Long Range Communications

[stormlion1]

We once played a game where we needed to enter Philadelphia and scout out and repair if possible a transmitter antenna and a repeater atop on of the surviving skyscrapers. Actually a interesting game as not only did we have to get into the city, which bore a striking resemblance to "Escape From New York" and "Cloverfield" in parts but had to ascend to the top of a surviving skyscraper. Actually pretty fun except for when we wrote out our equipment lists for the ascent no one wrote down the tools and parts we were going to need.

[Project_Sardonicus]

When I first read about the Morrow Project the communications system seemed fine.
But now well doesn't it seem a little primitive, this organisation with all it's amazing super technology keeping in touch via morse code and long range radio chat.

So what I was considering was the project had an early version of the world wide web. Not so much team members getting proto ipads, but rather an ambitious scheme to lay fibre optic cable across the nation. Each time a deep drainage or electrical cable was laid the project gets to add some extra cabling.

Then various, not all bolt holes get a computer station to communicate with prime base. I'm thinking very much 70s, 80s tec green flickering screen solid units. And like the early telex systems that linked NATO bunkers these systems can be redirected to go around disabled hubs. The idea being the recon team members spent a couple of weeks recording data and making observations. Then goto their hub and upload the data to prime base.

With the project having small human resources, much of this would be filling in standardised forms which are then processed by alogrythms.

In addition there's a supplementary radio system that can send even smaller amounts of data, but is very much a predecessor of the 3/4g world we live in.
An interesting system being that this would allow prime base or rather the central computer that is running these algorythms to update the nav comp.

So if the team is doing well or has a need it may gift them locations of new bolt holes, perhaps containing exciting new gear. If however their reports are slack, or erratic or in other ways they seem to have gone rogue. Then they may find the nav comp wiped, their fusion bottle shutdown and if their behaviour indicates they've been wiped out gone over to the dark side or what ever. Then perhaps the fusion bottle it's self is detonated, the assumption being such valuable treasure would be kept at the very heart of the enemies citadel.

Certainly if one is looking to prevent teams going gun happy, then having to lug around kilos of camera equipment, laptops and other gear to do their weekly reports may reduce capacity for bullets. A

[mikeo80]

Originally Posted by stormlion1

We once played a game where we needed to enter Philadelphia and scout out and repair if possible a transmitter antenna and a repeater atop on of the surviving skyscrapers. Actually a interesting game as not only did we have to get into the city, which bore a striking resemblance to "Escape From New York" and "Cloverfield" in parts but had to ascend to the top of a surviving skyscraper. Actually pretty fun except for when we wrote out our equipment lists for the ascent no one wrote down the tools and parts we were going to need.

I am from Philadelphia. It would be hard to find ANYTHING left. IF you go with V3 rules, Philly got a 25 MT SS-18, and a SS-N-17. Depending on exact hit points, maybe something left...Somewhere. I will look at V4 later to see what the new version says Philly got.

According to the Travel Guide out of the Supply Bunker Website, Philly had a little left down by the Airport. By definition, not many high rises near airport.

http://www.thesupplybunker.net/Trave...nsylvania.html

My $0.02

Mike

[stormlion1]

Man its been a while since we played that game, I think the building was described as "leaning, and not a single intact window left above the third floor" and lots of fire damage. Actually a lot of buildings were described as still standing, but plenty were described as leaning against each other for support and melted glass being piled waist high in the streets in spots around there bases. I just remember leaving the vehicle west of Boathouse row and hiking in with the gear. Just for fun, City Hall did survive and was practically a fortress of a cannibal tribe.

Main thing had been to bring a surviving antenna online so it could act as a repeater along the East Coast. Morse Code was used heavily as a medium as it was harder for groups without knowledge of it to decode. But the main thing was to bring surviving communications infrastructure online to supplement the Projects own communication infrastructure that we had to put up ourselves.

[robj3]

Communications concepts:
1. Meteor burst radio/data - using ionisation tracks caused by meteors as they burn up in the upper atmosphere.

Several thousand kilometre range as previously discussed here:
http://forum.juhlin.com/showthread.php?t=2688

2. EME (Earth-Moon-Earth) communication
Using the Moon as a reflector - eliminates need for satellites, global range when the Moon is in the sky at each location.

wiki entry is a good start:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth-M..._communication

pdf from Princeton is excellent but potentially too detailed:
http://physics.princeton.edu/pulsar/...E_2010_Hbk.pdf

Summary is that 1-2m diameter satellite dishes are usable, or ~12-15 foot yagi antennas.

