First Look At J.J. Abrams’ New USS Enterprise
Nov 11, 2008 by Vic HoltremanLet’s hear it: Do you LOVE the new Enterprise from the new Star Trek movie or HATE it?
Thanks to Entertainment Weekly, you are looking at the first full image of the redesigned USS Enterprise from the new Star Trek movie (you can head over there for a larger version).
As a long time Star Trek fan, whose favorite series is the original, my from-the-gut reaction when I first came across this was:
That is one ugly ship.
Here is what J.J. Abrams had to say in regards to the new design vs the original:
“If you’re going to do Star Trek there are many things you cannot change. The Enterprise is a visual touchstone for so many people. So if you’re going to do the Enterprise, it better look like the Enterprise, because otherwise, what are you doing?”
I don’t know… maybe it’ll grow on me or it will look awesome while in flight on the big screen, but at the moment it’s not doing it for me. While he went pretty “classic” with the saucer section (that’s “primary hull” for the Star Trek fans out there) the connecting pylon and the secondary (lower) hull just look… incongruous.
If I had to pick one word that comes to mind when I look at that image, it would be:
Taffy.
You know, that stretchy carnival candy? You get it warmed up and then you can pull on it and it stretches and thins? That’s what the secondary hull and the nacelles look like to me. The lower hull looks like it was molded out of clay, rolled between two hands and rolled narrower at one end.
Almost exactly one year ago I wrote a speculative post asking “How radical is the USS Enterprise Redesign?”
Pretty damned radical, it seems.
Here are some comparative images from that post to help put things in perspective:
The Original USS Enterprise NCC-1701
JJ Abrams’ Redesigned USS Enterprise NCC-1701
The USS Enterprise NCC-1701-A
Tell me the new design doesn’t look like the movie Enterprise saucer section tacked onto some completely different alien ship.
In another post, I tried to guess how a redesign of the Enterprise might equate to the modern trend of doing design updates of classic cars. As it turns out, I think my 1960s to 21st century Camaro comparison turned out to be the closest in design ideology:
Classic Camaro
Modern Camaro
At the time I wrote:
“Let me say that I think the new Camaro is really, REALLY hot and from a design standpoint pays homage to the classic version, but that degree of change for the Enterprise would be completely unacceptable.”
Oh well.
Or… is it just me? Do I need to give it time to sink in and see it in action? I’d like to hear opinions from both Star Trek fans and non-fans.
[UPDATE: Thanks to "Spockboy" check out this minor change to the design via Photoshop that makes the new NCC-1701 look FAR better by adding some bulk to the lower part of the ship.]
Star Trek opens on May 8, 2009.
Source: EW.com via FirstShowing.net
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@ Brighteyes:
“Brothers from other mothers”, I like that! Well, Dad DID get around a lot, HAHAHAHAHA!
Thanx for your comments about the importance of Area Rule as a principle of warp drive dynamics, I feel that way too; I agree with all you said, never thought about a reduced saucer-shaped sensor signature, but you’re SO right!
I just re-aquainted m’self with Laura Vandervoort (U got the L in her first name right, buddy, and with my fragmenting neurons I can’t nitpick about YOUR memory, lol), who played Clark’s cousin Kara from Krypton in Smallville, but I’m afraid she is otherwise engaged, sorry to say; she’s HOTTT! To wit:
“Laura Vandervoort, who played Kara, Clark’s cousin from Krypton in season 7, and guest starred in “Bloodline” 8.08 this season, has been cast in a sci-fi drama pilot “V”. Vandervoort will play visitor Lisa, a flirty tour guide aboard the Los Angeles Visitor mothership.”
I like your choice though, maybe she can do both. Series vs movie schedules?
As for the third Enterprise beauty, let’s not forget about Chief Nurse Christine Chapel, played by the then future Mrs Gene Roddenberry, Majel Barrett; I mused for a whole hour (kinda light for me), and since, except for Smallville, which I have not viewed for quite a while, am not all that familiar with Gen-X’er TV shows (Dawson’s Creek was the last one I checked out, and it launched the movie career of Katie Holmes – just look what happened to her, HAHAHAHA!), so I have no idea what lissome, nuture-motivated, sexy blondes are out there, but I was thinking someone like either Laura Dern, who may be too old for the role (or too big), or maybe, it just occurred to me, how ’bout cute little Julliet Lewis? She was dynamite in ‘Strage Days’ with Ray Fines, and she can always go blonde, right? Plus, has that same kind of face & manner, a natural life-giving nuturer, who’s also not at all hard to look at. Also, remember ‘Christine’, as she liked Spock to call her, had a definite wet spot for the Vulcan.
What do you think of my nomination, Brighteyes? Anyone second either/all?
JOHN
PS: Hmmmm…they’re remaking ‘V’ again…K Bone, you were soooo right about the ‘execu-clowns’…that wasn’t that long ago…
If you think “V” is bad. They’re also making an “A” Team movie. YIKES!
@ Purist
TOS is famous for not taking Speed Measurements very seriously, maybe its even fact that someone confused Warp and Impulse Engines. I mean….it takes light 8 minutes to travel from sun to earth (warp 1, light speed), so there is no way for a Starship at less-than-warp-1-Speed to get to the outer planets of the System in a few seconds….Somewhere I heard that full impulse power is about 1/4 of the speed of light…..
As in ST 2, remember the Enterprise was badly shot up and had difficulties maintaining power to run her systems, it is unlikely that the ship qwas capable of reaching full or even half impulse speeds in this state.
@ my good friends and kindred spitits, K Bone & Purist:
Hahaha, what am I gonna do with you two? K, just listen to you, talkin’ about torque stresses & pylon shear!
