geometry, other functional features. If I find it, I'll let you know.


As for the vehicle deployment, that concept (BTW — love your illustrations, Graham!) would be ideal if the capability to deploy these vehicles was in some way related to the ship's primary task. Then, spending the resources to create rapid and easy deployment solutions is the way to go.
As it is, it's not even a secondary task, but rather tertiary, or even lower ordered than that. Exploration is not something this ship is designed for, in any way. Its crew has standing orders to investigate, but even that actually happening is so esoteric and rare that other than Ash, it seems only the Captain is even aware of the existence of that policy.

Looking at the question from another perspective — if not to use the gear bay as a loading ramp, why else does the compartment have a door into the ship literally big enough to run a freight train through?
And seeing that the loading ramp is right there, just a few meters from where the vehicles are parked, why spend the resources to build airlocks and lifts to deploy the vehicles, when the loading ramp can do the job ... just that the crew needs to use a bit more elbow grease for it, on the rare occasion when it actually needs to be done.


This is the direction where my thoughts are running at this moment, as for the whole arrangement around the airlock and the gear bay/loading ramp.
Features are not to scale:


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PostPosted: Tue Jul 26, 2011 1:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I don't know why they put these freight elevator near the landing gear...hopefully there's no accident while putting all that stuff into the ship's belly: I'd hate to see some kind of truck falling off and damaging one of the foot.
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 26, 2011 8:43 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Whew! My head's a-spin with the brainstorming, guys!
Exclamation
Suggestion: should we begin establishing the llarger areas of the ship, established in the film or extrapolated? That will probably inform placement of the other areas.
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 26, 2011 10:32 pm    Post subject: Nostromo design Reply with quote

Guys, I just wanted to share a few thoughts on the NOSTROMO; of which, I am a HUGE fan.

1. as a preamble, I am an Aviation Power Plant and Airframe Mechanic, and served 20 years in the NAVY both as ships company and Fleet Marine Force.

2. VADER..and Fen....I feel your extrapolations are right on target with respect to the internal layout of companion ways; I have been on ships built in the 1940's...to the most modern aircraft carriers...not much has changed. a little know fact.. Aircraft elevators can be driven by a hand cranked reduction /multiplication gear system. Ladder ways are simple and direct, especially during an engineering casualty.

3. Drive systems< I would think there would need to be 4 systems
A. hyper-drive
B. "Conventional" for Orbit-de-orbit, and sub-light manuver's (with an RCS)
C. Atmospheric (I remember seeing written that the NOSTROMO had "Thrust Tunnels"...cant remember where I saw it.
D. Lift Engines/Anti grav drive...as you estutly pointed out. The Nostromo would have the Aerodynamic qualities of a man-hole cover, and would need a lift system to break "unity" (thrust..in any vector vs. wt)and get airborne from planet fall. Since the ship does appear to have a significant flat under surface...one could suppose that after establishing FWD speed, it may indeed act as a lifting body.

At any rate, what a mass to lift and provide propulsion for.!!!

Vito
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 26, 2011 11:46 pm    Post subject: Re: Nostromo design Reply with quote

"995"victor-d wrote:
Guys, I just wanted to share a few thoughts on the NOSTROMO; of which, I am a HUGE fan.

1. as a preamble, I am an Aviation Power Plant and Airframe Mechanic, and served 20 years in the NAVY both as ships company and Fleet Marine Force.

2. VADER..and Fen....I feel your extrapolations are right on target with respect to the internal layout of companion ways; I have been on ships built in the 1940's...to the most modern aircraft carriers...not much has changed. a little know fact.. Aircraft elevators can be driven by a hand cranked reduction /multiplication gear system. Ladder ways are simple and direct, especially during an engineering casualty.

3. Drive systems< I would think there would need to be 4 systems
A. hyper-drive
B. "Conventional" for Orbit-de-orbit, and sub-light manuver's (with an RCS)
C. Atmospheric (I remember seeing written that the NOSTROMO had "Thrust Tunnels"...cant remember where I saw it.
D. Lift Engines/Anti grav drive...as you estutly pointed out. The Nostromo would have the Aerodynamic qualities of a man-hole cover, and would need a lift system to break "unity" (thrust..in any vector vs. wt)and get airborne from planet fall. Since the ship does appear to have a significant flat under surface...one could suppose that after establishing FWD speed, it may indeed act as a lifting body.
Vito

