Excelsior Technical Manual: Grand Finale
- Thread starter Praetor
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Regarding the quarters, obviously it doesn't have to match and it's even from a different era, but my logic for Potemkin's Captain's quarters was to have them on the windows at the front of deck 2. Excelsior-class ships have a lot more windows than Constitutions, so it would make sense to me that the Captain has access to some. I never finished the room itself, and I'd probably change some stuff around if I were to continue work on it, but the main pieces are there to establish size and function.
Eaglemoss just regurgitated what the old Fact Files stated. The Generations matte painting suggest they're significantly smaller, but still larger than most shuttles. Visually they also look smaller than 26 meters, at that lenght the doors would be almost 2.5 meters wide!
Yes, thus it's only intended for heavy maintenance, not just general upkeep. Think once every 5 years or something like that. It's not a great idea, but it's the best I could come up with.
Heh, unlike designers such as Probert or Sternbach, the ILM folks didn't care much about what each individual bit did, just that it looked cool or different depending what was required. It's why all of the ST3 ship designs are a bit "out there", and still causing confusion to this day. However, I found this post from this very forum back in 2013 where Bill Geroge both confirms my previous statement and seems to call that area a "landing bay", so what do I know?
So perhaps it is a shuttlebay/landing bay after all? In that case, perhaps it's meant to be a special area where gravity is rotated 180 degrees? Because otherwise it's a very awkward space to use.
Yes, just by placing a shuttle on the deck below the bay, it's clear that it doesn't fit if we take into account even just .25 meters for the deck plating.
That being said, that is following the same deck structure for all areas of the ship. Notice how the shuttlebay floor isn't flush with the doors (as on the Constitution). If we raise the shuttlebay so that those elements are flush, then there's almost an extra meter. But that adds new problems on the shuttlebay itself, with the deck structure no longer making sense with the three rows of windows on the forward section added in TUC. Plus it no longer follows any of the canon MSD, if you care about such things.
Eaglemoss just regurgitated what the old Fact Files stated. The Generations matte painting suggest they're significantly smaller, but still larger than most shuttles. Visually they also look smaller than 26 meters, at that lenght the doors would be almost 2.5 meters wide!
Yes, thus it's only intended for heavy maintenance, not just general upkeep. Think once every 5 years or something like that. It's not a great idea, but it's the best I could come up with.
Heh, unlike designers such as Probert or Sternbach, the ILM folks didn't care much about what each individual bit did, just that it looked cool or different depending what was required. It's why all of the ST3 ship designs are a bit "out there", and still causing confusion to this day. However, I found this post from this very forum back in 2013 where Bill Geroge both confirms my previous statement and seems to call that area a "landing bay", so what do I know?
So perhaps it is a shuttlebay/landing bay after all? In that case, perhaps it's meant to be a special area where gravity is rotated 180 degrees? Because otherwise it's a very awkward space to use.
Yes, just by placing a shuttle on the deck below the bay, it's clear that it doesn't fit if we take into account even just .25 meters for the deck plating.
That being said, that is following the same deck structure for all areas of the ship. Notice how the shuttlebay floor isn't flush with the doors (as on the Constitution). If we raise the shuttlebay so that those elements are flush, then there's almost an extra meter. But that adds new problems on the shuttlebay itself, with the deck structure no longer making sense with the three rows of windows on the forward section added in TUC. Plus it no longer follows any of the canon MSD, if you care about such things.
Seems that you could extend the hangar bay forward so elevators can bring shuttles down into the thicker part of the engineering hull. As far as I can see on the Excelsior MSD it is not obvious on how far the shuttle facilities extend.
This picture reminds me, and maybe I've missed it elsewhere, but have you or @Praetor addressed or thought about how the shuttlebay doors physically function? It just doesn't seem possible to me. (I've also got issues with the Constitution class doors, but that's for another thread.)
@blssdwlf: I tested that out back when I first blocked out the shuttlebay, there are three problems with that:
- First, it would only work on the NCC version, the NX has the arboretum there clearly taking out all the space in front.
- Second, even on the NCC version, a lift big enough for large shuttles (like the Type 4) would take most of the forward structure. A forward structure that visibly has three rows of windows. There wouldn't be space left for those rooms.