And Purist, you are very close, the warpfield, as I understand it, follows roughly the same envelope as the deflector screens (and the all-important structural integrity field, the SIF); the inertial dampeners, or anti-accelleration field, as you say keeps everything not tied down from being turned into a human patee…I would’ve said strawberry jam, but YEA-AH, hamburger! Not good…
Okay, first of all, addressed to both of you gentlemen, let me adopt the traditional on-my-knees, bowing-&-scraping kow-towing, Wayne & Garth position, “I’m not worthy, I’m not worthy!” I say that because, quite honestly, I have no wish to trigger a smirk on the part of someone out there reading this (not much worried about you guys, or Brighteyes, say), and their musing “Who does this guy think the F*** he is?”
After all, we all know this is pretty arcane scientific stuff (thank you, Crazy Gene), but let’s be brutally honest, logical or not, such things as artificial gravity (gravitons – Einstein did say it was possible, don’t forget), inertial dampeners, warp fields, and the twisted (literally) logic of orienting a starship like a sea-going vessel, as opposed to a building, is all pure speculation anyway.
Having said that, I would be honored to share my, in some cases lifetime (well, forty years’ worth, anyway) of deductions:
First of all, we need to remember that the warp pylons – even those of my first & second favorites, the Ent-Refit/A, and the-ever-so popular Sovereign Ent-E model – still need to be pretty strong, not just for when they are live (it is the field which does all the work, good catch, P!), but also when they are DEAD WEIGHT at Full Impulse, where a starship will do most of it’s combat (much like a furball betwen supersonic fighters, even today) and ALL of it’s phaser firing (since phasers, being directed-energy ‘beam’ weapons, can’t operate at warp in hyperspace); so they do have to have some ‘oomph’, as it were. And by the way, Purist, I read in, I believe, the Star Trek Bible (mimeographed, orange construction paper cover & back, official as hell, available thru AMT before it became AMT/Ertl, the makers of my first, beloved Enterprise model – you both had one, don’t deny it) that ‘maximum impulse’ to answer the question you were kinda asking, is, BY AGREEMENT, .25c, or one quarter the speed of light; the reason for this restriction is to avoid unwanted relativistic effects, such as getting back to Earth (or wherever), not a few months or years later, as by your own lights, but years or DECADES, even centuries, after extended periods. Naturally, you don’t want to do impulse for very long, but between the suitable (but by no means ideal) efficiency of hydrogen/deuterium fusion impulse engines, as opposed to, say, mass-driver engines (which run cold, and are a 1000% more efficient than any rocket, even thermonuclear ones), and the fact that you only need them for brief periods over realatively short distances, they work just fine for puttering around the inner planets of the solar system. Or any solar system. Or in a dogfight.
Having said all that, since, as I calcualte it, ‘full impulse’ seems to be 1/4 of 186,272 miles per second (or about 300,000 kilometers per second), this is approx 75,000 klicks per second, or 45,600 mps, or about 20,600 mph faster than the re-entry speed of the Apollo command capsule, so once again, YEA-AH, I would say that would appear, even for a ship the size of a supercarrier, really bookin’! But then, I am not a movie director, lol!
Okay, what’s next? Right, warp feild dynamics.
That same orange Trek Bible also stated, I thought rather neatly, how “the field is generated by the warp core (down where Scotty works – mine), and the warp pods manipulate the field directionally, as the field throws the ship into hyperspace (subspace), and thus the Enterprise rides that ‘node’ like a SURFER RIDES A WAVE”…I remember thinking at the time, I rather like that image.
Let’s face it, guys, we might as well all be ‘hale fellows, well-met’, sitting around a table with steins of mead in some Florentine tavern sometime in the 16th Century, feeding off of Leonardo da Vinci’s fantasies about manned flight…and who’s to say, if somebody were to show old Leonardo a 747 or a space shuttle, that, even as it blew his mind, he would not also be vigorously nodding his head, muttering:
“Si, si, si, I knew this, this is just as I had envisioned it…”
Keep dreamin’, my friends, it’s what the FUTURE os made of.
JOHN
1704/Purist/all
Kirk ordered ‘warp .9′, which is almost 3 times the speed of full impulse (1/4 light speed, very good point out friends). This, I would speculate, is using the warp drive to allow for a much faster sublight speed than possible with conventional impulse drives. I had to figure this out once because I couldn’t reconcile the discrepency, but it makes sense. It’s just using the warp drive to do something unintended, but possible.
Let’s also keep in mind. This was 1979. A literal visual interpretation of the special effects may not serve us well here.
Purist, I will have to respectfully disagree on the placement of the warp engines. I do agree that it may be asthetic when structually allowed (i.e. center-of-gravity, mass physics in space, etc.), but I think placement of the nacelles in NX, 1701, 01-A were all placed well, along a plane that allowed for maximum manipulation and minimal torsion forces. I don’t deny some are asthetic, and why wouldn’t you want it to look nice, but with regards to the ‘jj-prise’ (no takers on that? lol), I think a little more close rendering to the lines of the original SECONDARY HULL would shore up the structure.
Like I said, I am just excited that they haven’t ruined this completely yet. Let the journey begin.
@ K Bone:
K, this may help:
I remember that scene, you say it was 1979 – did U mean ST/TMP? That checks, and I seem to recal that scene…
I read somewhere, in the Starfleet Chronology Guide (kicks ass, get one if you can find one, it is definitely canonical), that Zefram Cochrane (who we now know was actually actor James Cromwell, lol) managed to achieve Warpfactor 1 by taking the Phoenix to just shy of lightspeed (Warp 9.979, let’s say), and then boosting it, over & over again, to just past light speed, i.e., just dipping into hyperspace, and then falling back into normal space again.
