Why a "starship" is shaped as such?

I've never really got the whole point to the shape of a federation starship in Star Trek. You have a saucer, a weird protrusion out the bottom that forms "engineering", and two poles on sticks that are the warp drives. What the hell?! There's gotta be a better shape that lets a ship like this (and all plot points based on it) exist with some kind of sense!

Pardon me for this, it's just a question that's gotten to me for a bit, lol. Anyone want to nerd out and explain this to me, feel free, I shall nerd out in return and it'll be a fun convo.

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The answer is quite simple, it was the design, of all the ones presented to him, that Roddenberry thought visually looked the most interesting film-wise.

 

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Exactly! It was selected because it was considered cool. It combines the notion of a flying saucer with the notion of some exotic propulsion system.

There is a similar design in '2001 A Space Odyssee', but that one has the crew compartment as a sphere, which is far more realistic.

Hans

 

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In the books, the engineering section was designed to keep the background radiation to a minimum and the keep the noise away from crew quarters..
A sphere is the most structurally sound right ?.

 

In my opinion the best spaceship design to be featured in any film (and I have seen almost all space science fiction films...including Japanese and Russian), well the best shape is a fragmentation boxes. This kind of design if I recall correctly is only seen in two films: HitchHikersGuideToTheGalaxy and ArtificialIntellect.

Here are the designs:

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actually couldnt find the one from A.I.

 

Actually in space anything of any design is possible so it really is just up to the imagination of whoever is going to build such a vessel as to what it can look like. To me the Star Gate would be a better way to travel. No ship needed , just a worm hole into another world.

 

dont forget that there need to be 2 stargates to travel

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how are you going to get a second stargate from here MilkyWay Galaxy to Andromeda Galaxy, say?

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Set random coordinates, take it through, and hope for the best?

 

hope for the best of what? coordinates need to have a confirmed accepting coordination. Quantum world teleportation requires a second quantum particle.

http://www.lsr.ph.ic.ac.uk/~plenio/cp394311998.pdf

 

Wow, I was just educated...
Thanks, dragon, this should be a good read.

 

My favorites are still

Cylon Raider (80's)
FireFly
Millenium Falcon.
Voyager

as long as the ship doesn't need to go into the afmosfeer of a planet i guess that it doesn't really matter what shape it is in.

 

Doesn't the enterprise have to have to engenirings ? I mean what powers the saucer if it has to detach ? often wondered about that. were the hell is the engineroom on the saucer?

 

Your question has been answered, Rodenbery just liked that design. But within certain stories, depending on the theory used for FTL travel, there are sometimes restraints placed upon the design of the spaceship.

My favorite was from a story by John Ringo. In the story an American scientist had developed both a functional ZPM and warp drive. China had stolen some of the info and attacked the US using an FTL missile launched from space. No one else in the world realized that China and the US were at war since the result of an FTL missile attack was simply instantaneous destruction. No missile to track.

Anyway, the scientist was working at area 51 and was concerned about another attack from China taking out the facility; so he threw a warp field around his entire building and lifted it into space for a counter attack against China. Essentially, the building, parking lot, and some of the ground underneath became a giant spaceship.

PS The result of his counter attack was the complete destruction of all government facilities in China and North Korea. The US lost Colorado.

 

Note on the Millennium Falcon

One of the things about the Falcon, though, is that it looks to me as if it should fly vertically, and not horizontally, as if the cockpit should be atop the structure and not beside it.

 

to fully exploit the max of that disign, the cockpit should move. Like in some of todays ships were the interior moves seperatly from the hull. so you still are leveled eventhough the ships rocks on the waves.
If the cockpit of the millenium falcon would use the same principle it could spin around his axe and the pilot would still be in the same position.

 

I'd have to say that the best starship designs are:

Cylon Basestar

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Re-imagined BSG

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USS Defiant

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~String

 

:spank:

 

While it's design is totally unwieldy, the Valdore from "Nemesis" was sweet looking too.

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What's up with that? Don't like that ship?

It's actually realistic in shape and it just looks fantastic. Plus the show was pretty good [at times] too.

~String

 

Huh.. It says "No hotlinking"..
lol


How about a Wraith Dart (Stargate Atlantis) ?
Or a Star Wars X-wing ?