So, its been twelve years since TNG ended with "All Good Things...", and offering us a supposed glimpse into tecnology that is arguably forthcoming in the TNG time frame. In theory, the following will happen:
-Someone thought it would be a good idea to strap a third nacelle, BFP cannon, and extra whatnots onto a pristine Galaxy-class ship.
-They've either mastered transwarp, or it's good enough to warrant recalibrating the warp scale again. Tooling along at Warp 13 is no big deal for even older starships like the Pasteur.
-Which rules out what the third nacelle is for, apparently.
-Installing a cloaking device on Federation starships is also no big deal. This is more a political change than a technological one, but still, it's fun to rationalize that the technology itself was never a real hurdle for the Feds.
There are some who think that the tech is dubious at best, given the whole thing could be a Q fantasy. However, at least part of it is borne out as the Q-less Voyager finale at least re-uses the uniforms, implying that the AGT future is at least possible. Now, granted Picard and company arguably did something different with Soran and the Klingon sisters in at least one timeline that resulted in the Enterprise-D surviving the unlikely fate we saw in "Generations", paving the way to uglification two decades later. Likewise, the reuse of certain pasties on the Venture as seen in DS9 implies that at least SOME refitting is happening here and there.
But as we know now at least, retrofitting old starships like we saw in AGT generally doesn't happen in Trek - Excelsiors and Mirandas are essentially unchanged on the outside for decades. Perhaps it's limited to the few expensive Explorer ships? The Ambassador went through radical, if relatively unbreaking to the silhouette, refits in its two variants, and of coruse we know about the Constitutions. So, the question today is: given what we know now about Trek tech compared to a decade ago, would the AGT Enterprise-D have still been feasible? If the franchise could be seen in-context in fifteen years, could we concievably see AGT-type GCS emabarrassing all who serve aboard them?
Mark
[EDITTED for grammar and accuracy]
[ June 22, 2006, 04:01 PM: Message edited by: Mark Nguyen ]
Posted by Dukhat (Member # 341) on :
When DS9 started their Dominion War arc, it suddenly hit me that this could be the justification for the AGT Ent-D refit. Whether the war lasted longer in that timeframe, or whether Starfleet just decided to become more militaristic in later years, it might have been a good idea to start building "dreadnought" type warships. The Ent-D could have been a testbed prototype refit for the new design, just like the movie era Enterprise refit was a testbed for brand-new refit Connies to go into production.
Of course, the only thing a third nacelle would be good for is to generate more power to weapons (like that big gun). I don't think there's ever been a rule stating that the more nacelles a ship has, the faster it goes. If that were the case, then wouldn't all starships have like 6 to 10 nacelles?
As for the "warp 13" line, I think that was just nonsense implying that "hey, it's the future and we can go faaaasssster!!!"
IMHO, I think that instead of making the future Ent-D into a dreadnoughted, big-gunned warship, they should have made it look old, run down, with unrepaired damage and possibly minus the saucer section, since old Riker does state that it's now an old ship he was able to grab for himself as basically a memento.
Posted by Shik (Member # 343) on :
I never liked that line. Thirty years of service & decommissioned? The class is supposed to have a century-long lifetime as minimum. Dumb.
Why would a NACELLE be needed for power generation? Null program.
My problem is that that the "refit" doesn't really seem to DO anything. It reminds greatly of the kids who blow $70,000 on body mod kits for their Acuras & then leave the engine & everything else that matters stock. Looks shiny (to them, at least) but there's no difference.
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
Crazy unwarrented judgement: This thread seems unnecessary. Why does any of it have to be "rationalized?" They added some stuff, and afterwards it went faster and blew things up better.
That aside, there's precedent for Enterprises getting radically refit after the period chronicled in their TV show.
(Also I guess someone could produce an edit where every exterior shot of the future Enterprise is actually the Venture or one of the other Galaxies with the weird cobra neck thing.)
((Also also, while it is very well traveled ground, storywise, surely the D's decommissioning was intended to be one more reason why that particular future was undesirable.))