In this way he was able to make it all the way, on later journeys, to our closest neighbors’ homeworld, Alpha Centauri, which he later became associated with (“Zefram Cochrane of Alpha Centauri” he was often called), even though everybody knew he was from Earth; of course, by this time people knew of our cousins from there, humans who were settled on that planet (Quieberon) by ancient, unnamed aliens, so he already had company.
If you ask me, this is very problematical, since, even with the warp engines, this is still firmly in normal, 4-dimensional space, and at even just a few minutes’ worth, the time dilation would be massive, I should think; several days, or even weeks, maybe months back on Earth (or anywhere else in the Federation) will have passed by in just that short time. Very dangerous.
But what do I know?
JOHN
Well I don’t know about all of that, but I thank you for your engineering consultation. It’s nice to know I am not the only one here who loves that stuff/gets it. My buddy was reading over my shoulder and thought I was nuts. Infidels. lol.
JOHN, you know, OKC is the ‘recession proof’ city in America . . . and yet my wife mysteriously cannot land a job either. F*** you, economy!! But there is always the sequel, and with the platform I work on, let’s just say we have a motto that once you get to our installation, the only way out is seperation or the sweet release of death. So, we can all get together somewhere for the next one. lol.
I think we are all on the same page, though, that the physics of starship manuverability require coaxing the ship to work TOWARD your goals (i.e. the axis I mentioned, which we will designate the x-axis). Using the specifications I mentioned in previous posts, it is much easier to put greater demands on the hull (particularly the pylons) when the engines are only required to make modest movements with respect to their weakest elements. For 01-A, would be the x-axis rotation, but with the SECONDARY HULL doing most of the movement, there is minimal stress. I just don’t see the same harmonies of engineering in the JJ-prise. I mean to say, it has the same strengths as the 01-A (althougth it looks to be weaker where the engine and pylon join) and with the bizarre curvature of the pylons without the 01-A’s self-reinforcing design, they appear to be weaker in rotation in one direction but stronger in the other direction as opposed to equally strong. I will conceed that the closed engine-to-engine gulf does increase the stability and decreases stress factors. Credit where credit is due, I guess.
The more I look at the 01-A the more I find it is the most superior design in balancing form and function than any other ship . . . besides VOYAGER and DEFIANT, which are flying tanks. Those ships could be fliped end to end like it was nothing. But while I find them to be elegant in their own ways, none come close to the NCC-1701-A. Period.
@ K Bone:
How right you are, m’friend, INFIDELS, indeed! They just don’t get it, do they??? Hahahaha!
Also, thanx so much for the invite, again, another time perhaps, there’ll always be another Star Trek movie. and I’m sure I’ll get something lined up by this summer, 3+ years of retirement is about all I can stand, y’know? I’ll be there, eventually.
Not sure I follow you on your axes of stress/torque/propulsion, and whatnot, no disrespect but it’s makin’ my head spin, lol! But I DO so agree with you on the beauty and stateliness of the Refit/01-A, don’t forget it was two ships, originally the the original TOS Enterpriseand its replacement, and BOY, did they do a good job!
I still like the sleek, beautifully designed Sovereign class Ent-E, but the more I think about it, I take your point, and here’s why:
The Sovereign is just beautiful, I mean, BEAUTIFUL! It’s sleek, powerful, and as I said before, does it look good on a T-shirt! It kinda reemids me of the Excelsior class, from certain angles, but better, not as…lumbering, I guess.
But here’s where the Refit/01-A takes the crown, and it has to do with a snatch of poetry once spoken by Jim Kirk himself, I believe in one of the first few episodes of TOS – “Give me a ship, a tall, tall ship, and a star to steer her by’, he tells McCoy, “but the stars are still there…”
So true, don’t you think? The Sovereign, for all it’s beauty (I did admit it was designed by the Pinifarina branch of the Starfleet Design Bureau, hahaha), is only less than a half-dozen decks higher than the original Enterprise (21 decks, I believe, as opposed to 26), but is more than TWICE as long, its even several dozen meters longer than the Ent-D; it lacks the soaring impact, except in closeup, of the original. This quality was shared by the Excelsior, the Ambassador (another fave of mine), and the magnificent (but admitedly overweight) Galaxy classes, but NONE of them had the Refit/01-A’s spidery, delicate yet powerful beauty. Plus, the engines were sleeker – later classes are evident of the obvious fact that the temptation of including a glowing red Bussard Hydrogen Collector (which is cool) at the front, as visually appealing as it may be, was just too strong to resist – think about it, even the Voyager and Defiant (and you’re right about that too, they were flying tanks) had these, to some degree. I was so glad, when the movie came out, to see the nacelles fronted by a ‘matter sink’, something similar to the Bussards domes, but maybe less discriminaive, I guess, I dunno. I only know, the Refit/01-A rocks! Like I said, stately, a true tall ship.
As far as that goes, the same can be said, for all its many & grievious apparent faults, for the ‘JJ-prise’ (and I, for one, like your little appellation, K!).
Also, I just remembered that on one of the many occasions I saw one of the early movies (TMP or STII, I can’t remember which), my date, a spunky little gal named Sarah, couldn’t help but notice the sensual roundness of the Enterprise at certain angles, especially pertaining to the Engineering Hull, and commented on this.
“That must be why they call her a ‘she’”, she said. Trust a woman to understand, I suppose.
“Give me a ship, a tall, tall ship, and a star to steer her by…”
Indeed!
JOHN
Amen.
Whoops!
Boy, was I off!
