mechs: possibilities, thoughts, discussion

necro · Post by **necro** » Sun 05 Mar, 2006 9:27 pm

Well, IMO: mechs are very cool. In fact, in just about everyones opinions, mechs are the shizle. So, lets discuss.

As far as mech are concerened, full movement and leg design is often considered unlikely for large crafts do to a single main factor: gravity. But, as a possible solution, if the main body was partialy or fully bouyent, legs could easily jump and clamber as they wanted. Think of an armored baloon with jointed limbs and weapons. As far as way to achieve bouyancy, the main options are vacume chamber, hydrogen, and helium (in order of effectiveness.) All have negatives, but H2 is the most problamatic...as it violently reactes with oxygen and other substances. Helium is heavier, and unlike H2 and a vacume, would be dependant on be refueled with more He for any that it lost through leakage. Vacumes have the maximal possible bouyancy, but a material capable of sustaing its shape and still be light enough to be plossible is a problem. With new materials like carbon fibers though, a ultralight self supporting vacume envelope could be possible I believe. If so, you could increase or decrease the size of the envelope to inrease or decrease the bounacy and as such, alow for lift and decent.

To me, this seems a plossible way to make large scale mechanoids...what are your thoughts? (On this and other issues)

CoBB · Post by **CoBB** » Sun 05 Mar, 2006 9:50 pm

There is a good reason why people don't grow several metres tall: it's physically implausible. The smaller a body is, the more mobile you can make it. It is a very simple relation in action, namely that mass is proportional to the cube of height (volume), while the force of muscles (either synthetic or natural) only to the square of height (surface). Gravity is just one of the factors you have to tackle, but you also have to struggle with your own inertia when making a movement.

Every construct has its optimum size. Humanoid bodies are conceivable probably between half a metre and three metres (just making up these numbers, although I don't think they are far from reality). Outside this domain they would be a bad bet. My intuition say you'd need at least four legs if not more, no wonder elephants aren't walking upright.

Post by **Kozak** » Sun 05 Mar, 2006 10:06 pm

How do you define large scale?

Dinosaurs have proved that you can move quite fast on two legs even if you are really big.

Dinosaur shaped mechs are the only shapes that could have a future but I don't think they are very usefull. They are easy to demobilize.

necro · Post by **necro** » Sun 05 Mar, 2006 10:10 pm

the thing about a two legged two armed desing is that we could map the vehicles movents and controlls directly from a pilots movements and reactions. If a vehicle had effectively a few hundred ponds of weight or bouancy, you could effectively throw convenetion about people tipping and the dificulty of movement. (I wish i could run simulations in this respect, alas...I have a limmited knowledge of physics and even more limmited experience in such complex programming)

I'd clasify things like this: I made a booboo
Small scale: under 5 yards in height
Medium scale: 5 to 30 yards
Large scale: 30 to 100 yards
Giant Scale: 100 yards or greater
Massive: Mile or larger

dysfunction · Post by **dysfunction** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 2:15 am

Um... a mile tall mech is what you call massive? And SMALL is under 15 YARDS? 45 feet is pretty darn big my friend, that's tree-size you're talking about. Small scale would probably be more like 10 feet and under. Actually, Japanese inventors built a mech you can buy for about as much as a car. It's around 10-15 feet tall IIRC, and can shoot rubber pellets. It only moves at about the same speed as a human, though, and is basically useless. What is really interesting is the progress in mechanical armor technology, for soldiers or injured people. We already have "suits" that can triple your lifting capacity.

KevinJB · Post by **KevinJB** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 2:34 am

To be honest, I don't think Necro realizes what he's saying when he talks about 15 yards and a mile.

Andy_J · Post by **Andy_J** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 2:50 am

A mile? Please. Do you realize you jumped from 100 yards to 1760 yards? I'd put "massive" at 200 yards, personally -- not like even that would be very plausible.

Liazon · Post by **Liazon** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 4:43 am

dysfunction wrote:Um... a mile tall mech is what you call massive? And SMALL is under 15 YARDS? 45 feet is pretty darn big my friend, that's tree-size you're talking about. Small scale would probably be more like 10 feet and under. Actually, Japanese inventors built a mech you can buy for about as much as a car. It's around 10-15 feet tall IIRC, and can shoot rubber pellets. It only moves at about the same speed as a human, though, and is basically useless.

I believe most mechs in the Gundam series are around 16 meters, or was it around 50 feet? either way, that must be huge. #s are hard for me to comprehend.

What is really interesting is the progress in mechanical armor technology, for soldiers or injured people. We already have "suits" that can triple your lifting capacity.

Master Chief, Samus Aran, any of those would be cool.
what I find interesting is the debate over bioenhancement vs. biomechanical enhancement. Performance enhancing stimulants vs. performance enhancing exosuits. who knows which will be the better technology.

off topic:

my very first calc project will be a very VERY VERY VERY simple strategy game involving mechs. it is so simple that I bet any of you can code it in a day. unfortunately for me, I rarely have a day to work on any programming stuff, and the GUI is really annoying me. I can't decide how I want it to look.

edit: if anybody wants to contribute large 4 level greyscale 50x50 max sprites, go ahead.

Spencer · Post by **Spencer** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 5:39 am

Liazon wrote:around 16 meters, or was it around 50 feet?

Those are the same.

Spengo · Post by **Spengo** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 6:03 am

Like I posted in omnimaga:

clicky

Arcane WIzard · Post by **Arcane WIzard** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 12:50 pm

Put them on the moon and weight will be less of an issue.

But less gravity will result in lower walking speeds, or they'd launch themselves into orbit all the time. Rather expensive to test.

Timendus · Post by **Timendus** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 12:55 pm

I was thinking the same thing about Necro's initial armored baloon idea. Without gravity, you can't get the neccessary frictional force for movement. So unless you really want to make it fly, just making it lighter will certainly have it's downside.

Nice videos by the way, Spengo

dysfunction · Post by **dysfunction** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 2:17 pm

Those are just plain awesome

kalan_vod · Post by **kalan_vod** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 3:08 pm

Dude I want one for my birth day!!! Wow, that is plain sick right there! Yeah if reminds me of Robocop but with a person inside (the movie not robocop himself). Or the movie Alien! Well it would be useful in the military to!!

Post by **tr1p1ea** » Mon 06 Mar, 2006 3:15 pm

Wow imagine your kids having a 'Nerf-War' in the back yard with those things!

As far as any 'real' use for them ... i dont know if the production cost would be worth it. Sure would intimidate an enemy though.