The E-D was built on the ground, don't see why The 1701 couldn't

[trevanian]

Danke schon, mein herr.

No one, outside of American films, uses that phrase 'mein Herr'.

And this concerns you how?

Hey, I took four years of high school German, I can use it (or pig german equivalent) if I feel like it.

pig german: Mach Mein Tag.

 

[trevanian]

It makes perfect sense for the ship's parts to be manufactured planetside, and then launched into orbit for final assembly. After all, isn't that what we're doing with the ISS?

Because we didn't do our manned program in a reasonable progression, else we'd have a mass-driver on the moon that could ship raw materials back to earth orbit for TONS cheaper than any earth-to-orbit price.

Assembly in orbit, and in large part fabrication in orbit, is probably inevitable, and not just because every science book for the last 50 years has stated it as a matter of fact. You don't build interplanetary spacecraft in a gravity well, when they don't have to perform there.

 

[EyalM]

You don't build interplanetary spacecraft in a gravity well, when they don't have to perform there.

So by the same logic, we should build submarines underwater?

 

[GodThingFormerly]

Because we didn't do our manned program in a reasonable progression, else we'd have a mass-driver on the moon that could ship raw materials back to earth orbit for TONS cheaper than any earth-to-orbit price.

To be fair, detailed research concerning the use of lunar resources to fabricate space colonies, powersats and other infrastructure (e.g., employing "achromatic trajectories" to accurately guide mass-driven chunks of regolith into catchers stationed at L2) only began in earnest during the early 1970's with Gerard K. O'Neill and the L5 Society.

Assembly in orbit, and in large part fabrication in orbit, is probably inevitable, and not just because every science book for the last 50 years has stated it as a matter of fact. You don't build interplanetary spacecraft in a gravity well, when they don't have to perform there.

Gene Roddenberry need not have bothered with reading astronautical engineering texts to apply the concept to TOS, considering that Disney's Man and the Moon and Pavel Klushantsev's Doroga K Zvezdam ("Road to the Stars") - both produced in the late 1950s - featured space station components being launched into orbit by cargo rockets. Even if GR somehow managed to miss seeing both films on TV, Robert Justman may have mentioned the idea during a production meeting considering he was an assistant director on MatM.

TGT

 

[captcalhoun]

Danke schon, mein herr.

No one, outside of American films, uses that phrase 'mein Herr'.

not true, my dad does. even though he's not German.

 

[trevanian]

You don't build interplanetary spacecraft in a gravity well, when they don't have to perform there.

So by the same logic, we should build submarines underwater?

Are you the same poster who used that line a year ago? Cuz it is still as utterly irrelevant.

 

[trevanian]

Because we didn't do our manned program in a reasonable progression, else we'd have a mass-driver on the moon that could ship raw materials back to earth orbit for TONS cheaper than any earth-to-orbit price.

To be fair, detailed research concerning the use of lunar resources to fabricate space colonies, powersats and other infrastructure (e.g., employing "achromatic trajectories" to accurately guide mass-driven chunks of regolith into catchers stationed at L2) only began in earnest during the early 1970's with Gerard K. O'Neill and the L5 Society.

Assembly in orbit, and in large part fabrication in orbit, is probably inevitable, and not just because every science book for the last 50 years has stated it as a matter of fact. You don't build interplanetary spacecraft in a gravity well, when they don't have to perform there.

Gene Roddenberry need not have bothered with reading astronautical engineering texts to apply the concept to TOS, considering that Disney's Man and the Moon and Pavel Klushantsev's Doroga K Zvezdam ("Road to the Stars") - both produced in the late 1950s - featured space station components being launched into orbit by cargo rockets. Even if GR somehow managed to miss seeing both films on TV, Robert Justman may have mentioned the idea during a production meeting considering he was an assistant director on MatM.

TGT

With an orderly logical space program, we probably wouldn't have been getting to the moon till the mid 70s, after a space station was well established. A mass-driver notion advanced during the build to that time would have probably gained rapid acceptance in this alternate-universe where NASA had its shit together, so you could have piggybacked that onto the moonbase program, or even better, piggybacked it with a solar power program, mass-drivering the raw materials back to earth orbit.

 

[EyalM]

You don't build interplanetary spacecraft in a gravity well, when they don't have to perform there.

So by the same logic, we should build submarines underwater?

Are you the same poster who used that line a year ago? Cuz it is still as utterly irrelevant.

So is your argument.
So far every interplanetary spacecraft was build in the bottom of a gravity well.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

So far every interplanetary spacecraft was build in the bottom of a gravity well.

Except the set we made for the fake moon landing. That was built in space, then brought down to the Arizona desert.

 

[ST-One]

It makes perfect sense for the ship's parts to be manufactured planetside, and then launched into orbit for final assembly. After all, isn't that what we're doing with the ISS?

Because we didn't do our manned program in a reasonable progression, else we'd have a mass-driver on the moon that could ship raw materials back to earth orbit for TONS cheaper than any earth-to-orbit price.

Assembly in orbit, and in large part fabrication in orbit, is probably inevitable, and not just because every science book for the last 50 years has stated it as a matter of fact. You don't build interplanetary spacecraft in a gravity well, when they don't have to perform there.

The authors who thought up the metaphor for the teaser trailer for Star Trek obviously established a different set of facts.

 

[trevanian]

So by the same logic, we should build submarines underwater?

Are you the same poster who used that line a year ago? Cuz it is still as utterly irrelevant.

So is your argument.
So far every interplanetary spacecraft was build in the bottom of a gravity well.

There are no manned interplanetary spacecraft (moon is not a planet), there never have been any, and there aren't likely to be any in the near future either ... unless we build them up there. Geez, just look some of this stuff up, willya?

