A close-up on a fly-by of the ship and there's a section of nacelle that has a shape that looks like every other window on the engineering hull and saucer?
Starship Design Peaked With The Galaxy Class
- Thread starter USS Artorius
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A close-up on a fly-by of the ship and there's a section of nacelle that has a shape that looks like every other window on the engineering hull and saucer?
I do believe those are thrusters on the nacelles, not windows.
They're definitely not thrusters, which are clearly defined brown objects on the ends of the nacelles.
There are windows, or at least objects that look like windows, and also a docking port, on the nacelle "heel" where it attaches to the pylon. But as we already know crew can access the nacelle interiors and there are full work areas inside, not just cramped Jefferies tubes, so this isn't that unusual. We might assume the docking port is for servicing the nacelle or for allowing crew within the nacelle to make a quick getaway in the event of some sort of disaster.
However, we can also see in "11001001" that these structures are lit differently from the regular windows across the rest of the ship...
...Which, as I mentioned before, may mean they aren't windows at all, but just look like them. On the other hand, maybe they're dedicated inspection ports, and the red lighting is to preserve humanoid night vision during a service. Or maybe it's simply a byproduct of the nacelles being in a standby state while the ship is docked.
So, yeah. Could be windows; that still makes sense. Could not be windows; that also makes sense.
Huh… I’ve actually never noticed them before. Perhaps that’s external airlock access for the nacelle control room seen in “Eye of the Beholder”They're definitely not thrusters, which are clearly defined brown objects on the ends of the nacelles.
There are windows, or at least objects that look like windows, and also a docking port, on the nacelle "heel" where it attaches to the pylon. But as we already know crew can access the nacelle interiors and there are full work areas inside, not just cramped Jefferies tubes, so this isn't that unusual. We might assume the docking port is for servicing the nacelle or for allowing crew within the nacelle to make a quick getaway in the event of some sort of disaster.
However, we can also see in "11001001" that these structures are lit differently from the regular windows across the rest of the ship...
...Which, as I mentioned before, may mean they aren't windows at all, but just look like them. On the other hand, maybe they're dedicated inspection ports, and the red lighting is to preserve humanoid night vision during a service. Or maybe it's simply a byproduct of the nacelles being in a standby state while the ship is docked.
So, yeah. Could be windows; that still makes sense. Could not be windows; that also makes sense.
I think we all have biases depending on how we were exposed to Trek in the first place.
Personally I see the Connie Refit from TMP as beautiful but I see the Galaxy Class as the best interpretation of GR’s vision but also the one best suited for exploring and going on an adventure.
I’ve been pretty out spoken on X about those who bash the Galaxy class as missing what GR was aiming for and also that if the ship worked as technically intended then half the episodes for TV wouldn’t work!
Personally I see the Connie Refit from TMP as beautiful but I see the Galaxy Class as the best interpretation of GR’s vision but also the one best suited for exploring and going on an adventure.
I’ve been pretty out spoken on X about those who bash the Galaxy class as missing what GR was aiming for and also that if the ship worked as technically intended then half the episodes for TV wouldn’t work!
I just think of early versions of the technology will always have more problems than later iterations.
Just look at how the "Holodeck" was considered brand new & State of the Art for ST:TNG.
While the Transporters were considered advanced for the TNG era, there were still occaisional issues.
You don't see those technical issues as much in later iterations of Trek.
I suspect the underlines that often Trek is viewed through the lens of say the end of DS9/VOY forgetting when TNG aired so much of it was new and to be tested out. TNG needs some slack for that reason alone.
As with many plot related events, if the starships really functioned like they do in the tech manuals, many plot points would be solved quickly or almost never happen. Both the movie era USS Enterprise and the Galaxy-class starships are supposed to have loads of safety features, redundant systems, and tools for nearly anything that had been a problem from Kirk's first Five Year Mission.
Maybe someday someone will work up a show based on the technical manuals.
Fan art is filling gap to be fair.
To me, it was the epitome of unbeatable. It was where they said, "Ok, starships are so advanced now they're as art-like as any sculpture is", and that's it. Anything after that, the ugly as sin Ross class, the sovereign, even the intrepid, they all removed the graceful lines from any angle to put hard angles back. the D was really the only ship that at any angle didnt really have any completely straight lines. Can't do much to make things seem more advance than that.
Rodenberry actually said once that his vision was that by the 24th century engineering and construction and materials science would be so advanced that *asthetics* could take be a consideration, and a starship was not just practical, but also a work of art, a sculpture. (I could be wrong and *Probert* said that instead.)
And I agree, that was lost with Voyager, which I found kinda clunky and boxy.
I read that one reason that Jefferies had for lack of too much detail in the hull of the original Enterprise was that technology was so advanced that equipment was...if not *hidden*...at least *seamless*...and maybe could by MADE as needed...need an airlock, the hull reconfigures itself into an airlock. Something kinda shown with Voyager's holographic armor, and Discovery's "smart matter".
Unfortunately it makes the original ship look a little too "primative" and toy-like on screen - and caused confusion where the ship's phasers and photon torpedo tubes were...but maybe those parts weren't there until needed. Not the case in TOS time, but not impossible by Trek's 25th century. Imagine not having any weapons systems to give now cultures the wrong idea - and to lull an enemy with a false sense of security - but then when need, like magic, there are suddenly weapons *everywhere*!
