Why not just use the pilot design?
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ST-One
Vice Admiral
You just argue to argue, don't you?
I wonder why airplanes aren't built out in the open? I sure wish some smart guy would explain that to me, if they can build ships outside. Why, that just makes no sense.
Perhaps the size of the vehicle plays a role (the A380 is about 73 metres long, the QM2 345 metres, the (TOS) Enterprise 289 metres)
ST-One
Vice Admiral
Force-fields could help there.
.
And it has millions of linear feet of high-energy systems throughout its structure and it's standing out in the weather without its armor, without shields, without its skin, smart boy. ST-One doesn't need help making a strawman, son.
GodThingFormerly
A Different Kind of Asshole
If we are going to invoke early 21st century analogues, why are spacecraft assembled in cleanrooms? Why are USN submarines assembled in enclosed hangars? Simply because these systems can malfunction catastrophically - with total loss of vehicle and/or crew - due to a single-point failure, the probability of which is increased astronomically by foreign body contamination. This constraint does not apply to surface vessels.
TGT
TGT
ST-One
Vice Admiral
Why not?
http://img517.imageshack.us/my.php?image=trektrailercap31lk6.jpg
Is it just me or is the Enterprise within a forcefield? Looks like a blue bubble surrounding the ship, and there are some weird rays pointing towards it. One below the nacelle, one below the dish, one below the crane on the far right. Could be that they are just lights.
Is it just me or is the Enterprise within a forcefield? Looks like a blue bubble surrounding the ship, and there are some weird rays pointing towards it. One below the nacelle, one below the dish, one below the crane on the far right. Could be that they are just lights.
GodThingFormerly
A Different Kind of Asshole
Because the ship isn't going to sink if the engine/radar/crapper/whatever breaks down.
TGT
ST-One
Vice Admiral
And what, Dad, tells you any of these systems are already installed?
ST-One
Vice Admiral
Those are just lens-flares.
ST-One
Vice Admiral
I don't think there's any point in getting to the hard logic of starship construction when the majority of Star Trek is not logical with its science. When transporters are used at a whim vs. using shuttle craft, logistics and construction plans don't seem to matter at all.
I prefer ground based construction, but am not opposed to assembly in space, especially considering that this has been shown in various Trek shows. If this movie said the ship was built purely in space, I wouldn't care. They say it's built all on the ground and I still don't care. I can see it being plausible either way for numerous reasons. It's hardly enough to make me decree that the movie is completely devoid of science, and definitely not worth getting your panties in a bunch.
I prefer ground based construction, but am not opposed to assembly in space, especially considering that this has been shown in various Trek shows. If this movie said the ship was built purely in space, I wouldn't care. They say it's built all on the ground and I still don't care. I can see it being plausible either way for numerous reasons. It's hardly enough to make me decree that the movie is completely devoid of science, and definitely not worth getting your panties in a bunch.
Absolutely Right(TM).
If "The Making Of Star Trek" had said that the ship was mainly constructed on Earth - and it could well have, considering the varying levels of plausibility written into that guide - forty years later Trek tech fans would be arguing in favor of the clear superiority of ground-based construction.
This is just one more argument about the dissolution of canonical/orthodox "authority" represented by this movie, tarted up as a debate over engineering.
3D Master
Rear Admiral
No, it wouldn't. You see, whether something does severe damage is a function of four things:
mass
speed
size
duration
The first three form pressure, and the duration matters in how long that pressure is put on something. The first three behave to form pressure in the following matter: mass x speed / size.
In other words; if something is big enough, it can distribute that force over a wide enough area to produce but a small pressure.
Finally there is time, and in space, the time will be but very small, for it can't trap you in anyway. It sends you flying off, instead of trapping you, so only the initial impact hurts you.
Very, very, tiny speed, very large size, the result is that it isn't going to generate the pressure needed to do severe damage to your suit and you. Not to mention that with the low speed you can very easily get out of the way.
Safety lines? What would you need safety lines for? The ship doesn't go anywhere, because there's nothing that can make it go anywhere. It'll be fastened to docking clamps and that's it.
No, there won't be, you see, what protects starships from micro-meteorites, can also be used to protect docking bays from micor-meteorites: deflector shields. Which removes the one thing that could actually kill you instantly.
They will simply not be happening; for all the possible things that can really hurt you are SLOW-ACTING, and the evacuation method - transporter - is EXTREMELY FAST.
The result is, that by the time of the 23rd century working in space will be EXTREMELY SAFE. It would be FAR safer than planet-side with all its myriad of ways you can die and get injured near instantaneously.
Even in our time, it isn't half as dangerous as you think it is.
Just off the top of my head, what if a thruster gets stuck in the on position, sending the ship and the whole orbital construction facility crashing to Earth? Sheer altitude has its own dangers.[/quote]
If that thruster gets stuck in the on position on Earth, the exact same thing would happen. So this risk exists in equal measure on Earth as in space; and thus falls away against each other.
