[3e] DaVinci Tank

[Phaelen Bleux]

DaVinci's Tank (TL4)
The DaVinci tank was designed to be an armored car, "safe and unassailable," that would replace the elephant as the heavy cavalry of the Renaissance battlefield. It looked much like a flying saucer with wheels; all of the vehicle's surfaces were heavily sloped for protection. Inside, the tank was powered by four men turning gears connected to the wheels. At the equator of the vehicle were numerous ports bristling with guns.
DaVinci's design shows the gears at odds with one another--one set would drive the vehicle forward, the other backward. While some say this is a mistake, others claim that DaVinci included this "mistake" on purpose to prevent unauthorized manufacture.

Subassemblies: Body +4, four Wheels +1.
Powertrain: Four ST 12 men generating 0.96 kW on a 1-kW Muscle Engine.
Occupancy: 4 CCS.
Cargo: 0 cf.

Armor: 4/2W overall

Weaponry:
24 Muskets with Rests (p. HT112)

Equipment:
24 gun ports (15-degree arc of fire each).

Statistics:
Size: ?' Payload: 0.4 tons Lwt.: 5.25 tons
Volume: 475 cf. Maint.: 188 hours Price: $11,382

HT: 4. HPs: 548 Body, 57 each Wheel.

gSpeed: 3.5 gAccel: 0.5 gDecel: 10 gMR: 0.75 gSR: 4
Ground Pressure Very High. 1/8 Off-Road speed.

Design Notes:
Various illustrations and recreations of the tank vary on the number of guns. The design allows 360-degree arc of fire through the gun ports, which necessitated 24 of them. The tank is equipped with 24 muskets, which would allow six volleys before needing to reload. Body is medium, standard with 60-degree slope overall. Armor is DR 2 Standard Wood. Empty weight is 9,560 lbs. Off-Road speed is 0.5 mph.

I thought I could spiff up the design by adding a fantasy element, but all I really got was an extra 2 mph. Here is the alternate design anyway:

Dwarven Tank (TL3)
This is the DaVinci tank reconstructed with better materials (reflecting dwarven craftsmanship) and a more powerful muscle engine (since dwarves are generally stronger than humans).

Subassemblies: Body +4, four Wheels +1.
Powertrain: Four ST 14 dwarves generating 1.12 kW on a 1.1-kW Muscle Engine.
Occupancy: 4 CCS.
Cargo: 0 cf.

Armor: 4/2W overall

Weaponry:
24 Muskets with Rests (p. HT112)

Equipment:
24 gun ports (15-degree arc of fire each).

Statistics:
Size: ?' Payload: 0.4 tons Lwt.: 2.60 tons
Volume: 478 cf. Maint.: 112 hours Price: $31,695

HT: 3. HPs: 551 Body, 57 each Wheel.

gSpeed: 5 gAccel: 0.5 gDecel: 10 gMR: 0.75 gSR: 4
Ground Pressure Very High. 1/8 Off-Road speed.

Design Notes:
Various illustrations and recreations of the tank vary on the number of guns. The design allows 360-degree arc of fire through the gun ports, which necessitated 24 of them. The tank is equipped with 24 muskets, which would allow six volleys before needing to reload. Body is medium, Advanced with 60-degree slope overall. Armor is DR 2 Expensive Wood. Empty weight is 4,406 lbs. Off-Road speed is 0.5 mph.

[chris1982]

It general I'd put most investions of Mr. DaVinci as one TL higher as the one he actually lived in. If there was one RL person who had the high TL advantage it is him...

[Phaelen Bleux]

Originally Posted by chris1982

It general I'd put most investions of Mr. DaVinci as one TL higher as the one he actually lived in. If there was one RL person who had the high TL advantage it is him...

Maybe even 2 TLs. But I suppose I could argue that although the idea is TL6, craftsmen and materials limit construction to TL4.

And wood is wood, regardless of TL.

[Darekun]

Originally Posted by Phaelen Bleux

I thought I could spiff up the design by adding a fantasy element, but all I really got was an extra 2 mph.

Well, if you bump up the drivetrain to take full advantage of the dwarves' ST but keep the same speed, and assuming my back-of-the-envelope math is correct, you get an extra 1 750pd for engine, drivetrain, and armor. Assuming the human design had a 1kW drivetrain too, bumping up the engine and drivetrain to 1.12kW would add 14.4pd, and back-calculating the body area from the HP, you could add 8/4W DR(and change) with that remainder.

Maybe switch the dwarven model to metal armor, for a total of 18/9 DR; that'll laugh off just over 90% of hits from a 4d pi++ musket. A nasty contraption to pilot, but truly a dreadnought of battlefields otherwise dominated by DaVinci's model…