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Colony
Sept 26, 2009 18:24:58 GMT -5
Post by Floyd Looney on Sept 26, 2009 18:24:58 GMT -5
Trying to find enough details and info on colonial "technology" is a bit tough. I want to use it as a guide for a colonial story set on another world.
I will be working on Earth Czar, or whatever I end up calling it.
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Colony
Sept 26, 2009 20:50:50 GMT -5
Post by Attero Dominatus on Sept 26, 2009 20:50:50 GMT -5
I have very little knowledge of that era. WWII and WWI are the only places in time where I have any large degree of historical knowledge.
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Colony
Sept 26, 2009 21:04:41 GMT -5
Post by Floyd Looney on Sept 26, 2009 21:04:41 GMT -5
Its been tough. The tools were basic, what we would call handmade these days. I put a longer post in the scifi section.
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Colony
Oct 1, 2009 0:47:53 GMT -5
Post by Floyd Looney on Oct 1, 2009 0:47:53 GMT -5
something I threw together...
The containers were rolled off of the ship and some of them were unloaded, these included tents and blankets as well as other things. The first few nights were the worst as people were crowded into tents and the empty containers.
“We have enough food and supplies to last us maybe 6 months” Their Colony leader told them the following morning. Women were set to putting down markers while the men chopped down trees and began building shacks for all of the colonists. The children were sent to walk the animals and to make sure they get fed and watered.
In the first day the men managed to complete more than three dozen shacks, mud was thrown onto them to fill in cracks between logs and boards. Mud and logs were used to build chimneys and some of them had floors made of split trees as well. This is where the families would live in the beginning while work commenced on the farm fields.
The next morning men, women and children began clearing the fields of rocks and stumps so that they could be plowed. In the afternoon the women and children filled cloth bags with straw and grass to make pillows and beds. They also set out the tools their families had brought with them.
The John Morgan family had brought chickens and already they were allowing eggs to stay in the nest to expand their numbers. In not too much time eggs would be plentiful for trading amongst the other colonists.
The Daniel Johnston family had brought the necessary tools to make candles and soap, the amount they could make would be rather small at first but would fetch a fair trading price.
On and on it went, every family had brought tools that would be used to produce things that would be needed. The Sam Nelson family had what was needed to make nails and even things like hammers and other tools. Sam Nelson was also trained as a geologist and knew how to find the ore they would need.
A dozen fields were planted by the end of the week when the assembly was held, everyone was there of course. It was opened with an invocation from Pastor Bradley and then a report on their progress was given by their chosen leader Mark Johnson. He explained that a community well would soon be built and then that water from the river would be piped into a privacy house and another pipe would carry the “results” downstream far past their community.
Meanwhile a large clock that had been carried from Earth was set up on an 8 foot pole and wound up. This would be their community clock, in the center of the green with a face on both sides. The leader also indicated that a transparent plastic covered white board would be unveiled at the town center. This would allow people to advertise their products. The door would be otherwise locked so no-one could erase someone else’s advertisement.
Before the meeting was over the women in the colony made sure that another well would be needed for laundry purposes. This was soon agreed to.
After the well and the 6-room privacy house were completed, woodworker Bryan Jennings commenced building a boat from a big dead tree. Others had fashioned fishing poles from tree branches while their sons dug up worms for bait.
Meanwhile a large mud kiln was being built where they would be able to produce bricks as well as other things. Bricks were more important because plastic cups, bowls and jugs would still last a good while. When other business was done many men began building additions to their mud daub homes.
Colony leader Mark Johnson soon found men enough to begin work on a real meeting house that would also do business as a church on Sunday and a school on other days. It would have double walls of wood planks with a wooden roof. Inside would be several rows of benches and a small rise and dais for a speaker. Later bricks would be added to the outside of the meeting house.
The large shipping containers were soon distributed one per family and several for livestock and many for bales of hay and stuff. These would serve as storage of all kinds of things as well as become workshops for some.
The woodworker and a metal worker soon produced the first wagon for the colony, to be used to deliver bricks. A smaller oven was now being used to bake loaves of bread, an enterprise shared by a dozen of the families.
After two months of trying to build up their small colony they began in haste to prepare for the arrival of the second vessel.
This one carried fewer colonists but more importantly carried things like saw blades for a wood mill and several small steam engines. One of these would power the saw mill while another would be used for an ice house.
It also carried greenhouses that would be put together in an effort to grow things like vanilla plants, coffee, pineapples and other items. One Mr. Christopher Carlson was bringing along a paper-making machine and a printing press. He believed the colony would require the service of a printer sooner or later.
