Posted by: Somnus
« on: December 02, 2013, 12:02:11 AM »I'm just going to go ahead and mark this question as solved
Interesting discussion I stirred up though!
Interesting discussion I stirred up though!
No, which is included in the installation 'package.'
. . . which magically appears on a barren world after only hauling the 2-5% TN materials there. . . yes correct
Show me any modern complex design where this effect is larger then the extra amount of wasted raw materials needed to build it that disappears during refinement! It does not exist.
My point still stands that a TN minerals used should take up both more mass and more volume then their end product shipped for delivery.
Right, so the most sensible explanation is that there is 98% of non NT materials when a facility is pre-assembled.
Of course it's broken down. But that doesn't mean it's flat packed. You can't flat pack a water heater. Or a fridge. Or a reactor. Or a great many things. Installations aren't just a series of walls. Anything of sufficient complexity is going to become less and less efficient in the space it takes up, because not everything is flat. A lot of things incorporate air volume in their very design (like the aforementioned water heater).
Who in their right mind does this?
Have you seen any company selling houses or "installations" in reality transport the entire building from their factory in one piece? No they transport the walls / beams in a very efficient manner without empty space and assemble it on spot.
You even do this with furniture now thanks to companies like IKEA.
It's an insult to my intellect to claim that they are not capable of doing this in the future
Also worth noting that a fist-sized lump of clay can actually make a pretty large pot. Installations are mostly empty space. When you are transporting an installation, a lot of the tonnage is 'volume' more than it is 'weight. 'Who in their right mind does this?
That is 4800 tons of TN minerals. Presumably, the rest is regular old steel and concrete construction materials, or just air, as volume and weight are combined in terms of ship design.
Each point of minerals weighs 2 tons, I don't really know why, so a standard 5000 ton hold can hold 2,500 minerals.
Also the wiki needs love as it says "Most planetary installations, such as factories, mines, terraforming installations etc., weigh 25,000 tons but can be disassembled into parts of 5,000 tons each and transported separately"
I was under the impression that terraformers and research centers weighed significantly more.