- Third, even if you could put a lift and lower the shuttles there, it's where the torpedo launchers are, so one should assume there are torpedo bays and storage areas occupying that space.
So it is technically possible, but you'd have to make excuses for other things instead (those windows and the torpedo launchers), and explain away a completely different shuttle movement solution for the NX version anyway.
@B.J.: IMO the doors should be of a malleable material and bend out of shape as they open, it's the only way they could function as shown on the model.
- First, it would only work on the NCC version, the NX has the arboretum there clearly taking out all the space in front.
- Second, even on the NCC version, a lift big enough for large shuttles (like the Type 4) would take most of the forward structure. A forward structure that visibly has three rows of windows. There wouldn't be space left for those rooms.
- Third, even if you could put a lift and lower the shuttles there, it's where the torpedo launchers are, so one should assume there are torpedo bays and storage areas occupying that space.
So it is technically possible, but you'd have to make excuses for other things instead (those windows and the torpedo launchers), and explain away a completely different shuttle movement solution for the NX version anyway.
@B.J.: IMO the doors should be of a malleable material and bend out of shape as they open, it's the only way they could function as shown on the model.
After giving it some more thought, I was thinking along these same lines but I have some issues with it being on Deck 07 - why not have them closer to the bridge if they're standby quarters? I'll have to re-watch "Flashback" but I seem to remember Tuvok's line being "we returned to our quarters." I don't see this line as being problematic though; standby quarters are by definition quarters.
The room itself has a certain plain, generic look to it. There's a roll-up cabinet on one wall with some uniforms and a blanket in it, and a small shelf with some coffee cups and pot on another but nothing all that special. The framed paper art that appears on a few walls is the only thing that doesn't look very generic.
I feel like the intention was probably that these were shared quarters, but standby quarters make more sense to me. I just can't quite wrap my head around why they'd be on Deck 07.
Regarding the quarters, obviously it doesn't have to match and it's even from a different era, but my logic for Potemkin's Captain's quarters was to have them on the windows at the front of deck 2. Excelsior-class ships have a lot more windows than Constitutions, so it would make sense to me that the Captain has access to some. I never finished the room itself, and I'd probably change some stuff around if I were to continue work on it, but the main pieces are there to establish size and function.
I quite liked your solution here! I've always been of the mind that windows on older ships would mostly be for public or work spaces, but Excelsior is sort of a transitional ship so this works. I was leaning towards making the frontmost windows here into an officers' mess and scattering science labs around the inside, with quarters (standby or officers) towards the middle. I recalled after my post yesterday that we did see a brief peek of Styles' quarters in "TSFS" which were an obvious redress of Kirk's quarters from "TWOK."
Compare to Sulu's in "TUC":
Compare to Kirk's in "TUC":
It seems pretty clear that Sulu's and Kirk's are the same, minus the addition of some pipes and the changeout of personal effects. Sadly, I haven't seen any plans for this side of the quarters set
Ack, I didn't realize that was a Fact Files size! Throwing that out the airlock then.
It looks as though the Executive is about twice the length of the Type-7 a little ways behind it, which is said to be a plausible 8.5 meters long. So, maybe the Executive is a more reasonable 17 meters long. This would be too large for the hangars still, but maybe it's more plausible to dock in the hangar bay.
It's better than most ideas I've heard.
Re-posting Mr. George's quote here, since multi-quote ate it:
bgeorge said:
I remember this. I think he compared it at one point to the star destroyer's drop bay, including the "grabber" similar to the one that grabs the Tantive IV back in "A New Hope." My early exposure to this area was to the model kit version, which we now know to be highly inaccurate.
I think your model above is pretty accurate, but posting these references just to aid the discussion:
I also found this source for parts to accurize the model kit that seem to have some good representations of what this may look like:
The openings to the back on either side look inaccurate to me, but otherwise it seems correct.
Anyway, I'm going to try to make the middle "pod" a landing bay and go from there. I might try to fit the Executive shuttles in there, and maybe a few of the Saratoga type escape pods (from "Emissary") if I can find room.
