posted
You know what? The defiant is one hell of a bold design for the federation, I mean look at it no noticeable saucer section, no separate engineering computer core, the weapons are somewhat unconventional, I think it is safe to say that the defiant is the most brilliant design in Starfleet. A more stable structure for warp speed, a more capable weapons arsenal. But there is one major thing I don’t like about the defiant at all…the size. For one thing the size of the ship automatically deprives it of family quarters or comfortable crew quarters, secondly it should above all things be an exploration vessel not a battleship or warship. Sure it is armed to the teeth but if you look at it as being more capable of safe exploration, it qualifies as the safest ship for that particular task. Yet Starfleet built it with three decks and not something like ten or twenty, which would have been fine. Yes, it was made for war, Yes, it is overly armed, Yes, it is arguably the most controversial ship class in the fleet, but only capable of war,No.
-------------------- "Explore New Worlds"
Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
Which is why in the DS9 relaunch books, the Defiant (75633) is outfitted with scientific equipment and the like for exploration of the GQ. It's been a while since I read any of the DS9 relaunch books, but I think that either some crew quarters or some weapons storage had to be sacrificed for the scientific equipment.
-------------------- I haul cardboard and cardboard accessories
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Um, I've never seen anyone argue that the Defiant shouldn't be a warship before, much less suggest a whole bunch of modifications that would turn the Defiant into an Intrepid or something. Wow. Excuse me, I'm gonna be totally awed for a while. Wow.
-------------------- "God's in his heaven. All's right with the world."
Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
Hehe...the new breed of tech fans. Before, they wanted ships with phaser canons and all sorts of super weapons. Now, they want to take these warships and turn them back into exploration vehicles. Maybe Star Trek isn't doomed after all...
Registered: Jul 2000
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capped
I WAS IN THE FUTURE, IT WAS TOO LATE TO RSVP
Member # 709
posted
its not designed to operate independantly for long periods of time though, so it must only be used as a short run explorer, which gives it no range unless there are lots of bases to stop at along the way, which defeats the purpose of exploring, unless you are performing a specific mission in the area before the next stop, because unexplored space wouldnt have bases to stop at.
The crew would be terribly stressed, bunking two to a room with no furniture, no rec space and hardly any medical/workout facilities. Thats why the Defiant is constantly returning to DS9.. its not designed to be taken out for long periods of time. The living conditions are designed for soldiers, people who crew the ship in a battle and dont expect to be permanently assigned there (except for Worf, but he's wierd)
-------------------- "Are you worried that your thoughts are not quite.. clear?"
Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
How long should a starship be able to operate without support of any kind? If (a big if) we accept the idea that antimatter is similar to nuclear fuel, refueling would only be necessary every few years, and range is essentially unlimited in that regard. If that is the case, range might be limited by impulse fuel (which might be collected by bussards), consumables (which might be recyclable with high efficiency or replicable), maintenance (that can't be done in the field), replenishment (photon torpedoes and other nonreplicable items), and crew comfort. Cap'n Mike makes Starfleet crews sound like a bunch of whiny little babies! Good thing they're not on submarines.
Registered: Oct 1999
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posted
So far, we haven't really heard of a starship "running out of oomph" - save for the one infamous moment in VOY where a severe deuterium shortage hit the ship. And when it did, boy if it didn't make a mess: the ship was, like, totally crippled and had to limp to the nearest suitable planet to refuel.
Whether we like it or not, "Demon" is canon. And it's our only real source to information about starships running out of their endurance envelope. So what can we learn from it?
The fuel shortage was apparently rather sudden and unpredicted, to be such a threat to the ship. This might actually suggest that the ships need to refuel fairly often while cruising, and Voyager simply missed two or three of these pit stops in a row. "Fairly often" would probably mean mere months between refills, then. If the shortage was long time in coming, surely Janeway would have taken preemptive action. (Or was the fuel gauge of the ship broken?)
Larger ships might have a different fuel economy, which is why we never ran into the fuel shortage issue when the E-D was stranded a long distance from home, say, by the antics of Q. They might be able to sail sufficiently long between refills that they would never be caught between two refill points - one refill interval would span dozens of such points. But if smaller size means reduced economy, then the Defiant must be especially screwed unless there's a tanker or a friendly harbor nearby.
Also, "Demon" proves that the famous ramscoops cannot refuel the ship in all conditions, not even for impulse flight purposes. Whether the conditions in "Demon" were exceptional or commonplace is not known. Perhaps the ramscoops are only useful across a narrow range of operating parameters. And perhaps the range is different for ships built to perform different missions?
In light of "Demon", it seems possible that the seeming independence and endurance of TOS, TNG and DS9 ships is just an illusion. The ships from those shows probably refuel whenever the camera is turned away. In DS9, such refueling probably involves starbases (during the regular, "peace" episodes) and tankers (during the "war" episodes"), but the exploratory voyages of TOS and TNG cannot rely on starbases alone.