The third wagon produced by the woodworker and metal smith was soon fitted with a pump that could pump water from the river and douse a fire on a daub house. Several men said they would practice running to the wagon and getting a fire out. They would be the volunteer fire brigade.
As yet the colony had fewer than one hundred people but that would be more than doubled by the time the last vessel departed. They would likely not see another vessel for many a year thereafter.
A small colony living in a place with colonial technology apparent but with advanced technology used for as long as it would last. A big 6-ft wide communications dish, solar collectors and computers inside of a former shipping container was office of the Colony leader. He needed to know if there was anyone out there. After the third vessel departed though it would become useless for many years until another visited.
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Colony
Oct 1, 2009 4:07:42 GMT -5
Post by Attero Dominatus on Oct 1, 2009 4:07:42 GMT -5
Very interesting. In addition to solar collectors there could also be wind turbines and maybe small hydro-electric generators too if there is a source of falling water.
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Colony
Oct 1, 2009 11:09:17 GMT -5
Post by Floyd Looney on Oct 1, 2009 11:09:17 GMT -5
3 ships. Wonder where I got that from?
I should have included wind turbines and maybe some kind of water wheel could be built that would grind corn and wheat next to the river.
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Colony
Oct 1, 2009 13:53:20 GMT -5
Post by Attero Dominatus on Oct 1, 2009 13:53:20 GMT -5
Not to late to add those things. Just write that wind turbines and water wheel get built as more people arrive.
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Colony
Oct 1, 2009 14:15:03 GMT -5
Post by Floyd Looney on Oct 1, 2009 14:15:03 GMT -5
Its more of an idea than a story at this point. Just trying to figure how a colony might look.
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Colony
Oct 2, 2009 17:09:38 GMT -5
Post by Attero Dominatus on Oct 2, 2009 17:09:38 GMT -5
Location is also everything as far as a colony goes. Not only suitable for farm land as you made clear there, but it should be located where metals can be extracted. Iron can be extracted from certain bogs (the Vikings did this) while carbon can come from the bog material as well. Your colony could make simple steels that could be used for everything from spare parts to guns (obtaining gunpowder for propellant and lead for the projectiles is another issue but they did it in Colonial America for very primitive guns, and some copper exists in its metallic state and could be used to jacket bullets if you can melt it). Bog iron/steel is also rich in silicates which makes it more resistant to rust than regular steels, though I do not know if it has the tensile strength needed for firing projectiles out of it.
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Colony
Oct 2, 2009 18:18:04 GMT -5
Post by Floyd Looney on Oct 2, 2009 18:18:04 GMT -5
I am sure that some as yet un-invented technologies might exist in the future that could be brought with them and last a while. Tiny hydrogen generators? I dunno. A mobile nuclear forge? lol.
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Colony
Oct 2, 2009 23:02:16 GMT -5
Post by Attero Dominatus on Oct 2, 2009 23:02:16 GMT -5
Fuel cells have no moving parts and produce pure water as a byproduct. A radio-isotope generator could be used to provide electricity for both general use and to separate water into hydrogen and oxygen (which makes fuel cells a battery more than anything else). I would imagine both are standard equipment on a space ship.
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Colony
Oct 3, 2009 3:51:18 GMT -5
Post by Floyd Looney on Oct 3, 2009 3:51:18 GMT -5
I am at my brothers house. I just used Speedtest.net
Its download spped was 27.98 mbps!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Colony
Oct 7, 2009 23:35:10 GMT -5
Post by Attero Dominatus on Oct 7, 2009 23:35:10 GMT -5
Maybe to make things harder for the colonists, it took them centuries to arrive at this world at sublight velocity on a Bussard Ramjet or Daedalus-style fusion rocket (the colonists could have been kept in suspended animation for the journey) and no one knows the fate of the rest of the human race, which means no replacement parts or support from Earth.
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Colony
Oct 8, 2009 17:05:33 GMT -5
Post by Floyd Looney on Oct 8, 2009 17:05:33 GMT -5
MMMmmmm.... its a good idea but might limit the story line a bit. Maybe there was another ship following it 40 years later? But it was a bit faster and arrives 20 years after the landing.
Maybe they are very different. Maybe they know what happened to Earth, but are mum?
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Colony
Oct 8, 2009 19:21:07 GMT -5
Post by Attero Dominatus on Oct 8, 2009 19:21:07 GMT -5
That could work.
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