-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
posted
I don't agree with why it isn't a Connie refit.
Let's look to the end of the 23rd century. The Excelsior-Class has become the explorer of Starfleet, and Constitution-Class starships are set for retirement (evidence in TUC, "this ship and crew are due to stand down"). Now, perhaps Starfleet has a need for a light ship for assorted duties, and some bright headed lieutenant commander eager for a promotion comes up with an idea - "Hey, instead of scrapping all these Connies, why not do some refit work?"
It does make sense - presumeably, the Constitution-Class has at least the life-span of the Miranda-Class, and we've seen how long those have lasted. Even if you argue that the older Connies from TOS had a shorter span, a counter arguement would be that the TMP refit was initiated by Starfleet to expand the ship's operational life-span, and that new Connies built to those specs would also have that longer life-span.
The plan is thus: chop off the secondary hull, and gut the primary hull. Reconfigure the primary hull to accomodate a Mirandized-deflector, and engineering section, and other neccessities of a starship. The pros are clear: you save time by using an existing hull, meaning your productivity is higher - in the time time it takes you to build twelve ships of a new light-cruiser designation, you could possibly convert the entire Consitution fleet (let's guesstimate it at two to three dozen). Also, you have this new class of ship ready for space trials much faster, and you still have the ship's previous crew ready to man the vessel.
A Miranda-Class ship holds all of this, but does have a bit bigger hull, true ... on the other hand, there's no reason why a refitted Connie couldn't contain all of the neccessary sections with a smaller crew then a Miranda. Heck, if the ship's purpose is just cargo transfers, supply runs, and VIP transport, the ship could operate with a crew as small as a few dozen.
I don't see why the "ex-Connie" arguement is so quickly stricken. I think it does make sense. I don't think it is neccessarily correct, but I don't see why it couldn't be.
quote:Originally posted by Malnurtured Snay: A Miranda-Class ship holds all of this, but does have a bit bigger hull, true ... on the other hand, there's no reason why a refitted Connie couldn't contain all of the neccessary sections with a smaller crew then a Miranda.
Recall also, the Miranda class USS Lantree's crew was only twelve. Presumably to automation. That means that a Connie Refit could be used for this severe refit. I'd think small ships like this were on constant patrol throught the Fed to help in ship disasters, patrol the borders and stop piracy. The ship's probably a good match for a couple of Hediki's but would probably eat it against a Jemmie bug.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
posted
Yeah, but the Lantree had a crew of 12 in the mid 24th Century, the Connie Refit as described would probably have occured in the late 23rd century, so the ship would probably have been refit with a larger crew in mind - anywhere from 60 to 100 personnel (doesn't the Miranda staff close to 200+ crew in normal operations?), a number which could easily be reduced by the time of TNG/DS9, at which point automation systems seem to be much more reliable and ships don't require such large crews.
posted
Yeah. I figure the Polaris- if in continous service- would have recieved periodic upgrades just as trhe lantree did and if it's something de-mothballed, they'd want it to have the least crew possible due to manpower shortages during the war.
A bit OT: I wonder if Spacedock was ever armed DS9-style during the Dominion War.....mabye to protect Utopia Planetia?
If so, it's be a "not to be fucked with" outpost.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
posted
How do we know that it wasn't already heavily armed?
quote:Originally posted by Malnurtured Snay: Constitution-Class starships are set for retirement (evidence in TUC, "this ship and crew are due to stand down").
Er, the fact that the quote says "This ship", and not "all ships of this class", makes that evidence a bit, well, rubbish.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
quote:Originally posted by PsyLiam: How do we know that it wasn't already heavily armed?
Y'know, I thought about that after I posted in. If you're of the group that believes a Quantum Torpedo can be fired from a Photorp launcher, the Polaris could be VERY effective for such a small ship. Epically if they operate in packs of three in a relativly small area (say a million km) so they'd be able to back each other up when they ran into trouble.
This ship would still be better armed than a KBOP.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
quote:Er, the fact that the quote says "This ship", and not "all ships of this class", makes that evidence a bit, well, rubbish.