I said, in an earlier post up the rack, that 45,600 miles per SECOND (maximum impulse, by agreement) was some 20,600 miles per HOUR faster than the return trajectory of the Apollo command capsule…
Actually, maximum impulse would be about 1,641,600 mph, which would make it about 1,616,600 miles per hour faster, pretty God-awful fast, at any rate…YA THINK???
I regret the error, as publicat Cya!ions say when they make a correction.
I also regret that this post, which I wrote this afternoon, just got posted this evening – I know it looks like I stepped all over NCC-1704′s post, but I didn’t, but please, NCC, don’t be mad, Vic is a very busy man. Btw, good to see you again, how ya doin’?
It’s Vic’s fault, HAHAHAHA! Jus’ kidding!
L8r, JOHN
PS: Rememnber, as it said on one of the many signs in Geordi LaForge’s engine room (no, really):
300,000 KILOMETERS PER SECOND – IT’S NOT JUST A GOOD IDEA, IT’S THE LAW!
I liked that!
Cya!
“History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” wrote Mark Twain. (Whether he wrote this before or after he met the Enterprise crew in SF I don’t know.)
Just as Nero’s attack on Kelvin caused a re-thinking of starship design, so did the Jem-Heddar’s destruction of the Galaxy Class USS Odyssey over a century later send Federation Designers back to the drafting holo-interface.
This time the winning concept came not from the future, but from the past. The “Back-To-Basics” approach stressed use of contemporary tech in a classic configuration. It’s main advocate was Montgomery Scott.
Far from an anachronism, Upon being revived in the 24th century he returned to his greatest passion; studying technical journals. It wasn’t long before he was back up to speed and back in the game.
The Sovereign Class was his final, and greatest masterpiece. He never liked the Galaxies and I don’t blame him.
Ironic that I can casually discuss 24th cen tech but still not open up a new browsing tab to get LAURA Vandervoort’s name right. Not only that, but I couldn’t remember the name of the OTHER Laura; the blonde from “Blue Velvet” who I also immediately thought of for Nurse Chapel.
There must be a Trek Fan “Hive Mind” that we are a part of, I only hope some Paramount insiders have also been assimilated.
Sadly, the recent pictures of Laura Dern remind me of how long it has been since “Blue Velvet”.
Juliet Lewis is still looking good at 35 though. She sure creeped me out in “Natural Born Killers” but if we’ve got a brain-eating supervillian as Spock and are advocating a hamster-scarfing lizard-woman for Rand I see no problem seconding Jhonny’s nomination for Lewis as the Spock-Stalking Angel of Mercy; Nurse Chapel. Are you reading this, Paramount?
Not so sure If she should also voice the computer though.
@ Brighteyes:
THAT’S RIGHT! I forgot all about Mark Twain in that episode in SanFran in the 19th Century (I believe inside the Presidio), meeting Picard & his crew, and – as he called her – ‘Madame Guinan’! Hahahaha, that was the first time (for her) she & Picard had ever met, too! I forgot all about that!
Wow, you suppose it was after that meeting that he wrote ‘A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court’??? As far as I know, as I said earlier, that WAS the first time travel story ever written; y’think? – NAAHHH!!!
Hmmm, you just KNOW the writers at TNG were aware of this, though, probably why they wrote him into the plot in the first damn place, right?
I can’t believe I failed to make the connection, BE, thanx!
Also, it had slipped my mind completely that Cmdr Scott had been ‘re-rezzed’, so to speak, by Geordi LaForge, from that transporter loop he had, in his genius, put himself and his fellow traveller (some poor shlubb named Franklin, as I recall) into, trapped in the powerful gravity of the surface of that Dyson Sphere; I believe the ship was a large, rather cool shuttlecraft/transport vessel of the Sidney class, perhaps it even was the Sidney.
I had always wondered what happened to him; everyone else of the original Enterprise crew, except Spock, having either died of old age (like Bones, who was still alive for the premiere pilot in 1987), or had the odd fate of Captain Kirk on Veridian III. I know he wanted to retire to his boat. I guess the lure of space was just too strong…
Brighteyes, did you come up with this on your own, or are there official backstories of the main driving force behind my fave Sovereign-class? If that is the case, you should be working for Abrams!!! Or at least for Paramount, lol! Believe me, pal, if you just pulled that outta your arse, YOU ARE A GENIUS!!! I’m not kidding, that is nothing less than inspired!
Wow. Montomery Scott was the Chief Designer of the Enterprise E, I LOVE it!!! It fits, it makes perfect sense.
I just recalled, once again from a reliable, if not caonical source, that the Galaxy-class was so dependent on the SIF (Structural Integrety Field) that if brought ever-so-gently down to an Earth-like planet’s surface, it would ‘sag under it’s own weight’, like a soft eggshell; compare this to the Intrepid-class starships (Voyager), which, even though they were laid out with the traditional geometry (command saucer followed by an aft, ventral engineering hull, warp pods off on the side, and up in position), they were NOT seperable, even under emergency conditions (as far as I know), and were in fact capable of atmospheric operations and even landing.
Why mention the Intrepids? Easy answer, think about it – ugly though they are, they just preceeded the Sovereign- class, and did in fact have many details in common – sensor pallettes, continous phaser blister emitters, twin impulse engines, even the warp pods were just compact versions of the ones on the Ent-E. Obviously, they were a preliminary stage of the lovely, rakish Sovereigns, right?
I can just see Scotty fuming over the bloatedness of the Galaxy design, now; remember how much antipathy he had for the Excelsior? He must’ve hit the ceiling! Hahahaha!
