At one point, I thought about doing a Black Desert Comic Strip. To that end I designed a smallish spacecraft for my wacky crew of characters based off of the CASSTOR from back in the day. Alas, I never could get production on such a comic down into manageable amounts of time and effort, and abandoned the project. But I did come up with some pics of the ship and its interior I wouldn't mind sharing with the blogosphere, so, here we go:
This exterior is nothing special - just a rocket in launch configuration. Aft you can plainly see the large bell of the L-Drive folded out. It's got the checkerboard pattern traditional for tracking spin (useful for a rocket that gets shot in the butt ten times a second with a high-powered laser). The panels are mismatched, there are flags from all of the crew up the side - just a typical, reusable rocket that been reused more than its share.
Once in orbit, the rocket opens up like a flower. There are solar panels inside the launch fairing, radiator panels in the service module, and four equipment pallets hidden behind roll up doors. Each pallet bay conceals a robotic arm and one of the rocket's landing legs. At this point, the rocket looks like a space station and could indeed function as one. there is a docking ring for other spacecraft or larger stations in the nose as well as a utility airlock on the side of the spacecraft . The L-Drive bell folds up discreetly in this configuration, so as to so that the many sets of RCS station-keeping thrusters can keep the CASSTOR in the groove.
The interior, as is usually the case in free-fall environments, feels bigger than it is because you can use so much more of the space. In reality, the chamber pictured is only about fifteen feet from end to end in any dimension. The upper cubbies, as you can see, are tapered to the docking ring's airlock (1). The ceiling around the ring is festooned with low-heat lighting and hand holds (2). Starting on the right, the first cubby holds the rocket's head, life support equipment, and storage lockers (3). The main flight deck (4) and the adjoining service deck (5) are catty-corner to one another to allow face to face communication with all of the crew...in a position that was tight enough to draw in one panel. Anyway, the on-board AI Annabelle Li, who I've mentioned before, is housed in a nitrogen atmosphere with all of here peripheries in a shallow housing in the cubby below the life-support block (6). The side panel in this cubby allows access to the corner segments that house the air-scrubbers, batteries, and sundry engineering (7). The galley occupies the entire next cubby (8) and houses a large processor and ten lockers holding food. The cubby just under the service deck (9) holds the main airlock.
The last two cubbies we've haven't covered (because they were in this picture) house the workshop (10) and the dorm (11) respectively. The workshop is a miniature fab-lab with everything a flight engineer needs to prototype spare parts and components on the fly. The large red box with the white door is a 3-D printer, and there is a CNC cutter under that. Trays of off-the-shelf components, storage lockers with tools and feed stocks, and a small workbench round out the gear available.
The dorms are smallish coffin-rack style sleeping units only five feet by two-and-a-half feet square. Fortunately, such tight quarters is somewhat tolerable thanks to the lack of gravity. The little rooms have smart screens, padded walls with webbing for securing the sleepers, and most luxurious of all, built-in life support gear mounted in the void space between the cubbies. This allows the tiny dorms to function as passable survival shelters. The radiation shelter is under the main cabin and is a claustrophobic space with a shielded door surrounded by fuel tanks.
I hope you enjoyed this look into a working Black Desert rocket. My next post will probably be more about the "building a navy" project, with a look into turning that chart into an outline.
See you then!
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| "What a piece of junk!" -some stupid farmboy |
Once in orbit, the rocket opens up like a flower. There are solar panels inside the launch fairing, radiator panels in the service module, and four equipment pallets hidden behind roll up doors. Each pallet bay conceals a robotic arm and one of the rocket's landing legs. At this point, the rocket looks like a space station and could indeed function as one. there is a docking ring for other spacecraft or larger stations in the nose as well as a utility airlock on the side of the spacecraft . The L-Drive bell folds up discreetly in this configuration, so as to so that the many sets of RCS station-keeping thrusters can keep the CASSTOR in the groove.The interior, as is usually the case in free-fall environments, feels bigger than it is because you can use so much more of the space. In reality, the chamber pictured is only about fifteen feet from end to end in any dimension. The upper cubbies, as you can see, are tapered to the docking ring's airlock (1). The ceiling around the ring is festooned with low-heat lighting and hand holds (2). Starting on the right, the first cubby holds the rocket's head, life support equipment, and storage lockers (3). The main flight deck (4) and the adjoining service deck (5) are catty-corner to one another to allow face to face communication with all of the crew...in a position that was tight enough to draw in one panel. Anyway, the on-board AI Annabelle Li, who I've mentioned before, is housed in a nitrogen atmosphere with all of here peripheries in a shallow housing in the cubby below the life-support block (6). The side panel in this cubby allows access to the corner segments that house the air-scrubbers, batteries, and sundry engineering (7). The galley occupies the entire next cubby (8) and houses a large processor and ten lockers holding food. The cubby just under the service deck (9) holds the main airlock.The last two cubbies we've haven't covered (because they were in this picture) house the workshop (10) and the dorm (11) respectively. The workshop is a miniature fab-lab with everything a flight engineer needs to prototype spare parts and components on the fly. The large red box with the white door is a 3-D printer, and there is a CNC cutter under that. Trays of off-the-shelf components, storage lockers with tools and feed stocks, and a small workbench round out the gear available.
The dorms are smallish coffin-rack style sleeping units only five feet by two-and-a-half feet square. Fortunately, such tight quarters is somewhat tolerable thanks to the lack of gravity. The little rooms have smart screens, padded walls with webbing for securing the sleepers, and most luxurious of all, built-in life support gear mounted in the void space between the cubbies. This allows the tiny dorms to function as passable survival shelters. The radiation shelter is under the main cabin and is a claustrophobic space with a shielded door surrounded by fuel tanks.
I hope you enjoyed this look into a working Black Desert rocket. My next post will probably be more about the "building a navy" project, with a look into turning that chart into an outline.
See you then!
You know, if you ever wanted to try resurrecting the comic strip project, I could help you out on the production side of things.
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