I have a hypothetical idea and I have been wondering how realistic it is. Now most modern day Airships I see are not rigid airships, meaning the balloon does not have a preset outer skin as some did in world war two. My main question and focus for this topic is how much weight can the average size airship hold? I have noticed that the structure beneath most airships is very small in comparison to the balloon and I am wonder could the balloon hold more weight? Would it be practical to have two balloons of equal size mounted on the sides of the ship rather then on the top. The picture I have in my head is a ship structure the is something like a triangle on its side with about 4 decks and two large hot air balloons mounted on the sides with a rigid outer structure and ten disk shaped balloons within the hot air tanks that inflate and deflate seperatly and two smaller hot air tanks also with balloons mounted on either side of the tale of the airship. Now I know without any hot air to ship mass dimensions it will be hard to give an accurate answer. But I'm very curious. Maybe someone could give me a link as to where I could study up on airship functions and ideas.