“Aye, and if me grandmother had wheels, she’d be a WAGON!” You remember…
As for Juliet Lewis, thank you for your vote, Brighteyes. I can-NOT believe she is already 35, but that’s okay, she doesn’ look it, and so what if she is? Nurse Chapel was probably a contemporay of McCoy’s, anyway, and in this new movie as well as in TOS Bones was older. Karl Urban (who IS Bones McCoy!) is already in his mid-thirties, so that checks, and the two would play well off each other, if you ask me. They might have to pay her more, though, hahaha.
Jeez, 35…seems like only yesterday Juliet was Nick Nolte’s just-teen daughter in the ‘Cape Fear’ remake…well, I guess our little girl has just grown up, huh?
And I forgot also about Laura Dern’s role as the girlfriend in ‘Blue Velvet’ that film by David Lynch (there’s a spooky SOB for ya!); she was just a kid then, too – I don’t even remember who the guy was, but I remember Isabella Rosellini, though! I’d watch her in a movie if she was just sitting there dialing a phone…
I agree with you 100% about the Trek Hive Mind – great minds think alike, nes pas?
As for Paramount executive heads, I am not sure if I WANT to have them sharing my mind – EWWWW! But in any case, yes, youi’re right:
RESISTANCE IS FUTILE…
JOHN
PS: You know who WOULD be a good voice for the Enterprise’s computers (well, ALL Starfleet computers, really)? She already voices the ship captain Leila on ‘Futurama’ -
Katey Sagal – that’s right, good ole Peggy Bundy! She has an excellent voice, has done some narration work anyway and plays the mom on ‘Sons of Anarchy’; I’ll bet she’d do it.
Majel Barrett only got that job because, let’s face it, she married the boss. And, she’s very good, the keeper of her late husband’s flame, no disrespect to her!
L8r, dude!
Hey John,
Wow! I leave the computer for a day and come back to find a pile of new postings.
First thing. Yes, I did have one of the original models of the Enterprise (NCC-1701). At least I think it was one of the originals because it had those ribbings I talked about earlier. I remember the ribbings all too well. I remember saying some choice words trying to make the decals work over the ribs.
Second, according to the instructions that came with the model, the impulse engines were located at the rear of the saucer, not in the nacelles. That was the extra “stuff” built on to the back of the sacuer. In terms of centre of gravity, it works quite well. In addition to that, the engine pylons need only be strong enough to keep and engines in place whilst the ship engages in dogfight manouvers.
Someone awhile ago stated that the dorsal saucer support hadn’t changed all that much since ST:TOS. I’d like to point out that change occured right at the first refit. The Enterprise-A had her torpedo bay relocated to the lower part of said support.
Yet another question. In First Contact, we all know that Zephram Cochrane refits a Titan (I think) missile into the Pheonix (nice name). What isn’t explained is why the crew of three (Cochrane, LaForge, and Riker) aren’t slammed into the rear of the cockpit when the warp drive is engaged. Cochrane is credited with the warp drive, not inertial dampener. Then again, I guess that lends support to my earlier argument, doesn’t it. It a warp field negates the need for super strong engine pylons, it might also negate the need for inertial dampeners to keep people intact when going to warp speed, wouldn’t it? Guess I answered my own question. Oh well.
@ Purist:
Hey, U snooze, U lose, baby! Hahahahaha, welcome back, P!
Purist, I have to say, to you, to K Bone, Brighteyes, as well as NCC-1704, I am soooooo happy to have you guys (and everyone else on here, really, any Trek fans, ESP Vic, he is the moderator, after all – many thanx, Vic) to share this subject with, you have no idea, or perhaps ya do!
I even added a couple of shortcuts for these two threads, how ’bout that for obsession?
When I get up in the morning (well, whenever, lol, I AM retired), I check these two screen rants, first thing; next thing I know, the SUN IS GOIN’ DOWN!!! Can you get next to that???
I know you guys can. I feel it, like Brighteyes’ Trek Hive Mind…
The ribbings. Ohhh, yes! Those ribbings…I hope you did what I did, I just took a curved-edge X-Acto knife, and ever so carefully, scraped the sumbitches off…years later, I read in a Finescale Modeller magazine (those publications are very informative!) that the thing to do in a case like that, esp in the reverse situation (with inscribed lines) is to use a product called Miro-Sol solution, it relaxes the decal and allows it to snug up (or down) on any surface detail. Wish I’d known.
The point turned out to be moot, though; I also read in that same mag that when using that model (in this case, the guy was re-configuring it as a Ptolemy-class warp freighter – as described in the original Starfleet Tech Manual that Vic mentioned, great book, btw), the thing to do is what I did anyway, since the Enterprise is a “clean ship” as the guy said. So it turned out I was right. Again.
Always go with your first imulse, I guess…
I don’t know why AMT put those damn ribbings on there, I guess they were just goin’ by the original blueprints; the lines for that grid DO look just like structure lines, after all, so…Anyway, it is an interesting effect, because, owing to the fact that they were molded in, you can STILL see them, it’s COOL. It makes it look just like the real thing.
Listen to me…There IS no real thing! Lol!
Speaking of impulse…As for the impulse engines, that’s absolutely right, I thought everybody knew that – although, I do remember on the official blueprints for the refit (and just about every other ship in the TMP movie), the original cylindrical power units had ‘certain propuslive elements’ which were provided for in the Engineering Hull in the refit, so it turns out you may be right. The net effect, however, would be for the Enterprise to flip end-over-end, if that were the case, unless…unless they had a 3rd impulse unit under the fantail, I guess. Hmmmm, the comic book showed that, maybe…
I’ll go ya one better, though: Unlike what a lot of people think, the old TOS scenes of Scotty ‘down in the engine room’ – U know, the big screen a the back of the room with the angled tubes behind it, the 2-story instrument panel with the gangway ladder up the middle of it, the big, hulking Tokamaks ( I guess…) in the foreground – that was not down in the warp core area; as a matter of fact, they almost never showed the main warp engine area, in the TOS.
