NCC numbers, hyperdrive, and the TAS Bonaventure

[uniderth]

Could you also explain how Zefram Cochrane is originally from Alpha Centuri, and did Wrigley financially backed it where Cochrane is from? Unless you're going to ignore what was done in TOS, which was done right, and proceed with the crap done in TNG First Contact where he's from Earth.

Where is it stated he was FROM Alpha Centauri? He is known as Zefram Cochrane OF Alpha Centauri. Just like Lawrence is known as OF Arabia even though he wasn't born there. In my version there was a colony established on Alpha Centauri by sublight ships just prior to WWIII breaking out. Some of the first extra solar space warp flight were to check on this colony. I have Zefram Cochrane moving to Alpha Centauri in 2064 aboard the Bonaventure(C1-21). He went there to establish an second Space Warp Development Facility. That way there would be development both in the solar system and in Alpha Centauri. And FTL Ships traveling to Alpha Centauri wouldn't be stranded if something broke down on their months long voyage. Spending about fifty years in Alpha Centauri caused him to become known as Zefram Cochrane of Alpha Centauri.

Plus even being FROM someplace doesn't mean you were born there either. You can be from anywhere you choose to call your home base.

 

[STEPhon IT]

Below is my take on the original TOS/TAS timeline before things got retconned and hopelessly complicated by later series/movies, apologies for the length, this was lifted directly from my notes.

Uses of “space warp” in TOS/TAS

Zephram Cochrane “discovered” the “space warp” and was believed to have died c.150 yrs BT (Before TOS) yet he is known as Zephram Cochrane “of Alpha Centauri” despite being referred to –and acting like- a human from Earth. So perhaps Cochrane “discovered” the space warp when he was still quite young, say around the year 2018 when Lt. Marla McGivers said sleeper ships like the Botany Bay became no longer necessary for use within the solar system.

So it was at this point that limited interstellar travel became feasible, albeit still requiring cryogenic sleep for months/years beyond the solar system?

This, would not only explain how the Valiant “from 200 years ago” (WNMHSGB) got out into deep space but also how the Terra-10 colony (TTI) was established so far from Earth. (Especially if they were both using early space warp drive combined with sleeper ship technology)

Below is relevant dialogue from “Metamorphosis”

KIRK: Zefram Cochrane of Alpha Centauri, the discoverer of the space warp?
COCHRANE: That's right, Captain.
MCCOY: But that's impossible. Zefram Cochrane died a hundred and fifty years ago.
SPOCK: The name of Zefram Cochrane is revered throughout the known galaxy. Planets were named after him. Great universities, cities.
KIRK: Isn't your story a little improbable, Mister Cochrane?
COCHRANE: No, it's true. I was eighty seven years old when I came here.

If Cochran was 87 yrs old when he was lost to the pages of history, and that was a 150 years before the Enterprise’s five year mission, then Cochrane would have been about 37 years old in 2018!

Kirk: “Our space warp ability gone” WNMHGB

In neither case is there an association with warp drive per se.

On the other hand…

Dialogue in TOS/TAS suggesting that some relatively recent and significant breakthrough in propulsion technology (c. 30 yrs BT) -relating to time- has occurred (And which the Enterprise/Constitution class is among the first so equipped)

SPOCK; “S.S. Columbia, disappeared in that region approx 18 yrs ago”

TYLER: (to crash survivors) “And you won’t believe how fast you can get back. Well, the time barriers been broken, our new ships can…” TC/M

So perhaps the newer tech is an improvement or addition to the older more limited space warp tech, one which overcomes some limitation with the latter which had come to be known in general parlance as “the time barrier”?

The above has interesting implications for seeming contradictions between TOS and TAS as to when “warp drive” technology was first implemented.

SARAH APRIL: “the first chief medical officer on a starship equipped with warp drive”. (It has been generally been assumed that the starship in question was the Enterprise, since her husband -Robert April- was the ships first captain.)

On this basis it seems that Sarah April uses the term “warp drive” as a reference to the more recent time warp tech. suggesting perhaps, that it is the time warp tech that has the drive or field propulsion aspect associated with it? So perhaps Cochrane’s earlier “discovery” of the space warp was for a static warp field with no drive aspect associated with it and therefore merely allowed for the impulse engines to “cheat” the light speed barrier?

