Greetings!

Welcome to Scifi-Meshes.com! Click one of these buttons to join in on the fun.

3DSovereign Suggestions?

13567

Posts

  • SaquistSaquist1 Posts: 0Member
    jrhottel wrote: »
    It been a little bit. Here's what I've been work on. First, I've been modeling more interior features. I wanted a sense of the ships layout, particularly with regard to saucer separation and shuttle bays. Now I'm working it into a Master Systems Display.

    Attachment not found.

    The next image gets the cart way out in front of the horse. I wanted to experiment with image based lighting. I have been doing allot of high dynamic range photography. The starfield was an attempt at using those processes on telescope data. I have learned allot since then and have much more to try.

    Attachment not found.

    Yeah, Sovereign is an extremely short range ship with less than half the Galaxy storage of Antimatter and Deuterium. The Tech manual says it has 30 antimatter pods. Makes sense as to why Enterprise ran out of torpedoes so quickly in Nemesis.

    I like this MSD in 3D. It's a great idea. Looks like you've divided up the Star Drive into isolated sections. Very nice.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    Excelsior_MSD_Desktop_2650x1600.jpg I'm still working and MSD 1.0 is finished. It's actually a 4.5 x 3 foot poster. If you want to see the details get the .tiff file from link below. Changes are certain so don't be shy with suggestions. I used 3DS Max, Illustrator and Photoshop. In Photoshop I colorized with hue saturation adjustment layers. I probably should have just painted at low opacity. I don't have much experience painting in Photoshop and need to invest in a Wacom tablet. This thread still has the image from my original post, if anyone can tell me how to change it I'd be grateful. https://skydrive.live.com/embed?cid=9F65D11238DF02A7&resid=9F65D11238DF02A7%211166&authkey=AMaB9k73p
    102719.jpg
  • SaquistSaquist1 Posts: 0Member
    I like the 3D Frost-over style. Looks accurate while being futuristic and less 90's-ish.
    Trek has needed an upgrade in the GUI system departement for some time...This could be part of an interactive display or 3D holographic display. Trek needs a more "Mass Effect" Like attitude toward the future.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    I've been planning a master systems hologram all along and had the novel idea to put systems on my MSD. Actually, I think the ship images are a little retro as well. If you ever have the opportunity to look a aircraft maintenance manuals from the forties and fifties some illustrations based on photographs look allot like that.
  • BlueNeumannBlueNeumann615 Posts: 1,275Member
    I'd been playing around with marrying the LCARS system with the JJ-style interfaces (which I actually don't like that much)... honestly I'm surprised they didn't go with a Mark Coleran style (sample video here on Vimeo) or like what we saw in Oblivion or Skyfall... monochromatic and sleek.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    Digital Tutors has a lesson series on making animated displays of that sort using 3DS Max particles and animation, Illustrator and After Effects. I have other projects for now so animating the MSD will wait until modeling the bridge. I'm thinking of a engineering table with a free standing holographic MSD, traditional displays with holographic HUDs and popup/pull down checklists. HUD/Checklists at the Captains chair as well. I'm not sure the LCARS look is hopelessly out dated. In my book thoughtful, functional layouts are king and LCAR has lots potential. We haven't really seen a moving reconfigurable LCARS display yet, though that's always been implied. One Idea to explore is a reconfigurable 3d panel with knobs sliders and switches. The only thing JJ I liked was the warp core set. I'll have to take a look at the Mass Effects styling Saquist mentioned.
  • BlueNeumannBlueNeumann615 Posts: 1,275Member
    I dig the sleek Syd Mead styling of Mass Effect, it's informing how I do Trek ships (check out my Excalibur, for example), as well as anything else, really.

    As for holograms, I'm not a big fan of those personally and I would avoid using them except when necessary, there's a couple controls that might do well to have a 3D display (navigation, tactical) but having a big ball sticking out would look kinda strange. 2D just feels more accurate, you can't see things through an incorrect perspective. Having said that, the holodeck-- total holographic control environment, I can see it being like Final Fantasy-The Spirits Within.

