LOVE the books. Some nitpicks 🙂

On the black hole thing the question would be what caused it? What if it was a singularity caused by someone or something expressly designed to destroy the system or a experiment gone very wrong?

Good point about jumping. You could possibly jump laterally instead of doing a corrective burn and use gravity assist to change relative heading toward the target. Like using just the rudder to slip an aircraft.

On the jumping thing, Ryk has said that mass in between start and finish points interferes with jumping.

Chris, that wouldn't work. If you're already on one side of a star, you can't just continue jumping forward to change direction. Jumps occur along the path of travel, not whatever direction you wish to jump. Your example flying over the Earth would work, as the gravity of the Earth keeps pulling you around the planet, so eventually, you would get to the opposite side of your departure point. However, seeing as how a ship traveling away from a star already has achieved stellar escape velocity, the only way to return would be to either decelerate (burning propellant) to less than stellar escape velocity or make a 180. (Which would also result in a speed substantially less than stellar escape velocity.)

You have to remember that jumps take place along the pre-jump path of travel. If I'm flying on a heading of 180 that's the heading I'm jumping on.

Ryk

Salivating for Episode #11!
Thanks Ryk for enjoyable reading!

Ahhhhhhhh. now that changes EVERYTHING.

NOW I understand why they had to point the nose of the shuttles up and thrust up to jump back to space !!!! now that makes sense! though they "are" technically moving while on the surface of the planet they would just have to jump into space at a "tangent" to their current location on the planet. Very very interesting.

I am curious. in the book it says they can't jump through matter.

so how do they jump into an atmosphere? 🙂 hehe

I know this is nit picking (but this is why I love science fiction! makes you think!) there is no such thing as "not moving" you always have a "direction of travel" there is no (known) "zero speed"

so when your moving at 10% C on a heading of 180 you also have to factor in the rotation of the galaxy and the movement of the galaxy and the expansion of the universe to create a composite "true heading" which will be quite different from your "perceived" heading (where you bow is pointing)

Fascinating to think about this stuff.

Any idea when the audio of book 10 is coming out? I don't like "switching mediums" in the middle and the voices are quite good. 🙂 its driving me nuts knowing I have to wait nearly 2 years to get through the next 6 books!! Grrrrrr 🙂

Gee, Chris, why don't you just bring up inertial frames of reference and be done with it? This is why I wanted a 'Black Hole' forum, where we could discuss (among other things) what changes to the laws of physics would be needed to make certain things work.

While a star instantly changing to a black hole wouldn't affect its solar system gravity-wise, there are two things I notice. First, the jump drive seems strangely attracted to very steep gradients of gravity wells. Second, the process of turning from a morbidly obese star into a black hole can be rather messy. Novas throw all sorts of matter and junk around.

Chris,

Um... Not so sure you are right on the Black Hole mass being equal to mass before the formation of the black hole.... or that the radiation given off by the formation of the black hole is all contained... Even if all energy was contained inside the black hole AFTER it was formed... I believe a massive explosion would likely be required to form it and that would certainly have severe impact on planets.

In addition, NASA has published observed examples of spinning black holes releasing massive amounts of heat and energy:
http://science1.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2001/ast23oct_1/

That energy could certainly crack planets if the spin is sufficient.... Stars rotate, and the increase in rotational speed would be extreme if an object the size of the sun (about 865,000 miles) were compressed to the few miles across it would be as a black hole.

If you are trying to conserve fuel, using gravity assists is probably the best way to do it in a somewhat timely manner. You could even use the jump drive to correct your outbound trajectory if it needs to change, as long as the change can be made on the plus side of the jump (time after the jump).

Using gravity assists, you could make a weapon out of an orbiting asteroid, or even jump an asteroid from solar system to solar system. That is of course assuming that you have all of the 'gravity wells' documented that could pull your jumping asteroid to its death. I would think the asteroid base would use this method to get to Earth, if it comes to Earth that is.

Makes you kind of wonder how many emitters are needed per square meter on the basic geometric shapes. If there is a more efficient shape for jump ships, then it is likely that new cargo ships would be designed specifically for the jump capability using the more efficient shapes. Probably something that the Aurora will not be able to figure out, but I'm sure that Deliza or someone else in PC will look into it. Same shapes used for least amount of jump emitters, might also be the same shapes that need the least amount of shield emitters as well, so the data might be in the data ark.

Ok. Jump emitters on the hull took the place of previous FTL drive emitters that created a similar field, so shapes would have been just as important, or not at all and perhaps it has to do with total mass or surface area or displacement. Besides, we must consider shape and surface area for things like cargo capacity, hull mounts, etc.

Next, black holes emit much more radiation after formation than the star that formed them because of the nuclear reactions happening inside the hole much more frequently due to the maximal compression of matter. The star likely would have ejected its outer layers during death throws, which would have destroyed planets, disrupted orbits, etc.

Since mass is a universal constant and matter is not destroyed and energy is always conserved, anything that is absorbed by a black hole increases its mass, therefore increasing gravity and potential nuclear reaction fuel which increases energy output from the hole via radiation.

The ship jumps along direction of travel, regardless of orientation of the ship. If the ship were to yaw 90 degrees right while carrying previous inertia, then direction of travel would be left subjective to the ship. So, when jumping, the ship would jump along the direction of travel and remain oriented at a 90 degree yaw.

I like to think that the jump drive would instantly displace all matter at the instant it jumps in, which creates the jump flash, because there is always matter, whether it be alpha particles or some kind of stellar dust. If a ship were to displace something solid, say a rock or other ship, there would be dramatic consequences. As to why if can't jump THROUGH matter, perhaps it has to do with projecting something from the initial point. It may have been more accurate to state that they can't jump through solid phase matter (or shields since they act like solid phase matter? Or not since they are in fact energy? ) because the drive can't project through something.

I know I sound like a geek here, but I guess the point I want to make is to just enjoy the books and let Ryk do his research and write his story how he wants.

A week or so ago I asked Mr Brown several questions, which he answered to satisfaction. I have since bought all, 11, of the books. Hope you made a few dollars out of it Mr. Brown. Having had command aboard ships, and 22 years in the USMC I thought Natahn was a bit of a wimp. He should have put a screeching halt to the two womens insubordination. Ah...let me suspend my disbelief. Good story.
JSL

My thoughts on space ship shape is that despite the cool designs we all know and love (X-Wings, BSG, whatever) that spherical design offers the best ratio of mass (hull plating) to capacity. It all comes back to that. Flatten the design and you sacrifice the volume of the inside, or you add to the mass of the hull.

Spherical ships are boring, but that is what the physics say would be the most efficient.

Umm.. Have to disagree with the original poster. The reason a black hole is black is because the gravity is so great even the light cannot escape. Remember... Google is your friend...

A week or so ago I asked Mr Brown several questions, which he answered to satisfaction. I have since bought all, 11, of the books. Hope you made a few dollars out of it Mr. Brown. Having had command aboard ships, and 22 years in the USMC I thought Natahn was a bit of a wimp. He should have put a screeching halt to the two womens insubordination. Ah…let me suspend my disbelief. Good story.
JSL

On the other hand, Nathan was not expecting to get any command for a LONG time. He's still adjusting while flying by the seat of his pants.