I have seen all sorts of figures from Mr. Scott's guide to the Enterprise, and Franz Joseph Schnaubelt's stuff... In the show, how quick did it typically take to go from Warp 1 to Warp 6, and from Warp 6 to 8 or 6 to 9? BTW: From what I remember in TMP it took 22 seconds from Warp 0.8 to Warp 7, but the TMP Enterprise was actually a different ship and I'm not sure if it was going at full acceleration... CuttingEdge100
Starship Spotter had some acceleration figures, but the shows are somewhat inconsistent and I don't believe Spotter tried to follow them very closely. Offhand, I can remember that TNG "The Survivors" might be a good episode to look at for some rattling off of warp speeds as they were attained.
I seriously doubt we could gain anything of use from TOS. The few times our heroes move through various warp factors as the camera follows, the plot point is that warp 6 is okay, warp 7 is a bit risque, and warp 8 causes a high-pitched whine from Main Engineering. So our heroes don't move from warp 6 to warp 8 as fast as they can, but hesistantly, cautiously, and minding that awful whine (since it wouldn't be polite to tell Scotty to shut up). The accelerations in "Encounter at Farpoint" and "The Survivors" are a different matter, and may indeed approximate fastest possible increase of warp factors. Outside emergencies, the time between Picard's "Warp seven to our destination, engage!" and the actual reaching of warp seven may be considerable. Take for example "The Child", where Picard gives the command, the camera then goes to Ten Forward and follows through lots of dialogue between Wesley and Guinan, and the ship majestically turns and slowly edges into warp. The "outside view" of similar occurrences looks like a couple of seconds only - but on basis of "The Child", we may now assume that any such scene features many time-saving cuts! Timo Saloniemi
DITL.ORG has a warp speed chart and you can enter your own data to get distance to speed ratio's. Personally speaking though, I think it's a little off. That website states that warp 9.6 is a little under 2000 time the speed of light, warp 9 is is a little over 1500 times the speed of light, and cruising speed of warp 5 is a little under 400 times the speed of light. I think it's a little bit higher than that, but only a little bit. Seems a tad ridiculous to cruise at warp 6 which would take almost a month to travel across a sector. BUT, that said, it's pretty damn close and considering the research the guy does on the subject it's probably right and I'm just imagining things. FY, Voyagers top cruising speed is warp 9.975, and that's 5,551.9 times the speed of light, and at that speed you could cross a sector, 20 lightyears, in 1 day. So again, it seems pretty damned close if not probably right on the money as to actual speeds.
forgot: go to www.ditl.org, and on the top right of the screen there is, amongst others, a yellow button that says calculator. Then on the far left of the screen there is a vertical menu where you can select what TYPE of calculation you want. Enjoy.
Timo, Considering that acceleration from 6-8 would be slower... How long would you say it would take for the TOS Enterprise to go from Warp 0.8 to Warp 6.0?