    I don't know if they count as holograms, they might in the original movies, but I kept thinking maybe if you got a big viewscreen you could put an Iron Man-style HUD on there. That I can go for.

    Here's the link to the Oblivion computers, btw.. Complicated but gorgeous, I feel like maybe THIS is what the NX-01 computers should have looked like... the new LCARS, I think the kicker is deceptive simplicity-- it should have a minimalist, balanced style to it.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    Yes! like that allot. I'm also a big advocate of moving graph displays. The issue is really, designing displays has proven surprisingly time consuming. Hopefully my speed improves with practice.
  • BlueNeumannBlueNeumann615 Posts: 1,275Member
    I hate that on my walk all I could think of, when I was supposed to be thinking of how to finish my scenes, was interfaces for present-day computers for my stories, I kept coming up with ideas like a studio-styled Skype, a webTV viewer called "Showstealer" (after Arrested Development, of course), a customizable iTunes Pro-type program for DJs, all that kind of stuff... gotta doodle them now before I forget. But they're very minimalist in that Oblivion style. There was also gonna be an old iPod-like interface, so old that the cover art looks like the pictures from the Game Boy Camera. I don't have a place to use that yet but I gotta draw it.
  • SaquistSaquist1 Posts: 0Member
    I dig the sleek Syd Mead styling of Mass Effect, it's informing how I do Trek ships (check out my Excalibur, for example), as well as anything else, really.

    As for holograms, I'm not a big fan of those personally and I would avoid using them except when necessary, there's a couple controls that might do well to have a 3D display (navigation, tactical) but having a big ball sticking out would look kinda strange. 2D just feels more accurate, you can't see things through an incorrect perspective. Having said that, the holodeck-- total holographic control environment, I can see it being like Final Fantasy-The Spirits Within.

    I don't know if they count as holograms, they might in the original movies, but I kept thinking maybe if you got a big viewscreen you could put an Iron Man-style HUD on there. That I can go for.

    Here's the link to the Oblivion computers, btw.. Complicated but gorgeous, I feel like maybe THIS is what the NX-01 computers should have looked like... the new LCARS, I think the kicker is deceptive simplicity-- it should have a minimalist, balanced style to it.

    I think before Mass Effect and other movies in the Sci Fi genre it was difficult to to understand how DS9 tried to portray in words a future with holographic interfaces. But just watch Joker pilot the Normandy and it looks...absolutely natural.

    Before Mass Effect I'd say Earth Final Conflict did a fairly good job of showing hand motions with a "hard light" gui system.
    Then there was Minority Report...
    Then Iron man...

    But I mention Mass Effect first because it still combines the traditional "console" with the Holographic interface creating a holo console and at the same time "orbiting controls".

    After looking at this system...the LCARS system is just plain 90's. I know if they had more money it wouldn't be so static and it looked futuristic for long time until stoves, phones washers and dryers and micro waves had the same shiney black surface when off and light up buttons when on. In truth the idea of buttons/icons being movable with the GUI system still isn't fully intergrated but it's getting there with Windows 8 and touch screen tech for home computers.
  • BlueNeumannBlueNeumann615 Posts: 1,275Member
    I do like the holograms in Mass Effect (and, like I said, Final Fantasy) but it seems like... that should be the NEXT step, it's still too futuristic seeming, maybe the ship AFTER this one is the first to have all-holo displays. Gotta have something to look forward to, right?
  • DeksDeks200 Posts: 259Member
    Saquist wrote: »
    Yeah, Sovereign is an extremely short range ship with less than half the Galaxy storage of Antimatter and Deuterium. The Tech manual says it has 30 antimatter pods. Makes sense as to why Enterprise ran out of torpedoes so quickly in Nemesis.

