ISS Enterprise

[Werner]

This is a Capital Scout Ship, who's mission is deep space exploration, it consists of four sections:
The Saucer Section has 500 staterooms, this houses the crew of the starship. The Saucer section includes a maneuver drive, it propels the saucer section when separated from the rest of the ship, and it is the only part of the ship that is capable of making planetary landings.

The main body contains the Jump fuel tank and a hangar for receiving interplanetary shuttles, and other subordinate small craft.

A forward stalk connects the main body to the Saucer section and two rear stalks connect two Jump drive nacelles to the main body. Each nacelle is one half of a jump drive, and also contains an independent maneuver drive as well. The three manruver drives work in conjunction to maneuver the ship, the Nacelles also separate from the ship and can act as independent vessels. The main body has fuel intakes and processors for gas giant skimming.

What do you think of this idea? How big would this ship be?

 

[whulorigan]

The canonical ST:TOS Starship Enterprise displaced about 15,000-20,000 dtons.

 

[Proneutron]

What do you think of this idea? How big would this ship be?

Without structural integrity force fields that shape wouldn't do well under acceleration and hard maneuvering.

 

[GypsyComet]

Without structural integrity force fields that shape wouldn't do well under acceleration and hard maneuvering.

Even ignoring the TOS and/or TNG inspiration it's an odd way to arrange a long-term exploration vessel. Two jump drive modules that...can't jump on their own, a crew module that is over-engined but can't jump at all, and an intermediate hull that holds fuel and connects all the rest to each other.

Eh.

I might do something similar as a colony carrier: The "saucer" is the colony core, and is "disposable". The Drive Modules are configured to be fuel shuttles, and the central hull is intended to sit in orbit as overwatch and nascent spaceport. In a "drop and run" scenario, only the saucer is left behind, while the drives and core go back for another saucer.

 

[Werner]

Without structural integrity force fields that shape wouldn't do well under acceleration and hard maneuvering.

Two words: ANNIC NOVA

 

[Proneutron]

Two words: ANNIC NOVA

Study some structural engineering and you find out why the SIZE of the structure changes things. For the worse the larger you go. In short, it is about ONE word: STRESS

 

[Gray Lensman]

Saucer section should have some gcarrier/airraft/atv hanger space and a control center but not the vessels bridge. enough maneuver drive to land. and lets not forget some cargo space as well for the colonists.

This lands and stays and is the temporary home of the colonists, to be gutted later.

Central hull has bridge, maneuver drives, interplanetary shuttles, fuel scoops and processors and enough crew quarters to hold the needed crew. and lets not forget some cargo space. The two jump modules are connected directly (no pylons) and basically consist of a jump drive and fuel storage.

This sticks around for a minute then goes back for another saucer section to "drop off."

Just my 2 coppers, er ... credits

 

[Werner]

Study some structural engineering and you find out why the SIZE of the structure changes things. For the worse the larger you go. In short, it is about ONE word: STRESS

Well any ship that accelerates at 2 or more times Earth's gravity is not going to be tolerable for human passengers, so assume the maneuver drive is pushing on a bubble of space surrounding the Starship where passengers and crew cannot feel the Ship's acceleration, they are in their own inertial frame of reference unrelated to the acceleration on the ship, and you have artificial gravity holding people to the floor so they can stand and walk around, so it seems the maneuver drive does not need to be positioned like rocket engines so that the ship's center of mass is in front of it for proper balance,

 

[Werner]

Even ignoring the TOS and/or TNG inspiration it's an odd way to arrange a long-term exploration vessel. Two jump drive modules that...can't jump on their own, a crew module that is over-engined but can't jump at all, and an intermediate hull that holds fuel and connects all the rest to each other.

Eh.

I might do something similar as a colony carrier: The "saucer" is the colony core, and is "disposable". The Drive Modules are configured to be fuel shuttles, and the central hull is intended to sit in orbit as overwatch and nascent spaceport. In a "drop and run" scenario, only the saucer is left behind, while the drives and core go back for another saucer.

The jump fuel is in the main hull that the two nacelles are attached to, so if they seperate from it, they don't have access to the jump fuel so they could not jump individually anyway. They do each have their own seperate maneuver drives however, and those use much less fuel, and that can be stored on each individual nacelle. If this is a deep space exploration vehicle, it's going to require a high jump capacity. If for instance it has Jump-6 then its jump fuel will take up 60% of the Ship's total volume, so you put that fuel tank in the main body of the Starship. Each piece of the Starship has it's own maneuver drive, so the separated saucer section is going to have better maneuver performance than when its attached to the rest of the ship, and so are the individual nacelles.

