Coolant Pod Demonstrator

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Retry
03/06/18 11:05 PM
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There are some equipment that I just kind of wonder why they exist. Some weapons aren't particularly impressive in itself yet receive rather severe handicaps like blowing themselves up once every 36 shots (HVAC series). Others actually are impressive but blow themselves up every 12 shots instead (RISC Hyper Laser). Certain weapons don't blow themselves up, but also don't do great in their respective niche anyways, barely outperforming their standard counterparts in their own domain (Re-Engineered Lasers). There's the extremely niche equipment like the Blue Shield Particle Field Damper that tends to fail on its own in a moderately long battle on the ground (and isn't that useful in the air either since PPCs of almost all stripes are usually outperformed handily by lasers anyways). There's the chaff pod that provides decent protection against missiles... once.

And there's the coolant pod.

The coolant pod is a piece of equipment that weighs 1 ton, takes 1 crit slot, and is single use. On its use it floods heat sinks with coolant, increasing their heat dissipation by 1 each (regardless if they're singles or doubles). It's rather weighty for a one time use; a .5 ton pod would have a much better argument for existing but for 1 ton you may as well take another heat sink. And by the Double Heat Sink era, there's not really any purpose to the coolant pod, and if you want its ability you may as well try to fit a Radical Heat Sink System which is reusable.

But I still wanted to see a serviceable design that uses one. So I made one myself.

Enter the Coolant Pod Demonstrator.

When ignoring the rocket pods, the Demonstrator is your old average 20-ton light mech design. Equipped with a mediocre speed profile of 6/9, nearly maximum (and yet still pathetic) armor for its weight, and a main battery of 2 medium lasers and an ER Flamer for anti-infantry work, the Demonstrator is about what you would expect out of the 20-ton class.

When including the rocket pods, the Demonstrator mounts 100 rockets on a 20-ton chassis, or 25% of the weight is basically devoted to this one-shot array. This results in a very powerful first-strike capacity that'll shred similar weight classes in a single turn and heavily batter heavier battlemechs... if they can get close enough and survive that long, anyways.

That rocket array is where the coolant pod comes in. Since having your mechwarriors voluntarily fry themselves to annoy some giants is bad for morale, the Coolant Pod exists to be fired on the same turn as the rocket barrage in order to help dissipate the heat. Running while firing the rockets will net 22 points of heat, resulting in +3 to attacks next turn (not that you should be after that strike), a shut-down roll of 8+ and slowing to a crawl of -4 MP. The Mechwarrior would be in rather hot water (or rather, coolant.)

If the coolant is enabled that turn, the Demonstrator will only net 12 heat, resulting in +1 to hit, no roll to shut down, and slowing to a speed of -2 MP (withhold a single Rocket Launcher from your alpha strike and this reduces to -1 MP). The Mechwarrior can instead limp away from his strike the next turn to further cool down and operate like a normal light mech instead of being shut down in a metal coffin somewhere in the middle of a battlefield.

I personally find the idea of the Coolant Pod Demonstrator amusing, if not rather impractical: Grab a lance of four of these, either hide them somewhere or actively pursue a shot against your local Annihilator Assault Mech, guide the bloody gnats right behind their torso and unleash 400 rockets of doom into their backside. It's fun to think about, if nothing else.

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Coolant Pod Demonstrator
Base Tech Level: Experimental (IS)
Level Era
Experimental -
Advanced -
Standard 3145+
Tech Rating: E/X-X-E-D

Weight: 20 tons
BV: 703
Cost: 2,334,240 C-bills

Movement: 6/9
Engine: 120 Light
Heat Sinks: 10
Cockpit: Small Cockpit
Gyro: XL Gyro

Internal: 33 (Endo-Steel)
Armor: 67/69 (Light Ferro-Fibrous)
Internal Armor
Head 3 9
Center Torso 6 9
Center Torso (rear) 3
Right Torso 5 8
Right Torso (rear) 2
Left Torso 5 8
Left Torso (rear) 2
Right Arm 3 5
Left Arm 3 5
Right Leg 4 8
Left Leg 4 8

Weapons Loc Heat
Rocket Launcher 10 LT 3
Rocket Launcher 10 LT 3
Rocket Launcher 10 LT 3
Rocket Launcher 10 RT 3
Rocket Launcher 10 RT 3
Rocket Launcher 10 RT 3
Rocket Launcher 10 RT 3
Rocket Launcher 10 RT 3
Rocket Launcher 10 LT 3
Rocket Launcher 10 LT 3
Medium Laser RT 3
Medium Laser LT 3
ER Flamer HD 4

Ammo Loc Shots
Coolant Pod HD 1
AmaroqStarwind
04/02/18 03:49 PM
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Wait, what about Critical Slots?
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ghostrider
04/02/18 06:39 PM
66.74.61.223

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The question that comes up is why don't they use the coolant all the time?
Why have it a one shot thing?

