What is an IRIS Valve?

[BetterThanLife]

Now according to the book, IRIS valves are strong doors that retract like the IRIS of a Camera. They are generally used for airlocks, and bulkheads. They are also used on the surface of ships.

Now without looking at Deckplans one would think they are like the Blast doors on Starwars (The original movie.) or more recently Serenity. However in the majority of deckplans (official and unofficial) they are set up in places where they are on a curved surface and/or have no place for the parts to retract to.

What are these things made of and how do they actually work?

 

[TheEngineer]

Best is to provide a construction painting, I guess

 

[RainOfSteel]

Originally posted by BetterThanLife:
What are these things made of and how do they actually work?

This is not the first time this problem has been noted.

Basically iris valve doors looked really cool, and so they were included in Traveller originally for, IMO, the "gee whiz" factor.

IMTU, iris valves are sliding doors (sometimes multi-sectional doors).

 

[Blue Ghost]

Yeah, me too. An actual iris on a camera is rather flimsy, and there'd always be a small hole in the middle where the blades met => there'd be no way to pressurize any kind of vehicle or vessel that used iris thresholds.

 

[BetterThanLife]

Rain: Actually really Sturdy sliding doors. And I have no issue with that. (As opposed to the flimsy cabin doors.) However they still end up in places with no place to go. Airlock doors on the X-Boat, Interior Air-lock door on any and all of the small craft. Rear Center Door on the Type-S. REar Engine Access doors on the Lower deck of the Subsidized Merchant, Starboard side airlock doors (Interior and exterior.)of the Far Trader, interior Air-lock door on the Gazelle Close Escort and the Turret access doors on teh X-Boat Tender.

These doors have issues if you allow them to slide only one way. This is without leaving Supplement 7.

ACK! All this has come up because I am trying to do some of them in 3d models (including interiors) and I am sitting here looking at them from a relatively new (for me) perspective.

The Type-S Interior doesn't fit inside the exterior, (it isn't even close, even if you leave out the other decks the main deck won't fit.)

I guess I am just finding it frustrating. The worst of it is that the newer material isn't getting any better at this. It is, if anything, worse. I know it is just a game, it is just a game, but the time to figure out that something doesn't fit isn't four hours into modeling the stupid thing. It isn't like I am getting paid to do this.

 

[Rover]

I think this is a case or a nifty concept being used in a game with our regrad to reality.

The concept is something like the Iris used in the stargate series to block the worm hole.

You could posit they are made from titaniun or some uber strong ceramic materiel. As for a gap in the middle... If the leaves off the irsi interlock, rather than overlap as in a camera, you might be able to avoid the gap.

When retracted I assume the go into the frame.

R

 

[far-trader]

Yep, my take (to preserve sanity) was that they retract into the little bit of frame that exists between the 1m wide/diameter of the iris and the 1.5m wide framework. I actually have a harder time with them being anything but circular

And I've tried to do the mechanical drawing once or twice but quit before the headaches got too bad

They work by handwave and technology so advanced it seems magic to this primitive 21st C man.

Of course for my own deckplans I don't use them except in circular hatches (usually between decks). And I make sure all my doors and hatches have room to swing or retract into a wall, ceiling or floor that doesn't complicate bulkhead intergrity.

I figure the iris is a set of interlocking panels not overlapping. I think they may have to be (iirc my attempts at the mechanics) like a lot of curved blades, narrow at the tip/center and wide at the base/circumfrance.

Maybe that's why Marines practice with Cutlass, there's always plenty (of dull ones) to be found by tearing apart an iris hatch

You know, Marines in Battle Dress attack the enemy ship, realize they forgot any entry tools or weapons, so they improvise and using the BD strength simply tear apart the iris hatch to get in and use the pieces as (blunt) Cutlasses to attack See, just thinking about it again is making me crazy

 

[aramis]

IMTU, there is a central nub that seals the center, and is also the basic thing one pulls on when forcing it.
The iris valve needs approximately 1/3 it's width all the way around.

Also, it's not single layer. it's dual. So, when looking at the face, it always appears to swirl clockwise. The plates do not overlap in a given layer, they use tongue-in-groove.

At one point I figured out the needed curves... by using balsa and pins.

 

[BetterThanLife]

I don't really care how they work. These doors stand up to Plasma fire, in all versions of Traveller. (In some versions longer than others.)I am just trying to figure out where all that metal goes. If the hatch is 1M wide and the square is 1.5m wide, In many deckplans that doesn't leave a whole lot of room to put the pieces. Second the bulkhead around the door will be hollow so less resistant to damage. And the wall mounted ones couldn't be circular.

