The Wrongs of Starship Design (TOS Version)

[Vance]

I'm going to contribute more heavily to this tonight, but I'm starting this thread basically to get input from everyone on all those TOS-Era ships that made them cringe.

What are the biggest examples of 'bad ship design' you can think of, and why? Please provide links/images if you're showing specific ships.

(And yes, this is for a special Jaynz project... )

 

[USS Triumphant]

I'm not yet allowed to include pics in my posts. 2 more days, I think. Sorry. Googling the class names in Google Image Search works very well, though.

My two examples are from the FASA RPG.

The Northampton Class Frigate: an interesting shape, but there doesn't seem to be any logical reason behind it, and it just spreads out the targetable aspects. (I could almost see a reason for this design if it were meant to be a towing vessel. But not a frigate.)

The M'Benga Class Hospital Ship: Okay, the nacelles are waaaaaay the hell down there. Why?

 

[JoeRalat]

Dude there is a section on this forum, dedicated to a bad design ship...Could you guess which one it is...A hint..Its not from anyone of TOS ST1-6 AND TNG Movies, Not Voyager, Enterprise, Ds9 or TNG...What ship could it be!

 

[Vance]

I should have expected that.. but I was HOPING for something more useful, Ralat. :P

For me, personally, it's the 'three nacelles equals a dreadnought' scheme that I see a lot. First, it's lazy, cribbing parts from other ships and then just strapping another warp nacelle onto it. And, of course, the very idea that strapping on a third nacelle and changing nothing else suddenly changes a cruiser into a dreadnought is ludicrous, and pretty much proof positive that the 'designer' doesn't know shit about such things.

 

[USS Triumphant]

And, of course, the very idea that strapping on a third nacelle and changing nothing else suddenly changes a cruiser into a dreadnought is ludicrous

I agree. At least the "All Good Things...." Enterprise-D in the future had a mega-phaser cannon added to use the extra power from the third nacelle - and that was still pretty retarded.

 

[captcalhoun]

hanging the deflector dish off the bottom of the saucer on a little pole thingy. (too many designs to name)

 

[JNG]

I should have expected that.. but I was HOPING for something more useful, Ralat. :P

For me, personally, it's the 'three nacelles equals a dreadnought' scheme that I see a lot. First, it's lazy, cribbing parts from other ships and then just strapping another warp nacelle onto it. And, of course, the very idea that strapping on a third nacelle and changing nothing else suddenly changes a cruiser into a dreadnought is ludicrous, and pretty much proof positive that the 'designer' doesn't know shit about such things.

True. I can understand that some of the tech dialogue led some fans to think that nacelles=power (which it may very well have to some degree, although of course it wasn't that simple). However, where I lose patience with fan designs is when they go, "Oh, well that sure was dumb of the Federation to only put two nacelles on the Enterprise, then! My ship will be vastly superior because I will innovatively add more identical nacelles to make it more powerful. I am a smarter starship designer than they are." It sort of insults the intelligence of the source material to think on this level. Thus I feel designs that experiment with these sorts of features should appear to be doing so carefully and with some sort of awareness of the sandbox in which they are playing, not just slinging copypasta.

I cringe at the multiple deflector dishes, particularly the aft-facing one, on the Federation-class "dreadnought" because I don't really understand the thinking behind them. Was the super-tough dreadnought supposed to be doing a lot of high-warp retreating, so rapidly that she didn't have time to turn around at impulse? This seems weird for what was evidently assumed to be some sort of battleship.

The Saladin-class ship seems to me a very simple rearrangement of the Enterprise components in a configuration that seems to be neither technically compelling nor attractive enough to be worth doing anyway, and its deflector blocks the collector on the front of the nacelle, which FJ had labeled with a name that pretty clearly indicated he had some idea what it was for ("matter sink" or something IIRC).

