Excelsior Technical Manual: Grand Finale

[Praetor]

Okay, show-and-tell time.

I've spent a good chunk of time working on Deck 07 and Deck 08 because there are such clearly discernable windows and other features, and because these are really the main saucer decks.

• I've created thruster compartments with high and low bays for each of the six saucer thrusters. I'm pretty sure that these will be two-deck spaces, possibly with an upper balcony/catwalk. I'm planning to add some small deuterium tanks to each of these bays. The two aft bays flanking the interconnecting dorsal have corresponding hull windows, which I presume are for visual observation of each warp nacelle from inside the ship if needed.
• I've determined that the large clusters of windows around the saucer are all crew lounges/mess halls that are open to the outer corridor. The upper level only has one row of tables, whereas the bottom can fit two. Each "room" will have a set of stairs to go from the upper to lower levels along with a bank of food synthesizers that I've yet to place.
• On Deck 07, I've decided to characterize the set seen in "Flashback" as a "bridge officer ready room" that can be used by a given shift's bridge officers (likely divided by division) before, during, and after they come on duty. Since Deck 07 is the main turboshaft deck of the saucer there's easy access to the bridge, but it's also far enough away from the bridge to hopefully give the crew a sense of relaxation as well as access to food service and other crew facilities. I have two port and two starboard, and will likely add two at the forward location. This could provide two per shift, assuming the ship operates on an Alpha/Beta/Gamma shift rotation as is usually assumed.
• Deck 07 will have a portside ramp down to a mid-level gangway, following the refit Enterprise. The "real" Excelsior should of course have a visible hatch here but considering we almost always see the ship from starboard and never get a good look at the port side saucer we can fudge and pretend it's there. This also happens to line up nicely with how the ship was aligned to the dock in Spacedock in "TSFS."
• On Deck 08, I've placed the landing feet roughly where they are on the outer hull and will create compartments to house the machinery.
• Also on Deck 08, I've placed a number of lifeboat placeholders. I reckon that much like the Galaxy class, the Excelsior class will have a lot of lifeboats on the underside for easy ejection. It also helps that the Enterprise-B callout didn't show the underside, so I can do what I want. I have to finish designing the lifeboats themselves, as well as then calculating how many the ship needs.

My next tasks are:

• Come up with a ballpark for crew counts to determine quarters and lifeboat requirements
• Re-examine my old deck listing
• Do some shuttlecraft scaling and analysis

Not sure if anyone has seen these; I have no idea where they came from (and they are obviously based off of the larger ship as portrayed with the Enterprise-B) but I plan to use these as a starting point for what features the ship should have though not placement. If anyone does know where they come from, I am very curious.

As always, any feedback is welcome. More to come!

 

[Rekkert]

They're both rather inaccurate fan-made reproductions of graphics, the first from the Enterprise-B lift in Generations; second from the Excelsior lift in Flashback (which was the same graphic as the one from Generations, just with the Excelsior from the TUC lift graphic replacing the refit shape).

If you're gonna use such things as inspiration, I'd suggest you go with @Donny's reproduction of these on The Roddenberry Archive, as they're much more accurate to what was really there; and as all our work was done in collaboration and has the approval of the Okudas, who obviously worked on the original graphics.

 

[Praetor]

@Rekkert You're the best, thank you so much!

 

[The Librarian]

One thing that stands out to me, and I know this is a problem with many deck layouts, is that there's no way to walk across Deck 7 without going all the way around the saucer rim. It's even worse from points inside each quarter sections off by the lifts. Since it looks like you have that central semi-circle loop on multiple decks, you might look and see if you can omit it on Deck 7 by having cars go up or down a deck to reach the central shaft.

 

[F. King Daniel]

I recall J*mes D*xon suggesting decades ago that the deck callous in STVI matched those in the USS Ingram Excelsior-class plans, as proof the powers that be read fan stuff. I haven't a clue which even came first...

 

[BK613]

I recall J*mes D*xon suggesting decades ago that the deck callous in STVI matched those in the USS Ingram Excelsior-class plans, as proof the powers that be read fan stuff. I haven't a clue which even came first...

If these are the ones you're referencing*, they have a copyright date on them of 1986 (bottom right corner of the last sheet)
https://www.cygnus-x1.net/links/lcars/excelsior-blueprints.php

*(and the digital copy is of the original plans)

 

[F. King Daniel]

Thanks, I didn't have them to hand at the time and couldn't remember which came first. I guess it is possible someone used it to reference important decks for STVI in '91.

 

[CaptChris42]

Yeah, I'd been looking for a good view of that lift chart.

