New Orleans-Class

[Robert Comsol]

Let's have a closer look at these pods of the New Orleans Class in their raw stage configuration:

Bob

 

[F. King Daniel]

So THAT's what it looks like under the bussard collector caps!

 

[Robert Comsol]

If you are thinking of the warp nacelles of the Cheyenne Class, yes, but those were actually made from the older version of the Schwan Stabilo Swing.

(newer version)

Bob

 

[Unicron]

Ah, thank you The bolt-on torpoedo concept also makes a lot of sense.

However:
The 2330s seems a little too early to me. I'd have thought early 2340s to be a realistic timeframe, due to both the class registry numbers and also since the Ambassador, Renaissance and their ilk were still quite prevalent. Likewise, I'd expect Challenger to be of later construction. Since the Cardie War didn't start until 2347and lasted well into the 2350s, there's ample opportunity to have observed this weakness in design and rushed to correct it.

As for Steamrunner, I can't envisage that as pre-Wolf-359. Based on the layout and the stylistic cues (such as they are for anything as of ST:FC!) I'd have put it as something designed around the same time as the Defiant, at the earliest.

Well, the design timeline from ASDB actually fits in pretty well, with the New Orleans design being approved in 2335 and the first vessels entering service in 2342. Several production groups were built until 2348, when production ceased to focus on other designs. SoTSF lists about 30 vessels built altogether.

The Steamrunner is considered a heavy destroyer in the ASDB sources, having been designed around the same time to perform traditional support and defense duties. The Freedom class had been introduced as a modern destroyer, but it proved underpowered against Romulan forces during the Tomed Incident. The Steamrunner was developed as a companion unit, one that would be capable of such missions while not forcing Starfleet to divert designs like the Ambassador and Excelsior away from their intended role as explorers.

 

[Dukhat]

^That's a common enough school of thought, however it overlooks the somewhat more common school that likes to think of NCC numbers as linear, thus placing all the FC designs before the launch of the Galaxy class in the late 50s (at the latest). Thus, many people just think that "design cues" are simply from a different group of designs that have stayed similar through several decades. Inasmuch as some case designs (Volvo, VW, etc.) stayed the same for many years concurrently, and how US or Russian warships can be distinguished by certain design cues regardless of what decade you're looking at.

The things is, we can't just write off all registries being linear, as there's evidence that they are not chronological. For example, the 5XXXX Oberth class Tsiolkovsky's dedication plaque stated that the ship was launched only a year before the Enterprise-D. Plus, the Pegasus was the same type of ship with another 5XXXX registry, and it was stated in dialogue that it was only five years older than the Enterprise-D. The brand-new Prometheus class prototype had a 5XXXX registry as well.

Plus, we have the Ambassador class, which visually is far more advanced than the older Excelsior class, and yet the known ships have registries of only 2XXXX while the majority of Excelsiors we saw have regs of 4XXXX (not to mention the even older Miranda class, with regs of 3XXXX!)

What this has to do with the OP is that 1.) I think the "Galaxy family" of ship classes (i.e. the New Orleans, Springfield, Challenger, Cheyenne, Freedom, and Nebula) were all built around the same time (circa 2350-60) even though they mostly have 5XXXX and 6XXXX registries; and 2.) that the FC ships are actually new, post-BoBW ships regardless of their low registries. I understand that two ship classes with drastically different design lineages can exist at the same time (i.e. the Constitution and Oberth classes), but there are more similarities to the Sovereign than anything else (the bridge modules, the escape pods, the angular style of the nacelles and saucers.)

 

[LOLPeanutButter]

This is why I don't like taking about starship design history and linage. It always turns into a registry debate. ALWAYS.

 

[Robert Comsol]

Could it be that the first digit of the five digit registries indicates the "birthplace" of that particular ship?

I just pulled Utopia Planitia Fleet Yards and noticed that a couple of the ships listed there and whose registries began with "7" were also constructed there.

Bob

 

[Blip]

^That's a common enough school of thought, however it overlooks the somewhat more common school that likes to think of NCC numbers as linear, thus placing all the FC designs before the launch of the Galaxy class in the late 50s (at the latest). Thus, many people just think that "design cues" are simply from a different group of designs that have stayed similar through several decades. Inasmuch as some case designs (Volvo, VW, etc.) stayed the same for many years concurrently, and how US or Russian warships can be distinguished by certain design cues regardless of what decade you're looking at.

The things is, we can't just write off all registries being linear, as there's evidence that they are not chronological. For example, the 5XXXX Oberth class Tsiolkovsky's dedication plaque stated that the ship was launched only a year before the Enterprise-D. Plus, the Pegasus was the same type of ship with another 5XXXX registry, and it was stated in dialogue that it was only five years older than the Enterprise-D. The brand-new Prometheus class prototype had a 5XXXX registry as well.

Plus, we have the Ambassador class, which visually is far more advanced than the older Excelsior class, and yet the known ships have registries of only 2XXXX while the majority of Excelsiors we saw have regs of 4XXXX (not to mention the even older Miranda class, with regs of 3XXXX!)

