Three Ruimtehavik LAMs in One!

The rarity and technological complexity of Land-Air 'Mechs ensured that TME Industries would take an interest in them. Using proceeds of Mortus sales in 3017 through 3023, the Purchasing Department carefully acquired, through multiple front companies and mercenary commands, sufficient spare parts from the LexaTech facility on Irece to reverse-engineer the STG-A5 Stinger. Prototypes produced by cross-functional project groups from the Technology and Engineering Directorates flew by 3030, and over the next five years the Testing Department developed flight training and operational procedures for them.

In December 3035, as production of Stinger variants seemed imminent, the entire Stinger program was folded into the newly formed NFP Directorate and unofficially became a black project. The transformation was unofficial simply because, as far as white project documentation went, the LAM project simply disappeared on 15 December 3035. All technical records previous to that date were 'lost' (merely transferred to NFP servers, of course) and the associated personnel disappeared off the organization chart.

The Board of Directors decided the month earlier that suddenly becoming one of only two LAM providers in the Inner Sphere would attract far too much attention, but with so much progress made and shiny science to be done they couldn't simply drop the project. This spurred on the NFP Directorate as first a black-project brain trust that later would evolve (through projects like the Headsman) into a black-project TME-within-a-TME, the super-elite cabal almost but not quite operationally independent of the rest of the company.

As TME Industries lacked anyone cross-trained in aerospace and BattleMech piloting outside of test pilots and was not willing to put forward the effort to get new pilots trained up for a simple 30-ton harasser, the Board of Directors told the NFP Directorate to continue experimenting with their Stingers and see what improvements they could make. Knowing that field operations were unlikely, the NFP engineers tinkered with the transformation mechanisms, attempting to rationalize them as best they could. Through a series of trial-and-error simulations and scale model tests the Directorate eventually removed linear 'sliding' motions out of the conversion process and, in so doing, developed an entirely new chassis template.

With the dissemination of new technologies through the Sphere up through the Clan Invasion, the NFP Directorate didn't even need the orders it got from the Board to incorporate recovered Star League technology into Land-Air 'Mechs. Just like the Star League before and the Word of Blake after, TME engineers discovered that mass-saving technologies simply didn't work with conventional conversion strategies.

As TME Industries grew and became more paranoid over its defense, the Board of Directors asked the NFP Directorate to convert its LAM program from what was effectively a 'pure science' project into a fully militarized one. What passed for an academy on Tinker's World had produced a cadre of cross-trained pilots that could support a LAM company. Knowing the limitations of the current generation of LAMs, the NFP Directorate determined that the absolute best use of a LAM was as a heavy scout that could provide organic strategic-reach reconnaissance with tactical-level detail. Unlike most scouts, however, tactical electronics packages beyond ECM suites would be counterproductive since it would force this fragile unit into short range, and conversion in combat for escape was too dangerous to risk.

The resulting Ruimtehavik was truly a heavy scout, matching the Shadow Hawk LAM prototype in mass at fifty-five tons. It had an average speed for a medium BattleMech and was relatively well-armored, the weak spots inherent to LAMs notwithstanding. Scaled-up versions of the Outlaw's double-ball joints made the Ruimtehavik's arm conversions more secure with no exposed internals, and the 'box mechanism' side torsos maximized armor effectiveness by preventing useful armor in fighter mode from becoming useless in 'Mech mode due to how other LAMs 'folded over' in their conversion processes. To dissuade pilots from engaging at anything but extreme range the Ruimtehavik was armed with nothing but an extended-range particle cannon and a targeting computer, making it a dedicated sniper in combat--and thus, should it enter combat, it would have the opportunity to escape if need be.

Since it was never intended to be an aerospace asset as such, the Ruimtehavik's fighter mode had very poor endurance compared to dedicated aerospace fighters; this was considered sufficient as the Ruimtehavik's mission profile was considered to be suborbital at the extreme and intra-atmospheric in normal operations.

The first Ruimtehavik entered testing in 3066. Article 001 was the make-or-break operational testbed of the folding-box design, which, while mechanically simple, made internal attachments and connections between components complex. Special wire harnesses inside the frame ensured that cables and conduits would not be scissored by the folding boxes, and pneumatic pins served to lock assemblies in place and provide rigid structural hardpoints when engaged.

