Launching the Phoenix

[JuanBolio]

It was simply a more powerful ICBM than ones we have today. I don't think you really need to get into warp fields and inertial black magic to explain it getting into orbit.

I'd like to know how all those people standing around outside right below the launch tube managed to avoid being incinerated.

[Plecostomus]

Could it also be that he just used the frame/body of the missile installed all new everything? That rocket engine for example could be a standard Russian Heavy Lift Engine or a Chinese Moon Rocket Engine.

*shrug* The prototype warp-drive he hefted into orbit would be totally different than Archer's, Scotty's or Laforge's drive in almost every way... it wouldn't be a big old reaction chamber, exotic crystal, and massive unobtanium coil system fed by a tank of cryogenic matter and pods of antimatter.

Heck I wouldn't be supprised if it was pure fission or fusion powered, just enough to prove the concept.

[CuttingEdge100]

Out of curiosity in TOS was it stated how Zephram Cochrane got his vessel into space?

[Vance]

CuttingEdge100 wrote:

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Out of curiosity in TOS was it stated how Zephram Cochrane got his vessel into space?

Nope.

Just had Cochrane from the wrong planet, with a completely differently look and personality...

[GodThingFormerly]

Gep Malakai wrote:

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How is this not a flaw with inertial dampening and impulse engines as well?

23rd century Starfleet impulse engines are strictly Newtonian rockets, whether they be fusion (TOS) or M/AM (TMP) energized. As for inertial compensation during high-g maneuvers, I would assume that is a parallel function of whatever mechanism generates the space vehicle's artificial gravity field.

Jimmy_C wrote:

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(1) The inertially damped zone probably didn't extend around the entire rocket - just the upper stage.

*shrugs*

A serviceable rationalization as any, I suppose.

(2) The rocket could have been a nuclear heated rocket - maybe siphoning some antimatter from the warp core for a boost.

But from where could have Cochrane sourced the astronomical (by today's standards) quantities of anti-matter he required for the project if such is the case? That shantytown where he was building the Phoenix didn't exactly strike me as a place which would be equipped with its own dedicated Fermilab-like particle collider.

TGT

[Vance]

The problem with the 'newtonian physics' for the impulse drive, TGT, is that Roddenberry ALSO says that they're fusion engines, and fusion doesn't work that way.

At any rate, even if there were, there's no reason at all that the Phoenix (indeed, any warp-based ship) couldn't just have the 'warp field' envelop the ship and keep the 'nuclear rockets' for thrust. Remember, relative within the warp field, the ship doesn't have to go ALL THAT FAST to worry too much about inertial dampening anyway - since the mass within the field is normalized and the inertia is only what the relative /non-warp/ velocity would be.

Yeah, still, we ARE talking insane numbers here, mind you, but SOMETHING has to normalize the cabin.

[GodThingFormerly]

Vance wrote:

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The problem with the 'newtonian physics' for the impulse drive, TGT, is that Roddenberry ALSO says that they're fusion engines, and fusion doesn't work that way.

In what sense, exactly? Thermonuclear fusion rockets for space vehicle propulsion applications have been rigorously analyzed since the 1960s (Example 1, Example 2, Example 3).

TGT

[aridas sofia]

Vance wrote:

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The problem with the 'newtonian physics' for the impulse drive, TGT, is that Roddenberry ALSO says that they're fusion engines, and fusion doesn't work that way.

Where did Roddenberry state that the impulse engines were fusion-powered? In TMoST, Whitfield and Roddenberry tell us the impulse drive can run for a month before their fuel is exhausted, but nothing about their power source. I vaguely remember reading them described as "atomic powered" and the sheet accompanying the AMT model said they employed the same principal of propulsion as "rockets". But I don't recall ever seeing Roddenberry describe the original ship as having a fusion-powered impulse drive.

[GodThingFormerly]

aridas sofia wrote:

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Where did Roddenberry state that the impulse engines were fusion-powered? In TMoST, Whitfield and Roddenberry tell us the impulse drive can run for a month before their fuel is exhausted, but nothing about their power source. I vaguely remember reading them described as "atomic powered" and the sheet accompanying the AMT model said they employed the same principal of propulsion as "rockets". But I don't recall ever seeing Roddenberry describe the original ship as having a fusion-powered impulse drive.

The Doomsday Machine states that overloading (I think - lemme spin the DVD to confirm) the impulse engines will cause a "fusion explosion", so the credit for this particular data point may have to go to Norman Spinrad.

TGT

[aridas sofia]

Of course. Forgive my momentary lapse.

[GodThingFormerly]

aridas sofia wrote:

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Of course. Forgive my momentary lapse.

First recite the Three Hail Genes, buy something from Lincoln Enterprises, and go and sin no more. Oh, BTW, from the R1DVD (0:41:27):

Kirk: "Spock, listen. Maybe Matt Decker didn't die for nothing. He had the right idea, but not enough power to do it. Am I correct in assuming that a fusion explosion of 97 megatons will result if a starship impulse engine is overloaded?"

Spock: "No, sir. 97.835 megatons."

TGT

[Gep Malakai]

The God Thing wrote:

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23rd century Starfleet impulse engines are strictly Newtonian rockets, whether they be fusion (TOS) or M/AM (TMP) energized. As for inertial compensation during high-g maneuvers, I would assume that is a parallel function of whatever mechanism generates the space vehicle's artificial gravity field.

...which was my point. If a "Subspace field" to reduce the mass of a Titan II rocket would have a deleterious effect on the Newtonian thrust of the rocket exhaust, then the 23rd century impulse engines would have the exact same problem due to those spiffy inertial dampeners.

[GodThingFormerly]

Gep Malakai wrote:

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If a "Subspace field" to reduce the mass of a Titan II rocket would have a deleterious effect on the Newtonian thrust of the rocket exhaust, then the 23rd century impulse engines would have the exact same problem due to those spiffy inertial dampeners.

I fail to see the connection.

TGT

[Timo]

But from where could have Cochrane sourced the astronomical (by today's standards) quantities of anti-matter he required for the project if such is the case? That shantytown where he was building the Phoenix didn't exactly strike me as a place which would be equipped with its own dedicated Fermilab-like particle collider.

If people of his era really had mastered gravity and inertia, it sounds likely that there would be a shining white Mr Fusion appliance in every kitchen - and an antimatter generator for every forward airstrip, ready to supply the tactical aircraft on their sorties against hovertank formations.

Frankly, I see nothing wrong with the "mad scientist launches his own rocket" idea in the Star Trek 2060s timeframe. It would be a bit implausible in our 2060s, or in the Trek 1990s, but not really for a culture that has mastered interplanetary travel in the 1990s and gone secretly interstellar with that tech soon thereafter.

Timo Saloniemi

[Gep Malakai]

The God Thing wrote:

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I fail to see the connection.

TGT

The inertial dampeners reduce the mass of the propellant being expelled from the impulse engines, thus resulting in the same problem for the starships as you pointed out for the rocket. Because dress the terms up however, both the Enterprise and the Titan missile are inertially dampened rockets; if the dampening impacts the performance of the missile, it should impact the performance of a starship too.