Data rates wouldn't be too bad with modern digital comms (think dial-up, not broadband or LTE type speeds).

You could use inflatable satellite dishes, as manufactured by GATR:
www.GATR.com

30kg kit runs on compressed air to make a 1.2m diameter satellite 'dish'.

I don't like ELF because of the geological, power and size restrictions on transmitter siting. The receiver antennae would need to be pretty large for the boltholes to get messages.

[Gelrir]

Actually, SLF receivers can be very small.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_low_frequency

Yup, transmitter requires 10s of kilometers of "power line on poles"; the Project has hidden bigger things. The Project has large amounts of electrical power.

I think the biggest issue with an SLF or ELF system: the chance of being mistaken by the Soviet Union for some sort of secret backup to the Navy's communications systems. "Look, Comrade-General, the Americans think we won't notice their secret strategic transmitter system."

Any system requiring above-ground antennae or dishes isn't good for communication with boltholes.

There are a lot of systems to use once you've waked the team up. The basic PRC-70 radio isn't really a "pick up the handset and talk to any other PRC-70 in North America", but for Morse code and low-rate modem transmission it's not too bad.

--
Michael B.

[robj3]

Michael B. wrote:

Actually, SLF receivers can be very small.

Sure - but I wasn't talking about vaguely efficient antennae that sit above ground level.

Any system requiring above-ground antennae or dishes isn't good for communication with boltholes.

Not necessarily; antennae can be disguised. The problem is with redundancy. Weather, earthquakes, nearby nuke detonations, fires, etc. could damage above ground equipment.

Large antennae aren't required. The SNOTEL network in the Western U.S. is a good example of an operating meteor-burst comms system.

I don't like Project satellites or ELF comms capability for lots of reasons and I agree with this:

I think the biggest issue with an SLF or ELF system: the chance of being mistaken by the Soviet Union for some sort of secret backup to the Navy's communications systems.

[Gelrir]

An ELF system for initial team wakeup-and-orders has a couple of useful gaming features:

• the team knows they probably can't turn on their radio and call back
• direction finding for ELF signals is not trivial, so Prime Base (or at least the antenna array) won't be found easily after the Atomic War. And even if you do direction-finding, you 'just' find the area with the big rocks underground, heh.

The entire antenna system can be buried underground; the Navy was gonna do that, but it was too expensive. I wonder if a North-America-only system might be more suitable for an underground antenna? An organization with powerful cutting lasers might find making an underground antenna a bit easier.

A useful description of the Navy's first ELF system:

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j...60444564,d.cGU

Note the coverage areas in the first big "Seafarer" map, and the labels: Michigan (where the ELF system was eventually built), New Mexico, and Nevada (where PB is located).

Info on ELF direction finding:

http://www.vlf.it/minimal2/minimal2.html

A limitation for the Morrow Project: they probably wouldn't ever want to transmit on their big ELF antenna before the Atomic War. Also, the antenna needs to be placed at a location with a wide (kilometers long) ancient granite.

Hmm, from a Geological Society bulletin: " ... The Precambrian complex of the Gold Butte-Bonelli Peak area [in Nevada] is about 25 by 35 km and consists of gray porphyritic perthite-quartz-biotite granites and quartz monzonites (adamellites) that intrude Precambrian garnet-cordierite-sillimanite and hornblende gneisses, migmatites, and older granites, pyroxenites, and hornblendites. These younger granites strikingly resemble the Finnish rapakivi granites geologically, petrographically, and chemically. They are exposed over an area approximately 20 by 30 km and represent the roof of a batholith with numerous stocks, dikes, roof pendants, inclusions, and plutonic breccias."

More info on Gold Butte:

http://mrdata.usgs.gov/geology/state...unit=NVYgr%3B0

http://angeles.sierraclub.org/dps/archives/dps00514.htm

Gold Butte is a ghost town on the Nevada/Arizona border.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Butte,_Nevada

The mesa has very old granite, the basic requirement for an ELF transmitter. According to page 12 of this book:

http://books.google.com/books?id=QJk...nevada&f=false

... that's about the only Precambrian granite in Nevada, so quite likely the Navy's (not-taken) choice.

--
Michael B.