    Doesn't make sense really that the Sovereign would would have a 'short range'. Technical efficiency means that you can do more with less (and given that the Federation comprises of 150 different member worlds that cooperate together, share knowledge and resources - the amount of technological advances the Feds should be making on a yearly basis would effectively equate to 'quantum jumps' of exponential proportions - especially if you consider the premise that our civilization in real life develops new science exponentially already due to increased levels of automation and technology [real science is 60 to 100 years ahead of anything we use in practice, and we don't use state of the art methods of production, nor are we using superior synthetic materials] - which is limited by money [focusing solely on what's 'cheap' and 'cost effective', not what's 'technologically efficient'] - the Feds don't have that limitation and they would be focusing exclusively on what's doable from the perspective of superior synthetic materials, latest science and state of the art methods of production - instead, the writers merely transposed how we do things now into Trek - which is why scifi writers have limited understanding of science and technology and end up dumbing everything down). Its possible the Sovereign class features a more efficient method of storing antimatter and deuterium and using less of both to achieve more power, making it last just as much if not longer than the Galaxy class.
    Keep in mind that given the technological standard that goes into Starfleet ships, they should never really encounter a situation of scarcity because they have the capability of generating abundance through a variety of technological methods and alternatives (on the go).
    Star-ships should be able to park near stars and use solar energy directly to replicate whatever they require, in whatever quantities, and/or use transporters for quick automated construction/disassembly of various objects and converting them into energy (think regular matter being simply converted into energy and stored or manipulated on a sub-atomic level while in energy state to create what's needed in combination with replicators).
    Its also very likely they'd have the capability to store that energy, or modify existing technology (given its versatility) to include that capability.
    The writers on the other hand have no idea how to use this properly, so they project things from real-life and mash them up into an idiotic mumbo-jumbo that should effectively be a non-issue in Trek.

    As for the Enterprise running out of torpedoes quickly in Nemesis - it was firing continuously (on-screen and off screen), so its possible it exhausted a big supply of torpedoes very fast.
    The Enterprise-D on the other hand didn't often encounter situations that would require such high numbers of torpedoes (except perhaps with the Borg) - and its possible that the Ent-E didn't have a full torpedo compliment - but it would have enough to defend itself against regular Warbirds (besides, the Scimitar featured very powerful - overpowered - shielding).

    I do like the approach to the LCARS however. It looks more 'up to date'. Incidentally, Star Trek online was supposed to feature something similar - and then it got sold to another company that mucked it all up.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    I rarely play video games or watch TV, so I'm guessing as what you mean. I can see how a black background is dated, though it works sweet with hardlight images. Essentially, I see no advantage to Hardlight or monochromatic displays. If more than just hinting at functionality, LCARS seem an eminatly suitable display. When it come to interpreting information, pictures schematics and graphs are the way to go, allot of work for a designer though. Can you find any images, maybe of the orbiting controls? For the future I'm betting on direct neural interfacing but that's another subject or movie.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    I agree Star Trek writers have not thought through many of the implications of the technology they write about. The thing is Star Trek was a great tool for social commentary. Star Trek looked at issues that were too heated to touch else where on TV and we've really lost something there. Now we have JJ Trek but as much as I hate to admit it, first you tell a good story and then sweat the details. What I've thought is for all that technology increase, exponential increases in power are required for only marginal increases in warp speed. It seem you would effectively hit a wall pending a complete paradigm shift. Anyway, I probably shouldn't step up on the soap box just now. It's hard to stop me.
  • DeksDeks200 Posts: 259Member
    I liked the premise that Trek touched upon social issues on a good enough basis, however, when it came to actual social development, technology, etc. (to write things relevant to the supposed era the setting was in), the writers dumbed EVERYTHING down. They dumbed down the technology, they dumbed down the people, they progressively ignored the 'thinking differently' type of mentality of Humans (and various other cultures) and as Trek progressed, it effectively featured humans from today in space (who often behaved like children - and not an 'evolved culture') - plus, situations went from one extreme into the other. Instead of creating innovative solutions to problems, they ended up using force (at least TNG and Voyager didn't do this all the time, although Voyager did in later seasons).
    If you noticed - warp drive at the start of TNG was noticeably faster, until it progressively got slower throughout the seasons and when Voyager's writers finally 'nailed it' by saying that Warp 9.975 would translate 1000 LY's = 1 year (and in season 1 of TNG, they were zipping through such distances in a relative blink of the eye - which seems more consistent with Excelsiors Transwarp experimentation and redefinition of the Warp scale - I mean, in TOS they went to the Galactic barrier in a short amount of time).

