Life support:
A SynthLife commercial recycling plant, providing one year autonomy
to the pilot is standard with all Couriers. SynthLife is a Duval family
business, so go figure. A ESSF (eat shit, shit food) conversion unit,
again from SynthLife, is common on crew-operated Couriers.
For g protection, early Courier's cockpits were turned into acceleration
tanks (see Stories section).
Athough some consider them to be the best g protection devices ever
conceived, most would agree that they are ... troublesome. As such,
a Revox anti-inertial damper was fitted on Couriers manufactured after
3050. Basically it consists of a superconducting coil around the cockpit.
A high enough magnetic field is generated that eventually even living
tissue becomes magnetised. As a result every occupant of the cockpit
is maintained at zero-g during even the most eye-watering maneouvers.
Sensors:
Altough this area has a predisposition to customising, there are
a few constants. Every Courier comes with a neutrino scanner, high power
telescope (IR, visible, UV), comms laser and mass scanner all bundled
in two turrets, one ventral, one dorsal. Several external cameras provide
low-definition video to the cockpit for maneouvering. Besides these,
everything else is extra.
Reaction wheels:
To provide maneouvering capability without firing the thrusters,
three 1-ton reaction wheels aligned with the ship's X, Y and Z axes
are spun at up to 2500 RPM. They are also used to cancel unwanted spin
(after being hit by a missile, for example).
Controls:
Hidrostatic tank-equipped Couriers used a direct neural interface.
The modern Couriers are equiped with the ubiquitous 360-degree holodeck.
Navigation and combat software is as diverse as the folks flying the
Courier. The neural interface has known a resurgence in the last years.
Structural:
The Courier is built in a classic monocoque design, with the main
body and engine nacelles consisting of a single piece of nano-assembled
composite. On these are mounted PVC generating microfactories that
secrete a white, radiation resistant plastic and give the Courier its
ghostly appearance. It also doubles as an ablative layer, offering (some)
protection against directed energy weapons. It regenerates with time
(and energy, and a load of polyethilene).