15 replies to this topic

[Koniving]

It says its a 1/20th scale. Assuming the man is 6 feet, what can you get? Trying to use MrInitialMan the scale site... but when I match up the man with this man, the figure for the mech far exceeds the height of the mech. But when matching up with the mech, the man doesn't match up. So I'll let you guys work your magic and tell me the canonical height of the Marauder.

I got a Glaug model recently, states it is 16.55 meters tall. Too tall for a mech (also 41.2 tons).
So I figured take 4 off, around 12.5 to 12.55 meters. Makes it just a bit smaller in overall height than the Timber Wolf. But, then I stumbled upon the blueprint above.

Good luck, and for fun I'll post others for comparison, as while BT does stick to the source heights of many Dougram mecha, those of Macross changed.

[Karl Streiger]

See that the laser uses the same mechanism as the PPC and the AC as well.
Thats the issue with RoboTech vehicles as proxys for BattleTech. The Glaug Pod has 4 ACs (the arm) and a single particle beam (the turret).

Also the pod is to small for the legs and arms - its the most iconic BattleMech and its the worst from the concept.

but maybe you can answer me another Marauder related question is the GM Whirlwind = Whirlwind (Marauder-Wolverine AC)

Edited by Karl Streiger, 09 July 2019 - 05:30 AM.

[Koniving]

Karl Streiger, on 09 July 2019 - 05:29 AM, said:

Also the pod is to small for the legs and arms - its the most iconic BattleMech and its the worst from the concept.

One of my ideas for reworking the design is to cut off the forearm (as the design counts the arm weapon pods as the 'hands' when compared to the arm of any humanoid), changing the weapon pods to instead be the forearm (otherwise this thing could easily shoot behind itself by folding the arm, something the mech isn't supposed to do. In this regard, it'd be the same as the MWO design. (Catalyst's redesign keeps this for some strange reason). Then change the pelvis to be closer to the center of gravity, as the original pelvis makes absolutely no sense in both how it pivots (making it worthless as anything but a 'tilting' rotation as opposed to a directional rotation) or its placement when considering weight distribution.

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See that the laser uses the same mechanism as the PPC and the AC as well. Thats the issue with RoboTech vehicles as proxys for BattleTech. The Glaug Pod has 4 ACs (the arm) and a single particle beam (the turret).

Agreed. Apparently it was decided mid-illustration that the top cannon would be a ballistic weapon and the illustrator didn't get the memo and was like welp, firing pin! So uh, yeah, how does it load? Magic!

So yeah, from there I'd rework the cannon but keep it on top rather than to the right, with a turreted mount. I would, however, connect the top more so that there's a way to feed the cannon. It feeds by cassettes though a belt would be easier. Anyway, I'd set it up so that the cannon connects enough to the top of the mech that a cassette feed can reload the cannon, whether the cannon can reload in any direction OR has to return to a front facing to reload is an interesting question. The canon's hind-bulk would significantly increase if the ammo is kept on the cannon itself. BT has many references of weapons needing to 'lock' in a certain position in order to reload so it wouldn't be far fetched.

The next thing I had in mind is to shorten the lower legs. The BT redesign by Catalyst on the Sarna.net page has done this. In turn it makes the upper legs look longer. MWO's design has not, leaving the upper legs to look short and the lower legs to look exceptionally long.

MWO's Marauder is just under 16 meters, which I think is kinda comical actually. What I don't like is in both the MWO and Catalyst versions of the Marauder, the cockpit is placed where the visual sensors of the Macross model are. This irks me as it is center mass on the mech and incredibly vulnerable. I understand the placement as it allows for good sight of what's below the mech, however one mechs have monitors for this very reason and two, the Marauder should not be expected to engage infantry and targets below 90 meters and/or underneath it. A stomp should suffice, its speed (which is significantly higher than the Glaug's btw) should easily accomplish any distance requirements. Also no one in there right mind would deploy a Marauder without support; it's too expensive and too valuable. As such it should have no reason to position the pilot dead center mass, instead the pilot should be positioned higher to better take advantage of the dorsal cannon. I would place the pilot closer to the center of the torso, perhaps upper torso, rather than center mass (by center mass I mean the middle ground of the torso-and-pelvis at the nose, where the cockpits of both MWO and Catalyst's versions currently are).

Then I've got things about the turbines. It doesn't make sense to have them until the 3051 variant with jumpjets, and then we've got jets in the feet and forward jets in the torso [a very forward leaping mech, though the only depiction of the Marauder jumpjetting actually shows it flying like a jet; Battletech Sega Genesis, Mechwarrior 3050 Super Nintendo].