Obviously it is a handwave, but I still need to put the damn doors someplace.

 

[veltyen]

http://www.kemutec.com/htm/products/mucon/valves/idv/principles.htm

Quick description: A valve formed by 2 or three rings connected by a solid skein of deformable material. When "open" the skein hangs between the rings, to close a ring is rotated to draw the skein closed around itself.

I like that one, if you assume deformable materials it becomes very easy to do, and with no excess space required. Opening and closing involve rotating a central ring, can be airtight, involves no "lee space" which are all good things. On top of this, when closed there are (depending on design) at least two layers of material.

 

[bozzutoman]

This seems a bit indicative: Ultra High Vacuum Iris Valve (~ middle of page.) It appears to have a sealing mechanism supported in the center.

It also appears that each "tooth" folds back into a ring around the portal. There's another one showing the collar better here.

Considering they need precision alignment to function, I imagine that unless they're made of adamantium, any excessive dirt or impact would put these things out of commission pretty fast. I suppose if already closed, they might be difficult to breach, but should they survive, they'd be impossible to open again.

They'd be good for controlling air-duct flow much like on the Nostromo, possibly for low-use accessways as well (avionics, cpu, etc). Beyond that they are a bit impractical for common use.

You could always go for something more like a sphincter, but it wouldn't be air-tight, nor would it prevent forced entry... plus, it just seems a bit... icky.

 

[far-trader]

Originally posted by veltyen:
http://www.kemutec.com/htm/products/mucon/valves/idv/principles.htm

Quick description: A valve formed by 2 or three rings connected by a solid skein of deformable material. When "open" the skein hangs between the rings, to close a ring is rotated to draw the skein closed around itself.

I like that one, if you assume deformable materials it becomes very easy to do, and with no excess space required. Opening and closing involve rotating a central ring, can be airtight, involves no "lee space" which are all good things. On top of this, when closed there are (depending on design) at least two layers of material.

Looks like a lot of headroom needed on that to me. It would work ok in a short passage way, like the end of a 1.5m long corridor. When the valve is open the rings are at each end, to close it one of the rings moves down the corridor and spins.

But it suffers the same limitation a working iris valve has, it has to be circular.

 

[far-trader]

Originally posted by bozzutoman:
This seems a bit indicative: Ultra High Vacuum Iris Valve (~ middle of page.) It appears to have a sealing mechanism supported in the center.

Yep, which doesn't work too well for a hatchway

But that looks like the best idea for what we need. Perhaps the center disc could be designed to swing out of the way on a single arm (instead of being permanently mounted on two arms), to the side or vertically.

I like the center disc idea, as it could be the manual override/option contol as well. Just turn a built in handle a quarter turn to pull or push it out of the way and then push the irising plates into the frame. A job made even easier with a handy mechanical or battery operated portable iris hatch opening tool

It still needs a bit of area around the opening for the retraction but not too much. The biggest issue is still being limited to circular form.

It sure isn't cheap either! US$2350 for a used one of only 10.25" diameter. Let's see, scaling that up, using area for a simple comparison, a 1m iris hatch would be about Cr11,500 at a surplus sale outlet. Wonder what they are new? Of course with a hull costing Cr100,000 per ton it's easy enough to assume a few iris valves in the cost of a ship, maybe as much as one per 10tons. But at least now I know how much to charge the characters next time someone busts one up and they need to replace it

 

[GypsyComet]

"What is an IRIS Valve?"

Color text for "powered hatch". Any pressure door that requires power to operate, be it as a camera iris or a huge sliding bulk-door, qualifies.

By comparison, "hatches" are typically hinged and do NOT require power to operate.

I tend to use the standard deckplan symbols for the two types, regardless of actual door mechanism. And yes, I try to put *some* aligned wall next to all "iris valves".

 

[GypsyComet]

Originally posted by BetterThanLife:
The Type-S Interior doesn't fit inside the exterior, (it isn't even close, even if you leave out the other decks the main deck won't fit.)

Sure it does. The forward staterooms loose a bit of floor and ceiling to slopes, and the galleries are NOT full-height for their entire lengths (the lower gallery is actually *very* small).

sketch coming up...

 

[RainOfSteel]

Originally posted by BetterThanLife:
Rain: Actually really Sturdy sliding doors.

