Topic: A Real Starship Enterprise.

[Age]

This is what it would take to build a real Starship Enterprise.

A REAL Starship Enterprise!

[TAnimaL]

if pants are optional for female crewmembers, I approve this.

(Also, even these yahoos figured out that you have to build the Enterprise in orbit, JJ  )

[Lieutenant_Q]

I shook my head when I first saw this.  Still am.  While the technology is available, the design would be a complete failure.

The biggest problem, is the gravity deck.  You just can't build one parallel to the plane of thrust, which is what they are proposing.  All serious designs for spacecraft have the gravity deck perpendicular to the plane of thrust because of the issues involved with maneuvering and using the wheel.  You cannot use both the gravity deck and maneuver at the same time.  Especially with a parallel design.  You'll create a variable gravitational effect, which is not good for the people on the ship, nor the machinery involved in making the wheel move.  The size of the gravity deck is good, larger decks mean its easier to create larger gravitation effects without the vertigo problem of moving people too fast.  But a large portion of the central saucer would be uninhabitable because you are moving faster the closer you get to the center of the deck.  Now, cargo could be placed in the central area, water for example, something that doesn't need to have physical access.  But you still have the problem of maneuvers.  Anytime that the ship is expending thrust, the gravity deck must be offline, for a perpendicular arrangement, that's not a problem, most rooms on a perpendicular grav deck would be arranged so that they can have two "floors" and what can't be arranged as such would be bolted to the deck.  For a parallel arrangement, a portion of the ship will be turned on its head every time.  Remember, Inertial Dampeners haven't been invented yet, so every time you apply a thrust in one direction, everything on the ship is pushed against the thrust.  Could you imagine what it would be like to be directly on the bow of the ship, when the helmsman decided we needed a two minute maneuver?

The problem stems from trying to build something that resembles a design that is not to be in the design phase for another 200 years, the design has technology that we can only dream about, although those dreams are allowing us to start work on prototypes of the technology that may one day allow us to build an actual Enterprise.  It's just not possible today.  Not with this design.

[Brush Wolf]

I shook my head when I first saw this.  Still am.  While the technology is available, the design would be a complete failure.

The biggest problem, is the gravity deck.  You just can't build one parallel to the plane of thrust, which is what they are proposing.  All serious designs for spacecraft have the gravity deck perpendicular to the plane of thrust because of the issues involved with maneuvering and using the wheel.  You cannot use both the gravity deck and maneuver at the same time.  Especially with a parallel design.  You'll create a variable gravitational effect, which is not good for the people on the ship, nor the machinery involved in making the wheel move.  The size of the gravity deck is good, larger decks mean its easier to create larger gravitation effects without the vertigo problem of moving people too fast.  But a large portion of the central saucer would be uninhabitable because you are moving faster the closer you get to the center of the deck.  Now, cargo could be placed in the central area, water for example, something that doesn't need to have physical access.  But you still have the problem of maneuvers.  Anytime that the ship is expending thrust, the gravity deck must be offline, for a perpendicular arrangement, that's not a problem, most rooms on a perpendicular grav deck would be arranged so that they can have two "floors" and what can't be arranged as such would be bolted to the deck.  For a parallel arrangement, a portion of the ship will be turned on its head every time.  Remember, Inertial Dampeners haven't been invented yet, so every time you apply a thrust in one direction, everything on the ship is pushed against the thrust.  Could you imagine what it would be like to be directly on the bow of the ship, when the helmsman decided we needed a two minute maneuver?

The problem stems from trying to build something that resembles a design that is not to be in the design phase for another 200 years, the design has technology that we can only dream about, although those dreams are allowing us to start work on prototypes of the technology that may one day allow us to build an actual Enterprise.  It's just not possible today.  Not with this design.

The ship descriptions in Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's Mote in Gods Eye books describe what would have to be used to create gravity for the crew. At least until artificial gravity is invented. When under thrust up is forward, when not under thrust down is outward from spin.

[Lieutenant_Q]

Yes, I understand that.  The problem is that they don't seem to understand that.  I have done a lot of research into the theory behind centripetal acceleration gravity generation.  It's a shame that they couldn't do even a little bit.  When arranging a room on a gravitational wheel, you have to account for all possible vectors of "gravity".  The easiest one to account for is the vector when the wheel is on operation.  Outwards.  Its the vector that SHOULD be in use the most.  Then you have to account for the vector while the ship is expending thrust.  Aft.  Unfortunately, with a parallel arrangement, Aft is whichever way is currently pointed aft.  At one point in the wheel, it is outward, at another point in the wheel, it is inward, at every other point, it's some mix between the two, and it all depends on where the wheel is locked at.  The ONLY possible configuration for a gravity wheel is perpendicular to the plane of thrust.  There are only two vectors that a designer has to deal with in that case.  Outwards, and aft, which with a perpendicular arrangement is ALWAYS the same direction.

You cannot have a Gravity wheel design that is Parallel to the plane to thrust, unless inertial dampeners have been invented, and at that point, gravity wheels are obsolete, because its just a little trick to create gravity once you've learned how to cancel its effects.