I hope I don't get yelled at for posting that; people sometimes stick up for certain ship designs because of their place in the history of fandom Trek tech, and certainly not because they represented any particular creativity or innovation in and of themselves. (I respect the history and proudly own a very early copy of the book, but didn't think its ship designs or drawings were what they could have been--I'd have been very willing to play along with FJ if he tried to really do something quite different for, say, a scout ship. I do rather like the shape of the Federation-class primary hull, though, but not the whole concept of combat-oriented ships that make Enterprise a middleweight and not the pride of the contemporary fleet.)

FASA's Northampton-class ship (http://home.comcast.net/~ststcsolda/federation/northampton/northampton.html) is probably the worst of their lot, at least when we leave out their take on TNG styling (this has TMP-looking nacelles, so hope it still counts to answer the TOS question).

I've gotten too hazy on Star Fleet battles to remember what ones of those bugged me the most, but they were pasting nacelles and dishes around like crazy.

 

[hellsgate]

I HATE the god-damn Miranda-Class with no visible deflector but I gotta admit it has decent armaments. The Daedalus-Class is just too damn brittle looking. I hate most of the TOS/TMP-era of Klingon ships with the obvious "Shoot Here First" long, extremely thin pencil necks that look like they'd snap off if they wanted to enter an atmosphere & land somewhere for emergency repairs.

You'd think that the Klingons would've come up with a compact "Defiant-Class" of their own *first*, as they've been written-in as a warrior species, correct?

I love the NX-Class, and (god help me) the Norway-Class. My favorite of the TMP-era is Lieutenant Kevin Riley's U.S.S. Phobos (Loknar-Class, Mark 3).

The only gripe with the Luna Class is that the designer needs to bring the nacelles up a bit, I've always hated the underslung Intrepid Pathfinder-Class look of the Luna-Class USS Titan. Make the nacelles level with the saucer section, or just slightly above the edge of the saucer section.

 

[Albertese]

Double post. Sorry.

 

[Albertese]

I should have expected ...However, where I lose patience with fan designs is when they go, "Oh, well that sure was dumb of the Federation to only put two nacelles on the Enterprise, then! My ship will be vastly superior because I will innovatively add more identical nacelles to make it more powerful. I am a smarter starship designer than they are." It sort of insults the intelligence of the source material to think on this level. Thus I feel designs that experiment with these sorts of features should appear to be doing so carefully and with some sort of awareness of the sandbox in which they are playing, not just slinging copypasta.

I agree wholeheartedly.

I cringe at the multiple deflector dishes, particularly the aft-facing one, on the Federation-class "dreadnought" because I don't really understand the thinking behind them. Was the super-tough dreadnought supposed to be doing a lot of high-warp retreating, so rapidly that she didn't have time to turn around at impulse? This seems weird for what was evidently assumed to be some sort of battleship.

I see where you're coming from and I do agree with you, but the fact is that in those days that wasn't a deflector dish. It was the main scanner dish until TMP which was a few years after FJ's tech manual came out. From that standpoint, a big battleship could stand to use a high powered sensor array in the aft quarter.

The Saladin-class ship seems to me a very simple rearrangement of the Enterprise components in a configuration that seems to be neither technically compelling nor attractive enough to be worth doing anyway, and its deflector blocks the collector on the front of the nacelle, which FJ had labeled with a name that pretty clearly indicated he had some idea what it was for ("matter sink" or something IIRC).

I like the scout/destroyer well enough, but I think more should have been done with it. I don't like the freestanding deflector dish (which at the time of the drawing was meant to be a sensor dish) because it does block the engine, but also I just thought the whole assembly looked to frail anyhow. Also, i don't like how there is no obvious shuttlebay. Other contributers to this board have made a serviceable design out of it. Masao designed it and Forbin built it out of 1/1000 PL Enterprise kit. You can probably see it on either of their websites. It added a shuttlebay to the aft of the "B/C" deck under the bridge and also lengthened the pylon to allow for a mini-deflector dish to be installed just above the nacelle. I really liked that design a whole heck of a lot.