That whole set (and this I confirmed in the internal plans) was placed in the two-deck area at the BACK OF THE SAUCER! Can U believe it? Check it out, I just assumed the former, myself.
By the time of the TMP movie, they had flipped that concept – the impulse engines (which looked dmuch cooler, I think – and were ripped off, almost intact, by Abrams) were remoted, and as far as I know, fully automated (which made sense to me), and everything we saw took place, as you might expect, in the upper decks of the secondary hull.
This concept was continued in all the following classes of Enterprise, Voyager, any of the ships in the Trek franchise. But that first series…
As to the phototorp launcher, yes, you are dead on; the original photon torpedoes were fired from tubes located in the big, egg-shaped superstructure that serves as the mount for the command bidge, which also contained the briefing room, the officers’ mess, lots of stuff. Kinda close, for something that volatile (and subject to be taken out by enemy fire, YIKES!), so they quite wisely moved it down to just above Main Engineering, a very wise decision if you ask me.
Of course, JJ Abrams, on the ‘JJ-prise’ (kudos to K Bone for that, I like it), di’na wanna wait, as Scotty would say, for the refit. The Reboot Refit, hahaha!
As to the abscence of any ‘inertial dampeners’ (“inertial – waaaa?” Cochrane would no doubt say), I think you are absolutely right, the warp field would negate any or at least most of the effects of accelleration, and I’ll tell ya why:
In an episode of TNG where Mr ‘Q’ (remember him? Turns out John DeLancie, who played Q, was a close personal friend of Kate Mulgrew, who was Cap’n Janeway of ‘Voyager’…Hmmmmm, lotta nepotism in the Franchise, huh?) was suddenly dumped on the Enterprise crew, stripped of his powers; the plot involved a massive asteroid that threatened an enlightened but pre-warp race of decent folks, who were now threatened by, at least, a massive tsunami if they couldn’t stop this huge rock. Geordi LaForge explained very consisely that “The warp field, if extended around the asteroid, will have the effect of REDUCING ITS MASS, therefore allowing us to tow it off course.”
Plus, I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that at warp, at least, the principles of mass, momentum, and inertial properties of everything INSIDE the warpfield simply does not apply, since that is how it moves the ship through hyperspace (subspace, whatever you call it).
As I recall (and this is not from ST, necessarily, but theoretical physics, the mathematics of someone like, say, Stephen Hawking), a space warp “grossly foreshortens space forward of it, and grossly extends it aft”, a spacial distortion which would explain the problems a certain alien race on an episode of TNG, who wanted the Feds (& everybody else who might co-operate) to stop using spacewarps in their neighborhood. It makes sense that, sense you are essentially falling towards your destination (faster than light, remember, and therefore in hyperspace), that you would not need to worry about inertial dampeners…
At sublight, trying to jockey out of the way of a Klingon disruptor blast or a Romulan plasma bolt, not so much. You sure as hell need them then.
I hope this has been insightful, P.
And again, welcome back. It’s a sickness, ain’t it??? Lol!
JOHN
Whoops! That decal-softening solution is called ‘Micro-Sol’, sorry! And, it works.
JOHN
Just a minor nit to pick. Combat in Star Trek is 98% of the time done at warp speed according to the many source books which include both TOS and TNG material. The problem is that this doesn’t make for good visual effects so any shows or movie material gloss over that fact. The microwarp engines in the Mark VI torpedo are designed to go the ship’s velocity plus about 1.something. There are many warp turns and maneuvers spelled out in the guides. The reason we got both ships in the Wrath of Khan going like 18th century sailing vessels is because the director wished to create a Horatio Hornblower in space. (hence the first thing knocked out was warp capability)
The decal softener I used to use was called Testors Decalset. I also would take a hair dryer and blow the decal flat, remove air bubbles, form it to any surface detail, and finally, when dry and slightly heated, fuse it to the model like a laser printer. This results in decals that look like stuff painted on the surface rather than stickers. (they lose visibility of the membrane to a certain degree)
- on an earlier post, Scotty’s ship was the USS Jenolen.
My favorite two ships are NCC 1864 Reliant and NCC 1701 post refit (ST II appearance).
I really liked how all the other Enterprises except the D (least favorite) featured circular saucer sections.
@ Rumbeard (btw, another cool handle):
What can I say? You’re right as the mail, Rumbeard.
I knew that the phototorps could be used at even high warp, that’s true, and of course they are a little faster than whatever warpfactor the ship is moving at, as it’s platform; I stand by what I said about phasers, however, that they cannot be used in hyperspace, much as aerial cannon are pretty useless at supersonic speed (as the Air Force discovered with the tail cannon mount on the B-58 Hustler – the shells just left the barrel and went straight back into the bomber’s slipstream) and God only knows what phasers would do, esp forward facing ones. At the very least, they would be useless. At worst – RED ALERT!!!
Like I said, I’m not a movie director, and of course as such I agree completely about making it look ‘Hornblower-like’; not so sure about your percentages, though, 98% seems a bit high to me – this was the philosophy of the Air Force for the ‘antiquainedness’ of Korean War-era dogfighting, so they left the cannon off of the F-4 fighter/bomber, leaving it dependent on missiles, with disasterous results, we all remember that! And currently, the French & other Europeans are discovering that their philosophy of supersonic dogfighting, as with their new Rafale, Gripen & Eurofighter planes, is proving to be mostly theoretical, in practice. I have a feeling that that old Nathan Bedford Forrest saying from the Civil War, “gettin’ theah fustest with da mostest”, probably still applies in the 23rd Century, even in space. Or in the 24th Century. Just as in the 21st.
