What I Don't Like About the USS Kelvin

I have to side with CuttingEdge100 on the rocket exhaust thing. TOS tried to be futuristic in that area, where other shows basically had rocket ships.

It is therefore not rocket exhaust at the back of the warp engine.

 

My take on it is that it's the starship equivalent of frothing at the mouth, and the Kelvin is itching to slug the Narada directly in the....face? Damn Cthulu-esque ship design

 

If it were so capable, separating the hall would've reduced the amount of damage that could be inflicted upon the Narada. The saucer was needed.

Same thing with the Stargazer. Picard mentioned in dialogue that they left the ship in shuttlecraft. Moreover, the design of the model didn't have the obvious lifeboat pods markings. It's also something not seen on starships prior to TNG. Although, I think a lifeboat can be seen in the TMP cargo bay matte.

However, in this case, the crew needed to get as far away from the combat zone so I imagine shuttlecraft would be more efficient.

Also, the frame of the camera was such that we only saw a handful of shuttles. Who knows how many more were flying off out of frame? Shoddy, I know, but things like that have been done in Trek before.

Honestly, we've seen only a handful of the Starfleet inventory in all the movies and shows, including DS9. Besides, the size and crew compliment could've been mission specific and we never got to know what that mission was.

In TOS remastered, there is exhaust from the impulse drives.

Exposed turbo-shafts can be seen in the cargo bay and rec deck of TMP.

It's about time, tho'. I've always hated that they never had countermeasures of any kind. Hell, they don't even have Time On Target for dealing with cloaked vessels.

 

Qonos,

That's true, but Star Trek is a television show which features ships which generally feature certain design qualities. Many of these characteristics were developed fairly early on by Gene Roddenberry and Matt Jeffries. While both are dead, Gene Roddenberry and Matt Jeffries did create the first ships in the show, and established design ideologies, traditions and rules for ship-design.

1.) Gene Roddenberry specifically did not want the USS Enterprise (Which Roddenberry originally intended to call the USS Yorktown) to look like any spacecraft currently under development by NASA.
(Logical)

2.) Gene Roddenberry specifically did not want the vessel to have any wings or look like an aircraft
(Logical)

3.) Gene Roddenberry specifically did not want flamin' rocket exhaust shooting out the back of the ship
(Logical)

4.) Gene Roddenberry wanted the ship to employ engines which allow FTL travel by warping the fabric of space to get around the normal universal lightspeed limit
(Logical)

5.) Matt Jeffries wanted the ship's warp engines to be completely visible from the front
(Not Necessarily Logical *see footnote 1*)

6.) Matt Jeffries felt that the ship's warp engines should have at least 50% line-of-sight from the sides
(Not Necessarily Logical / Not Logical *see footnote 2*)

7.) Gene Roddenberry and Matt Jeffries initially felt that warp-nacelles must exist in pairs. Regardless, it is not clear how ironclad this rule was -- Roddenberry signed off on F.J. Schnaubelt's "Star Trek Blueprints" and other works which among other things included at least two (if not three) designs which featured vessels with an odd-number of warp-nacelles. It would seem that he made the twin-nacelle rule canon predominantly to screw F.J. Schnaubelt over.
(Not Logical)

8.) Matt Jeffries wanted the ship to have navigational deflectors which essentially sweep matter and debris out of the way of the ship to avoid high-speed impact damage while moving at high-rates of speed, including warp-speed.
(Logical)

9.) Matt Jeffries and Gene Roddenberry (Predominantly Matt Jeffries it would appear) preferred a modular design ideology which makes construction, maintenance and repairs easier, and is which is what ultimately resulted in podded nacelles, and a separate engineering hull and saucer.
(Not Necessarily Logical *see footnote 3*)

10.) The twin-hulled design of the USS Enterprise was essentially designed to function normally as an organic-whole, with the ability of the primary hull to house all the crew and separate from the rest of the ship in an emergency for the function of being a lifeboat.
(Logical)

Well, first of all, Marijuana is illegal, second of all, even if I did partake in it, I would not admit to it on an online forum (For the record though, I do not smoke marijuana, or tobacco, I rarely drink, and I don't do any illegal drugs) -- I do enjoy icecream though...

Star Trek fans have *always* been this anal. You should know that by now *rolls eyes*

Actually I'm quite aware of this. However, as I said, Gene Roddenberry and Matt Jeffries did establish a variety of design ideologies, traditions, and rules of I listed and I stated which ones had a logical basis, which had a semi-logical basis, and which had no logical basis at all.

I've never heard of that particular theory, though I wouldn't mind hearing about it...

FOOTNOTES
-> Footnote 1: Various warp-drive ideas were proposed. At least one idea did actually depend on the front of the nacelle acting as some sort of impeller. However, other than that it is not a logical feature
-> Footnote 2: Matt Jeffries assumed the flux-chillers/power-combs would share energy between them. Only under that assumption would this be logical, otherwise not.
-> Footnote 3: The modular construction idea *is* logical, but there are ways to design something in a modular fashion which is not as gangly as the USS Enterprise is, however the dual-hull arrangement has some useful functions however.


