ajohnson
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Post by ajohnson on Mar 18, 2006 22:40:07 GMT
Well, to start with, we need to work out the basic structure of the ship. I figure we'll just discuss one thing at a time until we come to a desicion.
First, we need to figure out the size of the ship. Length, width, height and possibly mass.
My thinking is that proportionally, this ship will be similar to the Enterprise-D.
So, the Enterprise-D's measurements were:
Length: 642 meters Width: 479 meters Height: 138 meters
We could double that which would give us:
Length: 1284 meters Width: 958 meters Height: 276 meters
Anyone have any thoughts on this?
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jared
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Post by jared on Mar 19, 2006 20:44:28 GMT
Depends on the model used. I'd suggest for final form doubling the Galaxy's length and then seeing what the model's measurements came to in other dimensions. The other option is simply deciding what measurements are needed for the final mass (say so the shuttlebay is large enough to hold a fighter wing, so it has to be X x Y x Z) and then building a model around that or altering a model to fit the specs required.
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ajohnson
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Post by ajohnson on Mar 19, 2006 22:42:25 GMT
What "model" are you proposing that we use?
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jared
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Post by jared on Mar 19, 2006 23:28:15 GMT
I thought you might have one in mind. I mean the rough physical shape.
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ajohnson
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Post by ajohnson on Mar 19, 2006 23:31:05 GMT
Well, I liked the one you drew, only wider. Do you think you could draw that for me?
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jared
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Post by jared on Mar 28, 2006 17:53:10 GMT
I tried a couple of times but they didn't come out well. They just looked a little squished.
I'll try again for a less post-high-speed-accident look, but I think the elongated saucer doesn't work when widened without having the shape changed dramatically. Trouble is that once you do that, the engineering section also looks like it needs to flatten in which case the nacelles and pylons also need some shape redesign.
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ajohnson
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Post by ajohnson on Apr 11, 2006 18:27:46 GMT
If you upload the picture, maybe others will have suggestions on how to change it?
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logan06
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Post by logan06 on Sept 5, 2006 1:35:07 GMT
Sorry to jump in so late, but I think some of the ideas I can put forward may rock the boat a little and keep within StarTrek legacy but be completely different at the same time. Like a Star Trek meets Space: Above and Beyond meets Starship Troopers, plus many more, lol!
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Elron
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Post by Elron on Dec 6, 2006 1:09:20 GMT
Am I the only one who thinks this ships sounds rather gargantuan and unwieldy?
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Jamey Gaz
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Post by Jamey Gaz on Dec 6, 2006 2:39:51 GMT
no ... I too think that double the size of the Galaxy class is simply too big ... if QSD is a "go", then power is already at a premium ... entering and exiting slipstream means less power for shields, weapons, dampeners ... etc ... at least until you exit the slipstream I like the Dauntless Class look (yes I know this wasn't a real ship ... but still) Dauntless Link
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jared
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Post by jared on Dec 6, 2006 13:44:17 GMT
Am I the only one who thinks this ships sounds rather gargantuan and unwieldy? Only if you still try to use it like a trireme or fighter plane. To counter this, I suggested that a large ship would have some sort of fast tracking pulse turrets and would simply sit still and fire on the smaller ships around it. Visualise a modern warship or a Borg ship fighting and that's sort of the idea. This would stop the limiting factor which makes most Trek ships so small. It would also make launching and retrieving fighters a lot easier.