At least that's how I thought of it. However, the blueprint here shows that the turbines are related to heat exchangers...in other words, they're the heatsink exhausts... something that this mech seriously lacks in the blueprints when compared to many other mechs that have visible heat exhaust ports.

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but maybe you can answer me another Marauder related question is the GM Whirlwind = Whirlwind (Marauder-Wolverine AC)

Yes..and no. I've seen it be referred to as 120mm for the Wolverine, however, I can't recall the novel. As such with issues like that I created the Mount aspect of my mechs, so that an identically named weapon of identical function but a drastically different visual appearance in artwork could be a different 'mount' type. Marauder's for example would be an exclusive dorsal mount (or in the case of MW5 with MWO's model, a torso mount), while the 'same' gun on the Wolverine is an jettison-capable (if possible in MW5/Unreal engine) arm-external mount. (If the engine isn't capable of it or too complicated to do, all that's gonna translate to is that specific version is going to be 'quicker' to swap as opposed to one that needs to be mounted into the arm).

As such while I've seen them be identical in terms of ammunition at 120mm, in one novel it is 90mm.... In fact lemme get you the old list I had.

GM Whirlwind = 120mm (Thunder ridge Wolves on the border) -Marauder Unclear total, but 3-4 shots per second for a few seconds. Really inconsistent with other findings. General consensus is that it is 3 shots per rating. (Fairly certain a Wolverine was in one of these too).
GM Whirlwind = 50mm (killing field) -Marauder Unclear total. Burst fires. Seems over a dozen before pauses and a pause or two before cassette ejection/replenishing. Math suggests 15 shots at 0.33 damage.

Whirlwind = 60mm (Price of glory) -Wolverine, seems to be 12.
Whirlwind = 90mm (Wolves on the border) -Wolverine (Need to reread, forgot to write down!) Suggest 5 shot (1 damage/shot, AC/2's highest caliber is therefore 2 shots).

Though I believe it is the TechManual that lists AC/2's highest caliber though it may be other places, I know BattleTechnology from which TechManual heavily plagiarizes (er, I mean... derives from almost word for word) does put the highest end of AC/2s at 90mm... the highest I've ever actually found in a novel is 80mm and even then its a multi-shot weapon firing between bursts of a few rounds to half a dozen. My math puts it at 3 shots at 0.625 damage (which puts the SHK's Armstrong J11 AC/5 at 8 shots which in fact ties very well to its descriptions of 2-4 shot bursts and several bursts before 'folding back' to reload.

Anyway.
TL;DR: GM Whirlwind/5 for the Wolver is the same as the GM Whirlwind/5 for the Marauder? Now I can't say I've read every novel, in fact I've got less than 12 under my belt. But, I've got one novel that I can't name off the top of my head and for some reason didn't write down (I think its because it was also in the same one as a Marauder) saying yes, one saying no it's 90mm and one saying no it's 60mm.

So one yes, two no. Both of the novels that say no simply call it a "Whirlwind" rather than a "GM Whirlwind" or "GM Whirlwind/5"

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Now, how 'bout you help me by ballparking that height comparison?

Edited by Koniving, 09 July 2019 - 11:46 AM.

[Karl Streiger]

well a PPC as dorsal weapon and two large and two medium laser for the arms sound **** a solid marauder.

about the height- had started a remix of the Mad based on a mix of the pod the mwo mad and some reference pictures of the new cgl one. unfortunately they were lost in progress (thx to faulty backup)

ok as suspected: the MWO Mad torso could work well enough with a 57m³ torso volume.
This inclued the space for a 8m³ fusion engine (~13MW) and a 3m³ gyro, plus some space for other stuff.

The Glaug however at the current size of 16m only has a 44m³ torso - and its a little bit more complicated to put all the stuff there.


its only a rough estimate - i realize that I currently lack motivation for more.... sry

Edited by Karl Streiger, 10 July 2019 - 06:17 AM.

[Koniving]

You went pretty far off the deep end for a height comparison of the guy and the mech under the assumption the guy is 6 feet tall.

[Nightbird]

Density of foam anyways with that scale

[Karl Streiger]

Koniving, on 10 July 2019 - 12:13 PM, said:

You went pretty far off the deep end for a height comparison of the guy and the mech under the assumption the guy is 6 feet tall.

nope i totaly ignored that Demolisher crew guy.
the pod is large enough to fit a 12MW engine into it and make it possible to have a seat in the front. and there is hardly enough space. the mwo marauder torso still has 10 more m3

[Koniving]

Well, it claims to be scaled but it neither states the height of the pilot not the machine, just that at full poster size it is 1/20th scale.