What this has to do with the OP is that 1.) I think the "Galaxy family" of ship classes (i.e. the New Orleans, Springfield, Challenger, Cheyenne, Freedom, and Nebula) were all built around the same time (circa 2350-60) even though they mostly have 5XXXX and 6XXXX registries; and 2.) that the FC ships are actually new, post-BoBW ships regardless of their low registries. I understand that two ship classes with drastically different design lineages can exist at the same time (i.e. the Constitution and Oberth classes), but there are more similarities to the Sovereign than anything else (the bridge modules, the escape pods, the angular style of the nacelles and saucers.)

Actually I tend to go with the far easier "ILM didn't give a hoot about the registries" route. The FC designs were only intended to be background ships (as clearly evidenced by the low quality nature of the models in terms of both textures and polys - the slight exception being the Akira*), so I imagine they gave very little thought to it.

Furthermore, several of the design cues present are similar to Defiant (see the Norway-class) which I'd think we should all be able to agree was pretty much a first among Starfleet designs.

Of course, there's always the possibility that the background ships looked substantially different when they were first commissioned, and that the styles seen in FC are indicative of heavy refits and modifications - likely in the wake of Wolf-359 itself (it's not as if we don't have precedent for it, what with the Constitution refit... and I also adhere to that rule for the low-registry Grissom seen in TSFS)



* The Akira I regard almost certainly as having had a partial refit, what with the saucer, registry, clunky nacelles, old-fashioned deflector.... and then the new-fangled lifeboat hatches slapped on top.

 

[Dukhat]

Actually I tend to go with the far easier "ILM didn't give a hoot about the registries" route. The FC designs were only intended to be background ships (as clearly evidenced by the low quality nature of the models in terms of both textures and polys - the slight exception being the Akira*), so I imagine they gave very little thought to it.

Oh, I totally agree with you about ILM...I truly believe that in STIII, they gave the Excelsior a registry of "2000" just because she was a big ship, while the Grissom only had a 638 registry because she was small

Furthermore, several of the design cues present are similar to Defiant (see the Norway-class) which I'd think we should all be able to agree was pretty much a first among Starfleet designs.

Exactly. The Norway's ventral view (which was simply a cut-and-paste jumble of the Defiant's texture) is another example of why these ships were new as of FC and not older per a chronological registry scheme.

Of course, there's always the possibility that the background ships looked substantially different when they were first commissioned, and that the styles seen in FC are indicative of heavy refits and modifications - likely in the wake of Wolf-359 itself (it's not as if we don't have precedent for it, what with the Constitution refit... and I also adhere to that rule for the low-registry Grissom seen in TSFS)...The Akira I regard almost certainly as having had a partial refit, what with the saucer, registry, clunky nacelles, old-fashioned deflector.... and then the new-fangled lifeboat hatches slapped on top.

See, I kinda have a problem with the idea of the FC ships being refitted from older ship designs. Mainly because we saw a ton of even older ship designs still in use in TNG (the Miranda, Excelsior, Constellation and Oberth), and none of them have been refitted to look any different from when we saw them in the 23rd century.

Plus, the majority of the Starfleet vessels used in the Borg attack of Sector 001 were the FC ships, implying that these were the new vessels Shelby mentioned in BoBW when she said the fleet would be back in less than a year. They were built to be Borg-killers, which was why we saw them, uh, attacking a Borg ship

I think the whole "refit" thing is analogous to the whole "Klingon blood is Pepto-Bismol pink" thing: It was used for the film it was portrayed in, but was never touched upon again after that in future incarnations of Trek.

 

[Robert Comsol]

I truly believe that in STIII, they gave the Excelsior a registry of "2000" just because she was a big ship, while the Grissom only had a 638 registry because she was small

...or a much older type of vessel, while Excelsior was brand new. (I shamelessly refer to my Oberth Class thread)

Bob

 

[Blip]

The only problem with that being she didn't look old, hence the idea that there may have been an extensive Oberth refit ala TMP.

 

[Robert Comsol]

You mean Grissom didn't look old because ILM didn't "dirty" her or that she didn't look old because she had this iPod / Apple white coating (this would be some retroactive reasoning, because such white Apple products did not yet exist back in 1983)?

Bob

 

[Mark_Nguyen]

Agreed, "looking" old is completely subjective, since some people think NX-01 looks more advanced than NCC-1701; similarly I think the Excelsior looks more advanced than the Ambassador, but I'm perfectly happy thinking it's an older ship. Everyone's mileage varies.

Mark

 

[Blip]

You mean Grissom didn't look old because ILM didn't "dirty" her or that she didn't look old because she had this iPod / Apple white coating (this would be some retroactive reasoning, because such white Apple products did not yet exist back in 1983)?