 

[Condottiere]

1. Heavy cruiser

2. Probably eighty thousand tonnes

3. Jump drive modules release inordinate amount of radiation, so separated

4. Roddenberry says that the twin warp modules are needed to create field, which is why three and one configurations shouldn't work

5. Lower hull actually giant fuel tank, dispersed structure due to warp nacelles

6. Breakaway saucer section, with manoeuvre drive modules

7. Large hangar, mostly gigs

8. Meson torpedo spinal mount

 

[Proneutron]

Well any ship that accelerates at 2 or more times Earth's gravity is not going to be tolerable for human passengers,

Artificial grav (inertial compensators) INSIDE the ship accounts for that in Trav. Not any type of "bubble".

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Well any ship that accelerates at 2 or more times Earth's gravity is not going to be tolerable for human passengers, so assume the maneuver drive is pushing on a bubble of space surrounding the Starship where passengers and crew cannot feel the Ship's acceleration, they are in their own inertial frame of reference unrelated to the acceleration on the ship, and you have artificial gravity holding people to the floor so they can stand and walk around, so it seems the maneuver drive does not need to be positioned like rocket engines so that the ship's center of mass is in front of it for proper balance,

That is not how Traveller M-drives work. They simply produce thrust in the drive, just like a rocket, but without the messy business with propellant (from 1980 at least).


If we can produce a 1 G acceleration field toward the deck with artificial gravity, we can of course produce an acceleration field counteracting the felt effects of the ship accelerating (aka inertial compensation) with the same technology.

 

[Werner]

That is not how Traveller M-drives work. They simply produce thrust in the drive, just like a rocket, but without the messy business with propellant (from 1980 at least).


If we can produce a 1 G acceleration field toward the deck with artificial gravity, we can of course produce an acceleration field counteracting the felt effects of the ship accelerating (aka inertial compensation) with the same technology.

You could use artificial gravity to transfer the thrust of the maneuver drive to any part of the ship, not just at the point where the drive makes contact with the rest of the ship. In any case you can have maneuver drives at the end of each nacelle, one on the main body of the ship and one at the rear of the saucer section, but since they are reaction less, you can also have the maneuver drives in front of each section as well since there is no exhaust.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

You could use artificial gravity to transfer the thrust of the maneuver drive to any part of the ship, ...

There is presumably a difference in scale between accelerating a few hundred people of perhaps 10 tonnes and accelerating an entire starship of perhaps 100 000 tonnes.

But, yes, we can add another M-drive pointing sideways to compensate for the imbalance of a badly placed main M-drive, but it would be very inefficient...

 

[Werner]

There is presumably a difference in scale between accelerating a few hundred people of perhaps 10 tonnes and accelerating an entire starship of perhaps 100 000 tonnes.

But, yes, we can add another M-drive pointing sideways to compensate for the imbalance of a badly placed main M-drive, but it would be very inefficient...

No one has any idea of how artificial gravity fields would work, this is science fiction you know. The design of the USS Enterprise has more to do with what looks cool than any real world physics.

 

[coliver988]

No one has any idea of how artificial gravity fields would work, this is science fiction you know. The design of the USS Enterprise has more to do with what looks cool than any real world physics.

the original Enterprise design was to make it easily recognizable and distinct. And it does look cool. :rofl:

 

[Werner]

the original Enterprise design was to make it easily recognizable and distinct. And it does look cool. :rofl:

I wouldn't worry too much about whether it could fly in our universe, in the Traveller OTU however, there are certain commonalities. I am talking about the original series Enterprise by the way. Lets list them:
1) Artificial gravity, Star Trek had it, so does the OTU. We can pretty much have the same deck layout as a Traveller OTU starship as in the television show.

2) Turbolifts, are basically elevator cars that move up and down and sideways through shafts. OTU can have grav vehicles in the shape of turbulent cars that move through these shafts accomplishing the same function.

3) The OTU doesn't have anything like the Transporters of the USS Enterprise, the ISS Enterprise will have to do without.

4) FTL Drive: Star Trek has warp engines, in their place is the Jump Drive. Also no interstellar communications.

5) in Star Trek, the Enterprise can reach a quarter impulse in mere moments, which is defined as one quarter the speed of light or 75,000 km/s, in traveller it would take 14.5 days to reach one quarter impulse while accelerating at 6-G.

The ISS needs more shuttles to compensate for the fact that it doesn't have transporters for its "landing parties", the Imperium also doesn't have a Prime Directive, so if the natives chuck spears at the landing parties, they will likely be burnt to a crisp by laser fire!

 

[Proneutron]

I wouldn't worry too much about whether it could fly in our universe, in the Traveller OTU however, there are certain commonalities. I am talking about the original series Enterprise by the way. Lets list them: ...

You forgot

6) Ship structural integrity force fields. ST TOS had them, Traveller OTU does not.

 

[Werner]

You forgot

6) Ship structural integrity force fields. ST TOS had them, Traveller OTU does not.

Traveller doesn't need them because they don't accelerate to one quarter of the speed of light in six seconds.

 

[Proneutron]

Traveller doesn't need them because they don't accelerate to one quarter of the speed of light in six seconds.

With your dispersed design with the thrust off center accelerating at 1G would be enough stress to eventually cause problems.