Herkimer Jitty,

I suppose one could claim that it's not much different than an impulse-engine glow, still, it is an unusual design feature nonetheless. Why would there be an impulse engine on the back of a warp-nacelle, especially when it has impulse engines on the saucer too...

Yeah, I remember that. That was awful...


Borg Phil,

I suppose, but it was never really stated for clear. It seems that it's open to interpretation. Still, for a ship to be so gigantic to hold so many shuttles in the proportionally small engineering-hull (relative to the saucer), a crew of 800 would most likely fit quite comfortably in such a vessel.


Plecostomus,

I'm an atheist.


Praetor,

I suppose you could use such an argument, but in most likelyhood the qualities that made the Constitution Class so special was it's range of scientific capabilities, it's shields and weapons capabilities, it's propulsion, and likely it's size as the labs on the vessel all took up space and were manned, not to mention it's supposed swimming pool, gym, and bowling alley (all of which take up space)

Also, pretty much every ship shown prior to the series "Enterprise", was smaller, or for it's size had much less occupiable space relative to it's size than the Enterprise...

The DY-100, DY-500, SS-Phoenix, and USS Daedalus for example were both physically smaller and had smaller crews than the Constitution Class.

The XCV-330 Enterprise was larger at 300 meters, but the habitable space inside the vessel (volume wise) was substantially less than the Enterprise

If you count the show "Enterprise" the NX-01 still was smaller than the TOS Enterprise (225m vs 289m) although some of the largest Vulcan vessels were larger (I'm not counting future federation ships)

I personally like a number of the characteristics the vessel possesses. The fact that the saucer has a warp-engine, the fact that the bridge is hidden inside the saucer for example...

Agreed, especially when the saucer could serve as a lifeboat and the ship could carry lifeboats onboard.

Still considering how big the Kelvin was compared to the Constitution Class vessel, 800 people could easily fit onboard that vessel fine.

I don't really see the point for having a hangar set-up like that, especially when you consider that a modular hanger design would have no reasonable purpose -- why would you jettison your hangar? An NCC-1000 Bonaventure-Class set-up would be more practical in that case as it would have one hull.

The Star Trek reason you'd have a dual hull is so you can use one of them as a lifeboat...


Disillusion,

That's true, but they established design ideologies, traditions, and such which was often used on later ship designs...


CuttingEdge100

 

Regarding the secondary hull, I might think of it more like the AWACS type pod on the Nebula - switchable for a variety of missions. This one happened to involve hauling 800 people...

 

They are also no longer in control of the property. Realistically Trek ship design has been kept more as a homage to the creators and the fans but it has been departed from (Defiant in DS9, Voyger with the variable pylons and the more elongated I guess we would call it more of an arrowhead design than a saucer section and the Enterprise E which really is one of the ugliest Enterprises ever.)

 

That's true, but a lot of those design ideologies have been nullified later on anyway. Perhaps the most important thing, then, is not if it agrees with what has come before, but if it looks like it could be what it's supposed to be.

For example: As long as there is some sort of blue glow in a long line, preferably with a red glow at the front, it's probably a warp nacelle, and people will recognize it as such. If you make it a glowing circle at both sides, it's still probably a pair of warp nacelles of some sort. If it looks like the ISS or Hubble Telescope, it's probably not a warp nacelle. Doesn't matter if it's big, small, long, short, single or if there are 65 of them arranged in a flower power pattern. It's still recognizable.

That doesn't mean that you need to lay these rules down and forgo any experimenting. The warp ring on the ENT Vulcan ships is a great example; something very different but still recognizable. The Jellyfish in the new movie; it's very different then any trek ship before, but not unrecognizable.

Most of the "rules" by Jeffires or Roddenberry are nice as guidelines, but nothing more. Look critically at the Star Trek ships; they already look almost exactly the same to the untrained eye. Perhaps some more difference isn't all that bad.

 

Middy Sea Fort,

That's not a really good argument. Plus considering how much more deadly weapons technology has increased simply from TOS to TMP, let alone TMP to TNG (which were massive), then from there to the Borg Conflict and the Dominion War (which apparently ended in the 2370's), and from there to 2387 where the Narada hails from, I'm amazed the Kelvin wasn't vaporized with one or two shots, or at least a volley from the Narada.

Even then, considering the time it took for the USS Kelvin to evacuate then steer towards the Narada, I'm amazed they couldn't have blown up the already wounded ship by then...

I suppose that's true, but they still looked way more streamlined than that. Pretty much all Star Trek ships generally are pretty clean-cut all the way back to the NX-01 at least.

While that's actually a good point, I'm pretty sure the ship would have had to have ECM of some sort even if they didn't mention it.

I'm also quite amazed that they couldn't shoot down torpedoes. The regular phasers could have done that though to my knowledge.

Regarding cloaked vessels, I've never received a very good explanation why they couldn't fire torpedoes while cloaked all the way until Star Trek 6


Praetor,

Bad argument. I'll explain why.

