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[QUOTE]Originally posted by Masao: [QB] As I mentioned earlier in this thread, the water displacement method has been suggested many times, but how many people have actually tried it? I tried it and it was too messy and inaccurate. You need a pretty large containers of water (for the large circular primary hulls) and a method of accurately measuring volumes, such as an enourmous graduated cylinder. I found it easier to build models out of clay than reshape the clay into cubes, which can then be measured with a ruler. If anyone has tried the water displacement method, I'd be interested in hearing what values you obtained. By the way, I calculated the volume of the TOS Enterprise (with pencil and paper) to be 197,178.09 cubic meters. If the weight is 190,000 tons, its density is close to that of water. A Daedalus class ships has a volume of 26,436.55 cubic meters. I question whether using present day spacecraft to determine the weights of Starfleet ships is valid. The functions and constructions of modern spacecraft is very different from that of starships. Launch weights of modern rockets are mostly fuel whereas starships carry relatively little fuel. Rockets are basically just cans of fuel with a motor at the end. Unmanned space probes are a poor comparison since they don't carry any crew and are mostly machinery. Also, modern spacecraft that operate only in a vacuum are constructed to be extremely light: they can't be constructed as sturdily as combat starships. I think a better comparison would be modern naval warships or perhaps aircraft and the space shuttle. In particular, warships are extremely similar to starships in layout, function, and crew. Also, their density is less than water, or else they'd sink. For these reasons I think the weight of TOS Enterprise of about 200,000 tons seems correct. It's certainly better than 1 million tons, which would require a density 5 times greater than water. [/QB][/QUOTE]
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