Warp Speed??

[los2188]

I'm a pretty smart guy (obviously! ) but I have a query to those that can answer it..since there's no air friction in space if you reach a certain speed, wouldn't you keep on going that same speed if your engines or energizers where to go off-line? What warp speed count, or do you need them on-line for a warp bubble?? What about going faster than light?? By the way, I really hated Insurrection.

 

[Canadave]

Well, warp engines are supposed to bend space-time so that you can actually go faster than light. So if the engines go offline, you can't go faster than the speed of light anymore.

 

[Peach Wookiee]

Got to move this to Trek Tech, fellas!

 

[Chaos Descending]

I'd say that if you were traveling at max. warp and then you lost power, you'd kick into sub-light only and continue coasting at max. impulse speed.

 

[CoveTom]

I believe TNG addressed this once or twice, namely when the Enterprise-D separated the saucer or prepared to do so. The most specific example I can think of is in "Brothers," when Data has control of the bridge. Picard plans to separate the saucer and tells LaForge and Wesley, "[t]he saucer module should fall out of warp within two minutes."

As has been implied here already, warp speed as displayed in Trek is not simply a matter of accelerating to a certain speed and maintaining it, as would be the case with impulse power or any conventional form of propulsion. The warp engines are literally warping space around the ship, creating a bubble of subspace in which it travels. Thus, it's able to effectively move faster than the speed of light without having to physically do so.

So as soon as the warp engines were offline, I'd imagine the ability to maintain that bubble of subspace would fail. Thus, pretty quickly, you'd return to sublight speeds.

 

[C.E. Evans]

If impulse engines have a subspace element--say something that reduces the mass of the vessel at high relativistic speeds--it may be possible for them to sustain a ship at warp for a limited time, with the duration perhaps dependent on a number of different variables. In some cases, though, there may be nothing left of the warp envelope for the impulse engines to sustain, resulting in an immediate drop out of warp, IMO.

 

[jgalley]

"Warp Speed" is how they "magically" break physics in order to go FTL.

once you lost the Warp Engines..the "warp bubble" would fall..and the ship would then be subject to normal physics..which makes it impossible for the ship to travel at FTL.

if anything, it's a wonder how a sudden loss of the warp field doesn't cause the ship to literally disintegrate the moment that field drops.

look up FTL travel (in the real world) and the problems with achieving, much less surpassing it. That alone will give you the answer as to the why the ship wouldn't continue at warp speed if the field is loss. because the "object in motion stays in motion" is lost during warp due to the nature of it.

 

[blssdwlf]

In TMP, when the Enterprise does a slow acceleration to Warp while firing the warp engines for the first time you can hear them count off from Warp 0.5 all the way through Warp 1. When she lost warp due to the imbalance, her non-FTL speed was Warp 0.8

So if a ship at warp (at least a TOS/TMP ship) loses warp, it will slow to under light speed but not come to a stop since it appears to accelerate all the way up to warp when at sublight.

 

[C.E. Evans]

if anything, it's a wonder how a sudden loss of the warp field doesn't cause the ship to literally disintegrate the moment that field drops.

I think it's because within the warp envelope, the ship never actually crossed the speed-of-light threshold.

 

[Tyberius]

if anything, it's a wonder how a sudden loss of the warp field doesn't cause the ship to literally disintegrate the moment that field drops.

I think it's because within the warp envelope, the ship never actually crossed the speed-of-light threshold.

Correct. The ship is not moving. Space is being warped around it.

What we are hearing when the conn officer speaks the slow count up to light speed is the speed of the craft relative to the universe.

 

[Chaos Descending]

look up FTL travel (in the real world) and the problems with achieving, much less surpassing it.

Tough directive to follow, since there's no such thing as "FTL travel (in the real world)'!

 

[jgalley]

look up FTL travel (in the real world) and the problems with achieving, much less surpassing it.

Tough directive to follow, since there's no such thing as "FTL travel (in the real world)'!

are you saying I seriously have to say that I didn't mean to look up that EXACT phrase?

I'll stop there, I'm not here to insult others intelligence.