On the other hand, Forrest WAS the founder of the Ku Klux Klan, so how smart could he’ve had been??? Lol!
Also, as far as warp maneuvering is concerned, I seem to remember something quoted by Captain Janeway, to the effect of “Faster than light/Straight-line flight”, from her old command school days; having said that, I need to cite, in the very pilot episode of ST/TNG, how Lt Data answered Picard’s proposition of separating the Command Saucer from the Stardrive Section at high warp as something that was “…possible; but there is absolutely no margin for error…” One little slip, disaster!
And then there is the whole plot device, at the heart of ST/IV, dependent on ‘time-warping’ around the sun…straight-line flight? Well, maybe time-warping is what happens when you don’t fly straight, Hahahahaha!
Also, in one of the FASA ship profile mags (authorized as official, but not necessarily cononical), mention was made of Klingon probes being released at warp, but that such a device would “probably be destroyed due to the stresses involved”
My conclusion is that I believe you, Rumbeard, my bad on that one. And besides, in the TOS anyway, I know the Enterprise was firing shots of something at warp speed, so, there ya go…Plus, I specifically remember Scotty at his Engineering Station on the bridge, muttering that “…Warp maneuvering just went down…oh, well, switching to impulse!”
What the Sam Hill’s up with THAT? Impulse maneuvering? At warp speed? Well, I guess, who wants to argue with Scotty? A thrusters is still a thruster, right???
I think a lot of this is just speculation, God only knows what would really happen.
But, seriously though, AIN’T THIS SHIT FUUUUUN???
I think it is, I just love it!
JOHN
Talking about ships. One thing that always bothered me is Picard’s first command The Stargazer. Here’s a ship that has more warp nacelles on it that the fabled Dreadnought, and yet looks like it would barely classify as Light Cruiser. Imagine the poor Chief Engineer. Scotty once referred to the two engines he had as “me poor bairns”. I think he would have keeled over and died trying to make four work together (although it would make the positioning of the impluse engines a cinch).
As for the Enterprise flipping end over end, I disagree. I realize we’re talking theoretical theories, but in my opinion positioning the impulse engine at the back of the saucer make a lot of sense.
First, the mass of the saucer becomes irrelevant since the impluse drive is centred with it. That leave the secondary hull which, since it had decks, has a lot of hollowed out areas.
Second, the warp nacelles are for the most part solid – don’t see too many scenes with crewmember crawling around INSIDE of them.
Does this mean the ship would start backflipping when using impulse? No. Since the secondary hull is further away from the impulse engines, it possesses a greater moment (i.e. the further away something is from a center of gravity or fulcrum, the greater force it can exert –like a lever). This greater moment compensate for the greater mass of the engine which (if you look from the front) and just barely above the saucer section.
I once made a rocket modelled after the original Enterprise. In rocketry, the rocket engine must be centred perfectly at the COG (center of gravity). If not, the rocket will go flipping end over end. Guess where the engine was to be located? Just barely below the saucer. In fact, the saucer had to be modified to accept the engine receptable. In short, the front the engine sat partially in the saucer. On a side note, My rocket Enterprise maiden flight, was also its last. You guessed, the warp nacelles were ripped off (LOL). Honest, true story. Better than my brother who, after spending literally months making a Saturn V Rocket, launched only to have the parachute fail to deploy. It nosed over and drilled itself into the ground, but I digress.
That my thoughts on the topic.
@ Rumbeard:
Good tip about the hair dryer as eesatz laser printers, I like that, thanx. Now, if only the warp nacelles on the new JJ-prise didn’t LOOK like hair dryers!
As for the Jenolen, thanks, I forgot that; I had the feeling the Jenolen, as a Sydney class, looked like a very large cargo shuttle or a small military transport (it had the standard 10-12 meter bridge housing mounted high/forward/center, so it was way to big to be a shuttlecraft). Common as it may’ve been, I liked it, and thought it was cool.
And, yeah, I liked the Reliant (Miranda/Avenger-class, depending on what century) too, along with the Refit/01-A Enterprise; I also feel pretty strongly toward the circular, as opposed to the elliptical saucer hull, but you are forgetting about the Sovereign, it had a length-wise ellipse, too. Besides, I am drawn to the circular plan due to something you may find interesting.
According to the later Starfleet Tech Manual (the one with the Galaxy schematics front & back), on the back pages, there are small plan viewings of projected designs for the next Enterprise, the ‘E’ (this was before they nailed down the Sovereign, which was developed as a replacement for the Excelsior, anyway – so, basically, a sucessor to the Galaxy)); there are four or five of these, but the most interesting, I think, is one with, among other features, movable warp pods which slide out on forward-swept, wing-like pylons, but that is not the only cool feature on it. This model also had a circular saucer, and for a very cool reason: The saucer was sliced up into piece-of-pie like modules, all but the two (equivalent) center-aft ones, fixed to the ship, could be swapped out. This is also a good way to update any circular command hull in a spacedock. Good point there.
I had the thought at the time, it would make an excellent Federation Marines assault ship.
Plus, the telescopic warp engines were, let’s face it, were super cool!
Aside from that, I wish I had my own Miranda…
JOHN
@ Purist:
P, that’s what I meant, buddy! The impulse (Newtonian thrust) engines HAVE to be at the back of the saucer, otherwise, as what I THOUGHT you were saying, the thrust, if there was any, at the back of the warp nacelles would cause the ship to flip end over end.