1.) This pod has the navigational deflector on it. Considering there are no other navigational deflectors on the ship, it seems likely that the nav-deflector and engineering-hull are integral to the functioning of the ship.

2.) The shuttlebay is located on the back of the engineering-hull/pod. There are no other shuttlebays on the vessel.

 

Bring your own bag of blood for the transfusion you'll need afterwards.

 

Touche. Still, I don't have a problem with it. I'd just put the warp core elsewhere. The Kelvin's mission profile obviously required a huuuge cargo/shuttlebay.

 

I stand by my statement. It is sound from a tactical point-of-view. The saucer provides a greater area of impact against the hall of the Narada. You may not agree but that is within your purview, and, honestly, you didn't write a convincing rebuttal to as it was not so. You merely stated it was "not a good argument," but did nothing to refute my statement rather you just moved on to the topic of weapon yields.

I was referring more to estimating position of a cloaked target by calculating it's last two know positions and deriving a current position by that. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_On_Target

 

I just love how people develop their own personal "canon" in their mind about the pre-TOS era. Because there has been ZERO canon material about the time between ENT and TOS.

And then they get up in arms about details of a never before seen ship class. Classic.

Arguing about design rules that are not canon. Classic.

And I just also love the bitching about no escape pods/capsules... Yet they conveniently forget that the ENT-D was the first trek ship with visible escape pods. Not a single TOS series or TOS movie ship had them either! Just classic!

 

Is this supposed to be funny? The entire ship is just a saucer with a nacelle and a hangar/cargo pod attached to it. What the hell would the saucer separate FROM?

 

It's modular, anyways. There's nothing to indicate it can't seperate and there are plenty of points you could put the seperation lines.

Besides, with the TOS E, it's more like the engineering hull is being ditched from the habitat hull, since the saucer has the sublight engine anyways. Same deal here.

 

Well yeah, but what possible utility would seperating have for a ship like this? The warp nacelle is pretty much an outboard motor at this point, there's no reason to separate from it unless someone shoots it full of holes and the Captain decides to jettison it so he won't have to haul that dead weight when he limps away on impulse power.

 

Remember in GEN when the Enterprise-D's saucer separated in order to act as a lifeboat? Remember how the secondary hull exploded, and the shockwave from the explosion was enough to send the saucer hurtling into the planet?

Even if the saucer of the Kelvin did somehow separate, where the hell was it supposed to go? The Narada would have blow it out of the sky before it had a chance to get away! Not exactly the kind of lifeboat I would want to be trapped in.

 

Newtype_Alpha,

Am I, like, talking to a wall or something?

The engineering-hull is not a cargo/hangar pod. It's an engineering hull. It has all the characteristics of an engineering hull... it looks like an engineering hull, it's got the nav-deflector on the front, it has a shuttlebay in the back...


RoJoHen,

Which presents another interesting point, why didn't the Narada just blow up all the shuttles?

If the shuttles any warp capability, it probably wasn't all that high, and the Narada in most likelyhood could outrun them no matter what they did, and it had the firepower to blow up the Kelvin, let a lone a few shuttles...


CuttingEdge100

 

if you count on the saucer as being your primary life boat then there a lot of cirumstances when the crew would be out of luck.
heck the function to seperate quickly could have been off line along with the autopilot/.

and if you are in a combat situation it might make sense to present a lot of smaller targets instead of one big target with failing shields.

i think saucer seperation was ment more for things going wrong in engineering where getting to the shuttles would have been too risky or in some event where the ship is crippled but no other outside threat is present.

as to why didnt the narada just blow up the shuttles..
uh that is shown in the film.

kirk senior is blowing up the weaponry before it hits the shuttles though one still gets destroyed.

and the collision of kelvin and narada ketp the narada from going after the narada.

though i suspect that going through the singularity affected certain systems on the narada including warp drive.

other wise when the jelly fish came out of the singularity spock could have attempted to go to warp and he didnt.

 

You do not actually know this, it's an assumption you make. It's entirely possible that Kelvin's warp core is actually in the SAUCER, equidistant from the navigational deflector and the huge single warp nacelle it has to power. "Separation" is unnecessary in this case, since in the event of a problem you can simply dump the warp core.

If on the other hand you are correct and the warp core is in the engineering pod, separation is still unneccesary since you can still eject the core without also ejecting your cargo bays and shuttlebays. Enterprise-D's saucer basically separated from the half of the ship that contained ALL of its main drive systems and offensive weapons; Kelvin doesn't have a drive section, and all its weapons are on the saucer.

The only characteristic that makes something an "engineering hull" (of the term is even applicable) is the presence of an ENGINE. Do you actually know that Kelvin's warp core is in that pod or are you just assuming that because it "looks like an engineering hull"?

Because George Kirk used the Kelvin as a shield, first covering them with the ship's bulk and then putting up a phaser barrage to shoot down its torpedoes (and we actually see several torpedoes being vaporized within meters of the shuttle, so clearly Nero was AIMING for them).