As for the Ptolemy tug, I always thought it was a bit goofy to waste a whole class I starship hull on cargo carrying. Unless the majority of the interior was fitted out as cargo holds and the crew facitlities were a lot more minimal. Seems like Masao did a take on this one too that was the same basic idea but fit a little better into the larger treknological picture.

On the other hand, I think the idea of cylindrical cargo containers analogous to a modern trailer or rail freight car makes a lot of sense and I'm sad to see that canonical Star Trek never made use of the idea.

 

[Plecostomus]

The whole cookie-cutter-lets-re-arrange-the-Enterprise look. Come on now, I'm sure there were OTHER hull-forms out there besides saucer-and-nacelles. Different style bridges too.

Dare to be different.

 

[Captain Robert April]

I really don't like the insistence of sticking a huge saucer section on a ship that doesn't require it, coupled with an insufficient number of warp nacelles to do the job. A tug sure as hell wouldn't need that huge saucer, neither would a destroyer or a scout ship, and the latter two would certainly need more than one nacelle.

And I am really really sick of this "power generated in the nacelle" crap. If you think the bridge location says "Shoot Here", whaddya think hanging your primary power source waaay out there on skinny little struts says?

Here's a hint, guys: the term "matter/antimatter reaction chamber" originated on TOS, not the TNG Tech Manual. Specifically, "That Which Survives". In fact, the whole resolution of that episode only works with a centrally located antimatter reactor in the secondary hull.

 

[Plecostomus]

Actually it could be a little bit of both, part of the reaction takes place topside and part of the reaction takes place down below. The bulk of the plasma is generated below-decks with additional processing occurring in the nacelles. *shrug* I've always assumed that TOS warp drive worked on a different principle than the other shows.

 

[Neopeius]

I should have expected that.. but I was HOPING for something more useful, Ralat. :P

For me, personally, it's the 'three nacelles equals a dreadnought' scheme that I see a lot. First, it's lazy, cribbing parts from other ships and then just strapping another warp nacelle onto it. And, of course, the very idea that strapping on a third nacelle and changing nothing else suddenly changes a cruiser into a dreadnought is ludicrous, and pretty much proof positive that the 'designer' doesn't know shit about such things.

People shouldn't be allowed to make ships until they get a degree in starship design, I agree.

Seriously, though, the Dreadnought doesn't look just like a three nacelled Enterprise. Both hulls are bigger and slightly differently configured.

The only thing I've never like about Federation ships is that they all have the same basic flathead design. I'd have liked to see more variation.

And I am really really sick of this "power generated in the nacelle" crap. If you think the bridge location says "Shoot Here", whaddya think hanging your primary power source waaay out there on skinny little struts says?

That argument is in the same place as the one that says having the bridge on the edge of the ship is dumber than having it in the center. The fact is, when your phasers can blow up half a continent or disintegrate a starship at 100,000km, it doesn't really matter where you put your engines or your bridge.

Of course, TWOK changed all that. In that movie, Federation ships are armed with advanced wrist-rocket technology. They moved to these more powerful weapons to adjust to the more leisurely pace at which combat was conducted--somewhere around the speeds used during the Battle of Jutland.

And, thankfully for the franchise, this tradition continued through all the movies and the later series.

 

[FalTorPan]

Regardless of their place in Trekkie Techie history, I like Franz Joseph's Trek ship designs. As for TOS I can't think of a single design from the actual original Trek series that I don't like.

 

[Wingsley]

How about we approach this from the affirmative first?