The thing I think we all struggle is "why the open space?" Zero gravity repairs make sense, and maybe so does using it as a staging area for launching and recovering craft without going through the hassle of landing them all at once. I have always thought there was some mass issue that kept the secondary hull from being filled in.
I'm starting to see why Mr. Drexler just made it a cargo bay.
I'm going to experiment with this some more with my deck layout. I hadn't forgotten about the lack of flush doors, but I was going to ignore some of the windows on the forward section. And the canon MSDs all describe a ship that's bigger than 467 meters, so I tend to somewhat ignore those.
Agreed with all of this.
Okay, thinking through crew quarters a bit more, I think these should be the types:
Right now, I'm thinking the senior officers' quarters will look like a "TUC" update of the "TMP"/"TWOK"/"TSFS" quarters. The VIP quarters will just be a redress of this with two beds and two sinks in the head. The junior officers' quarters will be the same as the senior officers' quarters but without the living area. The enlisted crew quarters are a big question mark for me.
I think if there hadn't been the tight filming schedule, low budget, and need to simultaneously depict officers and crew quarters in "TUC" we'd have seen Kirk, Spock and Sulu's quarters look a lot more like what they had in previous films, using the entire set containing both sleeping and living areas. We've never seen VIP or junior officers' quarters in the movie era (unless Kirk's quarters in "TWOK" count as VIP) but in any case Lora's approach in "Mr. Scott's Guide" makes perfect sense to me and seems like exactly what a production would have done with those standing sets if they were able. If we'd seen crew quarters clearly on Excelsior in "TUC", they'd probably have looked a lot like the ones on the Enterprise-A during the uniform search.
What we did see of the Excelsior's crew quarters was only brief and blurry; I've pumped up the brightness on these screencaps quite a bit to try to discern just what set this was:
The bunks aren't turned the same way, but it's possible this is the "TNG" senior officers set, but with a wall changed or added on one side or another that is seen behind the bunks in the caps above.
I'm thinking maybe the wall behind the bunks on Excelsior is the window wall with a temporary wall added to hide the windows, and the bookcase we see at the far end is the one opposite the door that the search crew come through on the Enteprise-A, where "food dispenser" is labeled below:
The odd thing about this to me is - why did they not just reuse the set redressed for the Enterprise-A where Dax's shoe is found? If this is the senior officers' set from "TNG" why did they turn the bunks? Was this simply to have lots of people falling out and rolling at once? Or was it a different set entirely?
And yes, I think I will treat the quarters seen in "Flashback" as some kind of standby quarters or similar and invent a reason why it's on Deck 07. Maybe all their regular quarters are on Deck 07 and this is a "green room" for folks who are on duty (or about to be.) Maybe it's down in the living area of the ship to give them more restful privacy?
Anyway, more food for thought as I continue going through the ship trying to fill things in. I need to also produce a simple deck list of what I generally think is where. I realized my technical writeup is so old that it's quite inaccurate to how the decks fall now. Oops.
More to come!
- Senior Officers - sleeping area with single bed, living area and private single head
- VIP - sleeping area with double beds, living area and private double head
- Junior Officers - sleeping area with single bed and private single head
- Enlisted Crew - sleeping area with bunk beds for four and shared head
Right now, I'm thinking the senior officers' quarters will look like a "TUC" update of the "TMP"/"TWOK"/"TSFS" quarters. The VIP quarters will just be a redress of this with two beds and two sinks in the head. The junior officers' quarters will be the same as the senior officers' quarters but without the living area. The enlisted crew quarters are a big question mark for me.
I think if there hadn't been the tight filming schedule, low budget, and need to simultaneously depict officers and crew quarters in "TUC" we'd have seen Kirk, Spock and Sulu's quarters look a lot more like what they had in previous films, using the entire set containing both sleeping and living areas. We've never seen VIP or junior officers' quarters in the movie era (unless Kirk's quarters in "TWOK" count as VIP) but in any case Lora's approach in "Mr. Scott's Guide" makes perfect sense to me and seems like exactly what a production would have done with those standing sets if they were able. If we'd seen crew quarters clearly on Excelsior in "TUC", they'd probably have looked a lot like the ones on the Enterprise-A during the uniform search.