Bob

Um, you seem a little upset about this? I can't see why, but nonetheless my reasoning has nothing to do with any of the above. I say she doesn't look "old" because she shares more design cues with the Excelsior (and to a lesser extent, the Enterprise) than with any examples that we've seen from TOS or prior, while if we were to go with the linear-registry mode of thought her number argues that she be an older vessel. Hence, a heavy refit is perfectly plausible. YMMV, but that's my take on it, and I'm sticking with it.

Agreed, "looking" old is completely subjective, since some people think NX-01 looks more advanced than NCC-1701; similarly I think the Excelsior looks more advanced than the Ambassador, but I'm perfectly happy thinking it's an older ship. Everyone's mileage varies.

Well to be fair we do know the Ent-C as seen on screen was the result of TV budget constraints and a necessarily rapid construction by the model team. If Probert's original concept had been adhered to she'd have looked substantially more advanced (though for some reason I still prefer the uprated Ambassador types we saw, such as the Zhukov).

As for the NX-01, honestly the less said about that the better.

 

[Robert Comsol]

Um, you seem a little upset about this?

No, I was just curious to learn your reasoning which you now provided.

Bob

 

[Dukhat]

STIII always gave me the impression that the Grissom, like the Excelsior, was a new ship, or at least newer than the TOS Constitution class, despite the low registry number. As I've mentioned earlier in this thread and elsewhere, I don't think ILM based their decision about the numbers on any more logic than the size of the ships. I'm not sure why ILM would have ever built a ship that was supposed to be intentionally older than the TOS Enterprise regardless of what it looked like, unless there was a specific reason or script reference to do so.

Plus, the fact that the Grissom shares design attributes with several of the Excelsior concept study models lends all kinds of credence that she's supposed to be the Excelsior's contemporary.

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

Well to be fair we do know the Ent-C as seen on screen was the result of TV budget constraints and a necessarily rapid construction by the model team. If Probert's original concept had been adhered to she'd have looked substantially more advanced (though for some reason I still prefer the uprated Ambassador types we saw, such as the Zhukov).

I have always preferred the canon design of the Ambassador-Class (my favourite "capital ship" of Starfleet, I find it far better looking than the Galaxy- or Sovereign-Class).

 

[Robert Comsol]

I have always preferred the canon design of the Ambassador-Class.

Now, which "canon design" would that be?

Locating some TNG screencaps for TNG discussions I hadn't thought that there would be that many conference lounge screencaps with Andrew Probert's golden Enterprise-C clearly visible behind the actors.

So I'd dare to say that Probert's Enterprise-C got much more screentime during TNG than the VFX model presented in "Yesterday's Enterprise".

Bob

 

[Dukhat]

Now, which "canon design" would that be?

Locating some TNG screencaps for TNG discussions I hadn't thought that there would be that many conference lounge screencaps with Andrew Probert's golden Enterprise-C clearly visible behind the actors.

So I'd dare to say that Probert's Enterprise-C got much more screentime during TNG than the VFX model presented in "Yesterday's Enterprise".

Oh, not this again...

The Sternbach-designed, Greg Jein-built Ambassador class model is the canon design for the class. It will always be the canon design for the class. With apologies to Andy Probert, whose work I love and whose original Ent-C design I love too, his version is not canon. An ill-defined sculpture on a wall with other ill-defined ships does not a canon design make, regardless of how much we saw it on screen. We saw Picard's desktop model of the Stargazer all seven seasons, but only saw the actual ship once. The model's registry is NCC-7100, while the Stargazer filming model's registry is NCC-2893. Are we supposed to disregard the registry on the actual filming model because we saw the desktop model more? I don't think so.

 

[Robert Comsol]

The Sternbach-designed, Greg Jein-built Ambassador class model is the canon design for the class.

Probert's Enterprise-C was the canon design for the Ambassador Class until the VFX model came along.

It will always be the canon design for the class.

Well, I'd say it changed our idea what a vessel of the Ambassador Class would look like.

With apologies to Andy Probert, whose work I love and whose original Ent-C design I love too, his version is not canon.

His design for the Enterprise-C is canon in the "real" TNG universe. The other one we saw was the Enterprise-C in an alternate reality universe!
It's possible that an Ambassador Class ship became the Enterprise-C in the alternate universe. So instead of insisting we are looking at a canon contradiction, the Probert Enterprise-C in the real TNG universe may have belonged to a different class and the only erroneous part about it is assuming it's a member of the Ambassador Class.

An ill-defined sculpture on a wall with other ill-defined ships does not a canon design make, regardless of how much we saw it on screen.

The sculptures are rather well defined as we can distinct the TOS Enterprise from the Enterprise-A. And they are defined enough to realize that the Enterprise-C on the wall and the one that showed up in "Yesterday's Enterprise" are not the same type of ship.

We saw Picard's desktop model of the Stargazer all seven seasons, but only saw the actual ship once. The model's registry is NCC-7100, while the Stargazer filming model's registry is NCC-2893. Are we supposed to disregard the registry on the actual filming model because we saw the desktop model more? I don't think so.

Well, I'd first need to see a scene from TNG where the desktop model's registry was really readable.

Bob