If we accept that the SS Valiant was an early space warp/sleeper ship combination, then it would still use impulse (rocket) power for propulsion, this is consistent with Kirk’s statement that “the old impulse engines weren’t strong enough” to resist the magnetic storm pulling it off course.

Then there’s this from “The Time Trap”;

SCOTTY “There’s the old Bonaventure; she was the 1st ship to have warp drive installed”. (A ship that looks a lot, perhaps tellingly, like the Enterprise)

Interpreting this is somewhat problematical; on the one hand, the design of the Bonaventure suggests that it could be a prototype vessel for the more recent “time” warp innovation that resulted in the production-line ships like the Enterprise. This is supported not only by its overall design configuration but also by the “NCC” on the nacelles, as well as the fact that a female member of the Elysian council is wearing what appears to be a “Cage era” Starfleet uniform and therefore may be the captain or one of the crew. On the other hand, Spock’s statement about “The crew's descendants may still be living, Captain.” suggests that it is perhaps the older “space” warp tech that is being referred to after all?

In my opinion, the preponderance of evidence here seems to point toward the conclusion that the Bonaventure should be considered as equipped with the newer time warp innovation and Spock’s statement should be taken in light of a similar statement he made in WNMHGB regarding one of his “ancestors” who married a human female.

In any event, note also that the use of the terms “installed” and “equipped with” in each case might imply some contraption that can be added to existing starship’s internal engineering systems, and therefore not something requiring a wholesale redesign of existing starship hull configurations.

Other specific uses of “time warp” in TOS/TAS

PIKE/SPOCK: “Our time warp factor” TC/M

-Suggesting that the later oft used term “warp factor” is, in fact, an abbreviated form specifically referring to the time warp as opposed to space warp

The association with warp factors in TC/M might suggest that the warp scale formula (given in TMOST/TWG) -which has been criticized for not yielding the kinds of speeds to cover the distances seen in some TOS episodes- is therefore actually the old, slower speed of C cubed (space) warp factor scale and that the newer time warp tech augments or modifies this scale so that the newer (time) warp factors are considerably faster, but not, apparently, in any consistent integer value? Alternately, perhaps the warp factor formula is for the time warp drive after all, but that it must be cross calculated with the older space warp velocities to arrive at a true ETA at any given time? The new scale factor would initially be distinguished from the older by calling it a time warp factor, at least until the new scale became standard, after which it would just be called warp factors again. Be this as it may, it should be kept in mind that the warp factor scale was never explicated in onscreen dialogue; therefore we are free to ignore altogether it if we wish.

To sum up, the seeming contradiction between TOS and TAS can therefore be resolved if we understand the term warp drive to mean time warp tech, either by itself or when wedded to the earlier space warp tech.

You're trying too hard to make it fit, but let's not forget TOS was set in the 22nd Century based upon Earth Time and not the 23rd "Tomorrow is Yesterday" and "Space Seed" altho the Botany Bay was found in deep space, Kirk was talking to an Earth man "Noonien Singh"; I don't dispute the timeline from the movies--which were faulty math--but what was in TOS was from 22nd Century.

 

[Dukhat]

...No more or less canon than the suggested but ultimately unaired Freedom, I guess. Pioneer is what Sean Hargreaves designed the ship to "be", after an early script.

(The ship could easily be both, of course. Much like Kirk might be flying a Horizon (NCC-1000) class ship of the late Constitution (NCC-1700) subclass, or Lorca the Zenith (NCC-1010) class ship of the late Crossfield (NCC-1030) subclass, we can pile on the fictional names just as we please. After all, we already know Starfleet does this with Enterprise class. So what the Federation adopted for its frontier needs may have been called the Freedom class after the earliest surviving specimen of the Pioneers, or vice versa. And vice versa would be nice, as the Federation supposedly later will operate "another" Freedom class.)

