Starship Warp-Tug

[CuttingEdge100]

I'm wondering what a "realistic" Star Trek tug vessel would look like...

First of all FJ Schnaubelt's idea of a ship with a really really long freight pallet doesn't seem all that realistic. Flying sublight yes, it works. For warp-flight you'd need the warp field to envelop everything -- everything getting propelled has gotta be in the field.

Additionally the ship would have to travel at a purposeful speed while carrying a damaged ship. I'm going to set this figure at Warp 4.5 as that will cover 1 light year in 4 days about. You need to be able to cover some distance in a reasonable time.

Considering the variances in ship-sizes there might need to be multiple classes of tugs.

Ideas?

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

I imagine they would be a rather wide vessels, with multiple tractor beams along the width of the ship to distribute the load of whatever ship is being towed (to ease impulse maneuvering, I'm sure). Warp drive would probably consist of a 4-nacelle setup, for the sake of endurance. The tug would be as "flat" as possible, to save space for the ship being towed to fit in the warp field.

 

[Kaych]

It may look something like this:http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Federation_tug

 

[CuttingEdge100]

I came up with a shape that might work -- the drawings are totally crappy but it illustrates the concept. It would be completely utilitarian and far less slick like other federation vessels, but I don't think that's an issue.

The ship's basic shape from the front would basically be like an octagon with the top and bottom lines stretched. The top sides would be slightly longer than the sides of the ship with the angled edges (the lines on the octagon that connect the tops and sides) tapering in to match the shorter length of the shorter flanks.

Not counting the nacelles (since I have not come up with a shape yet), the ship would at maximum length (the top surface) be approximately 60% that of a Federation-Class Dreadnought, about 50% the length of said vessel. Height wise the ship should (inside the octagon) be about 95 meters in height.

The front-centerline of the ship (both top and bottom) should have a navigational deflector fitted. The rear-centerline (both top and bottom) should have impulse engines fitted. The ship would feature 8 warp engines, two placed on either end of the 4 angled edges of the octagon. Whether a saucer section up top (I'm thinking like the shape of the Oberth's saucer area if applicable) is warranted or not I don't know.

In order to accomodate vessels of wildly varying sizes, the bottom section can simply fold open. Tractor beams then yank the ship in, the door closes under the ship, and braces hold the ship inside the tug. The enclosure of the design would probably allow the tug to even double as a flying drydock.

The ship would have very powerful warp-engines in order to allow it to haul even a Federation-Class Dreadnought to a nearby starbase if need-be. The ship at least while carrying a Constitution class should be able to do Warp 4.5 at high-power cruise.


CuttingEdge100