Starfleet Design Bureau

[Fouredged Sword]

There is no sane world in which we, as a government/military design bureau, are designing every engine type in the whole Federation!

It makes no sense at all! The civilian shipping world has completely different cost constraints, maintenance capabilities, longevity and depreciation concerns… this is not the USSR, we are not a command economy.

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I mean, we are a socialist utopia that basically runs on a polite request economy. We ask the public to do something and people with the relevant skills volunteer to do it for no reward other than the intrinsic good feelings they get from being productive.

I think, technically, we are a command economy.

 

[Lord Necromancer]

[X] External Intercoolers (+Complexity [A -> B+]/+1 Cost, +Cruise) (One Success Roll: Cruise Increase [0.2 - 0.4]

 

[landcollector]

[X] External Intercoolers (+Complexity [A -> B+]/+1 Cost, +Cruise) (One Success Roll: Cruise Increase [0.2 - 0.4]

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You're a voting cycle behind, unfortunately.

 

[Aged_Urbanist]

Ok, so I voted for extended based on this argument, but I want to voice a word of caution about overly modern assumptions here.

I am not sure how much of the industrial power of the Federation is based on trade at this time. From what I can tell the economy of the federation relies on several extremely well developed super planets like Earth and Vulcan and a number of colonies that are basically only marginally productive. The actually industrially productive planets seem to be more or less economically self sufficient and don't rely on imports to get stuff done. There simply isn't enough shipping to support an federation sized planet's economy. The numbers of large cargo capable ships currently in the federation is likely measured in the hundreds, not thousands.

Quite frankly I suspect that industrially useful colonies are more like resource extraction outposts than urban centers, and the outputs from them tend to be things like rare minerals and such that while vitally important are not actually that physically hard to transport.

I mean, seriously. We are building ships that are 200 meters long and are mostly spindly nacelles. There just isn't much room for cargo. Cargo carry capacity is likely not the critical factor in economic output. I wouldn't say it has no value, but I hesitate to draw a direct parallel between the modern capitalist economy and the future star trek economy. When you have all the resources of an entire star system and all the star systems within a reasonable warp travel window at your fingertips the limiting factor is people to man ships to go out and harvest them, not travel time.

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In this specific era it is highly unlikely that bulk shipping is taking place at all. Interstellar "trade" is likely to consist overwhelmingly of IP, the loan or immigration of skilled personnel, and small high-value cargoes like consumables, state-of-the-art cybernetics and medicines, or artworks (analogous to the "spices, slaves, books, and precious metals" trade of the Age of Exploration on earth).

Given the *vast* abundance of resources within developed solar systems, any bulk cargoes are almost certain to consist of very rare natural resources with military or strategic implications, carried in military-owned hulls under escort.

Only once the Federation becomes hugely larger and hugely wealthier will intersystem passenger travel and bulk cargoes of foodstuffs or refined resources become routine.

And when that happens we will certainly not be designing every class of freighter and passenger liner, nor their equipment, nacelles, warp cores…

EDIT: the obvious exception is colonial expeditions, which will carry a ton of shit and be very, very slow. Canon is that earth mounted less than half a dozen expeditions in total between 2063 and 2150, and the Vulcans mounted not many more in their thousand-plus years of interstellar space flight. All of United Earth probably has a single "colony fleet" in this time period, with a few private shoestring operations as well.

 

[Lord Necromancer]

[X] Extended Length (-0.6 Maximum Warp, +0.4 Cruise)

 

[KNakamura]

In this specific era it is highly unlikely that bulk shipping is taking place at all. Interstellar "trade" is likely to consist overwhelmingly of IP, the loan or immigration of skilled personnel, and small high-value cargoes like consumables, state-of-the-art cybernetics and medicines, or artworks (analogous to the "spices, slaves, books, and precious metals" trade of the Age of Exploration on earth).

Given the *vast* abundance of resources within developed solar systems, any bulk cargoes are almost certain to consist of very rare natural resources with military or strategic implications, carried in military-owned hulls under escort.

Only once the Federation becomes hugely larger and hugely wealthier will intersystem passenger travel and bulk cargoes of foodstuffs or refined resources become routine.

And when that happens we will certainly not be designing every class of freighter and passenger liner, nor their equipment, nacelles, warp cores…

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You forgot crops (which are shipped at this point prior to the invention of the modern replimat/replicator) and the sheer amount of minerals that cannot be replicated now (and that doesn't really go away)

Also, we know from ENT that trade convoys is a thing.

