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An early Earth/Vulcan Hybrid

I'm sorry, but as a Earth/Vulcan hybrid, this ship's concept story just doesn't do anything for me. I don't see a theme, a connection to Vulcan, anything.

But as a starship, generally speaking, it's lovely, daring lines are giving me a woodie! That front view just sent shudders of ecstasy though my right brain.

I admit, my logic behind the design is weak, but hey, the inside is LOADED with Vulcan stuff... :vulcan:

As for the tent built from lumber- :eek: Thanks. I think. That may have been the nicest compliment I've gotten about one of my designs. I think.
 
Okay- I'm almost done. The colours aren't going to be the same- I just wanted some contrasting colours to emphasize different parts of the ship.

x-class.jpg
 
Very nice design, may it have a Vulcan influence or not its in any case a very original design, don't change the neck its fine this way. :techman:
 
Here she is- pretty much done. I'll be adding some details such as RCS locations, and I'd still like to try building her in google sketch-up... IF my computer can handle it.

I just called it a Federation Class because I couldn't think of anything off the top of my head. I'll probably be changing that too...

xclass.jpg
 
I like it.

Although, I have to say I finally figured out (to me) what the bow section reminds me of... it brings to mind the head of the one 'droid in ROTJ that questions R2D2 in Jabba's Palace.

Not like that's a bad thing, just stating what's been subconsciously bugging me about it the past couple of days. :)

Cheers,
-CM-
 
Hey, this is awesome! :) I saved it in my "research" folder, where ideas for new meshes go. :)

The only thing I can add is that maybe the "head" a little wider that the neck, but not much more.
 
This is just a little ship I designed specifically with the intent of making something different. However to justify the odd design, I decided to make it a Vulcan and Earth hybrid.

It's essentially a testbed vehicle for combined technologies between the two worlds. Though the emphasis is on Earth design due to early Vulcan technology export restrictions. It is obviously heavily inspired by the Deadalus Class...

This crude sketch showes a bowed and tapered warp support pylon, and I'm not entirely sure which route I want to take with that. Or another- suggestions?

The nacelles are strapped to the pylons with a large "O" type ring. My reason behind that was because they are experimenting with different warp engines, and the ring contains stress reading equipment, critical to helping them design contact points for easy nacelle swapping.

I wanted to keep the main ractors far from the primary hull, and as far as possible from the small shuttle deck, in keeping with the original Star Trek intent that these are volitile areas.

The odd shapped primary hull is based on Vulcan input (for me to justify something early, different, yet somewhat familiar)...

The shuttle deck is quite small, with only 2 shuttles for available for use.

The sketch of the "warp core" is not what I have in mind for the ship, it's just something I threw in there to fill some space.

Any comments or suggestions are welcome of course.

x-class-a.jpg
I think this looks great as a TNG-era design... it borrows from the TNG-era design style quite a bit.

In order to look "early," there are a couple of design-cues which I'd lose, however. (It's your design, so you can do what you want, but you asked for input, sooo....)

I'm talking specifically about the nacelle pylons and the dorsal region. Both have that distinctive "TNG-era curvy-blobby" style, which absolutely (to me, at least) infers that this ship is from that era.

My advice would be to make the structural elements more distinct... and more linear... rather than having the smooth, blended organic curves you've got here. You can do so without significantly altering the overall shape or configuration of your ship, I think.

1) Make the leading and trailing edges of the pylons straight. (It's OK to keep the general taper, of course). Change the transitions of the pylons into the nacelles and secondary hull from "smooth organic" into a more angular "chamfer" feature.

2) Make the shape of the secondary hull leading edge more faceted. Not "flat" but step-wise straight sections, all around.

Those two things, to me, would make this much less "TNG-era" and much more "TOS-or-earlier" in feel, and wouldn't dramatically alter the overall look of the design.

My 2cents...
 
This is just a little ship I designed specifically with the intent of making something different. However to justify the odd design, I decided to make it a Vulcan and Earth hybrid.

