Coriolis Station Physics

This is the distance of one of the diagonals of the large squares on the face of the cuboctohedron. Using Pythagoras' theorem, this tells us the side of one of the squares is approx 2,035m.

Nice work, Commander!

That's interesting as it gives us an approximate area for the high-gee zones of the station.

Each side has an area of around 4.1M square metres, say 4 Km squared, times 4 gives us 16 square kilometres of high value living area.

If we compare with a densely habited area on Earth with high-rise buildings, say New York, that gives us the following.

New York area in square kilometres - 300
Population New York (2012) - 8 Million

That allows our Coriolis to hold at least 400,000 folks in the high gee areas. Depending on the internal config of the station (we don't know if it it's hollow like Rama or multiple levels of habitation within, the number could be significantly higher.

Of course, if Frontier could let us know the orbital parameters of the station we could work out its approximate mass and that would tell us whether or not it was 'hollow'. :)

Cheers,

Drew.
 
No idea WHY but the rectangular 'slot' opening allows for two ships to pass easily in both directions. We'll just have to decide which is 'in' and which side is 'out'. In deference to you Brits I've been entering on the left (unless I'm upside down then I've been entering on the right)! :D

The essential thing is to be able to enter and especially to go out

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Hopefully that Frontier will give us all the details and characteristics of space stations and space ships in an annex in the user manual

:)
 
It is definitely more than 2km when I flew yesterday. Have to actually get in game to measure that of course :) Well, maybe in 3.1 ;)

I targeted the beacon that's just outside the front earlier this morning and did a tour around the station and saw its backside... When I was round the back (not close up but not distant either) the range to the beacon was just over 7km... Looks like 4km could be about right
 
No idea WHY but the rectangular 'slot' opening allows for two ships to pass easily in both directions. We'll just have to decide which is 'in' and which side is 'out'. In deference to you Brits I've been entering on the left (unless I'm upside down then I've been entering on the right)! :D

But every 1/2 rotation left is on the right... How's that going to work? ;):D
 
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But every 1/2 rotation left is on the right... How's that going to work? ;-):D

They ought to put bright red cross and green tick indicators over each side of the entrance. Problem was solved long ago, an obvious omission. It would be easy to do, and the rotation wouldn't matter.

Cheers,

Drew.
 
I do love this forums :eek:

They ought to put bright red cross and green tick indicators over each side of the entrance. Problem was solved long ago, an obvious omission. It would be easy to do, and the rotation wouldn't matter.

Cheers,

Drew.

Aren't Coriolis stations a basic and cheap type of station, therefore more common in the outskirts and less frequented space areas?

So may be it is thought as a single lane operation? After all, even if you can move two sidewinders through it at the same time, there are larger ships (and safety room :p) to consider.
 
It worries me that you fiction writers aren't getting up to date enough information.
We got some "memos" or write-ups of various facets of the universe and have a separate thread for individual questions. Each author naturally asked the questions most important to their stories. Sometimes the answers to those questions that were not relevant to our own stories at that specific moment were easy to forget.

I was aware of the size of the Coriolis stations, for example, but I'm still rather vague about some other areas (not saying which, since that might be a spoiler by omission). And I have no idea whatsoever of the starmap... ;)
 
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Yes, it is true that in a novel, a profusion of details always add more interest
Um, no. I've read a lot of novels where the story halts and gets very heavy going when the author stops to explain all sorts of inconsequential details about something (about the world, about how to ride a pig, describing the sights along a long journey etc.).
 
Um, no. I've read a lot of novels where the story halts and gets very heavy going when the author stops to explain all sorts of inconsequential details about something (about the world, about how to ride a pig, describing the sights along a long journey etc.).

It depends on the story. Many details on the space stations and the spaceships, would not disturb me in a story of Elite Dangerous. But you're right too, it depends also of the context
 
That's a Cobra, or is that your point? ;)

Patrick_68000 said:
This is a Cobra. Sidewinder is smaller as you know. This gives a good idea of the number of Sidewinder that can go together ;)

I think that if you make silly things near the space station, the entry of the station should allow at a lot of spaceships of the police to go out at the same time, as a swarm of bee goes out of a hive (like in FE2)

:p
 
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Thanks guys. This thread some up what I love about the Elite community. Much better then constant 'my my ship is better than your ship' conversations.

Couple of thoughts. Can a sidewinder actually enter the station opening off centre. Surly the rotation would cause the floor/ceiling of the passage to hit you.

Also because the station is not round. If you had an internal corridor running the full length of the station near its out edge, gravity would not always be straight down and would vary along the length of the corridor. I'm sure kids would have great fun playing the the different gravity effects around the station. [starts trying to invent gravity games]

Ps, and because this is Elite that station could not have been any other shape or their would have been a riot ;)
 
Nice work! Although we really should be checking the angles on some of those inverted tower blocks to confirm they are perpendicular to the axis of rotation :D

David Braben keeps stressing how important the physics and internal consistency are, so I imagine their alignment is pretty good.
 
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