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Kind of like the USNs flip flopping with the battleships. Downsizing and leaving ones self weaker has been a problem the US has done often, with TPTB showing the possibility for Federation.
A thrid nacelle could improve the ships speed and/or handling, depending on the advances in warp tech at the time. Using the third nacelle to create a more stable center field, allowing for more degradation to the port or starboard field to turn at c+ speeds. New ships would of course have this built in to the two nacelle design to put things back on an even keel.
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
There are plenty of reasons why a starship could be considered obsolete enough to be decommissioned far before its intended end-of-life. Ritten already mentioned the USN's battleships; the aftermath of World War I would be a better example. The USN had a shitload of battleships and heavy cruisers on hand, many of which were barely ten or fifteen years old�but many were scrapped for political reasons to adhere to the artificial mass quotas imposed on each of the major world navies. Something similar could've happened with the 'D.
For example, the Galaxy class was developed at the absolute height of the Federation's confidence, pacifism, and power. The attitude was "bigger is always better," and there was no one to stand in their way. Maybe, in addition to the various engine and weapon enhancements, there were major developments in starship automation (like that apparently used on the Prometheus), requiring far fewer people to crew. Starfleet would absolutely prefer to operate less personnel-intensive ships, and retrofitting such a giant like the 'D would probably be too "expensive" in terms of resources, time, and effort. Also, one could speculate that the big Triple Threat of the Borg, the Dominion, and the Klingons would accelerate the trend towards more numerous smaller, heavily-armed ships, with a small handful of big battleships with really big guns to take out the large enemy ships.
As for the third nacelle... maybe it was added for redundancy? Maybe it was added because the existing nacelles couldn't support the more intense warp field to make it to WF13.
Who knows? I'm pulling most of this out of my ass, though it sounds mostly reasonable to me. The simple fact is that we have no clue just exactly why, other than BILC: "Because It Looks Cool!"
Posted by Mikey T (Member # 144) on :
Yeah... that third nacelle was more like a "this ain't your Enterprise-D anymore Dorothy" when it made it's entrance to save the day and blow up those Klingon ships.
Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :
I kinda wonder if Riker didn't pimp his own ride, so to speak. Use it as a testbed for experimental mods, make the ship totally unique and shiny.
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
Cloaking devices: Relaxation by the Romulan Government after the Dominion War and the events of Nemesis? The Klingons had taken over the Romulan Star Empire at this time - so maybe they had no qualms letting the Federation use cloaking devices.
Decomissioning: Maybe the E-D was not necessarily at the end of it's life-time - BUT it was heavily damaged at some point but not totally destroyed - it was mothballed until a time when an Enterprise E was commissioned that was as revolutionary as the ship before it.
This could have happened at several points.
The Fight with Lursa and Be'tor above Veridian III... with the Enterprise heavily damaged but not destroyed.
The Borg invasion of Earth during the time of First Contact (with an E-D not an E-E).
The Dominion War - at several points.
Even the events of Nemesis - having a Galaxy ramming the Scimitar instead of a Sovereign.
OR something further on - Maybe when Picard stepped down as Captain - and Riker had moved on they decided to stick the E-D in mothballs out of respect for Picard's captaincy.
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
I hate to blow my own trumpet (oh, no I don't! Toot, toot!) but my Galaxy Refit for UP3 may have some bearing. I wonder if I should modify it to include alternate Nemesis events - alternate as in "never happened at all!"
Posted by Captain Boh (Member # 1282) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dukhat: Of course, the only thing a third nacelle would be good for is to generate more power to weapons (like that big gun). I don't think there's ever been a rule stating that the more nacelles a ship has, the faster it goes. If that were the case, then wouldn't all starships have like 6 to 10 nacelles?
Warp Nacelles USE power to create a warp field. The only reasons I can see to having more than two nacelles would be to use them in alternating pairs to decrease wear on the individual parts, or exparaments involving alternate warp field geometry.
Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
I figure that the third nacelle was added to balance the extra mass and volume of the BFG and all the other stuff they slapped on there. We know from various episodes that a warp field is somewhat interconnected on the shape of the hull, and breaking the silhouette by adding so much stuff, and all the extra mass (maybe the BFG is just really, really heavy) would require a third nacelle to create a powerful enough warp field to balance everything and keep the Enterprise-D as fit and fast as she once was.
We have yet to see a Federation starship larger than the E-D in the local time frame (The E-J is probably much larger, but there's a 500+ year difference there), so perhaps Starfleet is/was at its upper limit for size with the GCS? What if they've since gone to smaller starships since then not because of political or policy changes, but simply because it gets really tough to build anything much larger AND move it at any appreciable speed?
The closest GCS to reference - the Challenger from VOY "Timeless" - happens about five years prior to "All Good Things...", relatively speaking, and she's a stock GCS, without even the nacelle-mounted phasers seen on the Venture. This suggests that the Enterprise-D in that time frame is a limited or unique variant, or part of a recent fleetwide upgrade.
Or, like the fourth funnel on the Titanic, the third nacelle doesn't actually DO anything and is mostly for show...
Mark
Posted by Shik (Member # 343) on :
So, like Titanic & sisters, they store all the deck chairs in there?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Mabye the third nacelle alters warp geometry for other reasons- it could be just the thing for fighting in Fluidic Space or even useing the warp field to enhance the shields in some manner (re-directing incoming phaser fire via warp geometry?).
It could have a LOT of diffrent uses, but I think it would allow the old girl to sustain a high warp velocity for longer periods and thus "keep up" with the rest of the fleet.
As to the model itself, it's pretty dumb: the BFG Phaser overlapps the captain's yacht and the very front of the saucer's phaser ring- making it look very much tacked-on. I've heard much fanboy speculation that those idiotic things near the bridge are phaser cannons and a super-sized torpedo launcher....(shudder)
The only really great mod done to the ship is the cool new impulse engine she has- I always thought the Galaxy's impulse engine looked a bit tiny for such huge ship.
In my own (Dominion War era) fleet of models, I have a dreadnaught Galaxy, but it does not have any of the dumb features- nothing added near the bridge, no extra "fins" on the nacelle pylons and it has no Galaxy "neck"- altering the ship's profile greatly and making the third nacelle unobstructed from the front. ...and an "NX" registry, of course. Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
Incidentally, this topic came to me as I was in the Town of Vulcan this week on business. Lo and behold, their visitor centre had a ton of Trek stuff in there, and amongst the dusty shelves I found the Johnny Lightning mini-model of the AGT Enterprise-D, which I bought. Cute little thing, despite all the tacked-on obviousness.
The BFG overlaps a lot of stuff, but I don't think it goes over the phaser ring, does it? No big loss with the Captain's yacht, as it was not used anyway (and an interpretation could be that it simply pointless, or that they ended up using a runabout or something else warp capable that could be stored in the mammoth shuttlebay.
Also, someone was previously wondering what the ridiculous cannons were attached to - those ovals were established in the TNG TM and blueprints as starbase docking hardpoints that could be pressurized to allow much larger cargo in and out ratehr than using open bay doors, etc. If they went similarly unused, one could rationalize that they could pack support systems and infrastructure to mount those extra cannons, or whatever they were, into the empty space.
Mark
Posted by Peregrinus (Member # 504) on :
My interpretations?
The thingies near the bridge: Stereoscopic targeting scanners for the phaser cannon.
The fins on the nacelle pylons: waveguides for the cloaking device.
The third nacelle: Added strength to the ship's subspace field/warp bubble, and enhanced maneuverability at all speeds.
"Warp 13": Given Voyager's sustainable cruising velocity of "warp 9.975", I figured it made sense that at some point the warp scale was recalibrated, but only from warp 9 up. Warp factor 9.1 became warp factor 10, warp 9.2 became warp 11, and so on. Thus the AGT ships would be tooling along at warp 9.4 (old scale), and Intrepid-class ships would now cruise at warp 19.5 (new scale, with warp 20 being the "new warp ten").
