Topic: This is probably what Kirk was thinking when he retook the Enterprise...

[Centurus]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Foz6xGBRL2g&feature=related

[Don Karnage]

at 2:11 you see something open under the saucer, just left of kirk left shoulder, is it the official landing gears or one of the access port?

[Vipre]

I've always wondered where the landing gear idea came from. First time I even heard of a saucer landing on a planet was the TNG manual. The large rectangles are loading ports, TMP shows this several times, I think Spock even uses one to exit the ship in the spacewalk scene. The ones at 2:11 are the access ports

Edit: The largest four rectangles are landing gear by design. Nice detail but utterly pointless.

[Don Karnage]

they're suppose to be use for emergency landing like when the warp core explode they land the saucer on a planet and wait rescue.

well if there a M class planet to land on, so since they can navigate with the saucer but just impulse power they wont go far and no warp core to power the ship they wont last long in space, mostly the defense will be limited since they will run on emergency power or on the battery, the shield and weapons wont be good for long.

[Beeblebrox]

I've always wondered where the landing gear idea came from. First time I even heard of a saucer landing on a planet was the TNG manual. The large rectangles are loading ports, TMP shows this several times, I think Spock even uses one to exit the ship in the spacewalk scene. The ones at 2:11 are the access ports

Edit: The largest four rectangles are landing gear by design. Nice detail but utterly pointless.

I believe the information about the primary hull landing gear comes from The Making of Star Trek by Stephen Whitfield.  The book included a lot of information that had been developed as background but was unlikely to be used on screen.  The saucer was meant to act as a lifeboat in the event of the destruction of the engineering hull.  The main idea was to survive in the saucer and send out distress calls.  Planetary landings were a last resort and the primary hull engines would be incapable of achieving lift off from the surface again.

I would have to assume the Galaxy class saucer isn't equipped with landing gear because it's simply too large to be properly supported by them.  The entire landing gear idea (and the design of them into the details of the Constitution saucer) was part of Roddenberry's "Believability above all." approach to Star Trek.  That's also probably why there was information developed concerning the ability to blow off the warp nacelles (an idea that was later developed in TNG as ejecting the warp core). 

[Vipre]

Read this on Memory Alpha...

According to fandom sources, the original Enterprise had landing gear stored underneath the two triangle-shaped hatches on the ventral side of the saucer. A third leg popped out from the cavity where the secondary hull connected to the saucer. Similar shapes were placed on the saucer of the Enterprise-E as a homage to the original ship, although designer John Eaves did not realize the fandom history behind those objects.
For the refit Enterprise, Andrew Probert purposefully designed landing gear into the saucer, hidden behind the four square panels located on the saucer's concave underside. The panels were also carried over to many TMP-era designs, including the USS Reliant and USS Excelsior. Probert had intended to place landing gear on the Enterprise-D saucer as well, but became distracted by other elements and never returned to the landing gear concept. As he recalled several years later, the poor ship eventually paid the price for that oversight!

My only thought an landing gear, besides how cool it is he thought out the design in that detail, is there's no way the thrusters on the saucer could provide enough lift for a vertical landing. Best I could imagine is a sled style landing and even on a plain that seems a seriously risky move on what are essentially four peg legs. Better they just stay in orbit if they can and wait for retrieval.

[Centurus]

*raises an eyebrow, and smacks everyone with rubber chickens and turns them all into the Dancing Judge Itos*

This isn't the place to debate about what capabilities the Constitution saucer does or doesn't have.  It was show that Kirk probably was thinking how bad he wanted to make love to the Enterprise.

*smacks everyone with a rubber chicken again and turns them all into Hillary's dirty underwear*

[Beeblebrox]

This isn't the place to debate about what capabilities the Constitution saucer does or doesn't have.

Well, except for the Swedish bath and massage parlor on deck 5 kept manned 24/7 by Deltans, Orion slave women, and 30 Sasha Grey clones.  I really think that feature merits additional discussion. 


 

[Centurus]

This isn't the place to debate about what capabilities the Constitution saucer does or doesn't have.

Well, except for the Swedish bath and massage parlor on deck 5 kept manned 24/7 by Deltans, Orion slave women, and 30 Sasha Grey clones.  I really think that feature merits additional discussion. 

Ok, you got me there.