Dongting Warship
It can be said that the layout of the warship equipped with Magnetic Shield is completely different from that of the Mountain-Class Warship, so humans must build new ones and must build new ships.
There are many reasons.
The first option was to make major modifications to the existing Mountain-Class Warship. Not only would that be time-consuming and laborious, it would be completely unfeasible.
The problem here is not just a design issue, but a combination of factors.
The propulsion system of the Mountain-Class Warship was also unable to support the surging energy required for the powerful magnetic field of the Magnetic Force shields, primarily because the Mountain-Class Warship were not large enough. It was impossible to fit a series of enormous Magnetic Field Generator inside while ensuring sufficient living space.
Of course, there's another reason why it's not big enough: the heavy Fusion Engine is really large.
The massive Magnetic Field Generator and the enormous heavy Fusion Engine both require humanity to build even larger warships.
Larger than the Mountain-Class Warship, they are called Lake-class by humans.
The name of the first Lake-Class Warship was decided by the New Humans during the design phase: Dongting Warship.
In the years following the achievement of Heavy Nuclear Fusion, the largest and most important project for the New Humans was shipbuilding. From exploration and design to feasibility verification, and then to actually preparing various materials for shipbuilding, the ships underwent various sea trials after construction. Finally, adjustments were made to the warships based on the experimental data, and only after everything met the design requirements could mass Dumplings begin.
This process takes an extremely long time.
In this process, humanity must also face a problem that all giant ships must face: structural strength.
Because in the design, in order for the warship to be able to accommodate Heavy Nuclear Fusion and Cold Nuclear Fusion dual fusion systems, as well as to carry Magnetic Shield System, it must be at least twice the size of the Mountain-Class Warship.
After all, it is a warship powered by burning rocks, and its fuel storage warehouse is also very large.
According to the Design Institute, its length must be at least 3 kilometers, and its width and height must be at least 1.2 kilometers. This is the minimum requirement; if more redundant space is desired, it will need to be built even larger.
Of course, as the first Lake-Class Warship, the Dongting Warship was built according to this minimum standard.
The reason why warships are designed with such a large difference in length and width-to-height ratio is entirely because the main guns and engines occupy a lot of space.
Let's not even talk about heavy Fusion Engine; just imagine the Planetary Engine in the movies—those things are enormous. In the movies, a single engine is as tall as 11 kilometers, the main body is 30 kilometers in diameter, and the base is 60 kilometers in diameter.
Of course, the New Humans' heavy Fusion Engine are not used to propel planets, but rather on warships. So naturally, they don't need to be that big; on the contrary, they need to be built smaller.
They built it as small as possible, but even so, it was still very large, with the space occupied by the heavy Fusion Engine accounting for one-third of the Dongting Warship.
The Cold Nuclear Pulse Engine are smaller, and according to the design, they will be divided into multiple units, distributed around the heavy Fusion Engine at the stern of the ship.
The heavy Fusion Engine is so large that only one can be installed on a warship the size of the Dongting Warship. As for the steering engine, both traditional Hydrogen Nuclear Fusion and new Cold Nuclear Pulse Engine are still required.
Larger warships, of course, need to be equipped with larger caliber main guns.
The advent of Magnetic Shield has led to a change in the main guns of the New Warship. Instead of every ship being equipped with Positron Cannon as its main gun, the configuration is based on the formation.
After mass production, at least one warship in a formation with the Dongting Warship will be equipped with a super-large Positron Cannon and another with a large-caliber Electromagnetic Railgun. A small formation must have warships with three different types of main guns at the same time.
Like the Dongting Warship, it was equipped with a super-large Gamma Ray Cluster Cannon in its design.
It would be an understatement to say that the main space of such a warship is occupied by its main guns and engines.
This size design also meant that the Dongting Warship had to change the design concept of the previous Mountain-Class Warship, and many spaces appeared much smaller.
However, the most distinctive design feature is not the amount of redundant space, but rather the bridge design.
The Lake-Class Warship no longer adopt the movable bridge design of the Mountain-Class Warship, but instead directly adapt to the core internal design. In other words, the bridge of the Dongting Warship will always be located in the most core part of the warship, where the armor is thickest.
Having learned from the lessons of the previous two ships that were sunk and all crew members perished, the bridge of the Dongting Warship will be equipped with an additional emergency survival support system.
In simple terms, it involves adding a layer of special material armor to the existing bridge. This armor layer is made of a material with a melting point of 150 million tons and capable of withstanding ordinary nuclear explosions, and it forms a single unit with the bridge.
This bridge design is equivalent to stuffing a "Steel Egg" inside the warship.
When a warship suffers a fatal blow and loses its combat capability, "Steel Egg" will activate its emergency system, closing all armored structures and turning the bridge into a "curled-up pangolin" to await post-battle rescue.
Human beings' Mechanical Specialization Technology enable them to do this. However, this also increases the difficulty of manufacturing and the time required for construction.
Of course, it's all worth it.
If this alloy material is used even for the bridge, one can imagine that the outer armor of the New Warship will certainly not be any worse. The current Dongting Warship has its outer armor made entirely of this alloy.
As an Experimental Ship, its configuration alone surpasses that of the Lyra in every aspect.
There is another reason why the Dongting Warship was built to the minimum specifications: its keel strength was almost at its limit, and if it were built any larger, even this material, which is said to be the strongest in mankind, would not be able to withstand it.
It is in danger of deformation under the surging power of the heavy Fusion Engine and the devastation of the Cold Nuclear Pulse Engine.
Therefore, in addition to building ships, the New Humans have another thing to do simultaneously: find a way to produce another, more powerful material on a larger scale.
Yes, this material has been developed. As a new type of alloy, it has a melting point of 280 million degrees Celsius, and its impact resistance is strong enough to withstand the impact of the Tsar Bomba. Well, although it still deformed somewhat in the experiment.
It was precisely the emergence of this material that enabled the New Humans to so daringly ascend to the throne of 'burning stones'.
This material was developed based on the analysis of the wreckage of the dilapidated spaceship on Callisto at that time.
Of course, even without this material, the New Humans could still achieve Heavy Nuclear Fusion using the existing alloy material with a melting point of 150 million degrees Celsius, but it would not be as fast, and more difficulties would need to be overcome in the technical details.
The Lake-Class Warship can certainly be built, but only warships the size of the Dongting Warship can be built. If they are larger, another breakthrough in materials technology is needed.
In fact, if a civilization were to develop normally without any extraordinary encounters, its warships and materials technology at the level of Level 2 Civilization would likely look something like this.
It's reasonable that the New Humans have the wreckage of a spaceship at least at the level of Level 4 Civilization as a safety net, and that their materials technology is more advanced than that of a normal Level 2 Civilization.