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Jamey Gaz
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Post by Jamey Gaz on Dec 6, 2006 15:33:44 GMT
I guess the question is ... what type ship are we building ... A tactical ship, explorer ship, fighter carrier, science, support ship I understood from past threads that this was to be an explorer ... however canon does suggest that StarFleet wasn't going to build as big as the Galaxy Class ever again ... The Romulan D'deridex Class is around 1200m in Length ... twice that of the Galaxy ... Borg Cube is around 3040m ... and simming a slow sluggish ship would be ... well ... boring I think big ships don't "fly" well in people mind ... we are after all asking people, especially CNOs, to fly the ship in words not pictures/movies. I just don't think people understand how a massive ship moves ... I have read people simming a Galaxy Class Star Ship making moves of the a NX class ship move or the Defiant. Just doesn't "work". If we want a big ship ... then The Scimitar built by the Reman, around 900 would be more than enough ... even to house fighter wings. And if QSD is going the be the propulsion of choice ... how does a huge ship handle in a slipstream? Again ... my two cents
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jared
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Post by jared on Dec 6, 2006 16:59:02 GMT
I didn't build a Scimitar... The Galaxy thing is due to the constraints of size and tactics; dogfighting means a smaller ship is needed. Hence why the Battlestar Galactica was so large and solid but the Federation saw the Intrepid class as a valid choice. It is true that a large ship does not have a pilot in the same sense that a plane would. The CNO would literally be simply a navigator. But then if simming was done on the ship which included fighter wings and marines and the support ships each would require then possibly losing the position as a simming one wouldn't be a bad idea. It depends on if people want a wholly new ship, simply a new shaped design or something in the middle. As for size, two things come to mind; the D'Deridex was long, but hollow and still built to the trireme model, not the cruiser model. If it was solid, then it would have been a far greater threat. The Borg cube wallowed in the sky, but was a far more rugged and effective warship than anything else in the canon universe. Were it not for plot convenience, the Borg would have PWNED Earth long ago. QSD; is made up in vague terms, therefore what actually happens is really up to us to decide as much as anything else. I'd suggest that a larger ship would handle the same as a smaller one unless Elron can cite some mechanics that would apply and suggest otherwise, not forgetting the fact that ships don't seem to be affected in warp by their size. Nacelles; Elron brought up the suggestion that nacelles are not needed for QSD and since they have proven to be a weak point of Federation design, losing them seems a good idea. Nonetheless, we need to be careful not just to build a Battlestar but to make sure that the ship fits Federation design lineage even if it means changing what things are for. In that basis, I'd recommend making the nacelles bulkier , closer to the body and something to do with the bussards (flying through the right nebulae is a great way to refuel those things that QSD and other systems might need) or weapons (putting phasers on the top of them would increase field of fire which was not previously possible on the delicate and cramped warp nacelles. Or we make up something that means large ships need them where smaller ones did not for QSD if we use a larger vessel shape. Thoughts, anyone? Physics, Elron?
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Elron
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Post by Elron on Dec 7, 2006 1:51:39 GMT
I don't think the size of the vessel should affect its ability to fly in slipstream. There's no aerodynamics involved, and you're essentially just being pulled along regardless of mass and size. You'd need a bigger slipstream-tube to accomodate a larger vessel, but I can't speculate on how much energy that might cost.
I like the idea of using the nacelles as large ramscoops; it lets us keep them but gives us the freedom to radically alter them. I suppose you could also say that for ships above a certain size, ie slipstreams above a certain radius, it works out more efficient to have two overlapping quantum fields and therefore two generators, rather than a single large generator (the deflector dish). You could build up a constructive interference pattern between the two emitters and generate the slipstream that way (a bit like warp drive). You'd have to keep them completely unobstructed at the front though.
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jared
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Post by jared on Dec 7, 2006 12:17:21 GMT
Also you can have bussards or generators at the front of the nacelle but not both due to space constraints. However, we could simply put the bussards somewhere else on the front of the ship. Above the usual spot for the deflector dish maybe.
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cptjeff
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Post by cptjeff on Dec 10, 2006 4:03:59 GMT
I'd prefer to keep the nacelles, actually. Even if we do use QSD, the ship will probably still be relying primarily on Warp, as QSD is still experimental.
900m sounds like more then enough to me, And while that ship would be hard to fly, we've seen the -E doing some pretty nice stunts in insurrection.
I dunno, I think we should continue on the big ship route. but sleeker then the Galaxy- the Z axis compression (or rather, lack of it) on that would have made it nearly impossible to manovour... especially in banking. Air resistance may not apply, but momentum sure does.
Manouvoring should be better if you build it to sleeker proportions. it's the ratios that are the key, not the size. Look at the Spruce goose. it flew, even though everyone said it was too big to. it's not the sizes, it's the ratios. a long thin ship, no matter the size, will bank better then a wide one of any size.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 10, 2006 11:48:40 GMT
we've seen the -E doing some pretty nice stunts in insurrection. Not to mention Nemesis as well....unless thats what you meant? lol
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jared
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Post by jared on Dec 13, 2006 12:35:56 GMT
I dunno, I think we should continue on the big ship route. but sleeker then the Galaxy- the Z axis compression (or rather, lack of it) on that would have made it nearly impossible to manovour... especially in banking. Air resistance may not apply, but momentum sure does. Manouvoring should be better if you build it to sleeker proportions. it's the ratios that are the key, not the size. Look at the Spruce goose. it flew, even though everyone said it was too big to. it's not the sizes, it's the ratios. a long thin ship, no matter the size, will bank better then a wide one of any size. Don't forget that this isn't an aircraft limited to a 2 dimensional design. So far the Trek ships have all been basically aircraft possibly because Roddenberry was thinking in those terms when Kirk's ship was designed. The ships would handle much better if given more than one set of manoeuving engines on the back of the saucer section. The optimum would be achieved by four jets near the front and back of the ship, which would help if it were knocked into a death spin, as the Discovery was in when found in '2010'. Banking is not something a starship needs to do and we could build any size ship if we abandoned the only two impulse engines rule.