What we did see of the Excelsior's crew quarters was only brief and blurry; I've pumped up the brightness on these screencaps quite a bit to try to discern just what set this was:
The bunks aren't turned the same way, but it's possible this is the "TNG" senior officers set, but with a wall changed or added on one side or another that is seen behind the bunks in the caps above.
I'm thinking maybe the wall behind the bunks on Excelsior is the window wall with a temporary wall added to hide the windows, and the bookcase we see at the far end is the one opposite the door that the search crew come through on the Enteprise-A, where "food dispenser" is labeled below:
The odd thing about this to me is - why did they not just reuse the set redressed for the Enterprise-A where Dax's shoe is found? If this is the senior officers' set from "TNG" why did they turn the bunks? Was this simply to have lots of people falling out and rolling at once? Or was it a different set entirely?
And yes, I think I will treat the quarters seen in "Flashback" as some kind of standby quarters or similar and invent a reason why it's on Deck 07. Maybe all their regular quarters are on Deck 07 and this is a "green room" for folks who are on duty (or about to be.) Maybe it's down in the living area of the ship to give them more restful privacy?
Anyway, more food for thought as I continue going through the ship trying to fill things in. I need to also produce a simple deck list of what I generally think is where. I realized my technical writeup is so old that it's quite inaccurate to how the decks fall now. Oops.
More to come!
Could be near a major turbolift junction, making it the fastest spot to get to or come from anywhere else on the ship.
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Or any kind of privacy whatsoeverI'm just annoyed that none of those bunks have guard rails!
No Triple Bunk Bed option setup either.
It's actually very interesting to me that even though they redressed the other half of the junior officers quarters to serve as a triple bunk room that they also redressed another set (presumably officers' quarters) to have multiple bunks. I have been debating whether both types of rooms exist as crew quarters on Excelsior and I guess since they both exist on Enterprise-A the answer is likely yes.
I also found this source for parts to accurize the model kit that seem to have some good representations of what this may look like:
this image is really selling me on the upside down gravity idea. Also goes well with the idea that they were trying "out of the box" ideas on the Excelsior.
Yes, that excelsior quarters with the bunk beds is the TNG senior officers' quarters redressed. The bookshelf matches the one that set has, as does the column right next to it. You can also see the pill shaped insets of the storage units below the windows. The position of the beds was most likely both to show all the people falling while also hiding the easy to recognize TNG-era slanted walls with the windows.
Wow! They did an amazing job redressing that set. Didn’t even recognize it.
Yes, that makes sense. I can see the NX version not needing full shuttle facilities being a testbed. We know there are changes between the NX and NCC model like the impulse area and shuttle area so adding full facilities in the NCC version isn't out of the question.
Hmm, in 3D, I imagine only needing the middle section of the box structure for the elevator because of the torpedo launchers.
Also, we don't always need space for proper rooms behind windows. Otherwise we'd have to explain for the windows on the warp pylons of the TOS Enterprise or any of the windows at the bottom of the Excelsior saucer.
I would slot the elevator between the launcher facilities. Here is a 305m Enterprise superimposed onto a 467m Excelsior. The red outline is for the incredibly spacious torpedo facilities, the yellow for the elevator and the green for the shuttle facilities. The Excelsior has so much volume that I'm not seeing an issue in 3D...
I don't believe any excuses are needed, IMHO. There is so much volume available that it seems like a straightforward configuration. YMMV.
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I believe the there are some fins on the neck of the Galaxy behind the torpedo bay. Maybe it is just painted darker.
Assuming that among other things, the deflection crystals redirect energy from the warp core to other systems on the ship, would a split point in the shaft not mean that a third crystal was needed to direct energy towards one of the two others? Maybe that is why the neck is vented?
In this case I think the two crystal detail would have been better for the NX version, and the single crystal would have been better for the NCC version of the ship.
Since they visibly altered the dilithium "articulation frame" in season 7 in TNG, I guess it is possible that there are internal changes we can't see for other ships.
As @Mytran observed watching "Redemption II" isn't super helpful due to the tight shots.
