AF-20 Hauler-class Automated Transport
Name/Type: AF-20 Hauler-class Automated Transport
Designer/Manufacturer: Stellar Enterprises
Combat Role: Medium Transport
Crew: 0 (2 in crewed models)
Length: 55 Meters, Width: 35 Meters
Hyperdrive: x1
Weapons: 2 Dual Laser Cannon Turrets
Cargo Space: 50,000 Metric Tons w/ all cargo moduals connected
Description: This transport class was designed to provide a cost effeciant way of haulering cargos across the galaxy. With most cargos moving from points A to B along preexisting or preassigned paths, it was designed that droid crews could do just the job for less money and more effectively than human crews. Droids didn't need to be payed or have living quarters created onboard. THey did, however, require sufficiant maintainance to stay operations.
It was also decided to have a human factor in the transporting of cargo so that at the end of the trip customers would have someone living to talk to and discuss future business if they liked. For this reason, some of these ships will be built with cockpits and living space of two crew members. These manned ships will have the responsibility of issueing orders to other droid operated haulers in their convoy. All ships will jump at the same time and move as one. In the case that these droid brains loose contact with the manned transport, they are all capable of limited lone operation. Their systems are programed with the different situation senarios and what to do in case something happened. When contact is lost, all ships will form up and jump to their destinations. If under attack they are programed to make a micro jump away from trouble and then jump immediatly to the nearest Stellar Enterprises base.
In situations where hyperspace escape is not possible the transports are programed to come together into a tight formation designed to create over lapping fields of fire and shields. They would then calculate the closest escape vector and proceed to it while transmitting distress signals and sending images of the situation via holonet to Stellar HQ.
These ships are fitted with not just internal cargo bays, but also external attachments for additional cargo modules. Magnetic as well as mechanical clamps are installed alonged the sloping sides of the outer hull and are reinforced to carry heavy loads. Internally there is room allocated for two repair droids and some spare parts for repairs. There are also upto 4 loader droids that could be stationed depending on the cargo carried. These would help to quickly unload the freighter upon arrival.
Unlike Stellar ships, these freighters will be built in dedicated factories on planets instead of in space. This will allow for faster building times and elliminate the need to take up space on obital shipyards. These freighters would also use mostly off the self components. As much recycled material as possible will be used for their contruction to limit costs. Most of the metal will come from broken or scraped freighters. These freighters will be torn down and melted. This melted ore would than be cast to produce Hauler Class Transports.
Engines will be taken from damaged YT-2000 freighters or from stockpiles of different companies that were not able to sell their produced stocks of engines. The electronics will also come from rebuilt or newly purchased off the self components. Shields and sensors will be the similar to those of other YT series transports since they are popular and their prices would be kept down with large surpluses.