Re: (TFT) Thoughts on Cidri

["Quite Confused" <Confused3141@hotmail.com>]

100 times the surface area isn't really possable. It's allong the same lines
as Dan mentions in his reply;

<<BIG planets
such as the kind they describe for Cidri have their own
problems: if the radius were ten times the size of earth,
you'd need a much lower density in order to maintain 1G at
the surface, then you'd have to worry about people jumping
up into the air and launching themselves into orbit, etc.>>

except that 1G = exactally the earths gravity at sea level at the equator.
Nobodys jumping anywhere. If Jupiter was just a hair bigger it'd be a brown
dwarf (it's already radio bright) if the earth was 100 times the surface
area but only dense enough to hold a 1G surface acceleration it'd spin it's
self apart in short order. Details to follow tonight.

Jay
<<To busy to think of something cute to quote>>


> These demon-launching thought experiments have got me to thinking a bit
about Cidri itself.  For starters, how big is it?  We're told it's BIG,
apparently the original idea was 'big enough that everyone's campaigns can
fit on it, all in their own areas'--or, at the very least, big enough that
an essentially unlimited number of settings could theoretically be placed on
it.
>
> All very nice, but it doesn't mean much.  Just throwing some numbers
around I decided to see how big a planet would be if it had 100 times the
surface area of earth.  I came up with a radius roughly ten times that of
the earth.  That leads me to two notions:
>
> If Cidri is a planet ten times the radius of the earth, it seems to me
that it would have to rotate ten times as fast as the earth in order for
each 'day' to be 24 hours long.  Now while I'm no physicist, I know that on
earth its easiest to launch things from the equator because of the momentum
you get from the earth's rotation.  Und zo...if the rotation is ten times
faster, that might make the lauch a good deal easier, ja?  Since the gravity
is apparently only 1G and all...
>
> Goodness knows what else would be affected by having a planet this size.
The horizon would probably be about 200 miles away, and climate would either
have to be produced artificially or not vary significantly across HUGE
areas.
>
> But who says it's a sphere at all?  It could be flat, I suppose, since
those Mnoren are so dashed clever and all.  If it were a flat object, but
still roatating and revolving around a star, you could get a day night
cycle, albeit with a very abrupt sunset/sunrise.  If it were 'corrugated' to
some degree that could perhaps give regional climate variation,although it
might be easier to do that by tinkering with the atmosphere to make some
areas reflect more sunlight than others.
>
> Of course, a ringworld or dyson sphere are always possible, but it's hard
to give things an 'earth-like' appearance to to the residents with either of
those set-ups.
>
> What I'm thinking, though, is that maybe it's a cylinder.  This seems to
be the easiest way to get a huge area with earthlike rotation speeds and
sunset-sunrise patterns.  Climate variation could again be done with
corrugations, or with atmosphere tinkering.
>
> Just some thoughts.
>
> Stan

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