Vader and Vito,
Agree wholeheartedly with yall's conclusions RE: as few as possible "amenities" such as special airlocks JUST for the exploration vehicles (as you point out, the landing gear storage bay has HUGE doors, easily big enough for the planetary excursion vehicles). And the ladder comapanionways are used throughout the film, as seen also in the 2003 Director's Cut when Ripley is escaping and climbs down the ladder INTO the landing gear bay, while fleeing the self-destructing "Nostromo" for the 'safety' of the "Narcissus" shuttle.
Vito: indeed, an atmsopheric drive--hence the "Dust in the intakes. Number Two is overheating again" line spoken by Harry Dean Stanton as Brett, when taking off from the planetoid. And the infamous exchange of Parker:"What the hell was that...?" and Brett:"Pressure drop in intake three; must have lost a shield." while attempting a landing there. Yeah, the "Nostromo" is about as aerodynamic as an anvil. Hence the Atmospheric Drives and oversized quad Lifters.
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 2:49 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Vito and BR -- that's great input! Welcome to the discussion; it's great to have a Navy man on board!


One possibility is that the B and C drive systems are operating modes of the same system -- a reaction rocket that converts to an air breathing propulsion in atmosphere to save on reaction mass.

The problem is that as we've established before, there is no way the Nostromo could carry enough fuel to de-orbit and land, or to take off into orbit; let alone do both -- on a single tank, as it were, to boot. Therefore, a reactionless thruster has seemed the more attractive solution.

Reactionless thrusters obviously wouldn't -- couldn't -- breathe air under any circumstances.
Another possibility then would be that the intakes referred to aren't for actual propulsion as such, but rather for cooling the systems. The propulsion system can be expected to generate a lot of heat. In space, you have very good radiative cooling available. In atmosphere however, particularly very dense such, you don't, so you need to take in atmosphere somewhere and cool the systems with forced convection instead.
(Actually, if the system generates really much heat, the cooling system actually may double as an auxiliary propulsion system, in that the heat dumped into the passing gas makes the gas expand so much that you can utilise the effect to generate thrust)
The "overheating" comment might actually be taken to support this option.

However, if we surmise that the antigrav we've postulated kills the effect of gravity (obviating the need for dynamic lift, though -- sorry), you only need the thrusters to break unity -- to shift the ship's inertia by generating or killing momentum in any given vector.
Then we might actually be able to get by with the "unrealistic (or "optimistic") reaction engine" option if we wanted to, and have the thrusters convert to air breathing in atmosphere.


For my own part, I can see points with either of these options -- reactiuonless w/ intakes for cooling, or unrealistic reaction w/ intakes for air breathing.
I am still slightly in favour for the reactionless option though, but what say you guys?
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 3:17 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well, either option has its point. hmm, Brett DID say "Number Two is overheating"--which lends credence to the idea that the intakes are for COOLING a reactionless, gravity-drive system, rather than for an air-breathing reaction drive. That said, an air-breather could also overheat from excessive dust intake, as found on the planetoids atmosphere.
Then yes there is the problem of fuel capacity for air-breather engines, and storage space for the same. Hmm I'm reminded of 1960s scifi stories where nuclear reaction drives were used in atmosphere--at least in one short story, a nuclear fusion drive was used as a weapon to kill a ground target, then thrust away into space. A nuclear reaction drive would certainly NOT be particularly environmnetally friendly....would The Company be overly concerned??? The reaction drive could also be a "zip fuel"-- an inert substance, superheated over a nuclear reactor, and ejected out of an appropriate thrusting port. Since my knowledge of this system is limited (particuarly as certain classified aircraft in the American arsenal are rumored to presently be employing such a propulsion system, on top-secret missions), I do not know if that system would require air-cooling, in an atmosphere.
However I think that since the Nostromo had "inertial dampers", as stated by Dallas during the descent, ("...this is going to be a little bumpy."), such inertial dampers would almost certainly be adjuncts to the gravity reactionless-drive. Especially in a "bottom line", cost-conscience Company starship. The quad oversized lifters would be used to alter the vector (which Ripley makes mention of doing during the ascent).
Thoughts...?
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 4:24 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ahh, lovely discussion!

The most immediate problem with an air breathing engine with a clogged up intake would actually not so much be overheating as loss of thrust.
The fact that Brett reports the overheating but has nothing to say about any thrust issues would suggest that the intake's main purpose is indeed to cool, not propel.