In fact, as there is such great height, there would be ample time to activate any of the ways you could use to get the ship from Earth to orbit to pull docking bay and incomplete ship back to the proper orbit - unlike Earth where it will smash into the ground near instantaneously.
Wow, does anyone remember when this was a discussion about using the pilot design versus the new design? No? Okay.
So I think we can boil almost thirty pages of 'Building on the ground makes no sense!' vs. 'Yes it does!' very easily. I'm sticking my neck out here so nobody cut my head off, there are just my thoughts.
Launching a ship built on the ground shouldn't be an issue for a ship that can travel hundreds of times the speed of light, nor is rain - ONCE IT IS COMPLETED. With hull plating exposed as we see in the picture, why wouldn't birds and rain present a problem unless there was some form of forcefield protection? Even warehouses and gymnasiums get bird and bat infestations when they're completed, closed and occupied.
If the ship has to be built in a sterile environment, space does seem to offer several advantages in terms of weather, but then there are micrometeoroids, particles, and the like - which again could be protected by forcefields. But again we're offered the problem of it needing to be sealed up to protect itself. A drydock as seen in the various movies and series would seem to generate some kind of field just to keep the damn things in place, so likewise they could generate a field to protect it.
So it seems that either way the trailer seems to invalidate the notion of the ship needing to be built in a sterile environment unless there is some kind of unseen protection, which could be offered either on the ground OR in space. The ship has huge pieces of hull missing, but so did the Columbia on 'Enterprise' which was clearly built in space. The Enterprise on the ground needs assistance to resist Earth gravity but a ship being assembled in space would need to be kept in orbit and also need something to help hold it together while final assembly was being completed. It seems both environments offer similar advantages and disadvantages, when coupled with what we have observed about 23rd century technology, and said technology would also seem to offer protection for a one-time vertical launch, either under power of the ship itself or under tow of a small fleet of shuttles. Security-wise, why would either location be any more dangerous? Would it really be any less difficult to get onto Earth and sneak up to the ship versus sneaking onboard a construction crew in space, given 23rd century security precautions? I think that it's all dependent on 23rd century technology, which as depicted seems perfectly capable of meeting the needs of either scenario.
With that said, I personally believe the smartest way to build a spacecraft is still to build separate components in Earth-bound, secure, sterile hangars, seal 'em up, fit them out as much as possible or as needed, ship them up to orbit, assemble them, and finish fitting out and testing various systems in the protective cradle of a forcefield generating drydock. I think it offers a greater degree of stability, sterility, and general ease of construction. It also gels more with what we have seen in previous starship construction.
All that said, I'm sure if the movie's scene serves the story well enough we can figure out a way to justify it, even if it might make more sense to built it on Earth and assemble and finish it in orbit.
Now resume arguing.
So I think we can boil almost thirty pages of 'Building on the ground makes no sense!' vs. 'Yes it does!' very easily. I'm sticking my neck out here so nobody cut my head off, there are just my thoughts.
Launching a ship built on the ground shouldn't be an issue for a ship that can travel hundreds of times the speed of light, nor is rain - ONCE IT IS COMPLETED. With hull plating exposed as we see in the picture, why wouldn't birds and rain present a problem unless there was some form of forcefield protection? Even warehouses and gymnasiums get bird and bat infestations when they're completed, closed and occupied.
If the ship has to be built in a sterile environment, space does seem to offer several advantages in terms of weather, but then there are micrometeoroids, particles, and the like - which again could be protected by forcefields. But again we're offered the problem of it needing to be sealed up to protect itself. A drydock as seen in the various movies and series would seem to generate some kind of field just to keep the damn things in place, so likewise they could generate a field to protect it.
So it seems that either way the trailer seems to invalidate the notion of the ship needing to be built in a sterile environment unless there is some kind of unseen protection, which could be offered either on the ground OR in space. The ship has huge pieces of hull missing, but so did the Columbia on 'Enterprise' which was clearly built in space. The Enterprise on the ground needs assistance to resist Earth gravity but a ship being assembled in space would need to be kept in orbit and also need something to help hold it together while final assembly was being completed. It seems both environments offer similar advantages and disadvantages, when coupled with what we have observed about 23rd century technology, and said technology would also seem to offer protection for a one-time vertical launch, either under power of the ship itself or under tow of a small fleet of shuttles. Security-wise, why would either location be any more dangerous? Would it really be any less difficult to get onto Earth and sneak up to the ship versus sneaking onboard a construction crew in space, given 23rd century security precautions? I think that it's all dependent on 23rd century technology, which as depicted seems perfectly capable of meeting the needs of either scenario.
With that said, I personally believe the smartest way to build a spacecraft is still to build separate components in Earth-bound, secure, sterile hangars, seal 'em up, fit them out as much as possible or as needed, ship them up to orbit, assemble them, and finish fitting out and testing various systems in the protective cradle of a forcefield generating drydock. I think it offers a greater degree of stability, sterility, and general ease of construction. It also gels more with what we have seen in previous starship construction.