    This is why I cringe when we develop new technologies in real life and people cry: grey goo scenario, terminator/skynet.
    These things are products of artistic minds that have a very limited understanding of both science, technology, etc. - people end up fearing imaginary fairy-tales that they saw in movies (which were made not to educate, but to 'entertain' - which is why I stopped watching TV about 10 years ago, and I 'cringe' at what 'scifi' movies do on a regular basis [past and present]).
    Trek did various things 'right' at first (in TNG mostly), but then it suffered progressive dumbing down I'm afraid.
    DS9 (at least from what I gathered) was the worst offender in dumbing things down.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    Hell, you really want me on the soap box. TOS had social commentary, TNG it was often there but really toned down and Trek risked getting boring. Rather than Return to relevant themes we got the borg. The borg screamed the future is less safe pay attention. With DS9 we devolve into a war story and not a bad one. Voyager is a "Odyssey" story of the voyage home. Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek has been gone for a long time now. If it were up to me and it's not, they'd find another secular, humanist, writer, producer, futurist, and start shining light on all the elephants in the room. Like when do the end Justify the means. Freedom vs security. What really is freedom. Why are we risking our live in exploration. And, how about the tension between democratic ideals and militarism or capitalism. All for starters. Maybe, most of all show a hopeful vision. Oh, and I want aliens to be more alien.

    I await the stone throwing...
  • SaquistSaquist1 Posts: 0Member
    @Deks (corrected)

    I try to draw these conclusions without overextending inference. For instance:

    Nemesis: Enterprise regenerated it's shields twice. The first time, more powerful than when the ship was at warp.
    I concluded this was the never seen Regenerative Shields spoke of in VOY: Message in a Bottle.
    Further, Sovereign must not be cable of high warp speeds at Battle stations, nor the shields at max while at warp. Limited to warp 9.5 or less as Shinzon and Picard seem to know speed was a problem for this class.

    "Short Range Explorer"
    The Federation seems to use solitary-multipurpose cruisers to defend and patrol the Border/Colony Worlds. Sovereign is heavily armed to this purpose. I don't know about stellar refueling as solar cells aren't found frequently in Trek, but at warp speeds Sovereign can easily refuel from the interstellar medium that floods the Galaxy. But antimatter is more difficult to find, therefore ships convert hydrogen into anti-hydrogen...which takes power and can cut your fuel supply by 2 fold. That would still mean without large stores of anti-matter ships would need to stay within 1 or 2 years travel of the Colony Worlds. (as opposed to 5 years) Voyager is in this same category.

    Matter/Antimatter reactions carry away large amounts of energy in weakly interacting neutrinos. I imagined Trek used some type of Higgs scalar fields to capture neutrinos and increase power efficiency. I always assumed they were approaching 99% efficiency already because of the tremendous amount of power a warp field would need.

    I did consider as you that much of Enterprise's arsenal was not seen launched in the film.

    Trek's tech was explained at the beginning of our understanding of Dark Matter.
    It's progressed so far (in understanding the depth of our ignorance) that Trek needs a tech make over to fit reality.
    If Trek is to find more power than the M/A Reactor then they'll have to go Zero-point/Dark Energy like Stargate.

    There is not much to add beyond your description of Trek's social dynamic and writing. I agree it was limited and childish perhaps preachy in a 20th century sense...too singular in a Galaxy of multiple sentient forms and cultures. DS9 (yes) being the worse offender. I concluded DS9's only intelligent episode of scientific curiosity was "Visionary". DS9 had poor juxtaposition in drama. Highly stereotypical species. Constant character inconsistency and flips, and perhaps my worse complaint, an extremely poor handling of the strategy of war. To this day it's completely unclear how the Federation won the Dominion War. Many take this for granted.