May have helped inspire the old USS Albion fan site, too? Which I believe posited, a 28 deck Excelsior, at the time.
No - I think that was TheInterimYears site, in this case.

 

[Praetor]

One thing that stands out to me, and I know this is a problem with many deck layouts, is that there's no way to walk across Deck 7 without going all the way around the saucer rim. It's even worse from points inside each quarter sections off by the lifts. Since it looks like you have that central semi-circle loop on multiple decks, you might look and see if you can omit it on Deck 7 by having cars go up or down a deck to reach the central shaft.

Gread observation! This has bothered me as well. I felt the need to have a "central" turbolift deck where everything could connect to everything in the saucer, and ended up with the version I have.

Deck 08 is kind of off limits because it is broken up by the outer recessed ring which I plan to call the ventral primary hull sensor platform. But, I will try to see if I can't do something with Deck 06 instead. The only issue here is that the third corridor inboard on Deck07 is where the turboshafts descend to the interconnecting dorsal, which may require a move of that. Alternatively or additionally, I may be able to connect the outer circumferential corridor on Deck 07 with a radial corridor that connects to the inner circumferential corridors. This would make for a rather circuitous route around the deck, but, hey, it's still walkable.

I recall J*mes D*xon suggesting decades ago that the deck callous in STVI matched those in the USS Ingram Excelsior-class plans, as proof the powers that be read fan stuff. I haven't a clue which even came first...

I can definitely see where they may have used this for inspiration. It's been so long since I started drawing my plans that gazing at these I think they definitely influence me (and others) in placement of hangars and certain other components too. As much as I love the Excelsior, there are a number of things about Ingram that make much more sense. But making sense of Excelsior is probably part of her charm.

I spent some time in spreadsheet hell yesterday and tried to come up with both a general deck listing and some approximate crew complements.

For the decks, I used @Donny's graphic as my foundation per @Rekkert's excellent suggestion. I moved things around according to where I thought they should be on the "real" ship. This is by no means written in stone and will likely be adjusted as I go along. Apologies for the long scroll, I'll find a better way to share the list for next time.

Deck 1:

• Main Bridge

Deck 2:

• Captain's Ready Room
• Conference Lounge
• First Officer's Ready Room

Deck 3:

• Captain's Quarters
• Junior Officer's Quarters
• Officer's Lounge
• Officer's Mess
• Phaser Banks 1-5
• Impulse Engineering Level 1

Deck 4:

• Environmental Systems
• Phaser Control Room 1
• Sensor Maintenance
• Impulse Engineering Level 2

Deck 5:

• Lifeboat Access
• Inertial Dampening System
• Officer's Quarters
• Waste Recycling & Storage
• Impulse Engineering Level 3

Deck 6:

• Armory
• Briefing Rooms 1-6
• Chief of Security's Office
• Emergency Transporter 1-2
• Main Brig
• Officer's Quarters
• Science Labs 1-4
• Transporter Rooms 1-4
• Auxiliary Control
• VIP Lounge
• VIP Staterooms
• Impulse Engineering Level 4

Deck 7:

• Forward Observation Lounge
• Briefing Rooms 7-12
• Emergency Transporters 3-4
• Lifeboat Access
• Crew Quarters
• Main Sickbay
• Science Labs 5-12
• Main Computer Core Level 1
• Impulse Engineering Level 5
• Primary Circuit Breaker Room
• Deuterium Loading Ports

Deck 8:

• Crew Quarters
• Ship's Library
• Stellar Cartography
• Chapel/Theater
• Crew's Quarters
• Rec Deck
• Gymnasium
• Main Dining Room
• Main Computer Core Level 2
• RCS Thruster Engineering
• Main Gangway
• Warp Reactor Core Level 1
• Galley/Pantry
• Food Preparation Machinery
• Waste Storage and Recycling

Deck 9:

• Auxiliary Fire Control
• Fabrication Center
• Primary Hull Freight/Cargo
• Phaser Banks 6-10
• Ship's Laundry
• Warp Reactor Core Level 2

Deck 10:

• Main Computer Core Level 3
• Lower Sensor Platform
• Warp Reactor Core Level 3
• Aft Phaser Banks 1-2
• Aft Tractor Beam Emitter

Deck 11:

• Warp Reactor Core Level 4
• Shuttlebay One Flight Control Deck
• Aft Officer's Lounge

Deck 12:

• Warp Reactor Core Level 5
• Engineering Support
• Shuttlebay One

Deck 13:

• Warp Reactor Core Level 6
• Battle Bridge
• Main Engineering
• Cargo Bays (Upper Level)
• Engineering Labs 1-3
• Engineering Offices
• Transporter Rooms 5-8
• Emergency Transporter 5-8
• Maintenance Workshops 1-2

Deck 14:

• Warp Reactor Core Level 7
• Forward Torpedo Launchers
• Foward Photon Torpedo Storage
• Engineering Support
• Aft Photon Torpedo Launchers
• Aft Photon Torpedo Storage
• Primary Sensor Array Monitor
• Maintenance Workshops 3-4
• Cargo Bays
• Engineering Computer Core Level 1
• Engineering Labs 4-6

Deck 15:

• Warp Reactor Core Level 8
• Deflector Control Room
• Cargo Bays
• Engineering Computer Core Level 2
• Antimatter Storage
• Antimatter Generator

Deck 16:

• Antimatter Fill Port
• Navigational Deflector Level 1
• Warp Reactor Core Level 9
• Engineering Computer Core Level 3

Deck 17:

• Navigational Deflector Level 2
• Engineering Crew Quarters
• Secondary Sickbay
• Maintenance Workshops 5-6
• Lifeboat Access

Deck 18:

• Navigational Deflector Level 3
• Lifeboat Access
• Maintenance Workshops 7-8

Deck 19:

• Industrial Fabrication Level 1
• Flight Control Deck

Deck 20:

• Industrial Fabrication Level 2
• Workbee Hangar
• Travel Pod Hangar

Deck 22:

• Shuttlebay Two Flight Deck
• Forward Tractor Beam Emitter

Deck 23:

• Auxiliary Craft Maintenance
• Shuttlecraft Hangar

Deck 24:

• Ventral Phaser Banks

For the crew, I used the excellent callouts from Strategic Design's old Enterprise-A plans as a foundation. I'll spare you the entire listing for the post, but I came up with:

And lastly, I took a stab at rendering the Excelsior version of the crew quarters:

Even though we know the corridor wall on the actual set is "zigzagged" with the doors in little entry alcoves, I didn't really want to introduce this to Excelsior and thought since we didn't see that wall there was no reason to assume it "really" looked this way, just like there aren't "really" any windows on the other wall. The presently empty bay at the end will be the refresher and have closets, though I have yet to figure out exactly how I want to configure this area.

As always, any and all feedback is welcome and appreciated. More to come!

 

[The Librarian]

Gread observation! This has bothered me as well. I felt the need to have a "central" turbolift deck where everything could connect to everything in the saucer, and ended up with the version I have.

What you might consider is having two central shafts, offset to port and starboard just enough to allow a corridor through. This would add redundancy, both for repairs/damage and for traffic flow through the saucer, similar to how you've got at port/starboard shafts through the engineering hull in a couple places.

By the way, what software are you using for this?

 

[Praetor]

What you might consider is having two central shafts, offset to port and starboard just enough to allow a corridor through. This would add redundancy, both for repairs/damage and for traffic flow through the saucer, similar to how you've got at port/starboard shafts through the engineering hull in a couple places.

This was a great idea! I wish I'd have seen it before I started ripping things apart.

I've taken a stab at something slightly different by realigning Decks 06-08:

You can probably see how I've extended a couple of shafts on Deck 06 to allow the open corridor on Deck 07, but this also required moving some of the passthroughs which required shifting the sections on Deck 08 inboard one corridor. I think it work pretty well. There are a couple of dead ends on Deck 08 that will probably get ultimately removed.

I've realized looking at the above that I never did figure out how to handle the double wide section outboard on Deck 06. You can see that it's wide enough for two compartment sections but not for an additional corridor. The windows on the outer part of that deck are where I had planned to put VIP quarters and a lounge. I don't think I can steal enough space for the corridor, so I will need to explore other creative solutions. One thought I had was eliminating the innermost corridor on each deck and shifting all the corridors inward, but this is a bit drastic and I hope to avoid it... somehow. Thoughts welcome.

I am not sure if I've mentioned that all the corridor lines are really for placement and reference; I plan to put in real corridor segments and cabins and in all likelihood those lines will go away. I suspect a lot of the turbolift stops will also go away in certain areas, eventually creating a more asymmetric look.

By the way, what software are you using for this?

This is all Adobe Illustrator, with the animations I've provided being prepared through Adobe Photoshop. I free drew the exterior plans from the best references I could find and have drawn the cross section and decks from that. There have been a lot of guide lines in this, lemme tell you.

More to come!

