Transwarp & Computers

[blssdwlf]

We could extend this to all the other shows, too. ENT gives us hard data on how the Warp Five engine behaves on the Earth-Neptune-Earth run, but the same engine performs the Earth-Qo'noS run immensely faster in the very same episode.

It would have to be for 80 hours to make sense

However, this won't solve the internal problems of TOS. If the engines are fast in the interstellar "subspace vacuum", then every location Kirk visited should have been pre-visited already.

Ah, good point! I'll switch my argument to other dubiously close locations that Kirk is the first to survey, then. Say, Pollux in "Who Mourns for Adonais". Or even the distant Rigel and Deneb (assuming they are Beta Orionis and Alpha Cygni, respectively, and not other stars with the words "rigel" and "deneb" in their names), which could have been reached in a day at the anomalous warp 8.4 of "That Which Survives".

Even dubiously close doesn't always mean visited or explored. Could we say in the days of sailing that every nearby island was visited by ships even though it would've been a quick trip?

As to "Who Mourns for Adonais" are we so sure that Kirk was first to survey it?

CAROLYN: Here's the report on Pollux Five, Captain. This entire system has been almost the same. A strange lack of intelligent life on the planets. It bugs the percentages.
...
SPOCK: Pollux Four. Class M type planet, oxygen and nitrogen atmosphere. Sensors indicate no life forms. Approximate age four billion years. Judged no reason for contact. In all respects, quite ordinary, Captain.
​

As far as we know, this system was surveyed before at a distance and bypassed because of the "lack of intelligent life". It could be that it is only until Kirk's ship is on a followup to map the planets from close-range (orbit) that awakens Apollo.

I'll look at the other places to verify and check back later.

That estimate of hers puts "maximum speeds" at slightly ABOVE Warp 9.

Not above Tom Paris' definition of that warp factor, which is a show-internal reference and also one in accordance with most of the travel time feats of the TNG hero ship. That is, if the E-D couldn't do four-digit speeds with ease, basically every pair of locations visited in an episode would have to be neighboring star systems or worse.

I'm not following Timo. When does Tom Paris define Warp 9?

TNG's "Bloodlines" puts Warp 9 as 833c.

Let's remember that it's Riker's hipshot estimate, not a Data figure... Although to be sure, Data was present and no doubt ready to correct Riker on tactically erroneous estimates.

It's an outlier in any case, and might be attributed to their target Bok residing in the shallow space of a star system, where even warp 9 gets quite slow as per "Paradise Syndrome".

Is there a specific episode from Tng+ that gives a different value for Warp 9? Otherwise, "Bloodlines" is the only data point we have for Warp 9 and not an outlier.

Regarding Janeway's estimate, it probably won't take into account repairable damage because that would get repaired in 75 years. But it may well be what the field manuals tell her about the true sustainable speed of her ride on long voyages, because it appears to be in rough accordance with the estimate Barclay uses for the ship's speed in "Pathfinder"...

On the other hand, Harkin's estimate is based on actual flight times and local conditions instead of Janeway's guesstimate of a straight non-stop trip at max speed back home.

From "Pathfinder":

HARKINS: The Delta Quadrant, sector 41751, grid nine. Voyager's doctor reported this as the ship's position when his program was briefly transferred to Starfleet two years ago.
Assuming they're still on course for Earth we've been able to extrapolate a range of likely trajectories.
Estimating an average warp speed of six point two, and accounting for various astronomical obstacles, we can reasonably assume that Voyager is now in one of these three sectors.
​

Interestingly, this is a Season 6 episode and they've traveled about 10,000 LY. 10,000 LY in 6 years averages to about 1,666c* or only 45 years to get home.

*However, I seem to recall that Voyager may had some alien boosts so I'm not sure that average speed is just at warp alone.

BARCLAY: Is it really so wrong? Do you have any idea what it must be like for them to be stranded sixty thousand light years from home?
​

 

[Deks]

In the episode 37's, Amelia Earheart asks Paris the following about Voyager:
"How fast?"
"Warp 9.9. In your terms that's about... 4 billion miles per second'.

Note he said 9.9... and not 9.975.
Obviously the 'speed of plot' at work or just an idiotic oversight by the writers.

Harkins had no business to estimate any average speed for Voyager.
He failed to take into account Janeway's personal preference for example because it's possible that she could have averaged at warp 7 or 8 most of the time due to being in the DQ.
Furthermore, this episode completely ignores Voyager gaining a 300 Ly's jump from using Slipstream v1.
Followed by 2 000Ly's from the anomaly in episode Night (to traverse a region of space devoid of stars), then another 10 000 ly's from Slipstream v2, and yet another 15 000Ly's from the stolen Borg TW coil.

So, all in all, Harkins and the episode missed extraordinary boosts (after Voyager crew informed Sf of Kes's original 10 000Ly's push) which resulted in Voyager being at least 27 300Ly's closer from where the Doctor was transmitted.
That's a pretty large gap if you ask me.