    With this being the better side of TV I can see why you'd chose not to watch it for the last 10 years. It's been much much worse than this, especially now. I haven't seen a Sci-Fi show worth watching since SG-Atlantis and that was really pushing the "worth" qualification. I just liked the characters. Now I mostly watch sports other wise the screen is off.

    @ jrhottel

    The orbiting interface was never shown consistently.

    Normally in cinematics Timestamp: 8:32
    You can see that the pilot has both an errect holographic control in front of him as well as holographic keyboards on the consoles.

    Better seen here starting with the control Room at Time stamp 5:08
    and against as Joker (The pilot) files away from the explosion
    Timestamp 5:24
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fIKeiJypeI
    ---
    In this one you can see General holographics in the arm Omni Tools: Time stamp: 1:46
    Tacial projections: Time stamp: 1:39

    Legion's hack of the door: Timestamp 4:53
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNg6T49SlME
    Essentially the GUI system rotates with certain hand movements just like our touch screen products today and it makes alot of sense that with the Federation's superior holographic tech they would use it just as effectively or more so. This should include see through graphics and interfaces as well as solid holographic interfaces that look just like normal matter like we see in the holodeck.

    What I'm saying is Star Wars and Mass Effect show 'imperfect' holographic tech. You see pixels lines, the image wavers, you see through the hologram. Trek can make holograms look real. That is amazing technology...and it's being under used in Trek. So look at the differences here and be creative. Imagine what you could do with a flexible combination of imperfect holographic interfaces and perfectly solid holographic interfaces.

    (Yes, it's true there needs to be a gradualism from the imperfect to the perfect holo systems but think about how long perfect holographic tech has been around in trek...since ENT (Enterprise) the only reason why it hasn't advanced in Trek is the producers and limited resources and imagination of the shows' illustrators.)

    Hasn't Trek been held back enough?



    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gssML_aVmk
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    Thanks again Saquist, good stuff. Basically, there is little reason to even know it's a hologram unless, like my holographic ship, you want to see interior details, or maybe have HUD displays materializing on demand. I'll give it more thought but at the moment I'm leaning toward augmenting rather than replacing LCARS. For other panels, I'll experiment with a bump map and physical controls.
  • BlueNeumannBlueNeumann615 Posts: 1,275Member
    I quite liked the holographic book case in Data's library in "All Good Things." When I think futuristic design and so on (I'm in real civilian mode at the moment) I'm thinking along the lines of non-intrusive: for example, you have a blank wall and a TV only appears there when you want it there, and you can expand or contract the size as you want, so you're not stuck with a big monitor there or a glass pane or whatever. When we saw the SF trolly in "Into Darkness," in my head it should have looked completely old school: wood and brass and all that jazz, no ads or banners (words on the outside would be painted on in the old style), but a holographic overlay map would appear in the space reserved for ads when a stop is coming up or to show you where you are. You switch those off, the trolley looks like a beautifully-restored antique.

    I think you also have to think of the power drain that holograms create, they're always the first things shut off, it's not just that they need dependable holograms, but they need to be low-power enough that they can't shut off. The LCARs take up much less energy. Having said that, I can picture in my mind a bridge dark with just the holograms for illumination and it looks DARN good.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    I agree on all counts. By that level of technology interiors could be in almost any style or time period and furnishings easily reconfigured. The issues of interior space and combat survivability don't go away though. I felt TNG was questionable on both counts but we'll see what I come up with when modeling things out. It's a safe bet much of the ship will be more cramped and spartan, though. This variant does represent some degree of militarization.

    I was already considering low light battle stations on the bridge, thought I have not thought of reason for it yet. I have already windowed parts of the overhead bridge dome and was thinking that area was a candidate for ablative armor. Likewise, I was considering turning all windows opaque for battle. Just Ideas.

