GDAC001 Basic Shuttles

General Designs Hulls (Auxillary Craft)

Scale: Fleet (very nominally 1:1500th (strictly 1:750th after smallcraft sliding scale adjustement))

Size (Bounding Box, Sprue/Base): 26.5mm x 25.3mm x 6.71mm (7.5mm x 5.5mm x 2.64mm individually)

Physical Print: Four squadron (48 shuttles) supplied.

Digital Files:

Supports: Not available at this time, sorry.

Mounting: 12 models on a sprue-slash-base for printing. The base may be removed afterwards, but can also serve as a base in and of itself.

Scaling Notes: Yellow. Parts potentially affected by scaling: Thin parts.

Photo of SLS print (Shapeways), not on sprue/base.

Model is printer type-agnostic.

General Hull Design’s GDH-1131 “Basic” range of shuttles is a widely available design throughout all of the human powers. Archetypical of light transport shuttles, the “Basic” range, first introduced all the way back in2092 was marketed with the slogan “Back to basics! Why pay more?” It was so successful that “basic” shuttle became common parlance for this type of vessel. The penetration of the brand was sufficient that three centuries later, many people assume the brand was named for the category, rather than the other way around.

Light transport shuttles (as the category is officially known) are the smallest class of space-going vessels classified as smallcraft. Any vessel smaller than that, such as personnel shuttles (which are functionally little more than short-ranged, space-flying cars) are classed as vehicles, rather than starship smallcraft.

Despite a plethora of clones, knock-offs and derivatives, the GDH “Basic” shuttle range has maintained position as market leader for nearly three centuries, with GDH’s biggest competitor being Hawkings Astronautics. This is due to the range’s reliability, simplicity and low cost, which has been maintained in successive models, with only a few (and quickly replaced) hiccups over the decades.

The GDH-1131 is the latest model in the “Basic” range. Like its predecessors, it has an acceleration of 32mc and manages 360 MEUs. It is little more than an engine and cockpit with space for cargo or personnel. The GDH-1131 carries no hyperdrive, which minimises its cost. (Though a slightly larger and more expensive version, the GDH-1135, exists and does have a small hyperdrive unit.)