Timo Saloniemi

I don’t have much of a problem with this particular instance of Starfleet having two ships with the same class name, as they’re 200 years apart. No one in the 2360’s is going to think that the Freedom class Firebrand is the same class as the 2160’s Freedom class Franklin

 

[STEPhon IT]

Where is it stated he was FROM Alpha Centauri? He is known as Zefram Cochrane OF Alpha Centauri. Just like Lawrence is known as OF Arabia even though he wasn't born there. In my version there was a colony established on Alpha Centauri by sublight ships just prior to WWIII breaking out. Some of the first extra solar space warp flight were to check on this colony. I have Zefram Cochrane moving to Alpha Centauri in 2064 aboard the Bonaventure(C1-21). He went there to establish an second Space Warp Development Facility. That way there would be development both in the solar system and in Alpha Centauri. And FTL Ships traveling to Alpha Centauri wouldn't be stranded if something broke down on their months long voyage. Spending about fifty years in Alpha Centauri caused him to become known as Zefram Cochrane of Alpha Centauri.

Plus even being FROM someplace doesn't mean you were born there either. You can be from anywhere you choose to call your home base.

I agree but Zefram Cochrane's origins wasn't interpreted in the way you're putting it in the episode "Metamorphosis"; when that episode was designed he was meant to say it was his place of origin. But because of First Contact you're making adjustments retroactively. I'm not buying or accepting the Prime changes.

 

[uniderth]

Below is my take on the original TOS/TAS timeline before things got retconned and hopelessly complicated by later series/movies, apologies for the length, this was lifted directly from my notes.

Uses of “space warp” in TOS/TAS

Zephram Cochrane “discovered” the “space warp” and was believed to have died c.150 yrs BT (Before TOS) yet he is known as Zephram Cochrane “of Alpha Centauri” despite being referred to –and acting like- a human from Earth. So perhaps Cochrane “discovered” the space warp when he was still quite young, say around the year 2018 when Lt. Marla McGivers said sleeper ships like the Botany Bay became no longer necessary for use within the solar system.

So it was at this point that limited interstellar travel became feasible, albeit still requiring cryogenic sleep for months/years beyond the solar system?

This, would not only explain how the Valiant “from 200 years ago” (WNMHSGB) got out into deep space but also how the Terra-10 colony (TTI) was established so far from Earth. (Especially if they were both using early space warp drive combined with sleeper ship technology)

Below is relevant dialogue from “Metamorphosis”

KIRK: Zefram Cochrane of Alpha Centauri, the discoverer of the space warp?
COCHRANE: That's right, Captain.
MCCOY: But that's impossible. Zefram Cochrane died a hundred and fifty years ago.
SPOCK: The name of Zefram Cochrane is revered throughout the known galaxy. Planets were named after him. Great universities, cities.
KIRK: Isn't your story a little improbable, Mister Cochrane?
COCHRANE: No, it's true. I was eighty seven years old when I came here.

If Cochran was 87 yrs old when he was lost to the pages of history, and that was a 150 years before the Enterprise’s five year mission, then Cochrane would have been about 37 years old in 2018!

What is your dating for Kirk's era?

If we're going with 2260s then Zefram Cochrane wouldn't be born until 2028.

Kirk: “Our space warp ability gone” WNMHGB

In neither case is there an association with warp drive per se.

On the other hand…

Dialogue in TOS/TAS suggesting that some relatively recent and significant breakthrough in propulsion technology (c. 30 yrs BT) -relating to time- has occurred (And which the Enterprise/Constitution class is among the first so equipped)

SPOCK; “S.S. Columbia, disappeared in that region approx 18 yrs ago”

TYLER: (to crash survivors) “And you won’t believe how fast you can get back. Well, the time barriers been broken, our new ships can…” TC/M

So perhaps the newer tech is an improvement or addition to the older more limited space warp tech, one which overcomes some limitation with the latter which had come to be known in general parlance as “the time barrier”?

That's my theory as well. The Enterprise's warp nacelles are the result of the technology that broke the "time barrier". It is just by chance that they resemble the nacelles of the Phoenix and other early "Space Warp" ships.

The above has interesting implications for seeming contradictions between TOS and TAS as to when “warp drive” technology was first implemented.

SARAH APRIL: “the first chief medical officer on a starship equipped with warp drive”. (It has been generally been assumed that the starship in question was the Enterprise, since her husband -Robert April- was the ships first captain.)

On this basis it seems that Sarah April uses the term “warp drive” as a reference to the more recent time warp tech. suggesting perhaps, that it is the time warp tech that has the drive or field propulsion aspect associated with it? So perhaps Cochrane’s earlier “discovery” of the space warp was for a static warp field with no drive aspect associated with it and therefore merely allowed for the impulse engines to “cheat” the light speed barrier?

