Jeff L's unbaked design thread

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What would it look like with the plasma ball and containment farther back. After all, if that's where the ship's power is generated, you'd want it as near as it can get to the warp nacelles.

Also, that's a really nice job of replicating the original series nacelles. They're instantly recognized, before reading the text. "Oh, that's a Plasma Dart-Starfleet mash up."
 
There are some really good ideas in there. The whole thing is clearly too stubby; see the USS Atlantis refit for comparison to a much longer, more slender form factor.

I think the warp nacelle design is excellent. I think the plasma ball is also really well executed, better than any of my attempts. However, I'm not sure they go together on the same rocket?

You've given me some ideas to go fool around with, thanks. :)
 
However, I'm not sure they go together on the same rocket?
I'm toying with either making the plasma ball surrounds out of straight line segments, or making the engine pylons be curved and then doing (um mumble shrug) to make the back of the engines more curvy feeling. Basically either go everything rounded or everything angular.

Maybe that helps?
 
I'm really not sure how I feel about the stubby/long thing. USS Atlantis has always felt to me like the put an unrealistically long front on it to make it fly right. It's got nice lines on it's own terms but it feels way out of proportion with normal Federation ships.
 
For a palette cleanser, lets step back a few hundred years to the days when "deep space mission" means sending some folks to Jupiter.
View attachment 432562View attachment 432563
I'm thinking this one really is too short. Also, maybe not the rounded nose...
Yes, longer; a ship to Jupiter would have more room for... I dunno, crew, cargo, whatever. I like the rounded nose.

No idea what the ping pong balls in front of the fins would do for stability.
 
Loving this thread. Also there is a precedent for a triple nacelled Federation ship: the refitted Enterprise D.
A three finned, er, nacelled ship would have a greater chance of being stable.
 
Loving this thread. Also there is a precedent for a triple nacelled Federation ship: the refitted Enterprise D.
A three finned, er, nacelled ship would have a greater chance of being stable.
Indeed, this my someday plan for my Cochrane Phoenix
 
Since I've got the ray tracer out...

I have this theory that the Space Shuttle is actually a Goonybird.
I imagine it going something like this:
we want a two stage to orbit space plane.
So we need a hypersonic plane, probably somewhere between a fast supersonic jet and the X15. It might look something like this:
spaceplane_orbiter.png

Now we need a heavy lift booster to send it into orbit. Maybe something like a Titan III, so...
spaceplane_booster.png
Then you just bolt the plane onto the booster and Bob's yer Uncle:
spaceplane_stack.png
Preliminary design goes great until somebody looks at that and says "You know what would be AWESOME..."

So I kind of want to build the non-Goony version of the shuttle.
 
Some quick experiments with starship nose sizes:
View attachment 432567
I find the noseless one strangely satisfying. No idea if it would fly.
It reminds me of this early sketch from Star Trek's concept development stage:
1600861084792.png


The same basic shape was used in a Pocketverse book about the founding or Starfleet.
Also there is a precedent for a triple nacelled Federation ship: the refitted Enterprise D.
Also, there was a three nacelle version in the old Starfleet Technical Manual, the Dreadnaught class. Admiral Riker's refitted Enterprise D resembled it.

Anyway, how about something vaguely like this (plus nacelle fins not shown):
1600862401861.png
Maybe it's too Klingon.

How would you suspend the plasma ball between the containment ribs? I mean in the model, not the real starship.
 
I wonder how the cylindricalish nacelles on the ends of the pylons will affect the CP, as compared to the flat fins in OR. People have done it with faux engine pods, and I'd like to know how that works out. I could do it in RS, but I don't know if the results would be meaningful.
 
I've got this notion that you can estimate the CP contribution of rounded objects (like pods or even the main rocket body) by assuming they have about half the contribution of a flat plate of the same plan area. I'd like to validate that against some real experimental data at some point...

In this case, the nacelles aren't exactly cylinders, they've got those strakes around a cylindrical plasma core, which I would expect make the restoring force closer to that of an actual flat fin. (He says while wildly guessing and with no actual evidence)

I really need to build a wind tunnel or something, my level of confidence in CP estimation is way lower than I want it to be.
 
BT-5 pylons to the triple nacelles, duct ejection force to the nacelles through the 5s, and pop chutes from one or more nacelles. Now you can put the ball anywhere you want, maybe just a wire through the middle from front to back.
 
'Chutes or streamers should come out the aft ends of the nacelles if that's the plan. Since the CG is forward of the attachments, coming out the front would get things badly tangled up.
 
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