The Oberth-class in ENT, TOS, and VAN

[DimesDan]

^Why bother to conjecture that at all? Because of a single 3-digit number? What's the point?

Because we can?

Seriously though, I like the challenge of coming with bizarre explanations for equally bizarre loopholes. Keeps me from going crazy.

"Just because you can do a thing does not mean you must do that thing" or how ever that quote goes, been a while I watched TUC and I'm sure I misquoted.

Oh, and it sounds as if you are crazy. One for trying to rationalise this and two because you think rationalising this doesn't make you crazy.

 

[BrotherBenny]

^Why bother to conjecture that at all? Because of a single 3-digit number? What's the point?

Because we can?

Seriously though, I like the challenge of coming with bizarre explanations for equally bizarre loopholes. Keeps me from going crazy.

"Just because you can do a thing does not mean you must do that thing" or how ever that quote goes, been a while I watched TUC and I'm sure I misquoted.

Oh, and it sounds as if you are crazy. One for trying to rationalise this and two because you think rationalising this doesn't make you crazy.

Being a nerd or geek does not make one crazy, merely strange.

 

[MatthiasRussell]

I personally think the low registry number of the Grissom carries a lot of weight but it wouldn't be the only time a registry number got messed up. This thread is actually the first time I've seen it argued that the grissom isn't old. Christopher's reasoning is fascinating. I would like to see the matter addressed in a book the way ENT explained where the Daedalus entered the picture. Martin's explanation for the Daedalus is a little strange to me but I accept it.

As to no ship design prior to the 2280s being used in the 24th century, Vanguard 1 says the Bombay is Miranda class so the Mirandas would be that old.

 

[Christopher]

I personally think the low registry number of the Grissom carries a lot of weight but it wouldn't be the only time a registry number got messed up.

I don't see why a simple number would carry that much weight, given that numbers in Star Trek are often wildly inconsistent from one production to the next -- different stardate schemes, different sector designations, different assumptions about warp velocities and travel times, inconsistent date references, etc. Like I said, it's generally best to treat the numbers as placeholders and not invest too heavily in the specifics.

This thread is actually the first time I've seen it argued that the grissom isn't old.

Whereas this thread is the first time I've seen it suggested that it is an older class.

As to no ship design prior to the 2280s being used in the 24th century, Vanguard 1 says the Bombay is Miranda class so the Mirandas would be that old.

Okay, that's actual evidence, and evidence is worth infinitely more than supposition. As I said, I can buy that the Oberth class might've been a couple of decades old as of TSFS. But dating all the way from the ENT era? That's just unbelievable. Why would they keep this one class in service for 200 years when nothing else remotely that old is still around?

 

[F. King Daniel]

The visual style of TOS is the odd one out in Trek. Enterprise NX-01, the USS Kelvin (which was built before the timelines diverged, despite some fans OCD over it) and the TMP - STVI ships and interiors are all fairly interchangable. Thus the idea that the USS Grissom is an older ship isn't really that far fetched.

It's also possible that, if we take the look of the shows and movies seriously, the TOS 'look' was one of a couple concurrently in use in Starfleet during that period, the others (Kelvin? We saw Kelvin-kitbashes in use in alt-2258) were simply just off-camera, like the Remans prior to Nemesis or bumpy Klingons during TOS.

 

[Christopher]

The visual style of TOS is the odd one out in Trek. Enterprise NX-01, the USS Kelvin (which was built before the timelines diverged, despite some fans OCD over it) and the TMP - STVI ships and interiors are all fairly interchangable.

I don't agree with that. I think the Kelvin is a good representation of the general design style of the pilot/TOS era, allowing for the differences in execution and detail resulting from different budgets and technologies. Too many fans mistake execution for concept. If Gene Roddenberry and Matt Jefferies had had access to the technology and money that J. J. Abrams had at his disposal, they probably would've designed an Enterprise bridge that looked a lot like the Kelvin bridge.

It's also rather bizarre to equate the NX-01 technology, with all its NASA-style pushbutton arrays, with the more "futuristic" stuff from the TOS movies. The design of NX-01 is clearly meant to represent a pre-TOS technology, something closer to our own era, and it succeeds at doing so; it's just that the people constructing the sets had access to more advanced technology and more money (and were designing with higher-definition televisions in mind) and were able to execute the designs with more detail and sophistication than the makers of a 1960s midrange-budget TV show could.

Reading too much into the differences in execution between different productions' representations of the 23rd century is like assuming that Saavik really got plastic surgery between TWOK & TSFS. It's taking artistic license way too literally. The sets constructed for television and movies are "playing" the facilities within futuristic starships, just as the actors are "playing" the crewmembers of those ships. Just as the same character can be played by two or more different-looking actors, so the same technology can be portrayed by different-looking production designs. It doesn't mean the differences are supposed to be real in-universe. It just means that this is art, not a documentary, and different artists are entitled to interpret the same subjects differently.