If we accept that the SS Valiant was an early space warp/sleeper ship combination, then it would still use impulse (rocket) power for propulsion, this is consistent with Kirk’s statement that “the old impulse engines weren’t strong enough” to resist the magnetic storm pulling it off course.

Then there’s this from “The Time Trap”;

SCOTTY “There’s the old Bonaventure; she was the 1st ship to have warp drive installed”. (A ship that looks a lot, perhaps tellingly, like the Enterprise)

Interpreting this is somewhat problematical; on the one hand, the design of the Bonaventure suggests that it could be a prototype vessel for the more recent “time” warp innovation that resulted in the production-line ships like the Enterprise. This is supported not only by its overall design configuration but also by the “NCC” on the nacelles, as well as the fact that a female member of the Elysian council is wearing what appears to be a “Cage era” Starfleet uniform and therefore may be the captain or one of the crew. On the other hand, Spock’s statement about “The crew's descendants may still be living, Captain.” suggests that it is perhaps the older “space” warp tech that is being referred to after all?

In my opinion, the preponderance of evidence here seems to point toward the conclusion that the Bonaventure should be considered as equipped with the newer time warp innovation and Spock’s statement should be taken in light of a similar statement he made in WNMHGB regarding one of his “ancestors” who married a human female.

In any event, note also that the use of the terms “installed” and “equipped with” in each case might imply some contraption that can be added to existing starship’s internal engineering systems, and therefore not something requiring a wholesale redesign of existing starship hull configurations.

I don't really have a problem rewriting TAS dialogue to make it fit. It's just a cartoon and therefore I don't consider it as canon as a live action series.

Other specific uses of “time warp” in TOS/TAS

PIKE/SPOCK: “Our time warp factor” TC/M

-Suggesting that the later oft used term “warp factor” is, in fact, an abbreviated form specifically referring to the time warp as opposed to space warp

The association with warp factors in TC/M might suggest that the warp scale formula (given in TMOST/TWG) -which has been criticized for not yielding the kinds of speeds to cover the distances seen in some TOS episodes- is therefore actually the old, slower speed of C cubed (space) warp factor scale and that the newer time warp tech augments or modifies this scale so that the newer (time) warp factors are considerably faster, but not, apparently, in any consistent integer value? Alternately, perhaps the warp factor formula is for the time warp drive after all, but that it must be cross calculated with the older space warp velocities to arrive at a true ETA at any given time? The new scale factor would initially be distinguished from the older by calling it a time warp factor, at least until the new scale became standard, after which it would just be called warp factors again. Be this as it may, it should be kept in mind that the warp factor scale was never explicated in onscreen dialogue; therefore we are free to ignore altogether it if we wish.

I think Series Proper's "(space) warp" and The Cage's "time warp" are the same thing as, just that over the years "time" was dropped from common use. The proper technical name was probably Space-Time Warp or something like that. But who has time to say that when your busy commanding a ship. We can see this again in how the successful "Transwarp" of the Excelsior became the common "warp" of the TNG era. So I look at it like this:
- Zefram Cochrane discovered the Space Warp. This evolved from a nacelle configuration to a ring shape configuration.
- Space warp had some sort of "upper limit" that became known as the "time barrier".
- This time barrier was broken with the invention of Space-Time Warp again which resembled the nacelle configuration.
- From there we have Transwarp of the Excelsior.
- And "Threshold" was just a bad dream Tom Paris had.

I agree but Zefram Cochrane's origins wasn't interpreted in the way you're putting it in the episode "Metamorphosis"; when that episode was designed he was meant to say it was his place of origin. But because of First Contact you're making adjustments retroactively. I'm not buying or accepting the Prime changes.

Certainly, it was interpreted as him being a native Alpha Centaurian. But the modern interpretation is not invalid because of that. Creators intent has never been canon, but is valuable in informing interpretation. So while it may have been their intent that he was a native of Alpha Centauri, it was never stated on screen that he was. Therefore having him be a native of earth is a valid interpretation, provided you do make him be OF Alpha Centauri at some point in his life. I'm not saying you have to accept it, but that my view.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

let's not forget TOS was set in the 22nd Century based upon Earth Time and not the 23rd "Tomorrow is Yesterday" and "Space Seed" altho the Botany Bay was found in deep space, Kirk was talking to an Earth man "Noonien Singh"; I don't dispute the timeline from the movies--which were faulty math--but what was in TOS was from 22nd Century.