As for the cloaking device and the decommissioning stuff, I think that's been covered well enough already in here.
--Jonah
Posted by Mars Needs Women (Member # 1505) on :
Ah shit, I was gonna post a pic of the AGT Enterprise micro-machine I had, but the 3rd nacelle came off and I cant find. Oh well...
Anywho, I was wondering if this beast even belongs to Starfleet anymore? Might be farfetched, but could Admiral Riker actually have "bought" the ship. Could he be like a nutty futuristic L. Ron Hubbard cruising the spaceways on his own private flagship with his most loyal of followers? That'd be some future.
Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
Then the ship wouldn't be crewed by a bunch of fresh-faced Starfleet ensigns in uniform... No, the ship is his assigned vessel.
Starfleet apparently gives its Admirals the right to choose their own ship to get around in or for related business, which is presumably assigned to the sector their posting is at (in Riker's case, his Starbase). We always see Admirals getting ferried about in Excelsiors, which suggests lots of them would choose a ship the class of which they themselves could have commanded back in the day.
Obviously Starfleet wouldn't grant a top of the line ship to its Admirals to joyride around in, but if they needed a ship to represent their sector fleet (or a task force, etc.), then an appropriate ship would be chosen. Other Admirals (like that guy who tried to take Lal) could be more mobile in their duties, and could be permenantly assigned to that ship (though not necessarily to its command). I happen to think that the Bellerophon could have been Admiral Ross's chosen ship, for example.
Mark
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
quote:Originally posted by Mark Nguyen: the third nacelle doesn't actually DO anything and is mostly for show...
Mark
Fitting Reg Barclay's line "I don't want to be a Third Nacelle". Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
quote:I happen to think that the Bellerophon could have been Admiral Ross's chosen ship, for example.
Mark
I think chosen for that mission is more likely- something fast, but not in any way threatening to the Romulans. Plus, Ross knew that things could turn sour and escalate eal quickly on his little spy-mission so he probabaly went with a captain and ship that would/could not make a bad situation too much worse.
Posted by bX (Member # 419) on :
(late in coming, but I do like Jason's Galaxy dreadnought AGT mod)
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Thanks- I need some better pics though!
Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :
I'd also be the happiest if all the modifications could be explained as steps toward a single goal, such as making the Wave Motion Gun work properly. Many a real warship has been turned into a scarecrow with the installation of a new weapon system...
The writers probably intended the modifications to suggest a broader, gradual fight against time and obsolescence - but as said, this doesn't seem chronologically realistic, not unless we postulate major damage at some point.
The third nacelle is the biggest problem to me, as it is difficult to tie into the Megablaster backstory, and it doesn't appear to be a credible anti-geriatric measure when the similarly "pre-existing" (lower-than-Voyager-or-Defiant-registered) Pasteur makes do with two nacelles. In theory, it's the analogy to adding a screw to a seagoing battleship - something that actually happened a lot in reverse, as several three-screwers became two-screwers between WWI and WWII while also receiving more compact powerplants.
But hey, adding a third nacelle made perfect sense in the TOS days, if we believe in FJ and the fanverse. The very same rationale that resulted in the Federation class is no doubt at work here as well. We only have to dream up, agree on, and adopt that rationale...
The "antlers as targeting/support systems for BFG" interpretation gets my blessing, as does the "let's stuff this stuff in elevator shafts and whale pools and secondary shuttlebays and other now-unnecessary interiors before we start welding it on the outside" logic.
Timo Saloniemi
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
quote:The "antlers as targeting/support systems for BFG" interpretation gets my blessing, as does the "let's stuff this stuff in elevator shafts and whale pools and secondary shuttlebays and other now-unnecessary interiors before we start welding it on the outside" logic.
I like that idea a lot too, except that you left one part out: the "let's ignore the fact that the third nacelle almost completely blocks the main shuttlebay entrance" logic.
Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
It's even worse on the Nebula...