Ruimtehavik Article 001 spent three years in testing in graduated steps. While the wire harnesses did their jobs, they also compressed the conduits and metal wires, when constantly flexed, broke in fatigue. The folding-box was more accessible for maintenance but connectors and interfaces required far more maintenance than in the conventional fold-over scheme; maintenance time effectively shifted from structure to subsystems and wiring. While a few smaller subsystems could be and were rearranged to prevent cable fatigue, most couldn't be without throwing off the LAM's delicate balance (which also prevented it from carring external stores). The lop-sided mass of the particle cannon in one arm also presented a stability risk; this was countered by spinning the gyro counter to the particle cannon's moment arm... which only made the problem worse in inverted flight (luckily tested in simulation before ever being tried in reality). Active gyroscopic controls, necessary anyway due to the possible range of particle cannon moment arms--even when they were limited by the flight control computer's strict rules--were beefed up to allow for inverted flight and linked to the flight control computer for automatic adjustment of flight control surfaces to account for damage. This resulted in wear on the gyroscope, requiring it to be replaced every five hundred to fifteen hundred flight hours, depending on the rate of use.

With its flight envelope strictly enforced by the flight control computer, Article 001 was universally panned as unresponsive in flight. While other over-stable aerospace vehicles like the Leopard-class DropShip were bricks--they responded, but slowly--most pilots felt as though their command input through throttle and stick were merely being taken as 'suggestions' by the flight control computer before it decided what it would actually do. This feeling was rather accurate, since that was exactly how the system worked to keep such an unbalanced, unstable, unaerodynamic thing in the air. As fighter mode was intended solely for strategic-distance transit, this was not considered a severe problem by managers, engineers, and strategists, especially as the 'Mech mode was fully functional (albeit undergunned).

Three more Ruimtehaviks were built in 3069 to test lance-level LAM operations in a 'live' environment, playing cat-and-mouse with Security Department forces in exercises. In 'clean' terrain the LAMs had a strong advantage, as they could hide behind rocks and snipe and convert from cover. Anywhere else, however, proved that the folding-box conversion system could become easily fouled by mud or trees caught by swinging flanges or limbs. 'Ingested' branches, if they didn't stop the conversion altogether, would then rattle about inside the structure; such a branch caused the loss of Ruimtehavik Article 003 when it disconnected the starboard flight hydraulics linkage in the right torso. The pilot ejected safely, but only because the Ruimtehavik incorporated a full-head lifting body ejection mechanism that stabilized itself after departing the stricken spinning LAM.

On a side note, Article 003 never hit the ground in one piece because the active gyroscopic control did its best to limit the roll rate. This overtaxed the gyro, which then failed explosively, and when the reaction wheels of the gyros decided that they didn't want to be part of the Ruimtehavik anymore, they shredded through vital parts of structure. Their departure meant that the rest of the LAM had to speed up its tumbling to conserve angular momentum and the combined centrifugal and aerodynamic forces tore it apart.

The 'open top' construction of the side torsos, and the nature of the folding-box design, made them difficult to seal against the environment. Article 002 was lost when it jumped into a lake formed over a tectonic trench, again forcing the pilot to eject before the LAM sunk to the bottom. While visited by subs since, Article 002 has not been recovered to date.

With the loss of half the test fleet from 'basic' environmental hazards, the NFP Directorate shelved the Ruimtehavik in 3070 to concentrate on its more-experimental but much simpler 'Phase III' LAM conversion strategy, which was less about conversion in the traditional sense and more about having very flexible limb joints. Ruimtehavik Article 001 was retired to static display duty inside the NFP Directorate hall, where it stands in Air-'Mech mode, and Article 004 was put into storage.

The longest and best legacy of the Ruimtehavik was actually in the form of project management. As it was effectively the capstone of the Stinger project from 3017, its half-century lifespan and technical complexity lead the LAM project team to develop the Long Term Technical Project Management Architecture (LoTTProMA). LoTTProMA became the go-to standard for any TME project that could be measured in human generations. While its usage of semantic webs and hyperlinked design documents gave it a steep learning curve, the advantages to having a modular project architecture that could house and relate transitional spiral and transformational mark changes simultaneously far outweighed the disadvantage of its inherent clunkiness.