The thing with even a nuclear reaction drive is that it needs the reaction mass to superheat. And since the Nostromo is a lot of mass to move, you need a lot of reaction mass, even with a nuclear reactor to superheat it -- much more than there is space for in the Nostromo. We discussed this a few pages ago, I think.

So, if we go the route of a reaction engine of some sort, we would perforce be constrained to postulate some sort of fantastic propulsion system that is much more efficient than mere physics would allow, even assuming the most efficient system we can imagine today (which would be a fusion engine).

And even though the Company surely would not give a rat's arse about environmental concerns, they would still need to follow legislation. They would want to be able to land on any planetary body they make landfall at, but I am sure authorities might take a dim view on Weyland-Yutani ships landing in Earth atmosphere in a cloud of radioactive vapour...


As we see the Nostromo use physical thrusters to propel the craft, I don't think the reactionless drive can be a gravity generating system, as such, and hence it wouldn't be part of the other gravity manipulation systems on board. Rather some sort of "thruster plate" technology.

The inertial dampers would probably be part of the artificial gravity system rather than the antigrav system. As we discussed earlier, these two would probably be applications of the same technology, and hence use technologically similar equipment, but be separate systems:
  • The antigravity system's job is to cancel out the gravitational influence of external bodies on the whole ship. This might be done by shielding the ship from the gravity field, or by somehow generating an opposing force (myself, I prefer the first alternative). This system is one component of the ship's drive systems.
  • The artificial gravity system's job is to generate a positive gravity field inside the crew habitat. It is thus part of the life support/environmental complex.
  • The inertial damper reduces the effect of inertia on the crew during acceleration, and the simplest way to accomplish that would to generate a gravity field of an equal number of G's as the acceleration, but in the opposite direction. It can thus be built into the artificial gravity system.

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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 10:34 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well...in going back to my comment on "how some things have not really changed on Navy ships", and for that matter ships in general...I'm going to postualte a possible Atmospsheric drive system....They are STEAM PUNKS...here we go..

1. STEAM TURBINES..still in use..how do get heat? OLD SCHOOL=BUNKER OIL or Coal NEW SCHOOL=Nuclear reactor

2. Nuclear Fuel stowage vs. Traditional comsumable: shot glass compared to a lake as far as volume goes

3. In todays Avaition world, HI-BYPASS TURBO-FANS rule the roost: Wt vs Power. Super Efficent,: Core Turbine drives a Large fan..the fan produces thrust By-passing the core engine.

4. Now...lets use SUPERHEATED STEAM to drive the Core Turbine...and Drive a Series of fans...and THEN..drive the air through a DUCT COMPRESS IT..DUCTED TURBO FAN= THRUST TUNNEL

5. How would you compensate for varying degress of atomospeheric density? ADJUSTABLE STATORS . or INTAKE RAMPS to control flow according to density, density could be controlled by water vapor injection..as was done in OLD SCHOOL Internal combustion aircraft engines.

6. What do we do with the excess heat...TURBO WASTE GATE..or use it the same as Traditional Turbo Charger..use as needed.

7. How about water??....and Oxygen??......Hydrogen Fuel Cell!!!

YES..its a stretch...but there seems to be ALOT of heat in the NOSTROMO...steam and vapor Hissing everywheres down in engineering.

AND...REMEMBER when Ripley fails to ABORT the Auto-destruct System...
" MOTHER!!!!......TURN THE COOLING UNITS BACK ON!!!

Any way you slice it...Thermo-nuclear reactor driving a steam turbine; or OIL Fired Boiler driving a steam turbine...or a Coal Boiler fired triple expansion steam engine...if you dont control the temperature and steam flow/venting..2 things can happen..

1. too cool ...low pressure..no power
2. TOO hot....TOO MUCH PRESSURE....BOOM!


Gentlemen....iI await your comments Very Happy
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 3:15 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Vader, and Vito--points taken. YES a hydrogen fuel cell!!! Yeah, EVEN THe Company would probably have to observe environmental legislation. So, no fission or fusion atmospheric drive systems. BUT I like Vito's ducted turbofan idea...
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 3:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Vader wrote:

As we see the Nostromo use physical thrusters to propel the craft, I don't think the reactionless drive can be a gravity generating system, as such, and hence it wouldn't be part of the other gravity manipulation systems on board. Rather some sort of "thruster plate" technology.

