Hello Phil,
I have the core books for the following: CT, MT, TNE, T4, GT, T20, and MgT.
The CT and MT 'canon' states that a Black Globe that exceeds the storage capacity of a CT jump capacitor or MT energy sinks destroys the ship. I'll have to dig through the other five to check their 'canon' rules. CT 'canon' and MT 'canon' indicate that misjumps occur under certain conditions. CT requirements can be found in LBB 2 1977, 1981 and in LBB 5 HG 2e 1980. MT Referee's manual when I searched my PDF using misjump found references to the word but no details like CT. The other five I'll have to dig through.
Part of the "hair-splitting" is due to my thinking that a TL 14 JD5 was being used at TL 15 instead of a TL 15 JD5 drive. My apologies for not catching on sooner.
However, there are still differences in performance of the JD with and without the drop tanks.
A 1,000 ton hull using a TL 15 JD5 carrying a full fuel load internally can make one five parsec jump or any combination of jumps that equal 5 parsecs that takes approximately one week.
A 1,000 ton hull using a TL 15 JD5 carrying an internal fuel load for 2 parsecs can only make one 2 parsec jump or any combination of jumps that equal 2 parsecs that takes approximately one week.
A 1,000 ton hull using a TL 15 JD5 carrying an internal fuel load for 2 parsecs needs J3 tons of fuel to make a 5 parsec jump. Drop tanks with fuel for 3 parsec jump are added. Consuming the J3 fuel and jettisoning the drop tanks and the J2 fuel allows the 1,000 ton hull to make one 5 parsec jump. Consuming all the J3 fuel and jettisoning the drop tanks allows a 3 parsec jump that takes approximately one week.
A 1,000 hull tonnage plus the J3 drop tanks changes the tonnage that the TL 15 JD5 has to move through jump space. The jump will be greater than the J2 internal fuel provides but it will not jump the maximum of 5 parsecs when they are retained during jump.
Yes, with drop tanks the range of the 1,000 ton hull carrying part of the fuel required for a maximum jump will increase the range depending on if they retained while jumping or jettisoned before jumping. The increase depends on the being the tanks being retained or jettisoned during the jump.
Tom Rux
On October 9, 2019 at 3:51 AM "Phil Pugliese (via tml list)" <xxxxxx@simplelists.com> wrote:
Well that very much depends on exactly what 'canon' you are using to explain how a jump drive operates.
Since this *is* the TU there are of course the usual contradictions.
In any case I feel that it's hair-splitting to maintain that there's a difference 'tween a TL15 jump drive mounted in a hull w/ demountable external tanks & one mounted in a hull originally w/o the tanks.
I believe that in both cases, the striped-down (w/o external tanks) versions will be able to jump further providing that enough fuel is on hand.
And that's what drop-tanks are for.