I suppose one thing that concept design/artwork involving Federation (and related) starships in the STAR TREK universe would be best advised to heed and follow would be to acknowledge many aspects of the canon design concepts seen in TOS, especially the original Starship Enterprise:

1: the Enterprise and her sisterships clearly had military capabilities, and formidable capabilities at that, as well as a military command structure. Having said that, they were not warships, nor did any character ever mention any existed. The Enterprise is repeatedly referred to/inferred as "the best ship in the fleet", and sentiment echoed in the very nature of many of the stories. (Earth and Starfleet don't just send a mediocre ship out on all these challenging missions, do they?) So, it is best to assume that Constitution-class starships (in the TOS era) represent the pinnacle in achievement in Federation/Earth design, shipbuilding ability, military capability and sustainability for that era. That doesn't mean that every other type of Federation starship has to look weak or puny next to a Connie. That doesn't even mean there couldn't be alternative designs that may have limited quantities built for service. But the notion of fleets of multi-nacelled, armed-to-the-teeth Asskicker-class Federation warships doesn't fit in the TOS Universe.

2: The design of the TOS Enterprise is simple, and yet has subtle sophistication. I don't mind stating the obvious: there's an impressive elegance to it. There's a saucer section housing the bridge, crew habitat, other non-engineering facilities (sickbay, labs, weapons) and an impulse drive. There's a secondary hull housing a large flight deck, an apparent multi-level engineering section, a forward-pointing deflector dish, and presumably other high-energy/high-volatility technology that is best kept segregated from the crew habitat in the saucer. (One caveat: the saucer is repeatedly shown firing powerful weapons.) There is also the suggestion (never canonically confirmed or disproven) that the nacelles, while obviously serving as a housing for the warp drive's superconducting coils, may also serve as a logical place to store the bulk of the ship's fuel. These various hulls are connected through pylon-like necks. Note that the secondary hull serves as the central connection point, with all the pylons leading to it, not the saucer. That ought to say something about how starships in the TOS Universe are built.

3: The Enterprise's appearance in TOS also points to another design characteristic as a "hero ship": it looks "good" by looking distinct from multiple angles. This is accomplished by keeping the various hulls dispersed enough (and oriented vertically and horizontally in relation to each other) so that the hulls can be seen from different angles. Despite this hull dispersal, the pylons connecting the various hulls are simple and straight so that they do not become too busy.

4: This hero ship visibility and simplicity extends to the smooth nature of the ship's hulls and pylons. They aren't busy with too many details, either.


I would also add a couple other subjective notions...

5: Warp nacelles should be balanced in pairs, commonly one pair, and if we assume that the nacelles house the bulk of the ship's fuel storage (presumably a substantial mass), some kind of center-of-gravity relationship with the impulse engines (as was discussed in Shaw's deck plans thread over in the Trek Art forum).

6: If design concepts for other classes of starship are to blend in with the TOS Enterprise, then these other classes should also adapt the above design concepts. (Separate the engineering section from the crew habitat, make the design's hull arrangements "photogenic" like what was saw in TOS, etc.) As such, we should consider that some starships seen in subsequent adventures (the frieghters/cargo drones of TAS, the Reliant, etc.) might not fit in the TOS Universe.

 

[drychlick]

i love the tos enterprize from all the other

 

[Timo]

I don't really get the argument of "Franz Joseph's altering of nacelle numbers is somehow not enough". In the real world, warships of different sizes and functions do look more or less like scale models of each other - but a small corvette might have a single propeller, a medium cruiser would have two, and a battleship would have three. And the size difference between a cruiser and a battleship need not be all that great.

As for hanging a vulnerable element on the outside of the design, that's a very typical tradeoff or necessity in real military design. Ground vehicles have to have their vulnerable wheels and tracks on the outside, because they would do no good inside. Aircraft need to have their vulnerable engines on the outside for the same reason.

Whether this should affect our thinking on whether starship nacelles have power generators inside them or not... Well, those aircraft engines definitely have "power generators" in there, dangling vulnerably outside. That's an absolute necessity because of the nature of jet engine technology. If warp engine technology, in TOS at least, requires major kaboomables in the dangling engines, then that's how Starfleet will have to build its ships.

