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Starship design history in light of Discovery

Beats me; the contest was nine years ago. But I do remember that Ihle's design wasn't one of the runner-ups in the popular vote because his win came out of nowhere, which was one of the reasons why people (especially the runner-ups) were so angry that the vote was meaningless.

Edit: I do remember that one of the runner-ups was a design by @Vektor , which I believe is Nog’s ship in STO:

https://sto.gamepedia.com/U.S.S._Chimera

(P.S. I’m not implying that Vektor, as one of the runner-ups, was angry at Ihle for winning.)
 
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The F showed up in the Picard comic, but it was just the class of ship, not the actual Enterprise F.

I'm not hot on the design. The shape is nice but it feels too close to the E, like they put the skin of the E over the shape rather than going for different color tones, window shapes etc.
 
8Ume90w.jpg

Saladin-class


Can I say that one looks kind of silly. WTF were they thinking when they designed that?

OK you have the classic TOS neck but what is inside what looks like an ordinary nacelle?
Did they bung the warp drive in there with the MARA chamber too?
 
Yup - I guess this was more or less the default assumption for how warp engines were set up at the time anyway.

As for what they were thinking: "The kids can create these things by using the bits from their scale model kit. Or from several, which is even better for the sales."

A bit harder to do for the ships of TNG. Not doable at all for the later shows, alas.

Timo Saloniemi
 
Can I say that one looks kind of silly. WTF were they thinking when they designed that?

OK you have the classic TOS neck but what is inside what looks like an ordinary nacelle?
Did they bung the warp drive in there with the MARA chamber too?
Up until TMP at the earliest the common thinking about warp technology is that the nacelles functioned much like the engines on an airplane - all the fuel and reactions took place inside there, on the end of those nice, long pylons and far from the inhabited sections of the ship. The "Engine Room" was just a systems control facility to monitor the reactors, much like the control room of a nuclear reactor.
Even TMP didn't have the reaction chamber in the middle of the work area, that was buried far below decks. The vertical and horizontal tubes (often mislabelled as the warp core) were just power conduits to convey the energy to other ship systems like the Impulse or Warp drives.
It wasn't until TMP that the notion of colliding matter with antimatter RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE of the engine room became a concept, after which some folks decided that a deal of retconning was in order.
But that was never the original intention.
 
...Of course, Scotty nevertheless had the plot obligation of accessing a single centrally mounted piece of machinery that would make or break warp propulsion for the hero ship. This didn't work well with the two-nacelle arrangement unless one assumed the nacelles were mere "end effectors", the screws to a steam turbine ship or the tires to an internal combustion engine automobile. "That Which Survives" is a particularly prominent example of an implied machinery layout that best matches the TNG idea of a centrally mounted antimatter doodad and somewhat conflicts with the idea that the great energies involved in warp drive would be confined to the nacelles.

But nothing much is explicit about future technology in TOS, and everything can be reinterpreted as need be. Counterexamples where the nacelles are the source of all power-related evil and their jettisoning would save the ship can be seen in several TOS plotlines, too.

Timo Saloniemi
 
Yup - I guess this was more or less the default assumption for how warp engines were set up at the time anyway.

As for what they were thinking: "The kids can create these things by using the bits from their scale model kit. Or from several, which is even better for the sales."

A bit harder to do for the ships of TNG. Not doable at all for the later shows, alas.

Timo Saloniemi


I guess that's a positive and even as a kid I did do that kind of thing and bash together my own ships from parts gathered from other ships. They didn't look neat or pro but they were the fruits of my imagination.
 
He really was the one that started it all. The designs were admittedly not the most inspired technically, simply rearranging components from the original Connie, but their value lay in the fact that they inspired the first generation of fan-made designs in the 80's (Mastercom, Aurora), and exploded into the 90's (Jackill, so many countless others). I can't think of a single starship designer (myself included) that didn't hold some level of reverence to the original FJ fleet, despite its many shortcomings by modern standards.
 
...Of course, Scotty nevertheless had the plot obligation of accessing a single centrally mounted piece of machinery that would make or break warp propulsion for the hero ship. This didn't work well with the two-nacelle arrangement unless one assumed the nacelles were mere "end effectors", the screws to a steam turbine ship or the tires to an internal combustion engine automobile. "That Which Survives" is a particularly prominent example of an implied machinery layout that best matches the TNG idea of a centrally mounted antimatter doodad and somewhat conflicts with the idea that the great energies involved in warp drive would be confined to the nacelles.
That might be how it looks after years of TNG style jargon and the word "pod" getting inextricably linked to antimatter storage containers. However, throughout TOS "pod" always meant "nacelle" and the terms were used interchangeably. Does that mean that Scott was ordering Spock to jettison him whilst he was still inside a nacelle? According to the first draft of the script (September 9, 1968) it was a resounding YES!

INT. CRAWLWAY - CLOSE - SCOTT
SCOTT
All right, Mr. Spock, I'm now opening the access panel to the magnetic flow valve itself. Keep your eye on the dial. If there's a jump in magnetic flow you must jettison me and the entire matter-antimatter nacelle immediately. It will blow in two seconds after the rupture of the magnetic field.
https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/what-the-heck-that-makes-no-sense.297138/#post-12709023

But nothing much is explicit about future technology in TOS, and everything can be reinterpreted as need be. Counterexamples where the nacelles are the source of all power-related evil and their jettisoning would save the ship can be seen in several TOS plotlines, too.
That's why TOS is an evergreen source of conversations and debates - and I love it! :biggrin:
 
Does that mean that Scott was ordering Spock to jettison him whilst he was still inside a nacelle?

This is the main issue: one Scotty, two nacelles... If there's to be a special spot, why not make it symmetric?

(Of course, we do have the additional concept of "antimatter nacelle", as if the two worked by mirroring each other, thus perhaps allowing Scotty in "Survives" and "One Of Our Planets Is Missing" to address antimatter issues through one nacelle only.)

That's why TOS is an evergreen source of conversations and debates - and I love it! :biggrin:

I hear Maxwell Smart's voice there... And yes, it's very much my cup of bittersweet tea, too.

Timo Saloniemi
 
This is the main issue: one Scotty, two nacelles... If there's to be a special spot, why not make it symmetric?

(Of course, we do have the additional concept of "antimatter nacelle", as if the two worked by mirroring each other, thus perhaps allowing Scotty in "Survives" and "One Of Our Planets Is Missing" to address antimatter issues through one nacelle only.)
TAS does lots of spice to the fire, that's for sure! :biggrin:

However, the lack of symmetry in TWS might not necessarily a problem (notwithstanding the fact that Scotty specifically calls it a "matter-antimatter nacelle" in the draft). After all, surely both nacelles' operating output would HAVE to to be tied together at a precise level in order to maintain a steady course, even under normal conditions. Therefore, if one nacelle malfunctioned (as in TWS) the other would automatically increase output to match in order to prevent the ship literally spinning out of control.

The other option is that the malfunctioning nacelle is the only one generating the warp field and the crew are able to shape the output enough to keep a straight course.
This seems unlikely because that one nacelle would have to be capable of Warp 30 and probably Warp 40! After all, we know from ENT that a twin nacelled ship suffers a performance loss of 25% when operating with only one nacelle.
There's also zero evidence in TOS that starship nacelles would be capable of that kind of performance.
 
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