 

[The Librarian]

For Deck 6, maybe move the outermost corridor towards the rim so you can have those window compartments, and then have more compartments facing inward? (IE have the double-wide between the two outermost rings.) That would save you from having to adjust any of the inner corridors or the lifts. It looks like your current templates are for the outboard side of the corridors, but the outer ring has the shallowest arc so they may fit there with a little adjustment, or you could use the space for storage or equipment bays instead of quarters. They'd be close to those lounge/mess areas so it might be a good place for synthesizer / replicator support systems, for example.

 

[Praetor]

@The Librarian Great idea, thank you so much! I'll give that a try.

 

[Praetor]

Welp, I pulled the thread and it unraveled. But I'm not too upset about it.

In short, when trying some different corridor configurations I discovered that most of my scale internals on the deck plans - except for the ones I had traced directly from set plans or were based on external features - were all scaled far, far too small. So, I'm regrouping a bit and re-laying out the entire saucer, and will need to make adjustments to the engineering hull as well. While I'm at it, I'm going to get the properly scaled shuttlecraft in there for my reference too.

Better to find out now than later, and it was getting close to being later as I was starting to fill in rooms.

The good news is, the saucer decks look MUCH better and make much more sense to me already:

Deck 05 looks good and lines up well with Deck 06. Deck 06's previous issues are now entirely solved and I think generally Deck 07 and Deck 08 make much more sense now, even if I still have a decent chunk of work to do in cleaning them up and getting them realigned. I am not sure whether I will still have the large dining rooms open to the corridor now that I have the space to not do so. We'll see.

Since it's Monday, I'm not sure I will have much more to show for today. But, I'm encouraged by how well everything is falling together now. Rest assured, more to come!

 

[137th Gebirg]

Are you going to put in a Disco-style funhouse?

Unlike the Discovery herself, the Excelsior might actually have the internal volume to legitimately support one of those behind the main nav deflector, sans-T.A.R.D.I.S. tech.

 

[B.J.]

Are you going to put in a Disco-style funhouse?

Unlike the Discovery herself, the Excelsior might actually have the internal volume to legitimately support one of those behind the main nav deflector, sans-T.A.R.D.I.S. tech.

It may be big, but it's not THAT big!

 

[Praetor]

Are you going to put in a Disco-style funhouse?

Unlike the Discovery herself, the Excelsior might actually have the internal volume to legitimately support one of those behind the main nav deflector, sans-T.A.R.D.I.S. tech.

It may be big, but it's not THAT big!

Maybe on the 622 meter version, if I ever get around to it.

 

[Ithekro]

The larger version might accommodate them getting rebuilt as Excelsior IIs at some point.

 

[Praetor]

The larger version might accommodate them getting rebuilt as Excelsior IIs at some point.

In my head, the Excelsior is "really" 467 meters long because that's what the art team decided on. But, there are so many reasons why a 622 meter Excelsior is probably more accurate anyway. It doesn't look that out of place, either.

Digging up some of my old comparisons just for giggles:

The Ambassador's saucer is still plenty big next to the 622 meter Excelsior for my taste. The Excelsior's length is largely made up by engines and overall is flat and stretched whereas the Ambassador is more compact and squat. I may have to try comparing the Excelsior II just for fun.

Plus, having Excelsior twice as long as Constitution really sells "By God, that's a big ship!"

You can find the previous discussion in the old "Scaling the Excelsior Filming Model" thread here if you're so interested.

Anyhoo, more to come on the 467 meter deck plans in a bit. Stay tuned!

 

[Praetor]

I thought I'd go ahead and share an update on the saucer decks:

You can see things are still in a transitional state - particularly the turboshafts - but I think things are coming along nicely. Particularly I think the mess/lounge rooms are much better off this time and generally make more sense as closed rooms. You can't tell yet because they aren't fully filled in and connected, but I also have ended up with fewer turboshafts and an easier ability to walk around the decks.

Deck 03 yields itself much better to the quarters that will go there now, too; the center section divided easily into two full cabin sections. Deck 07 will still have a gap in the axial turboshafts that will be bridged by a short section on Deck 06 as before. On Deck 08, I was initially uneasy about the new layout but I think it's coming together and there's still a reasonable amount of room for lifeboats, too.

The main thing I've taken from this revamp is that I need to pin down a size on the "real" bridge dome (which won't look like the actual bridge dome on the model at all) and use that to inform what Deck 02's layout is like and how the central turboshaft(s) line up in the core. I'm generally dissatisfied with how Deck02 is laid out and hope this will help me fix that.

As always, any and all input welcome. More to come!