The Frostyverse: Discrete-Grid Candidate for Gravitational Photon Deflection, Shapiro Delay, and Redshift

The Frostyverse is a speculative discrete mechanical model in which propagation, deformation, and local interaction occur through a three-dimensional elastic grid rather than a continuous spacetime metric. This preprint tests a frozen Frostyverse gravity-family candidate against three related weak-field observables: gravitational photon deflection, Shapiro time delay, and static gravitational redshift. The photon candidate uses a current-cell steering response proportional to K R² sqrt(current-cell convergence) sin³(theta), with one historically calibrated absolute normalization K that is explicitly disclosed and frozen before later holdouts. The timing sector uses a three-axis FrostCell clock coupling derived from principal logarithmic strains and an independently derived flat-grid clock exponent alpha = 0.5. Frostyverse outputs are generated and sealed before General Relativity is opened as an external comparison ruler in the stated tests. At R160, the worst reported Shapiro difference is 0.1217% and the worst static-redshift difference is 0.2723%. The photon-path separation remains much smaller than one FrostCell but increases over the R80-R160 ladder; the paper therefore preserves that photon residual as unresolved rather than claiming demonstrated convergence. The claim is computational and falsification-oriented. The work does not experimentally validate the Frostyverse, does not claim equivalence with General Relativity, and does not present the remaining local photon law as a complete first-principles derivation. A supplementary reproducibility package contains the final source, a direct reviewer-accessible Python source tree, preserved research archives, canonical outputs, assumptions/firewalls, negative controls, claim-to-file map, hashes, run instructions, and selected provenance.