According to "The Squire of Gothos," TOS is set in at least the 27th century. Trelane has a bust of Napoleon, which we see before he learns that he has been looking at Earth 900 years in the past.

 

[Lord Other]

According to "The Squire of Gothos," TOS is set in at least the 27th century. Trelane has a bust of Napoleon, which we see before he learns that he has been looking at Earth 900 years in the past.

But then again, there's this scene in "Tomorrow is Yesterday" when Kirk is being interrogated by Lieutenant Colonel Fellini at the "Omaha Installation" nee Offutt AFB in 1969..

KIRK: All right, Colonel. The truth is, I'm a little green man from Alpha Centauri. A beautiful place. You ought to see it.
FELLINI: I am going to lock you up for two hundred years.
KIRK: That ought to be just about right.​

My point is- I think trying to nail the time frame for when TOS takes place using dialogue not specifically related to Cochrane himself does little to help matters, but YMMV.

As for where Cochrane started out at / where he is from? It really makes very little difference overall IMHO, but from my own perspective he's from Earth, but after putting in for a change of address, he decided (that being the operative word), he owed his allegiance / had more connection to or in common with α Cen. That could have been simply because of all the nonsense goings on back on Earth, or it could have been simply because he felt it would inspire folks somehow. *shrug* As a related aside, I think the novel, "Federation" handled the development and history of warp drive more deftly than First Contact did, and I think it fits with Classic Trek and TNG better (at least up until the point First Contact was released)- and there's plenty of source material to draw from there, even if it's not considered "canon".

 

[uniderth]

Could you also explain how Zefram Cochrane is originally from Alpha Centuri, and did Wrigley financially backed it where Cochrane is from? Unless you're going to ignore what was done in TOS, which was done right, and proceed with the crap done in TNG First Contact where he's from Earth.

It was bugging me so I decided to have another go at this:

In 2008 an advanced sleeper ship set out on a colonizing mission to Alpha Centauri. The trip took twenty years before they finally arrived. Finding a habitable planet they started setting up the colony. This ship was to be part of a continual colonization effort so while dropping off colonizers the ship prepared for the return voyage. While on Alpha Centauri a couple on the crew gave birth to a son, Zefram.

After one year the ship set off again to return to earth. (At this point I'm not sure how to work out the sleeper ship aspect so that Zefram Cochrane ages normally. Either the sleeper ship tech breaks or it wasn't a sleeper ship to begin with. I'm not sure yet.) Twenty years later the ship, returns to earth. While reentering the atmosphere there was a problem which resulted in the crash of the landing module. Zefram Cochrane survived, but this event instilled in him a fear of aircraft and flying.

Now, Zefram Cochrane can be born on Alpha Centauri while still being on earth for the events of First Contact. Maybe it was during the twenty year long voyage to earth that he discovered Space Warp.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

But then again, there's this scene in "Tomorrow is Yesterday" when Kirk is being interrogated by Lieutenant Colonel Fellini at the "Omaha Installation" nee Offutt AFB in 1969..

Yes, I'm familiar with that scene. It doesn't mean that TOS takes place in the 22nd century. It means only that the century is near the 22nd century, which by the way would likely overrule what's in "The Squire of Gothos." But then again the reverse is true.

What it all really means is that the century wasn't nailed down during the production of TOS, especially for at least part of the first season.

"Tomorrow Is Yesterday" works perfectly well if the century of TOS is the 23rd century. Two hundred years is "just about right" in the grand scheme of time travel: it's on the order of a few hundred years. Kirk's under interrogation, and it's not like he's going to get super-specific anyway; he just got through claiming to be a "little green man from Alpha Centauri" (as you quoted).

 

[Mres_was_framed!]

Here's the thing. At this point in the fictional universe of Star Trek, Scotty's line from TAS has pretty much been invalidated.

Why invalidate it if something as simple as re-reading the canon lettering on a ship could make it valid?

Remember, there is no canon evidence that the Constitution's registry number was NCC-1700.

