NS Military Worldbuilding Thread No. 12

[The Manticoran Empire]

I don't understand why you wouldn't just pack a shipping container with tents, camouflage nets, and plywood if you really needed a mobile and modular housing unit.

Tents are not meant as permanent habitation. Rather, they are only intended to serve as shelters for a couple of days before the unit moves on. When you have a FOB, you need more permanent structures. Purp has a point in the advantages of repurposing shipping containers as prefab base structures, especially since you can stack them on top of each other and arrange them in different ways to achieve different tasks. Not to mention they are cheap and can be transported by basically any cargo ship.

[Eukaryotic Cells]

Camp Lemonnier is one example of a base with containerized housing.

EDIT: Cheesy Navy video talking about housing on base

[Triplebaconation]

I don't understand why you wouldn't just pack a shipping container with tents, camouflage nets, and plywood if you really needed a mobile and modular housing unit.

Tents are not meant as permanent habitation. Rather, they are only intended to serve as shelters for a couple of days

Seems like a lot of trouble for a couple of days.

The disadvantages of hauling around lots of empty metal boxes are obvious, although of course there are slightly more efficient collapsible containerized shelters available.

The best things to containerize are physical plant, kitchens, etc.

[Gallia-]

Dumbla being a MUSCULAR society only puts the nuclear fuel depot plants in containers. (:

[Triplebaconation]

Septic tanks are probably a better idea.

Also note that the walls and roof of a shipping container aren't load-bearing structures. There's a good chance of buckling when you bury one.

By the time you add all the reinforcement and ventilation ducts and everything you're probably just better off with a PVC prefab.

[Gallia-]

I was just thinking of burying it behind a dirt escarpment or sth idk and stretching some net over the top I guess.

I guess if the roof really needs to be covered then yeah it's kinda dumb. ):

[Triplebaconation]

Walls aren't really that strong.



Also commercial shipping containers have plywood floors which aren't great for underground. You could probably build a prefab bunker that looks like a shipping container but it's not going to be as cheap as one or PVC.

[Gallia-]

urghhhhhh

[Triplebaconation]

Lateral earth pressure

[Gallia-]

cant i just drop it in a revetment held up with 2x4s and sheet metal urhghgurghhhh

if a howitzer can do it why cant 25 megawatts blehhhh

whatever ill just put some traffic cones around it and caution tape

"stay this far back"

(:

[Triplebaconation]

I guess you could put one in a revetment but this isn't a big advance over a Nissen hut as far as accommodations go.

Holos was supposed to be the size of a shipping container but it wasn't a shipping container - armored and shielded, then buried and surrounded by water jackets.

[Purpelia]

I was thinking of making them armored by reinforcing everything until they are splinter proof. So that would probably help with the structure. Basically my idea here isn't for this to be something that replaces a proper garrison base or tents. It's to be the inbetween thing. The stuff where you have say a division parked on the front lines, part of its forces are on the actual front and part are in the rear resting. And that rest means having them pulled back to a crappy village somewhere far enough behind that the artillery can't get them to sit in some commandeered houses and annoy the locals. Well instead, you'd park a small fleet of containers there for them and use those. Also like for quickly setting up field hospitals, comm stations and such as it beats a tent.

This said, I do like the idea of having them be collapsible dovetailed things that you ship in bulk and assemble. Especially for stuff like sleeping boxes where all you really need is some hammocks inside the walls. It's a war after all, not a holiday.

[New Vihenia]

Methinks about nuclear powered Subterrene Barracks.

[Triplebaconation]

Also like for quickly setting up field hospitals, comm stations and such as it beats a tent.

Modern military shelters are generally better in nearly all respects and much faster than setting up shipping containers.

They're also about 200-250 times better in terms of floor area versus volume shipped.

[Purpelia]

Also like for quickly setting up field hospitals, comm stations and such as it beats a tent.

Modern military shelters are generally better in nearly all respects and much faster than setting up shipping containers.