 

[ST-One]

Are you the same poster who used that line a year ago? Cuz it is still as utterly irrelevant.

So is your argument.
So far every interplanetary spacecraft was build in the bottom of a gravity well.

There are no manned interplanetary spacecraft (moon is not a planet), there never have been any, and there aren't likely to be any in the near future either ... unless we build them up there. Geez, just look some of this stuff up, willya?

Well, all human space craft have been built here on the Earth.
Better?

 

[RobertVA]

The US Navy used to build ships from the keel to the bridge all in one fell swoop in the drydock (especially aircraft carriers). The Northrop-Grumman shipyard in Newport News, Virginia, developed the Superlift technique, where parts of the ship are built indoors and then lifted via a giant gantry and hauled to the drydock facility and attached to the ship. This greatly reduced construction time of a carrier to under three years, whereas before it was over 5 years. The Superlift can haul upwards of 900 tons.

Therefore, your description of modules built and then launched for later attachement is perfectly feasible.

As an added bonus, the combination of an aerial photo of that Northrup/Grumman Newport News dry dock and crane Photoshopped with a picture of the Enterprise or Reliant makes a nifty image.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

It was clearly a mistake for the U.S. Government to organize its successful Moon missions without consulting sf fans about the most reasonable approach. Just because NASA's way worked proves nothing.

 

[trevanian]

So is your argument.
So far every interplanetary spacecraft was build in the bottom of a gravity well.

There are no manned interplanetary spacecraft (moon is not a planet), there never have been any, and there aren't likely to be any in the near future either ... unless we build them up there. Geez, just look some of this stuff up, willya?

Well, all human space craft have been built here on the Earth.
Better?

No, just irrelevant to my point. As expected, right?

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

Fools. Everyone knows that they built the Enterprise on rock n' roll.

 

[Guartho]

I find it thoroughly amusing that there are so many experts on 23rd century construction techniques here. The only thing funnier is that some of you are actually getting indignant about your pet 23rd century construction theories.

 

[Brutal Strudel]

You don't build interplanetary spacecraft in a gravity well, when they don't have to perform there.

So by the same logic, we should build submarines underwater?

Are you the same poster who used that line a year ago? Cuz it is still as utterly irrelevant.

Not to mention embarassing.

It was clearly a mistake for the U.S. Government to organize its successful Moon missions without consulting sf fans about the most reasonable approach. Just because NASA's way worked proves nothing.

Lots of ineffecient things work. The internal combustion engine has worked for over a hundred years; the polar bears love it. Hell, chattel slavery worked in the Old South, despite being terribly inhumane, dehumanizing, evil and economically inefficient. Next. (Really but lets be civil, no?)

I find it thoroughly amusing that there are so many experts on 23rd century construction techniques here. The only thing funnier is that some of you are actually getting indignant about your pet 23rd century construction theories.

Roddenberry in TMoS and the novelisation of TMP pretty much laid this stuff out. I'd say he was pretty much the expert on this stuff. And Mr. Sternbach pretty much said, per GR, that the components were built planetside largely empty and assembled in space. And that's at the bottom of a gravity well not nearly as deep as Earth's. Pretty much.

The trailer made for a neat metaphor, sure. But if its new canon? Well, I'd expect as much from the great SF minds who brought us Felicity, Alias, Transformers and Fringe. I'm almost grateful; it's one more reason to disengage from the moribund "franchise." (Not this place, though. This can be diverting--Trek itself? Kinda played out.)

 

[EyalM]

Are you the same poster who used that line a year ago? Cuz it is still as utterly irrelevant.

So is your argument.
So far every interplanetary spacecraft was build in the bottom of a gravity well.

There are no manned interplanetary spacecraft (moon is not a planet), there never have been any, and there aren't likely to be any in the near future either ... unless we build them up there. Geez, just look some of this stuff up, willya?

The fact that the Moon is not a planet is irrelevant, the ship had to preform in space.
And unless we build them up there? So if NASA builds a spacecraft on Earth and sends it to Mars it won't be an interplanetary craft just because it was build on a planet? Geez, read your posts before pressing submit willya?

There are no manned interplanetary spacecraft (moon is not a planet), there never have been any, and there aren't likely to be any in the near future either ... unless we build them up there. Geez, just look some of this stuff up, willya?

Well, all human space craft have been built here on the Earth.
Better?

No, just irrelevant to my point. As expected, right?

If irrelevant=facts that contradict my baseless assumptions, yes.

 

[trevanian]

So is your argument.
So far every interplanetary spacecraft was build in the bottom of a gravity well.

There are no manned interplanetary spacecraft (moon is not a planet), there never have been any, and there aren't likely to be any in the near future either ... unless we build them up there. Geez, just look some of this stuff up, willya?

The fact that the Moon is not a planet is irrelevant, the ship had to preform in space.

Do you even know what you're arguing about?

I'm not saying a vehicle has to be built in orbit to function there (which I guess is what you're so hung up on considering you moon reference.)

I'm referring specifically to the notion of an interplanetary vehicle (which would likely feature an advanced drive) would be an orbit-to-orbit vessel, not designed to function in a gravity well. Constructing it in large part within one wouldn't be cost-effective either, since you have to haul the damn thing up.

WHAT DO YOU THINK A SPACE STATION IS BUILT FOR?
Well, one thing is that it is a way station for going other places. That is where you launch the interplanetary ship from, not down here.

Get your head up out of this gravity well, or else you will be proving why these deft movie writers may be trying to inject too much SW into ST (because modern SF fans seem to have less acceptance of science and more acceptance of fantasy, probably because they were indoctrinated in LucasLand.)