Unless we were watching the duplicate Voyager's adventures ever since episode 'Demon' (which was NOT implied) until episode 'Course: Oblivion'... because that's the only way Harkins could have gotten a hold of Voyager, or explain why the ship never crossed into the Beta Quadrant... let alone how are you going to reconcile the premise that Voyager had another 16 years in an alternate timeline of 'Endgame' to get back home (which actually sits well after you include the jumps they took)?

Lol...

 

[Timo]

There was every justification for estimating the average warp speed of the Voyager in "Pathfinder" - because Starfleet had solid data on how fast the ship had been moving at warp until "Message in a Bottle", thanks to the exchange of data in that episode.

Non-warp propulsion methods would be a separate issue, to be tackled in the "astronomical obstacles" category. We have no idea how Barclay included those in his computations, so that one of his three final guesses would in fact be correct. But somehow he did. He came up with (at least) three scenarios where the ship flies at warp 6.2 and in addition exploits various shortcuts. All of the scenarios were based on different assumptions about the shortcuts, because we observed that the sectors were not adjacent; this observed fact already proves that the warp speed estimate, which was explicitly the same for all three scenarios, was a factor used separately from the "jump guesses".

Now, I cannot see any physical or mathematical way to come up with such good guesses that just three 20x20x20 ly boxes would emerge as the final answers. But it's at least theoretically possible that Barclay would have independent information on some of the anomalies ahead of the ship (although I can't imagine how he could have gotten that information on any of the specific anomalies Janeway ended up benefiting from). Another possibility is that he got outside information from "knowledgeable sources", i.e. interstellar rumors. The show already featured one galaxy-spanning fast communications net; quite possibly, thousands of such nets exist, and various rumors travel along those and ultimately meander their way to the UFP ears, too, despite the UFP lacking direct access to any such net.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Cmdr_Blop]

To address an earlier point... the planet where Trelane was encountered could well have been made by Trelane or his "parents" in the spur of the moment, to serve Trelane's immediate purposes, much like how Q could create things to serve his purposes at will.

So there may never have been a planet there to detect in the first place.

 

[blssdwlf]

So we're still left with TNG Warp 9 as 833c ("Bloodlines") and Voy Warp 9.9 as 21,457c ("The 37s").

There was every justification for estimating the average warp speed of the Voyager in "Pathfinder" - because Starfleet had solid data on how fast the ship had been moving at warp until "Message in a Bottle", thanks to the exchange of data in that episode.

Still, the "average" warp speed could easily mean that Voyager is cruising at Warp 9.1 for a large portion of the time and then stops because Janeway gets embroiled in some local matter with a planetary government before continuing on their way.

 

[Timo]

Or that the ship is doing warp 7 for a large portion of the time and then stops for the weekly adventure. After all, the average adventure only takes a few hours of the heroes' lives, and is supposedly balanced by two weeks of non-adventure which in turn is probably spent cruisin'; the stops won't affect the average speed all that much.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[blssdwlf]

Or that the ship is doing warp 7 for a large portion of the time and then stops for the weekly adventure. After all, the average adventure only takes a few hours of the heroes' lives, and is supposedly balanced by two weeks of non-adventure which in turn is probably spent cruisin'; the stops won't affect the average speed all that much.

Have you averaged out the "average adventure"? The episode before "Pathfinder", Voyager was stopped for at least 3 days. I suspect if we actually went in and checked the data it'd be more like Warp 9 for a large portion, then days stopped or backtracking to rescue someone and then back to Warp 9 again

In the episode 37's, Amelia Earheart asks Paris the following about Voyager:
"How fast?"
"Warp 9.9. In your terms that's about... 4 billion miles per second'.

Note he said 9.9... and not 9.975.
Obviously the 'speed of plot' at work or just an idiotic oversight by the writers.

Or we could take it as the top speed of the ship with previous damage factored in. Voyager won't be making her spec top cruising speed until she gets to a Federation drydock for repairs

Harkins had no business to estimate any average speed for Voyager.
He failed to take into account Janeway's personal preference for example because it's possible that she could have averaged at warp 7 or 8 most of the time due to being in the DQ.
Furthermore, this episode completely ignores Voyager gaining a 300 Ly's jump from using Slipstream v1.
Followed by 2 000Ly's from the anomaly in episode Night (to traverse a region of space devoid of stars), then another 10 000 ly's from Slipstream v2, and yet another 15 000Ly's from the stolen Borg TW coil.

So, all in all, Harkins and the episode missed extraordinary boosts (after Voyager crew informed Sf of Kes's original 10 000Ly's push) which resulted in Voyager being at least 27 300Ly's closer from where the Doctor was transmitted.
That's a pretty large gap if you ask me.

Didn't Voyager cover 30 sectors in the previous episode as well? "Cutting 3 years off journey" roughly translates to 2,800 LY (based on her original 933c, 70,000 LY over 75 years estimate.) Harkin and Barclay must've been in on that space catapult being there for Voyager to find and Seven was correct in her conspiracy

"The Voyager Conspiracy"
Captain's Log, supplemental. After further testing, we activated the catapult and were hurtled across thirty sectors of space. In less than an hour we cut three years off our journey.