They're also about 200-250 times better in terms of floor area versus volume shipped.

Do tell more.

[Triplebaconation]

A good modern shelter tent is going to be insulated, have integrated electrical wiring and lighting, optional raised floors, and medical tents will have overpressure systems. Much more spacious and comfortable than a container.

A few guys without heavy equipment can set one up in 10 minutes to an hour depending on size and you can fit 16 240-sqf shelters into one 20-ft shipping container - more likely they'll just be on a pallet.

You can't just plop down shipping containers anywhere. You have to level the ground, build some kind of foundation, then use forklifts or something to move them around even when they're not armor-plated, which is kind of silly since you can just build a wall of sandbags or gabions around them. Dirt is free.

Of course you could just go full buckminster or use inflatable concrete tents.

[Purpelia]

A good modern shelter tent is going to be insulated, have integrated electrical wiring and lighting, optional raised floors, and medical tents will have overpressure systems. Much more spacious and comfortable than a container.

A few guys without heavy equipment can set one up in 10 minutes to an hour depending on size and you can fit 16 240-sqf shelters into one 20-ft shipping container - more likely they'll just be on a pallet.

You can't just plop down shipping containers anywhere. You have to level the ground, build some kind of foundation, then use forklifts or something to move them around even when they're not armor-plated, which is kind of silly since you can just build a wall of sandbags or gabions around them. Dirt is free.

Of course you could just go full buckminster or use inflatable concrete tents.

Ok, you have me convinced.

[Danternoust]

Not... Backhoes digging underground shelters and putting the dirt into hesco bastions?

Underground shelters have been used since WWI, not including mining warfare.

Also note that the walls and roof of a shipping container aren't load-bearing structures. There's a good chance of buckling when you bury one.

The roof is meant to carry the weight of half a dozen fully laden containers above it. I would believe there is a lack of lateral strength though.

[Austrasien]

The roof is meant to carry the weight of half a dozen fully laden containers above it. I would believe there is a lack of lateral strength though.

It isn't.

It has got a frame.

[The Corparation]

Not... Backhoes digging underground shelters and putting the dirt into hesco bastions?

Underground shelters have been used since WWI, not including mining warfare.

Also note that the walls and roof of a shipping container aren't load-bearing structures. There's a good chance of buckling when you bury one.

The roof is meant to carry the weight of half a dozen fully laden containers above it. I would believe there is a lack of lateral strength though.

Due to the design of the containers the roof doesn't actually bear much of that load. The weight of stacked containers is almost entirely borne by the walls and corners.

Once you actually start applying force to the actual roof of a container it doesn't take much for it to start to give

[Purpelia]

Jesus. That's like less than half a meter.

[Triplebaconation]

All the weight of a stack of shipping container is borne by the corner posts. The floor of one doesn't actually touch the roof of another.

[Purpelia]

All the weight of a stack of shipping container is borne by the corner posts. The floor of one doesn't actually touch the roof of another.

I know that. But I imagined that the design would be such that more of the force is distributed more efficiently down the sides. Although in hindsight with a box design and no internal girders that was a stupid expectation to have. I mean there is literally nothing in there that would facilitate such a transfer of weight nor is there any good design reason why there should be such a feature. And half a meter of dirt is actually bloody heavy when you think about it.

[Danternoust]

So... we reinvent snow-weather technology and put a pitched roof on top?

I think someone drove over that shipping container, dirt does distribute weight well, otherwise everything is quicksand.

[Almadaria]

Going to dive into a field I never have wanted to before and still don't-- what are the strengths and weaknesses of different radar bands (X, L, MMW, etc.) in military applications?

For example, which types of radar bands would perform best for the aircraft detection facilities of a naval vessel?

Are there any radar bands one can effectively ignore?

I apologize if this is too vague a question, I have no clue what I'm talking about. I'm just here to name warships that don't exist after funny Spanish men.