    I'm actually working out the ships interior in some detail. One complication is that many windows in the saucer need to be in the ceiling and would likely not work well for standard deck heights.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    Working and still learning. The Saucer has been full rebuilt since lasts shown. The stardrive is a mess, shown here as rough concept. Also shown turbo tube layout. Pass through s have been modeled between saucer and stardrive. Obviously this is a new saucer separation scheme and different than the implied by the movie model. While closely matching movie model in length and breadth The profile of this ship is significantly changed. Soveriegn_13_11_01.jpgScreenshot-(6).jpgScreenshot-(1).jpgScreenshot-(3).jpgScreenshot-(4).jpgScreenshot-(5).jpg
    103859.jpg103860.jpg103861.jpg103862.jpg103863.jpg103864.jpg
  • Vortex5972Vortex5972321 Posts: 1,202Member
    Looks great!
  • SaquistSaquist1 Posts: 0Member
    I like the ventral side of the nacelle tips. I like less smooth on Sovereign it uses too much smoothing for no reason. I guess those round things are docking latches lining the Secondary hull mating side. The deflector is the biggest improvement over Sovereign. It looked like Eaves just ran out of ideas and stuck a round disk in a box. Now it has a bit of life....
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    I was thinking of very large NASA stud and conicals as docking latches. Ridiculously old technology but I would think mechanical locks are still in order. The galaxy had, like, extending magnetic catch pads. They would take a hell of a lot of space and I'm thinking they're not strictly needed on the sovereign. As for the deflector dish, it reflects details in Eaves sketches that didn't make it to the movie model. I'm incorporating such details when workable. I'm still thinking about the captain's yacht. I stowed the nacelles out like on the Intrepid's yacht. Clearly the original Sovereign yacht wrapped the nacelles up to fuselage before docking but we never get to see how it works. Does any one feel strongly about either configuration? One consideration is that the yacht is much to small as depicted on the original Sovereign.
  • SaquistSaquist1 Posts: 0Member
    I see your computer has the same problem as mine with fractalizing the model in perspective view.

    The Galaxy Class Separation Latching System is designed to relay physical and dynamic movement stresses through the ships load bearing structural members. They use electrofluid to enhance their structural abilities with the ships IDF & SIF

    Docking latches come in sets and seat fully deployed into the saucer section. A a structural locking wedge is "driven into the gap between the plates." It sounds good but I think they messed up the explanation in comparison with the actual latch design especially since they say- "Each active latch segment is consists of two spreading grab plates driven by four redundant sets of electro-fluidic pistons." Visually there are four latches that have no pairs at all so what are they grabbing on to...who knows.

    I imagine that the grab plates would spread apart once through the latch aperatures (holes) an squeese the hulls together a structure point in the vessel.

    Were you able to place impulse engines on the stardrive?
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    Impulse drive for the stardrive remains a problem as nothing physically compares to the massive impulse nozzles of the saucer. I'm forced to conclude it works differently on the stardrive despite still being a vectored plasma, Newtonian physics drive system. Perhaps it relies on a mass reduction mechanism. Anyway, all I've done so far is add additional thruster type ports to the stern of the nacelles. Has this issue been addressed in any similar design. Another consideration is if the stardrive should have it's own impulse reactor. It seems the warp core could provide impulse plasma. A reactor as auxiliary power source or pony engine to the warp core it is worth consideration, though. All Ideas welcome.
  • SaquistSaquist1 Posts: 0Member
    jrhottel wrote: »
    Impulse drive for the stardrive remains a problem as nothing physically compares to the massive impulse nozzles of the saucer. I'm forced to conclude it works differently on the stardrive despite still being a vectored plasma, Newtonian physics drive system. Perhaps it relies on a mass reduction mechanism. Anyway, all I've done so far is add additional thruster type ports to the stern of the nacelles. Has this issue been addressed in any similar design. Another consideration is if the stardrive should have it's own impulse reactor. It seems the warp core could provide impulse plasma. A reactor as auxiliary power source or pony engine to the warp core it is worth consideration, though. All Ideas welcome.

    Well...