 

[MatthiasRussell]

As to no ship design prior to the 2280s being used in the 24th century, Vanguard 1 says the Bombay is Miranda class so the Mirandas would be that old.

Okay, that's actual evidence, and evidence is worth infinitely more than supposition. As I said, I can buy that the Oberth class might've been a couple of decades old as of TSFS. But dating all the way from the ENT era? That's just unbelievable. Why would they keep this one class in service for 200 years when nothing else remotely that old is still around?[/QUOTE]

I just want to say that I enjoy your logic. Your posts are always very thought provoking.
As for an 22nd century ship being around in TOS times, you have the USS Lovell being kept in service and I think we can conjecturally agree the Daedalus is older (though it is an anomaly). One of the Oberths we see in tng is an "SS" as opposed to "USS" so it may have been decommissioned and privatized.
I'm not sure in this but I've seen some sources say the Bozeman from First Contact was the same as the one from "Cause and Effect" which was a long decommissioned Soyuz class though I am a fan of Dianne Carey's "ship of the line" which says the original bozeman was decommissioned and the one from the movie was a Sovereign class.

Of course, one way to settle this with evidence and finality would be to insert into a future book when Oberths were first launched, lol.

 

[Christopher]

As for an 22nd century ship being around in TOS times, you have the USS Lovell being kept in service and I think we can conjecturally agree the Daedalus is older (though it is an anomaly).

I'm not talking about TOS times. We saw plenty of Oberth-class ships in TNG, in the 24th century. Yes, there's precedent for a class of ship staying in use for over a century, but over two centuries? We have no precedent to support that.

 

[BrotherBenny]

As for an 22nd century ship being around in TOS times, you have the USS Lovell being kept in service and I think we can conjecturally agree the Daedalus is older (though it is an anomaly).

I'm not talking about TOS times. We saw plenty of Oberth-class ships in TNG, in the 24th century. Yes, there's precedent for a class of ship staying in use for over a century, but over two centuries? We have no precedent to support that.

If there's nothing wrong with the spaceframe, and the ship is retrofitted every now and then to include new technology, why wouldn't ships be in service until it becomes too old through wear and tear?

We know from "Relics" that impulse technology hasn't really changed since the twenty-second century so the only real issue I see is warp technology. As long as the spaceframe can handle the stresses of increasing speeds from newer warp cores, and unless there are structural or other design flaws that come to light, there should be no reason why the class shouldn't be in service for as long as it can be reliably serviced.

Ships today stay in service until newer technology replaces them. One can extrapolate that in the future, the same will happen but the ships would last for longer because of better technology.

 

[Christopher]

Except we have no evidence that that's the case. If it were common in Starfleet for ship designs to be kept in use for 200 years or more, we'd see it. We'd see 22nd-century designs still in use in the 24th century. But we don't see that. The ships from the TNG era all date from that era or the TOS movie era (because, of course, the makers of TNG had access to ILM's movie miniatures but the TOS miniatures were either lost or in the Smithsonian). I believe that speculation should be based on the evidence, not on "why not?" flights of fancy. And there's no evidence of ships more than a century old remaining in use in the 24th century.

 

[OverlordSpock]

We'd see 22nd-century designs still in use in the 24th century. But we don't see that. The ships from the TNG era all date from that era or the TOS movie era (because, of course, the makers of TNG had access to ILM's movie miniatures but the TOS miniatures were either lost or in the Smithsonian).

I always wished that we had seen an older ship in TNG. I think it would have been great for the Enterprise to meet up with an old Connie (a pre-Refit Connie at that). I know that it probably would never have been feasible, but there actually is something somewhat...I don't know...romantic? about that idea. I remember that in one of the old FASA books detailing all the different starship classes, it had pointed out that one of the Connies had never been refitted, instead paying homage to the class by remaining in service as she was originally commissioned. That idea always appealed to me, despite how ludicrous it truly was.

Also, I believe the Stargazer was originally conceptualized to be a movie-era Connie. I don't remember what I read about why they decided to kitbash a new model together instead.

 

[Dukhat]

The two scouts and the dreadnought mentioned over the Epsilon 9 radio chatter in TMP had registries of 6XX and 2XXX respectively. This info was taken directly from Franz Joseph's Tech Manual, which inferred that at the time, registry numbers were based on the type of ship, not when it was built chonologically (all scouts had 6XX numbers, all dreadnoughts had 2XXX numbers, all heavy cruisers had 1XXX numbers, and all tugs had 3XXX numbers).

In TWOK, the Reliant had a registry of 1864. I believe this was done to show that she was a bit newer than the Enterprise, so one could assume that this was the start of registries being chronological to production date.

