• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Bridge location on Enterprise?

Most flying saucers as depicted in the movies at the time had a domed command center on top

True, as in the swipe--er, I mean influence of This Island Earth's ship on the bridge and saucer of the 1701--

TOS%20-%20ISLAND_zpsqq0ckbbm.jpg
 
Nemesis shows why the bridge being on the outer hull is a bad idea
In past and current naval ships having hte bridge be up top with lots of windows is a bit of a necessity, but on trek where the view screen isn't a window makes no sense
 
The interior of the Klingon BOP looked radically different from III and IV.

There must've been plenty of Klingon kit lying about on Vulcan to do a bona fide Klingon refit to take our heroes on the arduous journey home.
 
Nemesis shows why the bridge being on the outer hull is a bad idea
In past and current naval ships having hte bridge be up top with lots of windows is a bit of a necessity, but on trek where the view screen isn't a window makes no sense

Agree.:bolian:

I am surprised that J.J. Abrams Star Trek films did not relocate the Bridge deep inside the primary hull...but wouldn't that be the battle bridge. :shifty:
 
When the Enterprise was sitting on Flint's table, the crew inside was frozen in stasis. No one gaped and pointed at Kirk's giant face on the viewer, because they were unaware it was there. Showing him from the inside was a dramatic device to indicate the difference in size from the miniaturized point of view. Flint even stated the crew was in stasis. At least he did the last time I saw the episode. I'll have to check.
 
When the Enterprise was sitting on Flint's table, the crew inside was frozen in stasis. No one gaped and pointed at Kirk's giant face on the viewer, because they were unaware it was there. Showing him from the inside was a dramatic device to indicate the difference in size from the miniaturized point of view.

Correct.

Flint even stated the crew was in stasis. At least he did the last time I saw the episode. I'll have to check.
True.

The dialogue:

KIRK: My crew.
FLINT: The test of power. You had no chance. It is time for you to join your crew.
KIRK: You'd wipe out four hundred lives? Why?
FLINT: I have seen a hundred billion fall. I know death better than any man. I have tossed enemies into his grasp. And I know mercy. Your crew is not dead, but suspended.
 
Yes, it's a stupid place to put the bridge. True.

Yes, but the ship lasted 40 years without the bridge location being a problem. Remember that TV writers are more powerful than deflector shields.

Also, the ship was designed to be an exploration vessel, not a warship. What they should have done was have a CIC or battle-bridge. Something more versatile than aux-control. They propbably would have used that more often in TNG if they didn't cannibalize the set.
 
Starfleet ship's bridges are replaceable on the fly
How so? We've never seen one replaced.

We may not have seen it actually happening, but we know it has happened. For example, the 1701-A bridge from the end of ST IV vs. the one in ST V.

True, but it likely did not happen "on the fly". No doubt there was a period in the yard while this happened. There are going to be a large number of interfaces that need to be connected to the ship to and from the new bridge module. Computer/communications, weapons systems, life support, ad nauseum. I don't think this is going to be like swapping out the camper on a pick-up or something. There's gonna be some extensive work involved. The point isn't for a quick swap as much as to make any needed refit a little easier than having to gut half of the ship's primary hull to get at the bridge. This is probably the same reason main engineering is in the secondary hull near the cargo and shuttle bays which we've seen (in the movies at least) are connected (and I suspect the forward bulkhead of that cargo area abut engineering) giving a pretty large through-space between where engineering is and the outside. This probably makes a lot easier to move large components in and/or out of engineering.
 
Yes, I always figured the zoom-in-on-the-bridge shot in "The Cage" was to show the location of the bridge and the relative size of the ship. The redone CGI shot in the remastered version portrays a literal transparent dome over the bridge, which is silly.

And I had never taken it to show the location of the bridge within the ship. It had always seemed to me to be a simple pan into the spaceship, the same way you might zoom in on an office building and then dissolve to the conference room within.
 
If it were really a problem, the other races, including more warlike ones, wouldn't be doing it too. It seems to be a pretty standard element of Star Trek ship design, not limited to Starfleet, for whatever in-universe reason.
 
How so? We've never seen one replaced.

We may not have seen it actually happening, but we know it has happened. For example, the 1701-A bridge from the end of ST IV vs. the one in ST V.

True, but it likely did not happen "on the fly". No doubt there was a period in the yard while this happened. There are going to be a large number of interfaces that need to be connected to the ship to and from the new bridge module. Computer/communications, weapons systems, life support, ad nauseum. I don't think this is going to be like swapping out the camper on a pick-up or something. There's gonna be some extensive work involved. The point isn't for a quick swap as much as to make any needed refit a little easier than having to gut half of the ship's primary hull to get at the bridge. This is probably the same reason main engineering is in the secondary hull near the cargo and shuttle bays which we've seen (in the movies at least) are connected (and I suspect the forward bulkhead of that cargo area abut engineering) giving a pretty large through-space between where engineering is and the outside. This probably makes a lot easier to move large components in and/or out of engineering.
Even with all that swapping out between STIV and STV, it still needed a new bridge, as seen in STVI. Third time's the charm on which bridge module works best with that particular spaceframe. Makes one wonder if Starfleet knew beforehand that it wasn't as hot-swappable as intended, and Kirk got chosen as the guinea pig to determine which bridge design worked best with it because of the circumstances. Makes me wonder if they even let another crew fly the thing after Kirk and company signed off.
 