If it is that dangerous to run all the time, there should be some negative effects that aren't listed.
Maurer
04/02/18 10:05 PM
45.48.53.140

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The Coolant Pod went meant to be a new type of fluff technology to keep people interested in Battletech. In reality, the Coolant Pod is only viable for first-shot alpha striking to try to eliminate your opponent quickly. In practice, another heat sink and managing your heat would be more effective than a single use heat reducer.

Now the $.64 c-bill question: How does the coolant pod really work? If the the Coolant Pod contains a reserve of compressed freon which can be flushed directly into the attached 'Mechs coolant system, wouldn't the temperature of the freon be at the internal temperature of the mech (i.e. hot) before use?
"Captain! We're completely surrounded on all sides." - Kiff, Futurama
..."Excellent, then we may attack in any direction." - Zapp Brannigan, Futurama

"A fool fights a war on two fronts; only an idiot defends on one." - Fusilier
AmaroqStarwind
04/03/18 12:02 AM
99.203.27.104

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My explanation is a lot more complex than a metal tank of freon, and of story:
1 - A metallic tank of highly compressed Liquid Helium.
2 - Wrapped in a Titanium Carbide Aerogel Blanket to provide insulation, and Kevlar to provide structural reinorcement.
3 - Which is itself surrounded by a Thermoelectric Cooling Jacket, to keep the temperature inside the tank lower than the external environment.

This would also more appropriately explain it's weight. Seriously, at One Ton, it had better last more than just once, or have built-in CASE, or something.
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AmaroqStarwind
04/03/18 12:04 AM
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*reinforcement, with an F.
Thank you, Auto-Incorrect!
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ghostrider
04/03/18 09:18 PM
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Given what was said about the fusion engines and why they don't explode, would make me thing using this would shut down the mech as it would snuff the engine from cooling it so much.

Also, it may just cause other issues like heat stress fractures from doing to.

Now I don't know if they changed the coolant used in mechs, but they probably don't use liquid nitrogen that is consistantly moving around the power core of the engine to keep it cool. Otherwise the coolant truck has all the wrong elements in it to actually cool a fusion reactor.
Though I would love to hear the full technical way they could make this work.
Retry
04/03/18 11:10 PM
64.189.130.11

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Quote:
The Coolant Pod went meant to be a new type of fluff technology to keep people interested in Battletech. In reality, the Coolant Pod is only viable for first-shot alpha striking to try to eliminate your opponent quickly. In practice, another heat sink and managing your heat would be more effective than a single use heat reducer.

Now the $.64 c-bill question: How does the coolant pod really work? If the the Coolant Pod contains a reserve of compressed freon which can be flushed directly into the attached 'Mechs coolant system, wouldn't the temperature of the freon be at the internal temperature of the mech (i.e. hot) before use?



That's why I was trying to make something that made sense with it. The Pod would be more useful at a half-ton or so IMO, but this is what I had to work with.

Aye, the Coolant Pod's contents will be at the surrounding temperature at thermodynamic equilibrium. (0th law of Thermodynamics) So presumably it's a bit more complex than just a steel tub of freon and is insulated from the surrounding environment (so it takes more time to reach equilibrium and is cold for longer) or has some sort of integrated refrigerator/freezer (with spare power drawn from the Fusion reactor) to pump heat out of the pod and into the surrounding environment, or probably both.


Edited by Retry (04/03/18 11:10 PM)
AmaroqStarwind
04/04/18 04:14 PM
99.203.26.102

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If the Clans ever had their own version of a Coolant Pod, what improvements do you think it would have?

For some reason, I'm expecting the following:
- Built-in CASE: If the pod gets destroyed, it does minimal or even negligible damage.
- Reduced weight: 500 kilograms, or even 250 kilograms.
- Reduced size: Similarly to a Compact Heat Sink, two of them could be crammed into a single Critical Slot, however both would be destroyed if that slot gets hit

Using those rules, you could essentially get a Two-Use version of the Coolant Pod, at a reasonable size and weight. Might actually make it viable.
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