However, I started noticing something interesting. Check out the below image:
Data is facing forward, with Hobson to port, and the wall behind him seems to very obviously slant outward rather than inward as the previously posted erroneous plans would suggest. To me, this indicates and even greater likelihood that the galley set was less changed than previously thought.
Data's command chair would be just to the right of the "A" indicator above, with Hobson and his console just to the right of this, where the prep table is above. It's likely that the doors were simply added to the walls behind the "pipes" which I think can be supported by the fact that Data enters on the port (right) side of the set, where there would be clearance to use the door. I didn't notice anyone entering through the other door in the episode. The viewscreen would then be added where the corridor door was.
Based on that, I've come up with the following alternate configuration:
I believe this generally fits with what we see in the following screenshots:
Please pick it apart.
I think that the bridge version of this set probably does not have as much a a height difference for the captain as was thought at one point, and the sets are actually pretty much the same. It is interesting that "Mr. Scott's Guide to the Enterprise" puts the galley right under the bridge, a few decks down. That implies the galley would fit into a bridge module, and explains how this set could be used for the bridge of s ship.
Since the model was sometimes rendered at a bigger size, I would not have a problem with saying that the 622 meter size was the "real" size and that 467 meters was what was planned but not what was actually built.
I have also wondered if the Excelsior modules were the first of Starfleet's history to be scalable like the Galaxy modules are. Therefore some ships that look like Excelsiors are another class that is bigger, like was rendered in the original version of TNG. How do we know the Enterprise-B and Lakota were meant to be even bigger than 622 meters?
To my thinking the open space and the bunking crew quarters works like this:
The saucer is not really that much bigger than the ones from the Constitution class and Miranda class.
The secondary hull is mostly empty but would not have much space for crew and recreation facilities, so to have a bigger crew, the solution is to pack the crew in bunks.
The Excelsior was a ship that was testing new technology and was not set up for long missions (Sulu had a mission of only 3 years, not 5).
After that technology was worked out from the prototype (regardless of the failure or success of transwarp drive) the Excelsior the design went at least 3 ways:
1. The Enterprise-B type of ship was created, adding more space to sides of the secondary hull
for equipment.
2. The Ambassador class enlarged the saucer and "filled out" the secondary hull allowing for longer missions, but was essentially the same generation of ship.
3. The Excelsior design proved to work with very little for certain applications and was used for many ships with NCC numbers.
So the reason that the secondary hull was initially so empty with such a long undercut was simply that space (especially cargo space) was not needed for a prototype.
But later, Starfleet knew that a version with room for more equipment (and better accommodations) would be needed, and that developed into the Ambassador class.
However, the design of the ship was still workable even in a version relatively similar to the prototype, and if DS9 is to be accepted as-is, Starfleet must have built a lot of them that way
I think that on the Excelsior, the crew probably had to be in bunks to accommodate larger crew in a similarly sized saucer, and that room is really a bunkroom. Perhaps the officers have smaller quarters too because of this? or maybe the officer's quarters open up into more space, but we just don't see how this is accomplished in the movie.
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Yes, that excelsior quarters with the bunk beds is the TNG senior officers' quarters redressed. The bookshelf matches the one that set has, as does the column right next to it. You can also see the pill shaped insets of the storage units below the windows. The position of the beds was most likely both to show all the people falling while also hiding the easy to recognize TNG-era slanted walls with the windows.
Thank you! I should have known you'd know.
Agreed with this.
Agreed with this too, but I'd also say that just because it looks like a window it isn't necessarily a window. The Defiant has rows of windows that likely aren't windows on the ventral side. My "real" Excelsior likely will omit some rows of windows from the secondary hull, and may shift the ones on the saucer rim a bit.
I would slot the elevator between the launcher facilities. Here is a 305m Enterprise superimposed onto a 467m Excelsior. The red outline is for the incredibly spacious torpedo facilities, the yellow for the elevator and the green for the shuttle facilities. The Excelsior has so much volume that I'm not seeing an issue in 3D...
I don't believe any excuses are needed, IMHO. There is so much volume available that it seems like a straightforward configuration. YMMV.
Good thinking. I'm going to give this a try on my plans, in addition with trying to fit a hangar below.