 

[thepsyborg]

If you can honestly say that even 2 hours in a crisis is a negligible trade-off, I'm dubious whether you're in the right ship design bureau.

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Ah, no, actually, right now we're not in a Starfleet ship design bureau. Right now we're in a Federation warp drive bureau. We need to consider more than just Starfleet.

You cannot plan for emergencies to happen when you're nearby.

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Yes, I can, actually! Well, sort of.

I revisited some old spreadsheets with updated numbers, and the mean response time to a incident at a given distance converges to about a 4.7% increase with the extended nacelles as the volume of space being considered increases. (Obviously, the short nacelles have a more significant edge at short ranges.)

However, the average distance to a randomly-located incident from the closest of five randomly-located starships decreases by about 4.2% versus having four randomly-located starships. The net of a 4.2% shorter distance and 4.7% slower travel is *drumroll* a whopping 3% increase in average emergency response time. That's about five hours a week.

Given the exponential rates at which industry and economies advance, it is in my opinion an extremely conservative assumption that a twenty-four percent across-the-board boost to interstellar logistics will only result in a an additional twenty-five percent ships worth of budget over the next forty or fifty years. I would be honestly surprised if it's less than half again as much- which would put us at an average of 8.1% closer to a random incident, with an average response time converging towards 3.8% faster emergency response times with extended nacelles.

And also, you know, the benefits of our next-gen explorers- even assuming strictly equal numbers of hulls, which again I do not believe to be a valid assumption- covering 16% more distance per year, with 42% more time spent on location actually exploring- surveying, diplomatizing, etc.- per year, assuming identical itineraries and stopover durations, by just spending that much less of their year in transit.

Even if you straight up don't believe me about there being any economic benefit whatsoever, I have no idea how people are valuing four point seven percent emergency response over more than forty percent science and diplomacy and surveying accomplished. Over decades.

 

[Strunkriidiisk]

[X] Standard Length

 

[Fouredged Sword]

You forgot crops (which are shipped at this point prior to the invention of the modern replimat/replicator) and the sheer amount of minerals that cannot be replicated now (and that doesn't really go away)

Also, we know from ENT that trade convoys is a thing.

Click to shrink...

We simply do not have the cargo capacity to be shipping bulk crops anywhere. Even a few million people would consume more food than we can ship with the entirely of our navy. Anywhere people live in this universe basically MUST be self sufficient and with vertical farming and automation such self sufficiency is likely pretty easy.

There may not be replicators yet, but there are synthetic foods that are produced from yeast feedstock rather than grown in farms. People have already stopped killing animals for food but everyone still eats meat. Shipped food would be reserved for things that are absolute luxuries and are closer to art than something needed for life.

It is literally cheaper to send the tools needed for someplace to harvest local resources to build a vertical farm and a packet of seed than it would be to ship food.

While shipping likely happens I strongly suspect it is limited to sending very specific high value raw materials to central industrial hubs and shipping our low volume high value components like computer chips that colonies cannot easily produce on their own.

 

[KNakamura]

I would assume they think, properly, your numbers rely on statistical models that we have no clue even apply.

 

[Kartr_Kana]

That .1 in a crisis is 2 hours lost for every light-year a responding ship needs to cross. If you can honestly say that even 2 hours in a crisis is a negligible trade-off, I'm dubious whether you're in the right ship design bureau.

The problem here is that a ship with a Max Cruise of Warp 6 can just as easily step down to Warp 5.6 when maximum speed isn't necessarily required - but a ship that has a maximum cruise setting of 5.9 requires much more effort to accelerate past that velocity when a few hours could be the difference between "successfully completed its objective" and "got there just in time to bury the bodies".

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When travel time between planets is generally measured in months, I don't think a couple of hours will matter.

So worst case rolls we are looking at:
Standard
Warp 5, 6, 7

Extended
Warp 5.4, 5.9, 6.4

If you were traveling from earth to vulcan (16.5ly) and your science officer suddenly entered pon'farr one week into the trip...

Standard
Cruise 1 week = 2.4ly
Max sustainable for 14.1ly = 23.84 days

Extended
Cruise 1 week = 3.02ly
Max sustainable for 13.48ly = 23.97 days

You would get your Vulcan science office home 3 hours 7 minutes and 12 seconds sooner with standard length Nacelles. After a journey of 30 days, 20 hours, 9 minutes, 36 seconds.