It's generally accepted that the Enterprise-A was a renamed USS Yorktown, and that the Yorktown was in service during the days of TOS, yes? If we assume two things:
1) That Starfleet was phasing out the Constitution-Class starship in favor of the Excelsior and Miranda-Class as evidenced by:
(A) On screen evidence in TNG and DS9, not once do we see a Connie on screen, but we do see plenty of ships from that time period - Excelsiors, Mirandas, even some Constellations early on in TNG.
(B) That "a" indicates, or at least supports the conclusion, that the Constitution-Class starship was not in service by the era of TNG/DS9, thus opening the possibility that the Polaris-Class may have its origins in the mothballed Connie-fleet.
2) That the Yorktown/Enterprise-A was being retired because of her age, thusly all of the early run (surviving) Connies had either already been decomissioned or were slated for upcoming decomissioning. Later production run Connies (ships built new after TMP?) may have continued service for longer.
None of this proves that the Polaris-Class has its origins in the Constitution-Class, but there's really no evidence to shoot down the theory either. We know that ships of the time period had extremely long lifetimes, so why would Starfleet scrap an entire class when it could retrofit the Consitution-Class starships to provide a niche that otherwise would have to be filled by an entirely new class of starship?
quote:Originally posted by Malnurtured Snay: It's generally accepted that the Enterprise-A was a renamed USS Yorktown, and that the Yorktown was in service during the days of TOS, yes?
No.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
If you go for that Yorktown cra...er idea, it's very unlikely the ship was a TOS model: NOTHING worked on that junkpile in STV and it's layout was diffrent enough that a drunken Scotty knocked himself out on a pipe.
I'd think that ships were still being built utilizing the (possibly modular) connie saucer and nacelle designs as far as 50 years post STVI. Mirandas may have been built even after that. Later, the idea of changing ship components around moves on to the Excelsior group of parts and we get the Centaur, Shelly, Raging Queen and probably other stranger designs using Excelsior components too.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
quote:it's very unlikely the ship was a TOS model: NOTHING worked on that junkpile in STV and it's layout was diffrent enough that a drunken Scotty knocked himself out on a pipe.
How does that prove it ISN'T a TOS model? Remember that the Yorktown was the ship that had to rig a solar sail. For all we know, all the ships affected by the probe experienced similar computer malfunctions which took long refit times to repair.
Suggesting that the ship is a more recent model does however support the notion that the entire Connie line was scrapped after Star Trek VI - why retire a perfectly good ship when its only twenty or so years old? Remember that Kirk states that the ship is due to be retired before it gets punched full of big holes.
Also, what does the pipe prove - Scotty wasn't paying attention, or was drunk, or that the ship's refit was incomplete, that the ship was in the process of a second refit (hinted at by the change in bridges between STIV and STV), *or* to a different design of the original Enterprise - let's not forget that the interior of the ship (the corridors, the shuttlebay, transporter room) looked quite different then that of the Enterprise we saw in previous movies (I know thats because they were using TNG sets for a lot of it, but there's got to be a "real world" explanation).
quote:Originally posted by Malnurtured Snay: Remember that Kirk states that the ship is due to be retired before it gets punched full of big holes.
Where? Because, if I recall correctly, Spock also says to Valeris,
"Nature abhors a vacuum, lieutenant. This will be my final voyage on this ship as a member of her crew. I intend you to replace me."
Which implies that it wasn't originally going to be decommissioned.
And, going by the end of the movie, with the emphasis being mine:
"This will be the final voyage of the starship Enterprise under my command. This ship and her, er, something, will shortly become the care of a new crew."
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
Well, dialog in the movie did contradict itself. Right after the meeting with the top brass, Kirk did say to Spock that the ship and crew were to stand down. This was before Spock's and Valeris' conversation aboard the Enterprise. Also, at the end before Kirk's log, Uhura did say that she received a message from Starfleet to return to Spacedock to be decommissioned.
-------------------- Is it Friday yet?
Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged
Printer-friendly view of this topic