It's essentially a testbed vehicle for combined technologies between the two worlds. Though the emphasis is on Earth design due to early Vulcan technology export restrictions. It is obviously heavily inspired by the Deadalus Class...

This crude sketch showes a bowed and tapered warp support pylon, and I'm not entirely sure which route I want to take with that. Or another- suggestions?

The nacelles are strapped to the pylons with a large "O" type ring. My reason behind that was because they are experimenting with different warp engines, and the ring contains stress reading equipment, critical to helping them design contact points for easy nacelle swapping.

I wanted to keep the main ractors far from the primary hull, and as far as possible from the small shuttle deck, in keeping with the original Star Trek intent that these are volitile areas.

The odd shapped primary hull is based on Vulcan input (for me to justify something early, different, yet somewhat familiar)...

The shuttle deck is quite small, with only 2 shuttles for available for use.

The sketch of the "warp core" is not what I have in mind for the ship, it's just something I threw in there to fill some space.

Any comments or suggestions are welcome of course.

x-class-a.jpg
I think this looks great as a TNG-era design... it borrows from the TNG-era design style quite a bit.

In order to look "early," there are a couple of design-cues which I'd lose, however. (It's your design, so you can do what you want, but you asked for input, sooo....)

I'm talking specifically about the nacelle pylons and the dorsal region. Both have that distinctive "TNG-era curvy-blobby" style, which absolutely (to me, at least) infers that this ship is from that era.

My advice would be to make the structural elements more distinct... and more linear... rather than having the smooth, blended organic curves you've got here. You can do so without significantly altering the overall shape or configuration of your ship, I think.

1) Make the leading and trailing edges of the pylons straight. (It's OK to keep the general taper, of course). Change the transitions of the pylons into the nacelles and secondary hull from "smooth organic" into a more angular "chamfer" feature.

2) Make the shape of the secondary hull leading edge more faceted. Not "flat" but step-wise straight sections, all around.

Those two things, to me, would make this much less "TNG-era" and much more "TOS-or-earlier" in feel, and wouldn't dramatically alter the overall look of the design.

My 2cents...

I know what you mean by straighter lines being more in keeping with TOS. The curves that are in TOS are simple, and I did wrestle with the keeping this ship more in line with that era.

So- here is another version of the ship with straight pylons, and a straight dorsal section. I like them both and see my first version pylons more in line with the movies (eg. Excelsior), but that bowed neck did feel too TNG...

alternatexclass.jpg
 
I know what you mean by straighter lines being more in keeping with TOS. The curves that are in TOS are simple, and I did wrestle with the keeping this ship more in line with that era.

So- here is another version of the ship with straight pylons, and a straight dorsal section. I like them both and see my first version pylons more in line with the movies (eg. Excelsior), but that bowed neck did feel too TNG...

alternatexclass.jpg
That's more like it (from my standpoint)... very "Pre-TOS" now... :)
 
Now that what a call a Pre-TOS / early Federation Starship :) :techman:

Thanks!

Here's the start of a cross section. Engineering and deflector control are merged because of the limited room. Everything is very open in engineering because of the vertical nature of the equipment and narrow profile of the ship itself.

The PHASER (singular) is a giant size version from The Cage. I thought it would be a nice touch.

I'm not happy with the shuttles. I want something basic like TOS- yet something that is a transition from ENT. Or maybe something very Vulcan looking. Whatever that is.

crosssectionxclass.jpg
 
Thanks kaisernathan1701.

Here's close up version of the cross section with a little more detail. There are about 50 crew along the centre axis. I was concerned that such a narrow ship might not accomodate the number of people I wanted to shove in it. But I'm sure that if I did a top view deck by deck, there'd be plenty of room for other crew- both off and on duty.

crosssectionlargerxclass.jpg
 
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Yay! :hugegrin: I was going to ask if there was a bigger version of that crosssection :)

and Your Welcome :)
 
I'm not happy with the shuttles. I want something basic like TOS- yet something that is a transition from ENT. Or maybe something very Vulcan looking. Whatever that is.
The biggest problem I have with most shuttle designs is that they're designed to be "cars in space" that can go everyplace. That's really not reasonable.

