None of my current comissions looks like an explorer (and only one is the right length)- my stuff is all Dominion War right now and making masters for reproduction as model kits (like the Ageian class).
Still, I slacked biiigtime and should have entered something. [QUOTE]Originally posted by Mark Nguyen: [QB] Ahh, the Chariot-class from scifi-meshes.com! Beautiful, if Trekkishly implausible in the design lineage sense (that's a lot of lift-hopping to get from place to place). Hmm...I'd have to add something to the ventral protrusion to draw the eye downward (mabye some glowy sensor array), but I think the design is as plausable as any of the Romulan ships we've seen: as the Titan's crew is suppoosedly so diverse, why not make vertical corridors with zero-G to allow fast emergency travel?
The entire lower third of the ship might be dedicated to labs and "sensor nets" on a deep space explorer like the Titan is supposed to be.
Really, each series (and the books are no exception) need to establish a unique look if they are going to draw fans and this "Chariot" design would do that nicely.
It's growing on me....mabye I'll build a model of it.
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I mean, how practical is it to get to the engineering hull? Are we really supposed to believe there are turbolifts running through the nacelle support pylons?
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I guess it depends on the ship's original mission and nature. Warp field dynamics?
If you complain about accessing the lower decks on the Oberth - you have to complain about accessing half of the ship on the Steamrunner!
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Meh. At least the Steamrunner is large enough for turbolifts or catwalk-like walkways to the aft pod, along one side of the nacelles. You can had diagonal tubes or stairwells from there. They doubtless have special shielding for those areas, as they must have on the Saber class as well. Oberth too, probably.
And on that note, yes, someone figured that at most accepted scales for the Oberth, a standard turbolift could fit down the pylons with room to spare. Impractical, yes - but not impossible.
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Before TNG's "Hero Worship" and before all the discussions on the Net, I dismissed the idea of actual decks in the Oberth class engineering section. I couldn't see a T/E shaft going along the pylons. I imagined the lower section was one large sensor suite or other devices.
Maybe they use transporters to get there?
The same goes for the Steamrunner class. I never thought the lower slung lsection of the ship as being crew accessable. I concluded it was all deflector or sesnor or other equipment not needing constant access.
To carry the impractical discussion further, what about the Catamaran hull of the Akiria? The ship looks sweet, but imagine being in the back end of the port hull and having to book it over to the starboard end. Talk about a trip.
Something I've wondered about the Akira is where is the warp core? In the saucer? If that's the case, then the plasma distribution conduits would have to go a very long way to reach the nacelles.
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The Akira's warpcore is in the center saucer on most models I've seen (though the official CGI is not so detailed). NOthing wrong with that- the two computer cores could be in the catamaran hulls- leaving plenty of room for a large (if not through-deck) hangar bay and engineering section in the saucer.
On an Akira, you could always take a quick turbolift from one ctamaran to the other by cutting across the torpedo pod- there must be a couple of turboshafts there for it to work.
I always figured that for stuff like the Oberth's sensor pod or the Miranda's torpedo launcher there must be a safe beaming method that does not count as "intraship beaming". Mabye they transmit the matter stream along special conduits- lind of like an airport speedway but without physical bodies moving along the paths.
I dont see any pressing need to hang out behinfd the deflector on the Steamrunner: I'm sure jeffries tubes and turbolifts lead down there for repairs and such but staffing would be minimal if at all (OTOH, there were people assigned the shit job of manning the interior nacelles on the Galaxy class so you never know...).
I think all of the linked designs look good and plausable (if in need of some cosmetic tweaking on the last one to look more "starfleet".
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Wow, I really like these two you posted http://jason9704.fotopic.net/p6445847.html Reminds me of the ventral weight on a sailboat- I almost feel like it should be carrier further with a more vertical ship- perhaps that would look too unFederation. It does trouble me that the nacelles are to either side of the secondary hull- Warp drive is supposed to function by warping space between the two nacelles to push the ship forward- which is why the nacelles are usually out on pylons and extended up over the ship. Perhaps if it looked more like a quad-nacelle- but with the two somewhat built together I'd like it more... Still very cool. http://jason9704.fotopic.net/p4268821.html I really like it- though it does remind me of the Steamrunner class with a lot of the saucer cut away. I would not see this as an explorer, but as a combat vessel. It's like the Steamrunner, only there was a war going on.. and the team at the shipyards pondered how they could make it faster and do so using less material.
I've seen a number of places that "It was the Titan- and it should be bigger, not smaller". Those were the rules though, and they do have a logic. It is not after all the "Titan Class"- it is the "Luna Class" And lunar bodies tend to be the smallest. I often stuck to similar naming schemes for my ships as was started with the Danube Class (all then are named after rivers) The Luna Class are all named after moons- (Just Terran moons- and though I'd like the UFP to be a little less Terrancentric.... ) but as they are named after Terran moons, the design need only apply to the class, because it cannot apply to all the vessels individually- it'd be odd to have a huge USS Amalthea- the smallest moon of Jupiter, named after the nymph brought milk to Jupiter when he was an infant.
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quote:Originally posted by Shakaar: It does trouble me that the nacelles are to either side of the secondary hull- Warp drive is supposed to function by warping space between the two nacelles to push the ship forward- which is why the nacelles are usually out on pylons and extended up over the ship.
What about the Defiant-class? Or the Intrepid-class?
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Intrepid class raises them up when it goes to warp so the rear of the nacelle clears the top of the shuttlebay. The Defiant is something different... I ponder that this principal of warp, has been forgotten since it was created- course it did give it its name... With the Defiant I like to think it was actually a quad nacelle in disguise- that to get around the warping between the nacelles, they created it so that there were dual components in one side, and that is warped between the two halves and pushed the vessel that way. It does allow for a much more tucked in design better for a war ship, and Sisko did say that the design of the warp drive made it so powerful it nearly tear the ship apart in testing- I find that to be an illogical statement if it were a normal dual nacelle. 1) The Federation should have the know-how to build a starship of that size with warp drive that does not tear itself apart, if it were normal. 2) It takes many fold the power the travel at warp than it does to wage war- the warp core never pulsates quickly when they are in combat as it does when the ship is even at low warp- thus it is not logical to design a vessel with a more powerful warp core than what it needs to travel at warp, if it were normal. 3) The Defiant is a single hull vessel, it should be able to withstand the most hull stress out of any Federation vessel, and the fact it was greater in strength and had problems is a point of curiosity. 4) We�ve now been told of the Defiant�s super powerful warp engines, and also taking into account the much lower mass of the vessel- we discover it is really quite slow compared to normal Starfleet vessels. This is what leads me to believe that either: A) It�s a quadcore and each side warps space between two parts, in a small enclosed space, and that both sides then push the ship forward- it is more protected, but comes at a cost because it takes more power to get speed out of this system because there really should be greater distance between the two parts to work at peak effectiveness, and to make up for this they dump more power into it to get it up to normal speeds. B) Sisko & Starfleet committed several errors in the design of the Defiant.
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I seem to remember something to the effect of the Defiant being all the power and weapons of a Galaxy in a smaller package. Also, Roddenberry's starship design rules have been invalidated so many times that I find it amusing people still stick with them.
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