Fair enough. I simply used 1700 as the base number for ships that were originally-built "time-warp" ships because I like how it fit with the 17th series, 00 ( active-duty prototype) ship theory.

How likely is it that every starship "anchored" at a specific starbase on a given day were all of the same class of ship? That's my one big problem.

I thought of putting another post about this, but while I like Jein's numbers, I also think that it would be weird for every ship of a class to be at one base, unless they only seem to be of the same classes on the exterior, but are different capacities on the interior.

So, the dedication plaque on the bridge of the NCC-1701 says "STARSHIP CLASS."

http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Enterprise_dedication_plaque

Though at the very least it's clear that Star Trek has since moved on from this strict interpretation of "starship," assuming it ever obeyed it to begin with, some fans take that to mean that the intent was always only that ships in the same class as Enterprise be referred to as "starships." This is somewhat backed up by "Bread and Circuses," when starships are differentiated from spaceships.

With that in mind, if that's what you think "starship" means, and you assume that "star ship" and "starship" are synonymous, then under those conditions the status chart in "Court Martial" can only be referring to ships in the same class as Enterprise.

I don't think "Starship Class" on that plaque means anything other than that it is a ship that can travel from star to star and is some kind of primary vehicle for Star Fleet, maybe a cruiser, or maybe a vessel with "time-warp" capability.

Wow. This seems entirely too convoluted for my tastes. My fan theory is completely different but I feel would make a better episode or miniseries. The Bonaventure was launched in the mid to late 2060s. It was financed by eccentric billionaire William Wrigley(who would later go one to found a theme park planet of the same name). At some point in the early 2060s Mr. Wrigley had been taken aboard a starship that had traveled back in time from two hundred years in he future. When space warp was discovered by Zefram Cochrane, Mr. Wrigley became his primary financial backer. After several years he actually designed the first true interstellar warp ship, the Bonaventure. He modeled it directly after the ship from the future that taken him aboard several years back. The S.S. Bonaventure was one of mankind's greatest achievements. Yet, it was also an unusual design as it was a total departure from anything else humanity was designing at that point. The bizarre design requirements Mr. Wrigley had imposed on the project caused it to be much more expensive than it should have been. The design was in some ways ahead of its time, but in other ways it was not very efficient. As a result the Bonaventure was a one-off and no other ships like it were built at the time.

I feel this story explains a lot about the Bonaventure that seem weird. It remains one of earth's first warp ships though now it is the first major warp ship with warp drive built-in. That is oppose to the common practice at the time of retrofitting warp drives into existing ships, with the Valiant (a former solar system cargo hauler). It explains why the design looks so much like a Constitution class. And it explains why NCC is in the registry.

This is an interesting story, but it is no less convoluted than re-interpreting a few letters and lines of dialogue.

I am not considering the bogus prequels like Prime ST Enterprise and Discovery, but referring to TOS when Star Trek was good.

I was not considering the prequels in my original post. I made it a point to say that the use of the term "warp drive" in Enterprise should be ignored.

In my opinion, the preponderance of evidence here seems to point toward the conclusion that the Bonaventure should be considered as equipped with the newer time warp innovation and Spock’s statement should be taken in light of a similar statement he made in WNMHGB regarding one of his “ancestors” who married a human female.

It makes sense that the Bonaventure would have the newer "time warp" system, if only to explain that it is not Cochrane's ship that broke the lightspeed barrier, and that it looks vaguely like the Enterprise. If its number worked well as fitting around the same time as the Constellation and implied it was a generation of ship only slightly older and maybe even contemporary to the Enterprise, even better.

To sum up, the seeming contradiction between TOS and TAS can therefore be resolved if we understand the term warp drive to mean time warp tech, either by itself or when wedded to the earlier space warp tech.

I think that part of it makes sense. Cochrane invented space warp tech--low warp speeds, maybe up to warp 5ish? Later time-warp tech would go up to warp 9 or 10. Even later, Transwarp tech would be so much faster the warp scale had to be changed like it was for TNG. Or maybe Federation Science just kept changing the warp scale so warp 9 was very fast in any era, until TNG made it infinite velocity?