The inertial dampers would probably be part of the artificial gravity system rather than the antigrav system. As we discussed earlier, these two would probably be applications of the same technology, and hence use technologically similar equipment, but be separate systems:
  • The antigravity system's job is to cancel out the gravitational influence of external bodies on the whole ship. This might be done by shielding the ship from the gravity field, or by somehow generating an opposing force (myself, I prefer the first alternative). This system is one component of the ship's drive systems.
  • The artificial gravity system's job is to generate a positive gravity field inside the crew habitat. It is thus part of the life support/environmental complex.
  • The inertial damper reduces the effect of inertia on the crew during acceleration, and the simplest way to accomplish that would to generate a gravity field of an equal number of G's as the acceleration, but in the opposite direction. It can thus be built into the artificial gravity system.


Ok, Vader--so the artificially-induced "1G" that keeps the crew walking on the Nostromo corridor floors, not floating down the hallways or up the companionways, would be SEPARATE from the drive system that we are postulating. NOT simply a beneficient "side-effect" of that drive? Hmm ok--I guess having a drive that had that side benefit would be a little too wishful in thinking.
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 3:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yes; and one might even postulate a system where the atmospheric gas bypasses a mechanism that transfers heat from the reactor, superheating the gas, and making the propulsion even more efficient — sort of like a turbojet engine; just replace the fuel injection and the combustion chambers with heat from a rector core.

But I was actually not thinking mainly in terms of reactor waste heat, but rather waste heat in the propulsion system itself. Depending on how much of that is generated, the heat may or may not be useful in generating an auxiliary atmospheric drive.

When you're in a position to use atmospheric gas as reaction mass, you're sort of mostly all right — after all, once in an atmosphere, that stuff is plentiful.
The problems start when you're maneuvering in the vacuum of space, or about to land on the Moon or some other planetary body without an atmosphere. Then there's nothing for a turbofan or turbojet to turn into reaction mass, and that's when you need to carry mass on board to superheat and eject ... and that's when the Nostromo just doesn't have the volume to carry enough fuel.
Not fuel to generate the heat though, as in the Old School — you've got thermonuclear reactors to do that — but fuel to eject as reaction mass. Whole different ball game.

That's why we ended up with the reactionless "solution". But it also means that the auxiliary atmospheric propulsion may be redundant, in that the ship can't rely on being able to use it.



"MOTHER!!!!......TURN THE COOLING UNITS BACK ON!!!"

Yeah. We started struggling with that one a few pages ago. It's a nasty little conundrum.

So, we know (or at least, we must assume) that the Nostromo's main powerplant is built on some sort of thermonuclear technology. "Thermonuclear" means "a system that generates heat through a nuclear reaction". That heat is then somehow converted into useful power, for example as electricity.

This generates two questions for us to answer: What kind of "nuclear", and what kind of "somehow".


"Nuclear:"

There are three choices: fission, fusion, or antimtter. Problem is that none of them really fit 100%:

Fission
- Fission requires constant cooling lest bad things happen, so that's a good fit.
- Unfortunately, the "bad things" isn't really that the reaction goes haywire and stuff goes "kablooie", but merely that the reactor fuel melts. Not a good fit.
- Furthermore, when you want to bring the temperature down in an operating reactor, you don't turn on more cooling; you slow the reaction down by inserting control rods. Not a good fit.
- You can't get a fission reactor to turn into a thermonuclear bomb, however hard you try. The only way to make one explode is to make it make something else explode, such as a pressure vessel with too much steam pressure in it, and no safety valve.

Fusion
- Same thing as with fission re. cooling: if things get too hot, stuff starts to break, so temperatures need to be kept down ... while at the same time allowing the plasma in the reactor to be hot enough to actually allow fusion to happen. Tricky equation.
- If you need to stop the reaction, you just stop injecting hydrogen into the reactor; nothing to do with cooling. Not a good fit.
- On the other hand, depending on how the reactor is designed, this might not be an instantaneous stop — that would in that case require venting the plasma somewhere ... a tricky proposition, to say the least.
- Stopping the hydrogen feed will however stop any buildup in progress, and stabilise the reactor.

Antimatter
- Just like all the other ones, this one doesn't do well if temperatures go through the roof. However, the definition of "roof" varies...
- Very much like fusion, in that the reaction is fed by constantly feeding fuel into it.
- Unlike fusion, this can be expected to be much more immediate: stop the fuel feed, and you stop the reaction, immediately.