Also, I have seen stuff today, in real life, called something like...something tolerance engineering, where 2 components fit together the seams and invisible (Google "high tolerance engineering) so those airlocks and torpedo tubes are always there - but only visible when open!
In Linda Nagatta's Nanotech Successon books like "Vast" and the recent follow-ups, the far-future starship Null Boundary was more of an organic living thing, amd sorta biotech-nanotech hybrid (honestly, microbiology is literally just organic Nanotechnology- look as the inner workings or a cell, or the flagellum on some microscopy critters - it's a root is a nano-*motor*). A lot l
like "Gomtu" (Gumtu?) in Trek or Moyra(sp?) in Farscape - and they ship could be reconfigured, new equipment, components, "grown" in place. They ship couple scoop up matters in space from gas or dust clouds on the atmospheres of gas giants, and use it to *grow* in size...or burn and expell mass for fuel, or to bud-off a baby starship (Moyra did that too!!)
You could even imagine entire starships as partially *grown* rather than built. Then you would have technologies like nanotech and replicators you can make shapes not possible when just casting a mold or beating something in shape.
I heard it speculated that once day entite star ships could be replicated, either in part or *whole*.
But this was all something that occurred to me when I first saw the episode where Barkley used the holodeck (which utilizes replicator.and force fields technology) and then saw the Prometheus, amd *especially* that Enterprise episode with the automated starship repair station that was about to just replicate whole hull sections in place to replace damaged ones...is that with the holoemitters using force fields and transporters/replicators you could imagine a ship created with nano-holo emitters - or "Omniditectional Holographic Diodes" embedded in every surface.
You could have a fully reconfigurable starship. Able to reshape itself - inside and out - as needed. In Discovery there was a mention that some 32nd ships were partly Holographic force fields. I would only use those for temporary needs, as they have to be constantly generated and if the power goes out, well...
But you need spare quarters to be a science lab...or need to convert existing quarters into an extreme exotic alien habitat!? Just ask the ship's computer to do it.
If parts of the ships are damaged in battle, *instantly* prepare them...while still fighting. The Borg did something like that.
But you would have almost unlimited flexibility.
Anyway I am ranting.
Another thing about the Enterprise, is that it's not just a starship, it's a Polis...a Polity of the Federation - basically a mobile city.
It's really something you might see more in a space-dwelling society, like The Culture in Iain M. Banks Culture novels - where rather than planets, the citizens live in Orbitals (rings like in Halo, but the Culture came first) or in HUGE, continent-sized starships such as their "General Systems Vehicles", which are more like small mobile worlds, with *mountains*, small seas with beaches, some like the "Sleeper Service" with different habitats like a pressurized gas giant atmosphere with accompanying gas giant life-forms.
It's really something you might see more in a space-dwelling society, like The Culture in Iain M. Banks Culture novels - where rather than planets, the citizens live in Orbitals (rings like in Halo, but the Culture came first) or in HUGE, continent-sized starships such as their "General Systems Vehicles", which are more like small mobile worlds, with *mountains*, small seas with beaches, some like the "Sleeper Service" with different habitats like a pressurized gas giant atmosphere with accompanying gas giant life-forms.
After seeing the dedicated Xindi Aquatic StarShips, having the Cetaceans stuck in a tiny tank seems cruel & unnecessary IMO.
Especially in the future once the Xindi join the UFP.
Cetaceans can join the Xindi Aquatic on their own "Dedicated Starships" with a minor area for normal people to beam inside to communicate with them.
Especially in the future once the Xindi join the UFP.
Cetaceans can join the Xindi Aquatic on their own "Dedicated Starships" with a minor area for normal people to beam inside to communicate with them.
I didn’t care for it at the time. Over the decades though, I’ve really come around to it and it’s my favourite starship.
I was born in '76, so Trek was TOS and the films for me. I fell in love with Probert's refit Enterprise and only the original design comes close. However, when I first saw the Galaxy Class Enterprise fill the screen when "Encounter At Farpoint" premiered, I fell in love again. It's a beautiful design that I believe will continue to stand the test of time. Even though I'm not overly fond of where the series went after seasons two and three (including the abysmal films) I will always love the Enterprise-D and the Galaxy Class in general. She's nowhere near as beautiful as the refit or original design, but she's close.
To be fair, this is the kind of capability SF already would have by the 24th century.
Aka, ships would be technically replicated in many smaller parts (sort of like prefabrication is done today), and then just assembled via transporters, tractor beams and forcefields from the inside out.
If you take into account that transporter buffers can easily handle something the size of a shuttle/runabout (at least), and also are capable of beaming 200 Klingons at any given time (which definitely EXCEED the mass/size of a shuttle), then industrial grade replicators should be capable of replicating sections of a starship of at least shuttle size in a single cycle.
Leave it to do things around the clock and you end up with something the size of a Galaxy class fully built in less than a month.
Same principle would apply to hull plating. Just replicate a section which is the size of a shuttle roughly and beam it into place (then magnetically interlock it).
We know that ships don't have 'welding points', and instead magnetic interlocks are used throughout the ship (at least in the 24th century).
Granted, we have seen welding done in the Kelvin timeline on the original Enterprise when it was done on the ground, but that could have been in part because it was the 23rd century... by the 24th, this would likely fall out of use completely.