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cptjeff
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Post by cptjeff on Dec 29, 2006 5:18:44 GMT
Accually, Banking does help in terms of inertia. The momentum is focused closer to the ship's center of mass rather then out on the edge, helping it turn faster.
And I would agree with you on the 4 engines thing, but they aren't reaction thrust, though they have those too. The Reaction thrust (rockets) are the RCS thrusters, and they are positioned like you describe. Impulse engines create a distortion wave in space by putting energy out and collapsing it back on itself, creating waves. the ship then rides those waves. in theory then, the ship can move in any direction, but due to momentum, a ship is built for only one primary direction of movement- forward. Backwards is also an option (duh) but y and z axis movement is not recommended. Kirk does it in the mutara Nebula, but that's about the only time I think somebody's actually used that.
there can be any number of impulse engines- the -D had 3, one drive and 2 saucer. The only reason they put multiples in other then separation is for redundancy. And the ports you see are only exhaust vents, not the engines themselves. Kirk even orders them closed in obsession (of course the No. 2 vent s malfunctioning and the thing gets in anyways) but they can still move at impulse with them closed. They just have to temporally store the hot plasma.
here's an idea: We build in a system that pressurizes a tank with the exhaust before venting it, and put in emergency vents in the from that are normally closed, and that tank could be used for emergency reaction manouvoring. Or would that take up too much valuable space?
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jared
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Post by jared on Jan 3, 2007 14:35:28 GMT
Whilst banking may help with moving forward turning, it is a necessity on planes to keep moving forwards at the same speed to keep up the air pressure on the wings. In a starship, manoeuvring engines can be put at the front and back so that it can spin on the spot. In much larger ships, this is not easily possible or desirable, but Trek ships are small dogfighters and have no reason not to. The ability to round on one's opponent without having to chase him through is own flight arc is of massive tactical value for dogfighters.
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cptjeff
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Post by cptjeff on Jan 15, 2007 23:18:44 GMT
Trek Ships are small dog fighters? compared to What? Star Wars Ships? Those are not even close to realistic. Star trek at least tries to keep it's science straight.
They could add the engines, but with multi directional phaser strips covering all of the ship, there isn't much need for really tight maneuvering.
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jared
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Post by jared on Jan 19, 2007 19:47:06 GMT
Star Wars ships are no more or less realistic than Trek ones. The books detailing their functions are often not well written and clashes can be found in various editions. Likewise, fan fiction is prone to misunderstanding what writers actually mean at times. Otherwise, don't confuse futuristic with realistic. They're bigger, meaner and use different weapons, but they've been built for thousands of years compared to the Federation's few hundred years of ship building. Also on terminology and the confusion it can produce, consider that a phaser rifle is no more a rifle than a laser rifle, so why would a 'laser' be an actual laser?
Also, the comparison is to multiple sci fi ships. Adams, Asimov, Farscape, Freelancer, Haldeman, Homeworld and Red Dwarf all feature large ships which cannot move like Trek ships and neither need or try to.
And the phasers are one thing, but torpedoes pack more punch and it's not only to fight but also to dodge.
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Elron
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Post by Elron on Jan 20, 2007 1:48:07 GMT
What?
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jared
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Post by jared on Jan 20, 2007 18:27:39 GMT
They use the phrase 'laser' in Star Wars, etc, to describe the weapons they're using, but they clearly aren't lasers. But given that they're not actually rifles either then there's no guarantee that they are actually meant to be lasers either.
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cptjeff
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Post by cptjeff on Jan 21, 2007 5:55:46 GMT
flawed logic. To me that jsut says Star Wars doens't care so much about keeppng their science straight as they do a good story. No shame in that, but Star trek is very different. Trek tries to deal in a realistic science and tell a good story at the same time. There are also many more chances for trek to develop the tech. But phaser rifles are shaped like rifles and menat to serve the same purpose- rifles instead of pistols.
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