 

[uniderth]

Hey I just had a though relevant to our off-topic discussion. What is Zefram Cochrane's Space Warp was just the warping of space-time, like how an alcubierre drive theoretically works. Then the Time barrier has something to with the the plank-length and the size of the warp bubble. Lets say that the thinner the bubble shell is the faster you are going becasue you are warping space-time more. So there's an upper limit to how thin the bubble can be (the plank-length) thus you can only compress space-time so much, meaning you can only go so fast. That's the "Time Barrier". At least that sounds sciency enough to be true.

Now I was going to propose that the new warp engines utilized subspace to break the time barrier, but I found something interesting in my research. So for now I'm just going to say they discovered some other way to manipulate the system to break the Time Barrier.

What I found that was interesting is that prior to the in all of the Kirk era there is no mention of subspace in any other context than radio except two instances. The first if the subspace shockwave from the Praxis Explosion. The second is the Enterprise-B trying to generate a subspace field around the two ships caught in the Nexus. I propose that the Excelsior's Transwarp was the first instance of a (trans)warp drive using subspace to propel a ship. Prior to the Excelsior existing, subspace was exclusively related to radio and communications. Thus the TNG era warp drive, and all its subspace references, is actually just the Excelsior's transwarp with bussard's attached on front.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I don't think "Starship Class" on that plaque means anything other than that it is a ship that can travel from star to star and is some kind of primary vehicle for Star Fleet, maybe a cruiser, or maybe a vessel with "time-warp" capability.

I think it's reasonably clear that the nomenclature "starship" has evolved over the 50+ year lifetime of the franchise to become more generic and more inclusive of what we now refer to as different "classes" of starships.

The NCC-1701 dedication plaque was carved in "stone" while a variety of terms for what eventually became settled on as "Starfleet" cycled through the early episodes. A lot of terminology and understanding of capabilities was in flux in the early episodes as concepts were still getting hammered out.

The dedication plaque dates from the second pilot - http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/1x03hd/wherenomanhasgonebeforehd059.jpg

 

[TIN_MAN]

Some points of clarification regarding my previous post.

I accept TOS is 200 years in the future, Per “Space Seed” and “Tomorrow is Yesterday” plus or minus 10 or 20 years at most.

In “Squire of Gothos” there is only speculation by Spock that some sort of telescope or optical viewing device was used, but we really don’t know why or how Trelane screwed up, only that he did end up “seeing” Earth’s past.

After his discovery of the space warp, Zephram Cochrane became famous for the 1st voyage to -and perhaps later colonization of- Alpha Centauri, hence “Zephram Cochrane of Alpha Centauri”.

Cochrane’s “space warp” is a static warp bubble (hyper drive?) which modifies local space to allow otherwise sub-light impulse (rocket) drives to cheat the lightspeed limit. It is still used in TOS in addition to the newer “time” warp drive –associated with nacelles- which somehow utilize a time warp to actually move space in a dynamic way for propulsion.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Canonically, TNG "The Neutral Zone" explicitly took place in the year 2364, so....

 

[blssdwlf]

Just consider it all to be a big multiverse with each series having it's own continuity. Seems to be the easiest way to resolve it by having the TAS Bonaventure have the first warp drive because in *TAS* that is what happened.

In the same vein, why couldn't TOS' "Squire of Gothos" depict Earth's history as different in the 13th century? TOS is already way different in history regarding the Eugenics Wars, atomic powered spaceships, etc.

 

[Dukhat]

Why invalidate it if something as simple as re-reading the canon lettering on a ship could make it valid?

Because to me, it's even simpler to take what's on screen at face value and conjecture that the Bonaventure just had an older registry system. But since it's all conjecture anyway, one theory is just as good as another.

 

[Mres_was_framed!]

Hey I just had a though relevant to our off-topic discussion. What is Zefram Cochrane's Space Warp was just the warping of space-time, like how an alcubierre drive theoretically works. Then the Time barrier has something to with the the plank-length and the size of the warp bubble. Lets say that the thinner the bubble shell is the faster you are going becasue you are warping space-time more. So there's an upper limit to how thin the bubble can be (the plank-length) thus you can only compress space-time so much, meaning you can only go so fast. That's the "Time Barrier". At least that sounds sciency enough to be true.

Now I was going to propose that the new warp engines utilized subspace to break the time barrier, but I found something interesting in my research. So for now I'm just going to say they discovered some other way to manipulate the system to break the Time Barrier.