So I printed it.
I produced it at half scale on 17"x11" engineering paper here at work and measured it out in inches down to the 1/16th, then converted to centimeters, doubled the number to make up for the printout being half the original size, then times by 20.

I got that the man was 146.05 cm tall.
So according to the scale he is just under 4 feet 8 inches tall.

The Marauder comes out to 1257.3 cm, 12.573 meters, or 41 feet and 3 inches.

Made printouts of many blueprints for comparisons and they all use different figures. Furthermore they have a striking resemblance to many Macross blueprints which might be why you don't see myomer muscles.

[Koniving]

Nightbird, on 10 July 2019 - 12:42 PM, said:

Density of foam anyways with that scale

Gotta remember they took a walking battle armor for a giant that's barely more than a chair, shrunk it since it towered over anything they made, and while the original is listed as about 41 tons for a pilot that's as tall as a machine for a human but weighs less than a ton, and then they used it for a 75 ton machine so of course it's not very suitable or dense. Also they recycled a huge chunk of the original blueprints in which most of the pod is a chair and barely more than battle armor with some motorworks and jumpjets. (All the weapons were self contained with their own power supplies.)

So yeah it's gonna be thin. What I am trying to get though is BT's original official Marauder height.

[Nightbird]

Koniving, on 10 July 2019 - 10:16 PM, said:

Gotta remember they took a walking battle armor for a giant that's barely more than a chair, shrunk it since it towered over anything they made, and while the original is listed as about 41 tons for a pilot that's as tall as a machine for a human but weighs less than a ton, and then they used it for a 75 ton machine so of course it's not very suitable or dense. Also they recycled a huge chunk of the original blueprints in which most of the pod is a chair and barely more than battle armor with some motorworks and jumpjets. (All the weapons were self contained with their own power supplies.)

So yeah it's gonna be thin. What I am trying to get though is BT's original official Marauder height.

Panzer VII, 100 Tons, density of steel, equal in volume of one of that marauder's legs.

What you have there in the OP is a giant hollow plastic model

Edited by Nightbird, 10 July 2019 - 10:23 PM.

[Koniving]

Nightbird, on 10 July 2019 - 10:22 PM, said:

Panzer VII, 100 Tons, density of steel, equal in volume of one of that marauder's legs.

What you have there in the OP is a giant hollow plastic model

You are thinking of the Maus and showing me the lowe.

https://en.m.wikiped...r_VII_L%C3%B6we
Panzer vii, 70 metric tons, 77 short tons which I believe BT uses short tons. The Maus which is significantly bigger is 100 tons, and still smaller than this mech even at the recent measurement.

Armor 40mm to 140mm thick and is made of steel. Steel, in the straight form, is considered to be quite inferior and significantly heavier than virtually all modern armor and required twice or more density to do quite a bit less than modern armor, without getting into more advanced techniques, I'm just talking straight compound materials.

Measuring the poster, it is 3 millimeters at half size 1/20th scale, so double it to be 100% 1/20 scale and times by 20. 6mm, 120mm.

Already it has more armor thickness than the sides, top, rear and turret of the panzer vii for that tiny space of hip armor.

Now some sections like the torso have thicker armor.Measuring dorsal armor need point H gives me 4mm, which is 8mm*20 for true size and it is 160mm thick. Thicker than your 70 (77?) ton tank.

Now add to this that ferro armor would be that thick plus a quarter more to get the same protection for less weight and bigger mechs for ferro makes good sense...but that's a side topic.

And this thickness still is in the same scale of the man wrle see being 4 feet 8 inches tall, so if we assume the man is 6 feet tall, this armor is hella thicc.

But, primitive armor is still better than anything sported in the 1080s in the BT universe so this mech would effectively laugh off that gun better than a standard mech can laugh off a Light Rifle.

You are thinking of the panzer Viii Maus.

Armor 150mm to 220mm hardened steel.

Now I know I am introducing this to the conversation but it is related as this provides similar protection.
The m1A2 Abrams uses a much lighter composite armor and thicknesses of up to 4 times what the Maus has, and despite not being solid steel the armor defense is general as good or superior against the weapons of the Maus's time. It is 60 short tons. This is also where the concept of ferro armor comes from as well as Endo steel including the fluff thereof. Since then we have cut thickness down and significantly improved protection while keeping it light.
Now imagine what we could do in another 500 years for about when the Marauder gets made.

Sorry for so many edits, autocorrect is a pain.

Edited by Koniving, 11 July 2019 - 12:12 AM.