However, in TSFS, the brand-new Excelsior was NX-2000, clearly lower than the Entente from TMP. I rather doubt that whoever gave the Excelsior that number was even vaguely aware of FJ's work, and that the "2000" was simply used because it was a "big" number for a "big" ship (this was only 1984 after all). Conversely, the Grissom's NCC-638 was a small number given to a small ship. I truly believe that the size of the ship was the only rationale for this, so one shouldn't really try to over-analyze the numbers. By the time of TNG and DS9, there was far more of a cohesive, chronological-based registry system (3XXXX for the Mirandas, 4XXXX for the Excelsiors, 5XXXX and 6XXXX for the pre-Galaxy class-style ships, and 7XXXX for the Galaxy class and newer classes...although how the TNG Oberths with insanely high 5XXXX registries got in there I'll never know...I even wrote a whole essay about that)

Also, I believe the Stargazer was originally conceptualized to be a movie-era Connie. I don't remember what I read about why they decided to kitbash a new model together instead.

That's not true. From as early as Encounter at Farpoint, we see the Constellation Class desktop model in Picard's ready room, which was always supposed to represent the Stargazer. It was only when it came time to film "The Battle," they didn't think they'd have the budget to build a full-scale filming miniature, so they were going to settle for using the TMP Enterprise. Luckily that didn't happen.

 

[Christopher]

Also, I believe the Stargazer was originally conceptualized to be a movie-era Connie. I don't remember what I read about why they decided to kitbash a new model together instead.

There was actually a filmed scene where Geordi referred to it as a Constitution-Class ship, but they rethought it and had Burton dub over his line with "Constellation-Class." The reason they chose that class name is because it was easy to dub over "Constitution."

The two scouts and the dreadnought mentioned over the Epsilon 9 radio chatter in TMP had registries of 6XX and 2XXX respectively. This info was taken directly from Franz Joseph's Tech Manual, which inferred that at the time, registry numbers were based on the type of ship, not when it was built chonologically (all scouts had 6XX numbers, all dreadnoughts had 2XXX numbers, all heavy cruisers had 1XXX numbers, and all tugs had 3XXX numbers).

In TWOK, the Reliant had a registry of 1864. I believe this was done to show that she was a bit newer than the Enterprise, so one could assume that this was the start of registries being chronological to production date.

However, in TSFS, the brand-new Excelsior was NX-2000, clearly lower than the Entente from TMP. I rather doubt that whoever gave the Excelsior that number was even vaguely aware of FJ's work, and that the "2000" was simply used because it was a "big" number for a "big" ship (this was only 1984 after all). Conversely, the Grissom's NCC-638 was a small number given to a small ship. I truly believe that the size of the ship was the only rationale for this, so one shouldn't really try to over-analyze the numbers. By the time of TNG and DS9, there was far more of a cohesive, chronological-based registry system (3XXXX for the Mirandas, 4XXXX for the Excelsiors, 5XXXX and 6XXXX for the pre-Galaxy class-style ships, and 7XXXX for the Galaxy class and newer classes...although how the TNG Oberths with insanely high 5XXXX registries got in there I'll never know...I even wrote a whole essay about that)

Good point. Indeed, if we insist on trying to take the numbers seriously in-universe, it could be argued that Starfleet might've changed its numbering scheme at some point, just as the Federation has evidently changed its stardate scheme and its sector designations from time to time. Just because a chronological sequence is in use in the 24th century, that doesn't mean it was eternally in use from the beginning of Starfleet.

 

[OverlordSpock]

Also, I believe the Stargazer was originally conceptualized to be a movie-era Connie. I don't remember what I read about why they decided to kitbash a new model together instead.

That's not true. From as early as Encounter at Farpoint, we see the Constellation Class desktop model in Picard's ready room, which was always supposed to represent the Stargazer. It was only when it came time to film "The Battle," they didn't think they'd have the budget to build a full-scale filming miniature, so they were going to settle for using the TMP Enterprise. Luckily that didn't happen.

Ah...I don't actually remember seeing the model in the ready-room in "Encounter at Farpoint", but that doesn't mean it wasn't there. I don't actually remember seeing it until after "The Battle". But, that's not to say you aren't correct. What you say makes sense. I'll have to go back and check here one of these days.

I still think having Stargazer be a Connie would have been nice though... a bit of connection with what came before.

 

[Tiberius]

I'd say that it is likely that the Oberth was a pre-TOS design that was refitted several times as the Enterprise was in TMP. After all, it's a science vessel only. Doesn't need to be top-of-the-line like the Connies had to. As long as the spaceframe is in okay condition, chuck in a new engine and new sensors and send it out again.

 

[Christopher]

^I can see how that's possible, but "likely?" Based on what evidence?

 

[F. King Daniel]

^Why, the low number, silly

*slinks away*

 

[BillJ]

^I can see how that's possible, but "likely?" Based on what evidence?

I think the Oberth-class was the first warp two starship. Top that!

 

[ProwlAlpha]

If the first Oberths only stayed in the UFP space and just did science missions or something non-risky, I don't see why they cannot be that old with continuous upgrades and refits.

 

[Christopher]

Sure, sure, you don't see why not, but nobody's given a good reason why. If you're going to propose such an outlier of an idea as a single starship class in service for two whole centuries, it needs more to support it than just "I don't see why not."