StarCruiser is definitely onto something here.

If a Federation starship's defensive screens and shields are deactivated or weakened, it would not make much difference where any vital ship's facility is located. (Witness how easily the Engine Room was damaged in TMP2.)

This is even more apparent in the original series, most of the time it only took a couple of shots at most to completely destroy a ship once it's shields were down. In such a case, it doesn't really matter where the bridge is.

True, but it likely did not happen "on the fly". No doubt there was a period in the yard while this happened. There are going to be a large number of interfaces that need to be connected to the ship to and from the new bridge module. Computer/communications, weapons systems, life support, ad nauseum. I don't think this is going to be like swapping out the camper on a pick-up or something. There's gonna be some extensive work involved. The point isn't for a quick swap as much as to make any needed refit a little easier than having to gut half of the ship's primary hull to get at the bridge.

I don't know about that, it's not that big of a stretch to assume that the "plug-and-play" factor would be even greater in the future. It really shouldn't be that difficult "in universe" to move consoles around to suit a captain's individual preference. (The change in turbolift positions is a bit more of a stretch, however)
 
With people talking about how "vulnerable" the bridge is, it makes me hate the way space battles have been shown post TOS even more. Did you ever hear anyone saying anything like "Klingon cruiser 100 meters to port?" No. It's always thousands of kilometers. Now go pick out a landmark that is a few hundred meters long. A football stadium would probably be good. Now go to the next state over. (If you're not in the USA, go to um, far away.) Now pick off the front doors with a laser pointer. And that thing isn't even trying to get away from you at warp 4!

Ever since TWOK (and admittedly an FX budget and capability that could handle it) all the space battles have all of the combatants on screen at the same time! You should see a single ship (maybe a group of ships maneuvering together) all firing into the infinite distance and receiving incoming fire from that same unimaginable distance.

There's a good reason that Kirk says in TUC "Never been this close". (I think I worked that out to about 200m one time.) Also why Sulu's eyes bug out in TMP when Kirk orders to close to 500m.

Here's another thought: All of the weapons we SEE in TOS point away from the bridge. So they should be maneuvering to keep not just half a saucer in between the bridge and incoming fire (if the bridge was in the center) but and ENTIRE saucer!

They're safe as houses on top of that ship. Unless they blow up the ship. Then they're atoms.
 
You have to keep in mind that the TOS/refit Enterprise was supposed to be about 300 meter long (847 feet). Having a likewise sized ship be about 200 meters away would present a collision danger. Judging by my desktop model of the TOS E. 'Kronos 1' would have been about 2000 meters away (2 kilometers). A perfect distance for a "face-to-face".
I assume that phasers are like lasers in that they are formed into a coherent beam that keeps going once fired. It's power is only diminished after it spreads out after a very,very long distance. A phaser's effective range is in how accurately you can aim it. And that's a function of the targeting scanners. Scotty demonstrates in "Assignment Earth" that using the ship's scanners he can get a very clear high resolution picture of a person on the ground from a standard orbit. That's a hell of alot better than a current KH-12 NRO/CIA spy satellite. Using your laser pointer analogy, if I had a scope of equal power attached to it. I could not only hit that door. I could hit a specific spot on the doorknob. From orbit.
 
Especially when you realize that a standard orbit isn't the 200 miles (or so) our spacecraft have used over the last 50-60 years, but some 20,000 miles away. Far enough to be mistaken for something much farther out if not seen with a telescope good enough to make out detail.
 
The interior of the Klingon BOP looked radically different from III and IV.

There must've been plenty of Klingon kit lying about on Vulcan to do a bona fide Klingon refit to take our heroes on the arduous journey home.

I thought the fan consensus on that was that Kirk and crew were using a larger, auxiliary control room to pilot the Bounty.
 
Why on earth would an auxiliary control room be larger and better-appointed than the main bridge?
 
I thought the fan consensus on that was that Kirk and crew were using a larger, auxiliary control room to pilot the Bounty.

The only problem that I can see with that is, most Klingon bridges we've seen since then have looked like that. If anything, it's the original bridge of the Bounty (as seen in ST III) that might have been an aux control room...

Although I have also heard it said that the ST III bridge was some kind of Combat Information Center, or intelligence-gathering installation, which was separate from the main bridge.
 
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top