Mark
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
No it's not. Besides, the AGT has a small shuttlebay at the base of the nacelle (where anyone with sense would have re-located the aft torpedo launcher!).
If I ever decide to re-buiuld/re-paint my dreadnaught model, I'm going to eliminate the yacht, change the angle on the port/starboard nacelles to yaw farther away from the ship and eliminate the seam between the suacer and secondary hull completely: no way this design can seperate with all that stuff on there.
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
quote:Originally posted by Timo: as does the "let's stuff this stuff in elevator shafts and whale pools and secondary shuttlebays and other now-unnecessary interiors before we start welding it on the outside" logic.
Timo Saloniemi
Maybe the Whales control the TARGETING of that big gun!! Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Mabye the big gun converts the whales into energy and fires them.
Posted by Bernd (Member # 6) on :
Here are my two cents on the issue of the third nacelle. It could be used to
1) achieve a higher speed (by pushing more power into subspace). Right, the Pasteur could accomplish the same with two smallish nacelles. Also, the additional power must come from somewhere. The ship would probably need a second warp core for that, making it a very cluttered design (which is what it looks like though).
2) re-balance the warp field after all the other changes made to the hull. This seems counterproductive as the nacelles are usually the heaviest components of the ship.
3) compensate for a design flaw or a previous structural damage. In addition to the rebuttal of 2) I doubt that such an effort would be made to rework the ship when slight unnoticeable changes could accomplish almost the same (especially within the boundaries of Trek physics where recalibrating something and adding a bit of new hardware is usually sufficient to repair and save the ship).
4) as a testbed for nacelles. In order to test big nacelles, you need a big ship. In this case the Enterprise has likely been retired from normal duty. But then I would expect the third nacelle to be of a different, newer type.
Posted by Peregrinus (Member # 504) on :
Nice to see you again, Bernd.
All this commentary about the Captains Gig (it's not a yacht) has reminded me of something totally unrelated. One of my fun little hair-pulling projects is building the Calypso in 1:72 scale. With a removable top and full interior. Oy.
--Jonah
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
Yes, I think we should all applaud Bernd for taking time out from his no-doubt hectic training schedule as part of the Germany squad. 8)
I don't buy this argument that if the E-D+ has three nacelles, then so should a (older) ship like the Pasteur. They're very different kinds of ship, built at different times and to different design philosophies. Humanity are adaptable, so where once warp fields harmed subspace, so they came up with nacelles, and new field geometries. If the E-D remained at the forefront of technological discovery, then it might well be enhanced - only to suffer as methods of faster propulsion emerged that didn't require the 3rd nacelle. Humanity are also all too human - so they might choose to enhance their battleships before they got around to their hospital ships. . .
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
The spherical hull it may have a difference in geometry, with the smaller coils maybe it was easier to swap them out. The ease of making the smaller coils as oposed to making the big ones, plus material uses would have been lower. If the third nacelle on E-D+ came from a wreck.
Posted by Peregrinus (Member # 504) on :
Or maybe warp 13 is nothing in that era, and while the Pasteur was pushing to maintain it, the Enterprise was barely ticking over.
--Jonah
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
[quote]1) achieve a higher speed (by pushing more power into subspace). Right, the Pasteur could accomplish the same with two smallish nacelles. Also, the additional power must come from somewhere. The ship would probably need a second warp core for that, making it a very cluttered design (which is what it looks like though).[/i] Yeah, but for all we know, the Pasteur could be an even bigger refit than the Enterprise at this point. Mabye in the AGT future, all starship's nacelles look like those on the Pasteur.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
quote:1) achieve a higher speed (by pushing more power into subspace). Right, the Pasteur could accomplish the same with two smallish nacelles. Also, the additional power must come from somewhere. The ship would probably need a second warp core for that, making it a very cluttered design (which is what it looks like though).
Yeah, but for all we know, the Pasteur could be an even bigger refit than the Enterprise at this point. Mabye in the AGT future, all starship's nacelles look like those on the Pasteur.
Posted by Peregrinus (Member # 504) on :
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