What I found that was interesting is that prior to the in all of the Kirk era there is no mention of subspace in any other context than radio except two instances. The first if the subspace shockwave from the Praxis Explosion. The second is the Enterprise-B trying to generate a subspace field around the two ships caught in the Nexus. I propose that the Excelsior's Transwarp was the first instance of a (trans)warp drive using subspace to propel a ship. Prior to the Excelsior existing, subspace was exclusively related to radio and communications. Thus the TNG era warp drive, and all its subspace references, is actually just the Excelsior's transwarp with bussard's attached on front.

This theory would partially account for the bizarre statement in Mr. Scott's Guide to the Enterprise that transwarp drive allowed a ship enter the Defiant's "Interspace" and exit in a new location. That's maybe what they "thought" they were doing, but actually they were entering subspace.

In that case, that fan interpretation that the transwarp experiment "failed" would be left open. It succeeded in that a new warp system, noted by vented nacelles, capable of subspace travel did work; it failed because it did not mean a near-instantaneous movement from one place to another, as there were still limits to what was possible with subspace.

Maybe this is why the new Defiant on DS9 has a weird configuration, as engineers were experimenting with a more compact way to enter subspace, and thought the name Defiant was would be nice reference?

 

[STEPhon IT]

According to "The Squire of Gothos," TOS is set in at least the 27th century. Trelane has a bust of Napoleon, which we see before he learns that he has been looking at Earth 900 years in the past.

You're not calculating what the distances of time it would be on that planet Gothos. Be focus. When the Lt. interrogates Kirk they were on Earth. When Noonian Singh, An Earth man, asked Kirk of the time; Kirk would only tell him the truth of the real time of that century. If Trelane mentioned that with Kirk on Earth then yes it would be from the 27the Century, but they were on Gothos not the planet Earth. I'll repeat they were not on Earth, Gothos time is much different from Earth time. I'm getting sick and tired of fans believing Earth time relates to space time and other worlds outside of our solar system when it doesn't; even our fellow planets have their own specific time spans than Earth.

 

[David cgc]

If Trelane mentioned that with Kirk on Earth then yes it would be from the 27the Century, but they were on Gothos not the planet Earth. I'll repeat they were not on Earth, Gothos time is much different from Earth time. I'm getting sick and tired of fans believing Earth time relates to space time and other worlds outside of our solar system when it doesn't; even our fellow planets have their own specific time spans than Earth.

Trelane didn't mention it. Kirk established they were nine hundred light years from Earth at the beginning of the episode, before they detected Gothos and were discussing how they were in an unusually empty part of space, and then Kirk and Jaeger/Yaeger the meteorologist said, specifically, to each other, humans and Earth-nationals, that Trelane's décor was nine hundred years old, reiterated that they were nine hundred light years from Earth, and the discrepancy could be explained if Trelane was studying Earth via light-speed telescope.

So, unless it's standard operating procedure for Starfleet to mentally convert all their time and distance units to the local standard, and unless they were lying in the teaser about Gothos being unknown and popping up out of nowhere after Kirk first mentioned how far they were from Earth, and unless Gothos, a self-propelled rogue planet, was moving in some fashion that could be described as a "year," I don't know what you're on about.

 

[Mres_was_framed!]

Because to me, it's even simpler to take what's on screen at face value and conjecture that the Bonaventure just had an older registry system. But since it's all conjecture anyway, one theory is just as good as another.

Not disagreeing with you. It could be another registry system. I was referring to a post that involved a long time-travel story to explain the registry differences rather than just say it might have said 1028 i NCC. A different registry system makes sense as well.

On a related note, someone said on another thread that the last two digits in TOS might refer to "100 front-line vessels," meaning that Excalibur NCC-1664 was replaced by Defiant NCC-1764 that was replaced by Reliant NCC-1864.

Maybe it has something to do with role in the fleet. 00 is a prototype; 01 serves as the flagship/main exploration vessel; maybe 64 is for scientific research. (I know that the Enterprise was not the flagship in TOS, I'm just suggesting a framework for such a system).

Are there any ships in non-remastered Star Trek with registries that end in 01? Assuming that in TNG there are more than 100 "front-line" vessels, how many repeats are there in the last 2/3 digits?