One thing that I suspect we'd see a lot more of in "early" ship designs would be specialization. Yes, you can do modularity to an extent, but an optimal atmospheric shuttle is probably going to dramatically different from a space-only shuttle, which has a nearly totally different set of requirements.

So... what roles do the "shuttles" on this ship serve? Assuming (as I would) that we're talking pre-transporter (hell, I think that "ENTERPRISE" should have stayed "pre-transporter" entirely, too), the shuttles are the main way of getting onto or off of the ship.

So... is this ship actually going to "go exploring" and visit strange new worlds? If so, it needs something capable of planetfall and return. But that's probably going to be less of a "minivan" (like most Trek shuttles have been) and more like a fighter... with propulsion and structure and so forth taking up much more of the overall volume than "passenger space" will.

On the other hand, if it's primarily a "testbed" and maybe a scout/mapping vessel... you don't need those. You only need "personnel transfer pods" useful in space only (maybe with a few extra tools that can be strapped on for emergency repairs).

SO... what do you want these "shuttles" to do? Start from function, and the design should come from there.

My 2cents...
 
Cary, I agree completely. Especially with your comments regarding Enterprise. The show had such promise, but they took it off on a tangent and added too much "future" technology to the Akiraprise. Space should have felt HUGE, dangerous (being out there alone), and a little scary, but most of all, wonderous. They failed to convey everything but the danger (because of that stupid time war)... Besides, limitations make for good drama, so why give them everything? But now I've gone off in the wrong direction. Back to the thead.

My ship does have one transporter room due to space and primarily, power restrictions (I've always suspected transporters are power hogs due to the nature of what they're doing- and for dramatic purposes). Transporter Psychosis was diagnosed in 2209 and my ship is in service around 2190, so, I'm sure the technology was in place (despite Enterprise having it so much earlier).

That being said, the shuttles in this case are pretty much just people and small equipment movers to planetary bodies. But this is really on a limited need. Of course different atmospheric make-up suggests the need for a completely self sufficient propulsion system, and I'd say the technology would limit the range/ time, that they can operate in.

In other words- I'm still stuck. What I can say for certain is that the boxes I have in the shuttle bay are pretty much there for show right now.
 
Cary, I agree completely. Especially with your comments regarding Enterprise. The show had such promise, but they took it off on a tangent and added too much "future" technology to the Akiraprise. Space should have felt HUGE, dangerous (being out there alone), and a little scary, but most of all, wonderous. They failed to convey everything but the danger (because of that stupid time war)... Besides, limitations make for good drama, so why give them everything? But now I've gone off in the wrong direction. Back to the thead.

My ship does have one transporter room due to space and primarily, power restrictions (I've always suspected transporters are power hogs due to the nature of what they're doing- and for dramatic purposes). Transporter Psychosis was diagnosed in 2209 and my ship is in service around 2190, so, I'm sure the technology was in place (despite Enterprise having it so much earlier).

That being said, the shuttles in this case are pretty much just people and small equipment movers to planetary bodies. But this is really on a limited need. Of course different atmospheric make-up suggests the need for a completely self sufficient propulsion system, and I'd say the technology would limit the range/ time, that they can operate in.

In other words- I'm still stuck. What I can say for certain is that the boxes I have in the shuttle bay are pretty much there for show right now.
If you need a place to start... try to imagine a Hawker Harrier design expanded into a "shuttlecraft," with an interior of roughly the same size and shape as an auto interior (two front, two back, some minimal cargo behind).

Start with this:
http://www.flightglobal.com/airspac...ys/images/11506/hawker-harrier-t2-cutaway.jpg
http://www.flightglobal.com/airspac...s/images/11505/hawker-harrier-gr1-cutaway.jpg

And tweak the shape as necessary... I'd loose the "tail" assemblyl entirely, widen the body and shorten the wings, change the nose shape a bit... but keep the "vectorable" thrust ports on the sides, the wings with little "pads" (or in the case of the harrier, wheels) on the tips, and so forth.

That's what I'd do. Just a suggestion.
 
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