Sorry if I misunderstood you, I knew that you knew better than that; but you would be surprised how many people I’ve talked to, who, because of that silly scarfing at the back of the TOS Enterprise’s warp nacelles, honestly thing that they act like rockets.
I think I may’ve misunderstood you, and if that was the case, I am so sorry!
Good to know we are on the same page, pal.
At least about Newtonian physics, lol!
As to the way-too-many warp nacelles of the Stargazer (Constellation-class, you maly remember), I dunno, I think you’re right, except for two things:
One, as a rather sharp friend of mine named Joe Hyde once pointed out, I think accurately, that they would, by virtue of their symmetrical placement, make a perfectly balanced warp field;
Two, it could handle battle damage like nobody’s business! If the upper-left & lower-right ones went out, you still have a perfectly good (operationally) starship, so you just might win the battle.
Besides, it looks cool! Those nacelles, if you notice, aren’t faired back like the vertically-mounted ones on the Refit/01-A Enterprise; they are squared off, maybe that means something as relates to the intercoolers, or whatever.
I take your point though, but I was just admiring the Connie-class Stargazer (also the Hathaway, as I recall) just the other day, and I admit that like it.
Overdesigned? Definitely. And if I’m gonna get in a scrape with hos-tiles (ESPECIALLY AT WARP SPEED, RUMBEARD) you better BELIEVE I want redundancy!!!
Just pullin’ yer chain, ‘Beard, no offense!
Howzzat? Hahahaha…
JOHN
PS, Purist:
Sorry about your rocket Enterprise, but this is exactly why I always hated those skinny little pylons on the TOS ship, as popular as it may be – I have the feeling that would happen on the big one!
So sorry about your brother’s mini-Saturn V, that must’ve hurt! If it makes him feel any better, at least it didn’t happen that way to the real ones, any of ‘em.
“Go, go, go, go, go baby! She looks good, she’s gonna make it….no, no , no, nononono, NO, NO, NO, NOOOOOOO…shit.”
I can just imagine. Drilled it, U say? Ouch.
JOHN
You cannot fire phasers at Warp speed, physical fact…..
@ NCC-1704:
THANK YOU!
john
@ Johnny-O
Remember asking about what ship the Enterprise-A was before being given the Enterprise name. Well, it turns out that it was the Yorktown.
I typed NCC-1704 into the Google search engine (I was curious which ship NCC-1704 was identifying him(her)self with) and clicked on Memory Beta : Federation Starship Database.
It states there that Gene Roddenberry himself suggested that it was the Yorktown. Hope that helps.
@ Purist:
Yeah, Terry, I accidentally stumbled over that Memory Beta site (Captain Mike’s if I’m not mistaken), looking for the Bonhomme Richard, named of course for John Paul Jones’ (JPJ, in Navyspeak!) original French-built ship that was lost in his battle with the HMS Serapis; I liked it so much, I made a shortcut to the actual site, and another one that had a link on there, hahaha! Can you believe that? We may’ve even been looking at the exact same article at the same time, or at least within a few hours’ of each other!
Thanx for that, pal, I think I saw that same entry…kinda makes you wonder about Brighteyes’ notion about the ‘Trek Hive Mind’, doesn’t it?
If you ask me, that is nuthin’ short of SPOOKY!
YOU WILL BE ASSIMILATED….Lol!
JOHN
I thought of a new name for JJ Abrams retarded looking ship.
Name: USS RETARDED
Hull number: NTE-0001 (Not The Enterprise)
After reading the spoilers of the new movie, I’m glad I’ve made up my mind not to see it. I hope the new aged movement enjoys the new Trek, but the theaters may want to stock-up on prescription pain pills, Beer, and condemns. I’m sure it’ll stir up a the senses until there’s no more high for them to attain.
Joe
@ Joseph:
Laying aside for a minute the old chestnut about never judging a book by its cover (or a movie before you even SEE it!), I would just like to say, as gently as possible, Retarded Is as Retarded Does, Joey.
I am not crazy about the new design either, I’ve made no secret of that; however, we’ve all seen the press releases (well, most of us, anyway, I don’t know about YOU), we know that this movie is an ALTERNATE TIMELINE UNIVERSE story…
DO YOU GET THAT? It does not, repeat, DOES NOT, in any way have anything to do with the precious ST Canon (which is not the same as a cannon, with 2, count ‘em, TWO n’s in the middle [!], which is a large-bore weapon, make a note of it!), so your worries about the original timeline in the original series, blah, blah, blah, how many times do we have to go over this? – DOES NOT APPLY!!!
In addition to that, the term is ‘new-age’, not new aged (although many if us are older and gray-haired – take me for instance, I’m silver-haired), and New Age stuff has to do with crystals, chanting, and meditation, real Age-of-Aquarius stuff; it has nothing whatsoever to do with Star Trek!!!
Also, where do they sell beer in movie theaters? No where I know or have ever heard of…maybe where you live, out past the planet Mongo…
And prescription pain pills? Puh-LEASE! No way they sell those in the concessions, although I’m sure five minutes with you would give me a headhache.
And ‘condemns’? I know you condemn this new movie unseen, but it sounds like you mean ‘CONDOMS’…what does that have to do with anything? Unless you feel like the Enterprise has been sodomized by JJ Abrams, a little harsh, if you ask me!
As for a high to attain, DID YOU SEE THE BOX OFFICE TAKE ON THE LAST ST MOVIE – ‘NEMESIS’? It was almost the nemesis of the Franchise, that’s why they decided to do a prequel as an alternate timeline story! The ironic thing is, I liked it, but there’s no arguing with those abyssimal numbers, is there?
Like I said, Joseph, retarded is as retarded does. You have your opinion, I can respect that…
But make sense, will you???
JOHN