Perhaps Kirk and Picard rendezvoused with tankers fairly often. Or then there are "sweet spots" in space for ramscoop refueling, and the ship sought out those (but left a safety margin, unlike the Voyager). Certainly they couldn't refuel from the surfaces of Demon-style planets, since only the Voyager met the hardware requirements for that.
Possibly the Defiant would meet those requirements as well, given how she has demonstrated semi-controlled planetary landing ("Children of Time"), tractoring of large objects to orbit ("The Ship"), and maneuvering in atmospheres ("Starship Down" et al). But overall, she looks like a ship that would rely heavily on tankers and tenders and other external support if forced to take on a long-range, long-duration mission.
We have to remember, though, that the Valiant operated for a long time without any external support... Perhaps that's the best benchmark we have for Defiant-class exploration potential.
(Uh, and I just remembered that "Night" ought to set the standard for Intrepid class endurance. Two years without any chance at refueling beyond ramscoops didn't seem to worry Janeway there.)
Timo Saloniemi
[ April 10, 2002, 02:00: Message edited by: Timo ]
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted
Well, my biggest disagreement with the original post is the idea that the ship should have been built for exploration. Says who? "The Search" establishes that the ship was built for pretty much one reason: to fight the Borg. At the time it was constructed, that was its only purpose. Now, when the Borg threat became less pressing, the project was redeveloped a little, but it still retained its original design.
The Defiant was built as a Borg Killer...not an explorer.
posted
Amen. And if we want to give our DS9 heroes some exploration duties (which they never really had during the run of the TV show) for the book series, why not give them a new and better-suited ship? This Commander Vaughn character could fly the Defiant in a defensive/offensive role, while the rest could go gallivanting across the Gamma quadrant aboard a Nova class ship or something.
A stupid concept in the first place, really. DS9 was not about our heroes exploring Gamma, for a good reason - they had better things to do, like actually running the station and minding the wormhole. The Defiant was mainly there for "armed recce", and seems largely unsuited for Sisko's heirs now that the war is over.
So, what do you think - what sort of auxiliary ships SHOULD the DS9 heroes have in the post-show environment? Defiants? Runabouts? Big honking "full starships" from Voyager size up?
capped
I WAS IN THE FUTURE, IT WAS TOO LATE TO RSVP
Member # 709
posted
sorry to make starfleet crews seem like "whiny babies"... but how long is a submarine designed to operate without letting its crew out hmm? five years? ten?
no? thats because the realities of a long range space exploration is a little different that submarine patrol.
thanx
-------------------- "Are you worried that your thoughts are not quite.. clear?"
Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
The ramscoop is probably only operable within a narrow range of conditions. An old book I have called "The Science In Science Fiction" has a couple of pages on a ramscoop as a starship propulsion system. It points out that at the density of interstellar space (one to two atoms of hydrogen per cubic centimeter) a 100,000 ton vessel would need a collecting field with a funnel radius of 34,100 kilometers. (How the author determined these figures I do not know.) Moreover, since fusion engines use deuterium, only one atom in 6,700 of what would be collected would be useful as fuel.
It seems likely that the ramscoops would be useful only in a fairly dense cloud of hydrogen gas; out in normal interstellar space there would be very little to work with.
-------------------- The difference between genius and idiocy? Genius has its limits.
Registered: Aug 2001
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Amasov Prime
lensfare-induced epileptic shock
Member # 742
posted
Hey, I just finished the comic dealing with the Trill and that one guy who wants to destroy every Worm on the planet, Verad? I think that was his name (he appeared on DS9 once). And I noticed something at the beginning; when Defiant arrives at Trill to meet with the terrorists, they are ambushed, and they are not able to beam them back. Commander Vaughn launches two shuttles (not the pods, the real shuttles from 'The Sound of her Voice'), Chaffee and Sagan. That made me think about the capabilities of the ship; the MSD doesn't show anything shuttlebay-related behind the bay, but the schematic from the DS9TM ( this one's from maximumdefiant.com ) shows a door behind the main hangar. And the game 'The Fallen' included the complete ship, with an accessable repair bay behind that door. So a possible storage room for another shuttle. And what did they say about the pods? 2 or 4? If every secondary bay holds one ship, then it's 2, but could there be a similar storage?
-------------------- "This is great. Usually it's just cardboard walls in a garage."
Registered: Nov 2001
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capped
I WAS IN THE FUTURE, IT WAS TOO LATE TO RSVP
Member # 709
posted
eh.. Drexler has them swap out new shuttlebays every six months or so.. keeps it fresh
I was really disappointed the comic didnt show the correct 75633 reg for the Defiant III
Registered: Sep 2001
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