I don't think Excelsior-Classes have a high refit rate. I'd imagine every few decades for a major upgrade, maybe less. If you can imagine the Melbourne as at the end of a refit cycle (and due for another), then it doesn't take too much to believe that the ship had her last major refit thirty or forty years later, thus accounting for the aged appearance of her bridge stations ...

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Star Trek Gamma Quadrant
Average Rated 6.83 out of 10 Smileys by Fabrux
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"Oh, yes, screw logic, let's go for a theory with no evidence!"
-Forum Member Who Shall Be Nameless. 11:48am, Jan. 19th, 2001

I will always stand by the Nebula-Melbourne. She was in both "BoBW" and "Emissary", the registry fits, and she was in Riker's ready room in "Future Imperfect" (which *was* 3rd season, thank you!). All the Excelsior-Melbourne has going for it is seeing the registry semi-clearly, which as we all know counts for naught in Trek. ;-)

While I'm thinking of Excelsiors, any theories as to what the second Excelsiorin Spacedock in ST IV was? Could have been the Repulse, or the Roosevelt -- I personally like Yorktown, the ship Tuvok's parents were serving on at the time of ST VI. True, that last is not referenced as an Excelsior in any way, but it makes sense when considering the circumstantial evidence of 1) the official Paramount party-line that the E-A is the Connie-Yorktown renamed, and 2) the general trend of Starfleet toward the Excelsior class at about that time.

Are we all settled now on the indentifications of the Princeton, Freedom, Ahwahnee, Kyushu, and the unnamed (retired E-A?) movie-Constitution in the graveyard?

I still haven't spotted the Chekov or the Buran, but I haven't stopped squinting. I'm happy with the pics and extrapolations of the former. The Buran, however, doesn't work for me in its existing configuration. Ask Bernd and several others on here who know me -- I much prefer a configuration with straight-horizontally-opposing nacelles, rather than straight-vertical. If anyone's positive of a shot and location in which the Buran can be seen, let me know. Until then, I'll maintain my happy little dreamworld that the orientation of the Buran's engines is a result of either bad resolution or battle damage. :-D

I personally like the better of the two McQuarrie Enterprises to carry the Apollo label, and have spent some time with pencil and eraser trying to make it look more Trek-ish. I think I have succeeded, but to continue (in AutoCAD) I need measurements of the Excelsior primary hull, and the bridge superstructure of the Ambassador. Help appreciated.

And to finish, while I'm thinking of AutoCAD, how badly do you all think I'd get stoned for drafting up some revised TOS Enterprise deckplans that take into account what Matt Jeffries intended and what we saw onscreen -- both of which would end up badly contradicting the FJ deckplans?

I think I'm through for the moment...

--Jonah

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"It's obvious I'm dealing with a moron..."

The Melbourne was Excelsior, which is pretty dammed clear if you saw the first teaser and few acts of BoBW, in which the Enterprise Galaxy-Class and Melbourne Excelsior-Class are orbiting the Borg-attacked world and Hanson is identified to have arrived aboard the Melbourne.

(in Picard's ready room)
Picard: "One's available?"
Hansen: "The Melbourne. It's his if he wants it."

...and...

(again in Picard's ready room)
Picard: "You've been offered the Melbourne."

At no point is there a connection between this mystery Melbourne and the ship Hansen arrived in, but you and the "Emissary" VFX producers and quite a few others are happy to forge one anyway. I can see the rationalization, but I don't subscribe to it.

And the second Excelsior is in ST IV, not III. You need the widescreen edition to spot it, and a good eye for camera angles. Basically, in one shot the Excelsior is pointed directly at the space doors, and in another she's broadside to the doors. This isn't the sort of goof ILM makes, so we assume it's intentional.

And something I forgot earlier... All the discussion about lack of secondary hulls/deflectors is almost painful to me. Every ship that has a Galaxy-type saucer probably also has the saucer-mounted deflectors. And I'd be happy to extend that to the other contemporary ships out there (the Freedom class for instance). As for the Miranda not having one... Anyone else here remember when the big dish was the main sensor? And the deflectors were the greeblies flanking it? The Miranda has those greeblies mounted on the hull and torpedo pod. Just no real long-range sensor capability -- as evidenced by the Reliant's inability to find the Enterprise when the Enterprise could track the Reliant just fine (when they were playing tag around Regulus). What did fandom call them again? "Space-Energy/Matter Field Attraction Sensors" or some shite...

<\rant>

--Jonah

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"It's obvious I'm dealing with a moron..."

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Star Trek Gamma Quadrant
Average Rated 6.27 out of 10 Smileys by Fabrux (with four eps posted)
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"Oh, yes, screw logic, let's go for a theory with no evidence!"
-Forum Member Who Shall Be Nameless. 11:48am, Jan. 19th, 2001

One could say that this Excelsior did at least go from Jouret to the battle of Wolf 359, since it would make little sense for Hanson to change ships en route if he was in a hurry. And apparently, the "ferry Excelsior" didn't stay and linger anywhere near Jouret, since soon after Hanson's departure, the nearest Starfleet assets are 6 days away - shouldn't that ship be counted as an asset if she's still around, even if she's a little bit older, slower and weaker than the E-D?

