There seems to be two sets of rule for acquiring new things in RT; the Availability rules found on pages111-112, and the Acquisition rules on pages 271-272.

They don't indicate how they work together in any fashion. Which one(s) actually are used, in what process when trying to acquire something during downtime?

The way I see it:

- The acquisition test tells you if you can acquire the item(s) or not.

- If you can acquire them, the availability rules tells you how long it will take for you to actually acquire it.

So just be vague about how long the downtime is and you can ignore the availability rules.

You use the Availability Rules first to find out if you can actually find the thing you are after for sale, and how long it'll take you to find it, and then you roll your Acquisition roll to find out if you can actually buy it.