Vandar-class Torpedo Bomber

The Vandar-class Torpedo Bomber was a line of Wolatarian attack vessels used extensivly between the Spika Wars though the Post-Colonial era. Fifty-eight thousand were built, with seven variations.

''Vandar'-Class Torpedo Bomber

Early development
The concept for the Vandar-class Torpedo Bomber was drawn up after the first Spika War. The Spika had built masive vessel stretching more than a kilometer long, while most Imperial and Brocan vessels were less than half that. Because of their layers thick armor, many of the high explosive rounds from the deck guns of Imperial House cruisers would not penetrate deep enough. The use of nuclear weapons in space combat had extreme disadvantages, including damage to friendly targets and were considered a last resort. However, most of the bombers of the Imperial fleet were too slow and were easily killed by the Spika Cruisers defensive guns.

Engineers at Antar Shipyards, located in the Antar Nebula, drew up designs for an extremly fast light capital class vessel with a mass drive to crack open the armor of the daunting Spika Cruisers. The vessel could quickly acchive speeds greater than twenty-five thousand kilometer an hour and place a dumbfired depleted uranium round right through the enemy vessels. A test platform was built and tested a week before the start of the second Spika War.

Production of the Mk.I line
Three months later the first set of Vandar MK.I-class Bombers rolled off the asembly line and into combat. The first models were not presurized on either deck to prevent of thin walls from imploding in the event of a hull breach. There were no viewports, so the three man bridge crew flew the vessel based of insturments. On the second level, the single mass driver was loaded manually and fired with an eletric switch on command from the bridge crew.

The first five thousand saw combat during the first two years of the war, most being lost to enemy fighters. The engine was easy to overheat and the tempture regulator often read long resulting in several critical failures and loss of vessels ion non-combat situations.