All that said, I'm sure if the movie's scene serves the story well enough we can figure out a way to justify it, even if it might make more sense to built it on Earth and assemble and finish it in orbit.
Now resume arguing.
3D Master
Rear Admiral
They did. I'm not taking things to an extreme, ALL of YOU are, when you suggest there is not enough people who can, and thus are unwilling to work in space by 23rd century. I wonder who's living in those massive starbases, that can house hundreds of thousands of people easily. They're empty?
For there not to be enough people who can work in space, would require nearly everyone to not only not want to go into space, they'd even be unwilling to take the training when the job opens up. And on top of that, anyone who does want to go to space, immediately find himself/herself to got to work on starship construction, they'd only work on starships.
Given people living on Mars, the Moon and starbases, space stations and whatnot, and that's just us humans, to suggest that not enough people are willing and/or able to work in space on a starships, requires 95% (AND MORE!) of the people being COMPLETELY unable and/or UNWILLING to work in space. That would be the only way you'd ever get the numbers low enough for people willing and able to work in space, that building it on the ground becomes feasible via the workforce their.
Now expand it to the entire world and beyond. Tell me something, what unifying trait could it be, that nearly entire species, 95% at least are unwilling to travel about? There are but very few but all serious, serious things that could do that on such scale.
1. A collective fear (which could be induced via ineducation of the masses)
2. A new philosophy (which preaches a level of apathy (since it needs to surpress natural urges in people to go enjoy what the universe has to offer; all those (types) people who today are already thinking of doing thsoe things would need to have their desires surpressed once this philosophy gets hold))
3. Religion (producing the same effects as the philosophy).
Either way, the picture it paints is not an optimistic future.
I'm not talking interstellar travel anymore, we're talking about building the interstellar and private space fleets - all on the ground - nobody unwilling to do the jobs in space.
This would require those people who built the ships in Britain (which was what, not even 1% of the population) to say; I refuse to do the job, and refuse to learn the job, because I don't like the ocean, and I want to be nowhere close to it. The only way I'll build your ships for you is if it's in the inlands, and then you can drag it to the coast.
Even people living AT the coast (equivalent all those hundreds of thousands of people in starbases big enough to hold those numbers) would say, we're not working for you near the ocean; uh, uh, move us inlands first.
And the person who'd like to have the ships built would go, "But but, you LIVE AT the coast. At least YOU should know how fun it is. There's the beach, you can row, your kids can play there - look they even want to - you can swim - and it." (Kids go: "Mommy, daddy, I wanna play in the ocean.")
The answer of 99% of the population: don't care, we're not working near the ocean, we're not playing in it, and the kids don't get to go near it.
And the person: "We'd train you! We'd even pay you more if you don't like it!"
The answer of at least 99% of the population: don't care, we're not working near the ocean, we're not doing it.
So, they go build the ships inland and drag them to the coast afterwards.
It's a level of apathy and disasociation, or crippling fear (COLLECTIVELY) of space/the ocean that I can't fathom, and is as unoptimistic as you can get.
Which again requires an apathic people and extremely UNoptimistic.
Ah, right, so our optimistic future is government by political people who don't care about what is best, but by money, power, political backstabbing, and what he thinks gets him the most votes of his constituency.
Not very optimistic to me.
No! The beauty of space, is that it CAN'T kill you instantly with you making one wrong move. The only wrong move that could get you killed instantly in space would be (well, not YOU specifically) would be someone turning off the deflector shields that keeps micro meteorites away, and just at that moment such a rock comes passing by and hits, and hits you so that your suit is ruptured so big it kills you really fast, at the same time it has to kill your emergency beacon + nobody sees it happen too, or if those don't happen the transporters have to be off line at just that time.
The level coincidences required in space to kill you instantly (and especially in the 23rd century) is so massive it would happen statistically speaking once in a billion, in practice, probably never.
Space is not filled with predators, it's not filled with enough pressure to crush you instantly, it's not filled with poisonous animals protecting themselves, space is certainly not filled toxic fumes that kill you near instantly.
The things that can kill you in space are all (except micro-meteorites and even then most of them aren't) SLOW killers. In short, PLENTY of time to save you should it happen.
If you have artificial gravity, living in "space" isn't going to be that different from living on a planet.
To me it does NOT make better drama, because it breaks one of the tenants of the genre this drama is set in.
And here, I thought it was just me.
3D Master
Rear Admiral
:sighs: The known laws of physics are NOT broken by going faster than the speed of light. In fact, the known laws of physics tell us that if space is warped as Star Trek tells us it is warped, it will happen EXACTLY as Star Trek tells us happens.
Seriously folks: Alcubierre warp drive theory. Has been around for FOURTEEN ffing years. Keep up with the times, will you.
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