[Nightbird]

I think I meant the Schwerer Löwe, the Maus is 188 tons. That been said, I'm more concerned about size inflation. These tanks have enough inner space for a crew of 6 so it's not exactly stuffed full. Modern composite armor which also includes depleted uranium armor can be more dense than plan steel.

All things considered, the volume of most BT schematics are pretty bad... even ignoring the equipment/weapons/engine, I'm not sure you can build something that large with light weight carbon fiber and still be within tonnage limits.

[Nightbird]

(I didn't use modern M1 because I wanted a 100 ton armored MBT type vehicle, but the density is about the same. M1 is lighter but shorter vertically so it can stack more front armor thickness)

Edited by Nightbird, 11 July 2019 - 12:20 AM.

[Koniving]

Nightbird, on 11 July 2019 - 12:14 AM, said:

I think I meant the Schwerer Löwe, the Maus is 188 tons. That been said, I'm more concerned about size inflation. These tanks have enough inner space for a crew of 6 so it's not exactly stuffed full. Modern composite armor which also includes depleted uranium armor can be more dense than plan steel.

All things considered, the volume of most BT schematics are pretty bad... even ignoring the equipment/weapons/engine, I'm not sure you can build something that large with light weight carbon fiber and still be within tonnage limits.

You're right, Maus is 207 short tons (could have sworn it was 100 tons... That's what I get for not confirming the Maus's weight, but also note how thin the Maus's armor appears. Keep in mind that despite the Maus's size, with the printout and stated scale of the Battletech Marauder [that the full size image is 1:20 scale, which the full size image requires a 22"x34" sheet/poster to fit it, being widthxheight. I had to have it print at 50% size and was able to get it to fit on an engineering 11x17" sheet.)
Edit: (I see I got side tracked in the middle of a sentence.)
"Keep in mind that despite the Maus's size, with the printout and stated scale of the Battletech Marauder blueprint, the Maus's length is 10.2 metres (33 ft 6 in) according to the wiki and 10.8 meters according to that scaled image above, when including the barrel. The Marauder's height when I measured out the scaled image is 12.753 meters, making it physically taller than the Maus is long, so while the armor seems thin, it really isn't.


The Lowe is 77 short tons ("as specified") as opposed to 100, though as designed it was 99...okay I got where you got 100 tons. (I'm certain the Maus as specified and designed were also different and yet that detail isn't thrown there or in any other tank...) (Battletech uses short tons). (Late night shift near the end and phone-based fact-seeking, yay.)

Still, the Marauder's got thicker armor in the section by point H (pictured below), and thicker than all but the front on its thigh (also pictured, look for red lines for points measured for armor thickness).



To repeat measurements in case if this is the only post being read without the history above:
Hip (thigh) armor thickness: 3mm measured at 50%, 6mm at 100% 1:20 scale, and at 1:1 scale, 120mm thick.
Point "H" Dorsal Armor: 4mm measured at on sheet at 50% image scale, 8mm at 100% image scale, 160mm thick.

Also pictured, shots from last night that I couldn't upload since the work computers can't browse "gaming sites" and uploading to my image host is a royal time-consuming pain from anything that is considered 'mobile'.



(Just showing that the ruler goes well beyond a foot for paper size, other side has 1/8th and 1/16 splits for inches.)

Anyway, the armor thickness of the M1 Abrams series is closer related to the fact that the armor is light and in part because its necessary for a comparable level of protection; The M1A1's armor (which is what I used the thickness of rather than the M1A2 as previously stated) is comprised heavily of ceramic materials filling the space between two sheets of hardened steel (if you read the concept of ferro armor, it's two layers of standard armor with a lot of 'filler' material, the ferro-fibrous material). The M1A2 thickness isn't specified but given its armor is a depleted uranium composite, well, it's likely nowhere near as thick.

The standard armor shown here in the blueprint is before the "hexagonal shedding plate sections" lore rewrite of later Battletech refluffing. Though not sure if it would be shown any differently than already shown (at the moment it looks like a solid piece of armor but littering the illustration with 'layers' of armor would lead to a filthy image rather than a clean one, much like how such displays lack any detailing of how the armor is attached to the frame or in many cases they often leave out the frame itself as instead the blueprint here and on the Maus both show its just magic space between the structure and the armor).

Now where the armor appears the thinnest is definitely the arms especially the tops of the weapon pods. The AC/5 itself gets better armor than the "hands" (weapon pods as the arms have shoulder, upper arm, forearm, and the pods themselves are placed after the wrists).

But, using the stated scale of 1:20, and accounting for my 50% size of that 1:20 (so the illustration I printed is actually just 1:40 scale), it's a lot thicker than you (and even I) might have thought. And that's with the measured man coming out to just shy of 4'8", and the mech coming out to 12.573 meters.