    I've never considered the impulse engine a Newtonian Physics Rocket.
    1. They simply don't have that much fuel on board. (especially Voyager) and no one talks about refueling, 5 year mission in all.
    2. to many examples of Federation starships using reverse thrust or retro fire without a hint of vector exhaust or forward impulse engines. I don't subscribe to the forcefield vectored exhaust...not when Enterprise reverse out of a nebula that prevents shields.

    I always thought that they compressed energy from advanced fusion into a spatial distortion wave. The drive coils in the impulse engines are used to ride that wave. That way it doesn't matter what direction the ship is pointed in.

    Suggestions:

    1- You don't have to make the IMF of the stardrive as obvious and intrusive as the saucer's. You can spread them out at the tips of the Warp engines and one in the center (Galaxy like)

    2-You could put them at the nape of of the rear belly as it goes into the aft shuttle bay (Again less intrussive)

    3-You could make the current IMF's the stardrive's impulse engines (redesigning the sep plane) THe saucer's engines could be just above that or part of that wasted space arrow head Sovereign has on the Dorsal side.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    NASA is working on a physical prototype impulse reactor on the conceptual premises of the Star Trek engines, a Newtonian physics rocket. The Physics of Star Trek discusses the implication of such engines including the need to limit velocities lest differential time considerations render managing a StarFleet impossible. http://www.amazon.com/Physics-Star-Trek-Lawrence-Krauss/dp/0465002048/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385434715&sr=8-1&keywords=the+physics+of+star+trek

    Anyway, I am seriously considering images and maybe animations showing distortion waves from nozzles. Way back, you and I discussed the function of scoops and vents on the sovereign pylons. I'm still leaning toward the scoops as reto-exhaust and the trailing edge as stardrive impulse nozzles. One thing that bothers me though is how thin the pylons are. Barely thick enough for a jefferies tubes even discounting thickness of the Skin/Hull.
  • prisoner881prisoner881336 Posts: 30Member
    Saquist wrote: »
    Well...

    I've never considered the impulse engine a Newtonian Physics Rocket.
    1. They simply don't have that much fuel on board. (especially Voyager) and no one talks about refueling, 5 year mission in all.

    Basically this is covered by the Bussard ramscoops, a sort of constant in-flight refueling. Interstellar hydrogen is present in quantities that make this quite viable. The ST:TNG tech manual even goes into detail on how this "regular" hydrogen is turned into anti-hydrogen for use in the warp core (albeit inefficiently, thus the preference for anti-matter refueling stations).

    Also, don't forget the majority of the time the ship will either be (a) at warp, going from place to place or (b) in orbit of whatever it is observing or interacting with. Impulse drive would be used pretty sparingly, so fuel wouldn't likely be an issue.
    2. to many examples of Federation starships using reverse thrust or retro fire without a hint of vector exhaust or forward impulse engines. I don't subscribe to the forcefield vectored exhaust...not when Enterprise reverse out of a nebula that prevents shields.

    I agree this has been used poorly throughout the TV and movie series. However, Federation ships have *three* propulsion systems, not two. One is the warp drive, obviously non-Newtonian. One is impulse, which is Newtonian but augmented (according to ST:TNG tech manual). The last is "thrusters" which seem to be used only in low-speed, close-quarters stuff like leaving spacedock. The thrusters appear to be situated on the periphery of the ship -- fore, aft, port, and starboard, both ventral and dorsal -- which makes reversing no big deal.
    I always thought that they compressed energy from advanced fusion into a spatial distortion wave. The drive coils in the impulse engines are used to ride that wave. That way it doesn't matter what direction the ship is pointed in.

    The gist of the impulse drive is a standard fusion rocket, but augmented by a little warp technology. Without quoting the ST:TNG manual verbatim, it goes like this: the Newtonian fusion rocket is given a boost by a low-level warp field which alters the mass of the action/reaction equation. This makes the impulse rocket behave as if it were a much higher performance rocket than it actually is. But it's still Newtonian in nature.
  • jrhotteljrhottel9 Posts: 0Member
    Excellent and thanks. I'll think that over and get the manual, not the first time its come up here.
Sign In or Register to comment.