Gerall Kahla wrote:

> I thought the cziltang brone only rendered the material *permeable* and
> not malleable?

There are indications it makes scrith malleable, not just permeable.
Note in /Protector/, Phssthpok uses the "softener key" (which appears to
be the same thing as a cziltang brone) to run a hose thru the twing of
his hull. When he turned the key off, the twing hardened around the hose.

Also, there are hints that large-scale cziltang brones may have been
used to shape the Ringworld floor.

> Beyond machinery, the Patriarch of the Map of Kzin would certainly have
> a suit of armor and at least one weapon made of scrith... (Imagine
> parrying with a scrith vambrace!)

Hey, that's a great idea! Yah, ultra-strong, ultra-light armor, and
ultra-sharp, unbreakable weapons.

Beyond that: Ultra-light/ultra-strong cables... shadow square wire is
very thin scrith wire. Ultralight, ultrastrong material for building
flying machines. Such material would make building a hull (or at least
the skeleton for the hull) for one of their gigantic ships a lot easier,
too.

If you really want to make the Kzinti formidable... how about a tank
built of scrith? Darn near invulnerable!

The problem will be, of course, that only one cziltang brone is
available, and the quantity of output of objects and material will be
very limited. Gigantic building projects, such as a bridge joining the
Map of Kzin to the Map of Earth, are probably beyond their reach.

Oh, and off-topic for cziltang brone, but on-topic for mid-20th century
military tech without access to petrochemicals:

Solid-fuel rockets can be propelled with "rocket candy", a mixture of
sugar and saltpeter. Both should be available in quantity; sugar can be
refined from the sap of many plants, and saltpeter is to be found under
any dung heap.

Visit my Incompleat Known Space Concordance at

http://www.freewebs.com/knownspace
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Clear ether!
Lensman