This still leaves the question...
Why is the man 4'8"? Who the hell uses a 4'8" man as a comparison? I know people were short, and I know as a 6'5" man that people are short...but I have only seen one man close to that and he's still over 5'.

But, what also bugs me is every blueprint uses a different person and STILL fails to expressly state the person's height.
One of them has a dude that, thanks to the unnecessary inclusion of shading details and general lack of clothing, "almost" looks to be fully nude with equipment on display (he's wearing boxers, boots, and a neuro helm). We'll get into that later when I do more measurements of other classic mechs since I went on a printing spree.
-----------------------

So, 12.573 meters is what I got if the scale is exactly what it states and measuring it out on paper and factoring the difference in size of the printout and the original (50% smaller than the original).
Now if we change the man from 4'8" to a reasonable height using math...
Know what, gonna use a ratio calculator and see what happens.

The Marauder, if the man was 6 foot tall, and using the same scale but assuming the man is 6 foot (182.88cm) tall... then the ratio of measurements before to the new assumed height makes the Marauder: 15.74358 meters tall. (That's rounded.) (Going to measure it tonight in milimeters for greater accuracy and drop the google conversions).

So. Since the Marauder would be too damn big even in spite of its smaller "pod" (body) when given that the tallest mech ever seen until 3070+ is the Executioner at 14.4 meters tall....
I guess we'll just swallow that FASA thought it was a good idea to put a 4'8" man in there to show us that some people of the future are just... a lot smaller.
(which I suppose makes sense, as its been speculated that long periods of time in space with low gravity over generations could lead to shrinking, and BT's dropships do not use artificial gravity, there's just the gravity generated by acceleration and deceleration).

So, 12.573 meters tall.
When I got my Glaug model, I figured it'd be fun to knick its size from 18+ meters down to 12.5 to 12.55 so that it'd be comparable to the Timber Wolf and see how to redesign it. So, pretty close.

And now that I've got my sizes, I can get some loose information about weapons that I didn't have as Magna Mk II lasers are next on my list. Although I've got another issue. Even with the 12:573 meters tall height and the man's height at 4'8" on the chart, that dorsal cannon bore is too damn big for a 120mm shell. Its amazing how they kept the thickness of the armor reasonably consistent, did so many neat details, and yet left out some of the obvious facts of the machine's equipment. Then again the fact that it was basically detailed out to be an energy canon and at the last second someone said "that's a ballistic cannon." "oh well, I got this. This emission rod is now the firing pin, done; nobody will ever scrutinize this."

If the laser/PPC isn't too big, I'll use those sizes for the MW5 Mercs mod on those weapons.

I find it kind of amusing that despite the inconsistencies between the madeup details and real world lasers, it saw fit to put a mini generator to amplify the energy sent to the laser in order increase the output, akin to lasers amplifying output and even the HBS Battletech's "charge" sound right before firing lasers. But virtually every MW game never even considered it...

Side note:
The Marauder has a Gerard-Kent P75-DS0 Ejection Seat Unit.
....that is ridiculously specific for a bit of "nobody cares" fluff. It's a damn chair.

Side note 2: The Warhammer schematic has brownie points with me, it features the main controls. Evidently Warhammer features separate individual arm-aiming controls.

Edited by Koniving, 11 July 2019 - 12:06 PM.

[Koniving]

Will follow up by EST morning with images and the like but some quick stuff.

Nearly naked pilot by Warhammer, 4'3".
Warhammer, 8.6 meters tall.... Couldn't make that if I wanted to. Side by side Warhammer is short as heck. I should note both blueprint posters are identically sized, printed at 50% size onto the same paper... Warhammer doesn't even get up to the lmich beyond the Marauder's thigh.

But to be fair that's height to top of head. 9.2 meters to highest point (srm). Wasp is taller.

Battlemaster dwarfs marauder. It's PPC is as thick as two Marauder PPCs.
Locust... Is taller than Warhammer.

My head hurts. They set them all to the same size poster, source images are identically sized and from the same source, all to the same scale (many of the figures are identical in height). All State they are 1:20 scale.

I'm even using calipers for precision measurements and doing it all in mm for the best precision possible.

Will say one thing. The armor attention to detail is impressive... But whever was establishing how big they are universally either didn't talk to each other or it was one guy in his basement that was like "this looks good, I think".

[Koniving]

Pilots are universally 4'8 (rounded up) for men and 4'3" for women in these scaled images.

BM doesn't appear rescaled at all. Haven't fully measured yet but it's roughly the scale of dougram's Big Foot.