A question about the technical aspects of Starship design.

[reanimatedfish]

Working with a friend of mine on some starship designs. Is there any technical reason a federation starship can't have any of the starships bulk between its nacelles?

He has an old technical manual buried in his garage which seemed to indicate the warp field would be rather unpleasant for any crew there.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Voyager has a lot of hull between the nacelles, as does the USS Defiant. I guess that whatever was written in that old manual was forgotten or ignored by subsequent producers.

 

[STRenegade]

http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/articles/design.htm
Good info on this subject.
http://www.trekplace.com/article15.html

 

[Shawnster]

Cardassian ships as well as the Klingon bird of prey also do not have distinctive warp nacelles.

 

[HIjol]

As we know, the nacelles warp the space around the ship, thereby giving it is propulsion and maneuvering...starship hull design optimizes or de-optimizes the shape and efficiency of the field (see three and four-nacelle designs) but do not in and of themselves have any effect separate from that on hull or inside space...

...while Andrew Probert and Roddenberry worked out the visual rules for starship/nacelle designs, the field itself dictates placement of nacelles and hull design via efficiency and balance...that said, there has been a lot of "off-the-reservation" design and combination of nacelle placement over the years, with various "non-Canon" explanation...as STRenegade so correctly points out above, Canon is Canon, and Brundle-Fly is not Brundle...

 

[reanimatedfish]

Okay, thanks guys, useful info!

 

[publiusr]

I think the general rule is that the ship must be at least a little swan shaped.