Really, that's the starting point of Trek ship design. We cannot really contest that even in a thread titled "the wrongs of starship design", or at least that's how I interpreted Vance's intent... If we argue that Kirk's ship is of piss-poor design, then we argue that Starfleet doesn't know how to build its stuff, and how likely is that? It's more probable that we don't understand what makes a good ship by Trek rules!

OTOH, if Kirk's ship is good, then something like the original Aurora is probably bad, since it's not multi-hulled and has no smooth curves or saucery shapes... But if we accept that the builders of that ship weren't idiots, either, then we have our two existing TOS design datapoints already nailed down, and we should judge all the fan ships on the basis of those. In which case I can't condemn the Federation, but I'll join the choir that shouts down the Northampton and the elongated FASA monsters.

Although there's an obvious reason to why the FASA ships look like that: they all were designed in side view principally, and in such a manner that the saucer and the nacelle were cut-and-pasted and the remaining hull was drawn around these two, making use of the available white spaces but avoiding three-dimensional thinking. Naturally, such a vessel would tend to have a massive side profile consisting of very long connecting elements between the components.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Cary L. Brown]

And, of course, the very idea that strapping on a third nacelle and changing nothing else suddenly changes a cruiser into a dreadnought is ludicrous

I agree. At least the "All Good Things...." Enterprise-D in the future had a mega-phaser cannon added to use the extra power from the third nacelle - and that was still pretty retarded.

Very true, and none of the GOOD Dreadnought designs were done that way, though a couple look that way if you don't look too closely.

The first dreadnought, of course, was the TOS-era Federation class. But the one that gets the most "bad press" is the TMP-era Federation (uprated) class. The thing is, despite people thinking that this is just the TMP Cruiser with a third nacelle, THIS IS NOT TRUE.

I've got a half-finished Federation (uprated) model in my stable right now. Why "half-finished?" Because I've had to make an entirely new secondary hull as well as rebuild, from scratch, the entire upper three decks of the primary hull.

I've got a couple of comparison images I did a while back to help illustrate this.

Here's the upper side of the primary hull... compared to the unaltered AMT/Ertl "Enterprise" model. Yes, the shapes on the AMT kit aren't PERFECT but they're reasonably accurate, and provide a perfectly serviceable comparison.

Note that this region is MUCH larger. On the TMP Enterprise, the B/C deck region consists mainly of the "officer's club" (including the manual kitchen in the middle of C-deck, and the formal dining room on the port side of C-deck, the "ballroom" (with the "helm wheel" and emergency transmitter) forward, a "snack bar" to port, and of course the aft-facing lounge area) and the communications division (on B-deck, in the middle region not taken up by the upper levels of the lounge and ballroom). But in the dreadnought, this region holds a complete "fleet operations center" separate from the bridge... plus some basic "lounge/conference" areas... so the ship's captain runs the ship from deck 1 and the admiralty and their staff oversee operations from the large facility on the next two decks.

The secondary hull is also dramatically different. Here, I was able to get both hulls in a single shot. Note that the Federation (u) hull is almost 50% again larger (by volume). This hull contains not one but two separate reactor assemblies, and an enlarged hangar facility (with a bit less total cargo space). You'll also note a pair of aft-firing photon torpedoes. And, the dorsal is significantly larger, and thus commensurately stronger.

 

[Vance]

hanging the deflector dish off the bottom of the saucer on a little pole thingy. (too many designs to name)

I often feel a need to defend Franz Joseph here, for a few reasons. But for this issue I actually see the dish and realize what he was going for, with the 'sensor' just being a big transciever and not some important structual piece of the ship (as a deflector would be). The 'dish' was never really that important to the Trek mythos until TNG, and that, not coincidentally, was when all the arguments about the design started to come up.

Now, all that said, I've actually taken to 'stripping the dish' for designs from 2260 and up, and attributing the 'deflection grid' to being part of the shield grid for ships without the dish. The sensors, for their part, are already part of the the lower dome, so that's also taken care of. For ships prior to 2260, I actually leave the dish because I think that it helps add to the 'archaic' look of the technology.