Well, yeah.

Originally posted by BetterThanLife: However they still end up in places with no place to go. [...] Interior Air-lock door on any and all of the small craft. Rear Center Door on the Type-S.

The door goes up or down, your choice. It is not one solid door, it is several sections linked together with joints. It sort of "scrolls" out of the way. When the door is fully extended, locking mechanisms inside the door swivel into place to enhance rigidity between sections.

Technically, this would work sideways, too.

At TL-15, you could easily specify that doors were made of nano-glop and simply oozed into place and out of the way.

Originally posted by BetterThanLife:
The Type-S Interior doesn't fit inside the exterior, (it isn't even close, even if you leave out the other decks the main deck won't fit.)

There have been several redesigns of the S-Class scout for all kinds of reasons, including bad major door/hatch placement.

Originally posted by BetterThanLife:
I guess I am just finding it frustrating. [...] It isn't like I am getting paid to do this.

Ah, the labor of fans is never done.

I am also not getting paid to assemble my website, either, although I'm guessing my HTML/CSS mis-steps are not quite of the same magnitude as losing four hours of modeling time only to realize it doesn't work (unless, perhaps, my suggestions above are of help).

 

[GypsyComet]

See below.

The numbers for the main deck may seem a bit odd, but this is because they are *total* deck height. Halve them for height above the mid-line.

The base assumption is that the 3m spacing for decks is held for all three decks (for a total of 9m height; consistent with the illo of the Seeker in Traders and Gunboats, though not the stated dimensions for the Scout in the same book), and that the *crew space* portion of the main deck is centered vertically. These numbers also assume a sharp edge at the midline, of effectively no height. Soften that edge to even a half-meter at the defined hull line and the contour lines get even better for space.

Yes, the upper gallery is really best accessed from the rear iris valves. You have to be *really* limber to use the forward hatch, though it helps to assume that the ceiling machinery space is actually clear around that hatch, giving another 0.375m minus actual deck plate thickness of potential wiggle room.

Because the crew space of a deck is closer to 2.25m, the line where floor and ceiling start to slope is actually halfway between the two lines on the main deck. You could make the assumption that the crew space of the main deck is not vertically centered, but actually at the top of the 3m allocated for it. This pushes the floor slope line to the shown 1.5m line, while the ceiling slope line moves to the 3m line.

That help any?

 

[Scarecrow]

Y'ever see the thing Lando calrissian goes through to drag Luke in from the top of the Millenium Falcon after they rescue him from the underside of Cloud City?

That's how I see a Traveller Iris Valve between decks. It's about 4 inches thick and it's just small enough to get a human through. On the whole, I'm not a fan of Iris valves because all the ones I've ever seen are like the one that covers the Stargate. Thin shards of sheet metal that look like they wouldn't stand up to a good, hard kick, never mind a plasma blast or that they might ever be vaccuum tight.

Crow

 

[TheEngineer]

Hi !

I made a rough iris valve sketch.
It could be find here:
https://mc.1und1.de/mc/O5jKCOUOnH6vWmOn74czcN6ZAfWZdS

If you follow the "MediaCenter" link, there will be a valve picture.
(Hope this stuff works)
To construct a real valve, You need a number of segments, which where rotated into the center in order to close the valve.
The more segments You use, the less space the valve frame needs. Theoretically and with a magical material the valve frame could be very narrow, but thats ancients stuff

The seperate segments must be able to overlap or move inside each other, which makes actual contruction a bit challenging

In order to be able to take some forces, the seperate segments would have to be very rigid for themself or perhaps better there is an additional mechnism to actually lock the valve at the center (as Aramis noted).


regards,

TE

 

[Icosahedron]

What is an Iris Valve?

I booted iris valves out of MTU almost from the start, because they were more trouble than they were worth. They must be hideously more costly than a hatch and what advantage do they confer? I figured the concept is not economically viable.

I use manual hatches and Star Trek/Star Wars style sliding doors.

If you want sliders to turn corners you could use a roller/writing desk style. I see two layers of hard material sandwiching a flexible airtight membrane. Once, in place locking plates slide out from each vane to cover the joints.

Or, how about doors made of flexible superdense foil in two layers, the gap pumped with incompressible fluid that also acts as a heat sink? The superdense skin will laugh off bullets and blades, and the fluid will conduct away the heat of energy weapons before they damage the surface skin (ever boiled water in a paper cup?)

Hang on - I think I'll patent that!