Hanson arrives on the Melbourne at Jouret.

Hanson leaves on the Melbourne, and commands the Battle for Wolf 359 from the Melbourne. He is aboard the Melbourne when he communicates to the Enterprise-D

This is why there is such emotion when the Enterprise arrives at Wolf 359. Shelby is identifying the ships ... "the Tolstoi, the Tripoli ... the Melbourne..." (I'm making some of these names up, BTW)

Riker and Shelby both become downcast, because they know that Hanson was aboard the Melbourne. And it makes no sense for Hanson to switch from an Excelsior- to a Nebula- class. Also, the background of the communication scene backs up that Hanson was on an older class of starship.

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Star Trek Gamma Quadrant
Average Rated 6.27 out of 10 Smileys by Fabrux (with four eps posted)
***
"Oh, yes, screw logic, let's go for a theory with no evidence!"
-Forum Member Who Shall Be Nameless. 11:48am, Jan. 19th, 2001

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Star Trek Gamma Quadrant
Average Rated 6.27 out of 10 Smileys by Fabrux (with four eps posted)
***
"Oh, yes, screw logic, let's go for a theory with no evidence!"
-Forum Member Who Shall Be Nameless. 11:48am, Jan. 19th, 2001

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Here lies a toppled god,
His fall was not a small one.
We did but build his pedestal,
A narrow and a tall one.

quote:

---

Yeah, "Emissary" establishes that the Excelsior-Class is the Melbourne, doesn't it? Hah! Proof positive

---

The Nebula with the additional warp nacelles in Emissary was labeled with Melbourne too.

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"Second star to the right, and then straight on till morning."

Other points I might as well get out on the table now, so as to concentrate any outrage into a single place:

I also believe the Crazy Horse and Pegasus are properly Cheyenne-class. The forms they appeared in was a result of lack of foresight.

The Yamato's registry is NCC-71807, not NCC-1305-E.

And it's Brattain, dammit.

Now then. Yes, the Melbourne was also mentioned in "11001001". No, we didn't see it. What I meant in my above post was that those were the only other times the name Melbourne was mentioned in "BoBW".

And just because we saw it onscreen doesn't mean it's correct (*cough* Defiant *cough*).

--Jonah

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"It's obvious I'm dealing with a moron..."

Crazy Horse was an Excelsior...

Pegasus was an Oberth...

Regardless of what TPTB "planned" them to be, it doesn't change the fact that they are what we saw.

And the same goes for the Melbourne. It's an Excelsior, it's the only one we saw with the actual name and number on it. Hell, we didn't even see the Nebula one until we figured out it WASN'T the Rigel class in the wreckage!

I don't see why people want to believe the LESS logical of the two sides, and then come up with far-fetched reasons for why they are right...

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"No, 3 & 6 are mandatory, so you only have to do them if you want"

I didn't say ignore what's onscreen. Just take what onscreen with several solar masses of Sodium Chloride. As nice as it would be to just accept things as they ended up onscreen, the laziness inherent in the system has created many little flaws, mistakes, and contradictions that a completist canNOT just sweep off into a dark little corner and ignore. Mike Okuda intended the Crazy Horse and Pegasus to be Cheyennes. VFX budget couldn't allow that. I wouldn't have had as much of a problem with it if they'd then simply used different names and registries for the ships we eventually saw onscreen, but they didn't. It's worse in the case of the Pegasus, thanks to the clearly visible displays in engineering that show four long nacelles.

As for the Melbourne? Go read Bernd's Wolf 359 research page, for one. Take a gander at the two pics of the Melbourne miniature. As soon as I saw those, I went back and re-watched "BoBW". What I'd first taken for a smudge is the registry. If it weren't for the resolution limits of TV and video tape, it would be legible -- for the record, the clearest and largest one in that episode. Same holds for "Emissary", even though I almost passed out from holding myself upside down to see it better.

The ship in "Night Terrors" is Brattain, not Brittain. There is someone very specific it was named after, rationalizations be damned.

One cannot cling to the "TPTB can do no wrong" position. They can, they have, they will. Maybe if I can convince Mike to float the idea of a Special Edition treatment for the last three series to fix some of those mistakes... and maybe toss in some neat new stuff, too. I for one would love to see the other three ships in "Conspiracy" and a properly-choreographed battle in DS9.

Also, why is everyone so quick to dismiss the list from the exhibit that Fitz told us about? I see nothing wrong with it except potentially the "Peking" spelling. Granted, it brings our total to 42 ships, but I've always believed the unarmed Oberths were there to evauate the lifeboats, and thus the Bonestell isn't counted in the "40 starships" figure. Additional circumstantial evidence being in Star Trek IV, "two starships and three smaller vessels" were disabled by the Probe -- the two starships being the Saratoga and Yorktown, and one of the others being the Oberth-class Shepard. So the Bonestell wouldn't count as a starship anyway.

--Jonah

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"It's obvious I'm dealing with a moron..."