All in all, fusion would seem the best fit, after all: let us postulate that the cooling system is used to keep the fusion bottle (the actual plasma containment) at safe temperatures. Once the system is turned off, the bottle's containment starts to degenerate. Shutting the fuel feed won't help: it will stabilise the temperature of the plasma, but it won't change the fact that it's still going to be several thousands of degrees hot for some while.
After the deadline, the degradation has reached a critical point, and turning the cooling system back on will no longer stop the bottle from losing containment.
Once the containment goes, the reactor, and the ship, will suddenly have an uncontained sun in its middle. The result is likely to look spectacular.


"Somehow":

Today, we obviously only have fission reactors, and in these, this is done by using the reactor's heat to superheat water and generate steam, and then use this to turn a turbine, that in turn turns a generator (or a screw shaft, as the case may be).
In this future...? Who knows. They may still be using the same basic concept. More likely to me would be some sort of advanced thermoelectric solution, that uses the ∆T and resultant heat flux between the reactor and outer space, ultimately, to generate electricity. This would, btw, also need a titanic atmospheric cooling solution when not in outer space...
The water (and all the steam) would just be from auxiliary cooling — removing waste heat from the wrong places, but not necessarily doing a lot with it — hence all the steam.


Hydrogen fuel cells ... there are likely to be several of those on board, as auxiliary power supplies to various systems, and whatnot. I doubt the main powerplant will be one though, not least because it won't need much cooling, if any, and it wouldn't be able to generate any "adios muchachos"-grade thermonuclear fireworks.
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Vader
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 3:40 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

BR26354 wrote:
Ok, Vader--so the artificially-induced "1G" that keeps the crew walking on the Nostromo corridor floors, not floating down the hallways or up the companionways, would be SEPARATE from the drive system that we are postulating. NOT simply a beneficient "side-effect" of that drive?

In a nutshell, yup.
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BR26354
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 4:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ah ok then Vader RE: the gravity-manipulating drive, and inertial dampers...hmm I think given the technology the fusion reactor powerplant sounds like the most "fitting".
Just after the landing, while "picking up the pieces" for damage control, Parker mentions"cells" that have crapped out. In addition to the ducts that needed a Drydock to be repaired. Whcih could be postulated as either cooling ducts for whatever the in-atmosphere drive is; or worse for the Nostromo crew, ducts for the theorized turbofan in-atmsophere drive.
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 5:43 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I hope you guys have some pictures or some idea what these things look like - as right now I have two nice looking rectangles on my drawing, one marked Fusion Reactor and one marked Hydrogen Fuel Cell....

(just kidding).

I don't want the FBI to come knocking on my door either as they think I'm trying to draft up some kind of nuclear weapon.
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 6:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I don't think the FBI is gonna knock on your door but rather NASA engineers .

Other thoughts: sure the Corp doesn't want to land anywhere (Earth specially) spewing radio-active dust everywhere...then again they could have 2 kinds of engine: a "clean one" (Hydrogen Fuel Cells) and the other more lethal kind for deserted worlds...could those be working in tandem to make landing an easier task?
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BR26354
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 10:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Space Jockey wrote:
I hope you guys have some pictures or some idea what these things look like - as right now I have two nice looking rectangles on my drawing, one marked Fusion Reactor and one marked Hydrogen Fuel Cell....

(just kidding).

I don't want the FBI to come knocking on my door either as they think I'm trying to draft up some kind of nuclear weapon.


Space Jockey: I do believe, and correct me anybody if I'm wrong in this guess, that the four, MASSIVE clusters of cylinders in pillar form seen in the foreground, as Ripley scrambles in view in the comparitively tiny windows of the Engine Room to avert the self-destruct, are indeed the Fusion Reactors of the Nostromo which are being postulated here.
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BR26354
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 27, 2011 10:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

joberg wrote:
I don't think the FBI is gonna knock on your door but rather NASA engineers .

Other thoughts: sure the Corp doesn't want to land anywhere (Earth specially) spewing radio-active dust everywhere...then again they could have 2 kinds of engine: a "clean one" (Hydrogen Fuel Cells) and the other more lethal kind for deserted worlds...could those be working in tandem to make landing an easier task?

Hmm possibly--I think that The Company would opt for simplicity (READ: "cheaper") kinds of solutions for an in-atmosphere drive, an Einsteinian Space drive, and the interstellar Hyperdive. Also there is the problem in even as big a ship as the Nostromo, there being finite space to house all of these drive systems. AND in a way that would not interfere with the functioning of each drive system. OH and the Crew not being lethally irradiated...
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