Looking on this photo, I am not seeing them. You did remind me that the refit has some on the rear, though, seen in this photo. I seem to recall these were once stated to be some kind of photorp launcher exhaust that helped hold the ship in place when it was firing torpedoes.
I figure since the refit Enterprise intermix chamber was more or less just a power transfer conduit, and the reactor near the bottom of the vertical shaft, that the addition of some kind of a split shaft at the top wouldn't matter much. When it's the TNG style core, the power lines have to come up from the split red tubes at the back of the core. Anyway, I think the "deflection" aspect is less about power transfer and more about doing something with a low level warp field to move the ship. YMMV, of course.
I'm beginning to agree with you here.
Don't tempt me to do the 622 meter version too!
To my thinking the open space and the bunking crew quarters works like this:
After that technology was worked out from the prototype (regardless of the failure or success of transwarp drive) the Excelsior the design went at least 3 ways:
- The saucer is not really that much bigger than the ones from the Constitution class and Miranda class.
- The secondary hull is mostly empty but would not have much space for crew and recreation facilities, so to have a bigger crew, the solution is to pack the crew in bunks.
- The Excelsior was a ship that was testing new technology and was not set up for long missions (Sulu had a mission of only 3 years, not 5).
So the reason that the secondary hull was initially so empty with such a long undercut was simply that space (especially cargo space) was not needed for a prototype.
- The Enterprise-B type of ship was created, adding more space to sides of the secondary hull for equipment.
- The Ambassador class enlarged the saucer and "filled out" the secondary hull allowing for longer missions, but was essentially the same generation of ship.
- The Excelsior design proved to work with very little for certain applications and was used for many ships with NCC numbers.
But later, Starfleet knew that a version with room for more equipment (and better accommodations) would be needed, and that developed into the Ambassador class.
However, the design of the ship was still workable even in a version relatively similar to the prototype, and if DS9 is to be accepted as-is, Starfleet must have built a lot of them that way
Forgiving me for bulletizing your points, but I do agree with a lot of this. Great thinking.
This is probably about right, it's just annoying that it seems to change from "TMP" to "TUC."
I need to do some calculations and try to figure out just how many senior officers, junior officers, and crew the ship might have at around 720 people, and then figure out how many cabins of each type it needs. This should help inform particularly what the senior officers' quarters and junior officers' quarters will look like, since I'll have to shove them all in there.
More to come!
Thanks for the positive comments. If I had known how to bullet them on this site I would have done so myself
Where did you get that number? It feels right but I cannot recall where it was stated. It especially fits well, in my option, with the idea Rick Sternbach gave in his Star Trek the magazine article that the Constellation class was meant to accommodate more crew in the same docks as the Constitution class, and had a crew of around 500.
So the idea is that Starfleet is wanting to increase the crew complement for more labs (or more torpedo launchers, lol), and the Constellation is a step in that direction, which possibly includes other ships that have a kitbashed look using movie-era components. Then the Excelsior has about the same size saucer as the Constitution class, but even more crew (again, that 720 numbers sounds about right and is possibly why there are so many bunks). By the time the next true new generation of ships is introduced, the largest of that new generation, which includes ships like the new Orleans and Cheyenne class, is the Galaxy class with another jump of about 300 crew to the approx. 1000 number from TNG. Makes sense to me.
My faulty memory. According to the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Technical Manual, the Excelsior-class starship has a standard crew complement of 750 officers and crew members. The ship can also accommodate 130 visiting personnel and has a maximum evacuation capacity of 9,800 people. So, I will need to try to accomodate this number when laying out the officer, VIP, and crew quarters. I imagine that the 9,800 people entails converting public areas to sleeping quarters, perhaps even in the corridors.
I'm a big fan of that article, myself. And that general approach of leapfrogging crew compliment seems to fit. Since we're talking about the Constellation, one of my favorite ideas about this design was that it was refit-era tech taken to a final and somewhat ludicrous extreme; multiple nacelles/warp systems and lots of other similar such. This would help explain why they are considered "overworked and underpowered."
Apologies for the lack of pretty pictures when it comes to the deck plans due to all the research, but I will have some nice developments to show shortly.
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