If you're Science officer goes into pon'farr after 2 weeks of cruising....
Standard
Cruise 2 weeks = 4.8ly
Max sustainable for 11.7ly = 19.95 days

Extended
Cruise 2 weeks = 6.04ly
Max sustainable for 10.48ly = 18.64 days

In which case Extended nacelles got you to Vulcan 1 day, 7 hours, 26 minutes and 24 seconds faster. After a total elapsed travel time of 32 days, 15 hours, 21 minutes, 36 seconds.

 

[Aged_Urbanist]

I mean, we are a socialist utopia that basically runs on a polite request economy. We ask the public to do something and people with the relevant skills volunteer to do it for no reward other than the intrinsic good feelings they get from being productive.

I think, technically, we are a command economy.

Click to shrink...

I tend to simply dismiss TNG-era statements entirely in favor of the TOS and DS9 hints of a mostly post-scarcity economy in which it's still possible and encouraged and rewarded to work, and in which a great variety of organizations provide a great variety of services and goods beyond the guaranteed "food, housing, education, transit, and cultural enrichment" that core world citizens have access to by right.

You forgot crops (which are shipped at this point prior to the invention of the modern replimat/replicator) and the sheer amount of minerals that cannot be replicated now (and that doesn't really go away)

Also, we know from ENT that trade convoys is a thing.

Click to shrink...

No one is bulk-shipping food, it makes precisely no sense. Earth's population in 2151 is lower than today, Vulcan's lower still, Tellar's not much higher.

Aside from dilithium, what mineral isn't available in massive adundance within the solar system? We have helium isotopes, platinum-group metals, and fusion and unlimited solar energy to refine the latter with the aid of the former. Antimatter is known to be synthesized, not mined, the equivalent of using electricity and atmospheric gases to synthesize aviation fuel as in USN pilot projects today.

Bulk trade would be rare biological substances and dilithium, both with strategic implications and shipped by the armed forces.

 

[KarmaA]

I'd completely forgotten the easier to take your foot off the gas than it is to push past a redline argument. Higher max cruise means the captain can back it off if he doesn't need the extra speed.

Edit: shipping resources makes sense if extraction or processing are more expensive or volume isn't needed. Amazon vs local manufacturing. That being said with trek scanners and tech I'd expect most planets to be completely self sufficient for basic requirements.

 

[robofin117]

[X] Standard Length

 

[UbeOne]

[x] Extended Length (-0.6 Maximum Warp, +0.4 Cruise)

 

[Estro]

If we turned the entirety of Sagarmatha's available interior volume into cargo space, , it would have less shipping capacity than the Evergiven, that ship which blocked the Suez a few years ago. And simply by the fact it can fit through the Suez, I can tell you it's notably smaller than the actual largest shipping vessels on the planet.

There is no way we are moving something so volume-heavy as crops across interstellar space right now. Or, really, anything, as again, the Sargmatha is going to have less cargo ability than a containership. And there are thousands of those buggers. There are not thousands of Sagarmathas.

 

[KNakamura]

We simply do not have the cargo capacity to be shipping bulk crops anywhere. Even a few million people would consume more food than we can ship with the entirely of our navy. Anywhere people live in this universe basically MUST be self sufficient and with vertical farming and automation such self sufficiency is likely pretty easy.

There may not be replicators yet, but there are synthetic foods that are produced from yeast feedstock rather than grown in farms. People have already stopped killing animals for food but everyone still eats meat. Shipped food would be reserved for things that are absolute luxuries and are closer to art than something needed for life.

It is literally cheaper to send the tools needed for someplace to harvest local resources to build a vertical farm and a packet of seed than it would be to ship food.

Click to shrink...

I think, and I hate to say this, you're making the mistake of using our real world stuff in Star Trek, which handwaves a lot of this away. I would assume, flat out, there's small fleets constantly making rounds and dropoffs.

 

[thepsyborg]

Yup. Sure. The things being shipped between star systems are things like, gee. Rare and exotic mineral resources used in starship and other high tech manufacturing. High-skill and high-prestige scientists and researchers moving between universities and labs to study and collaborate on starships and other high technology.

You know.

All the things Starfleet and its advancement actually depend on would benefit from the extended nacelles, even if the wider economy doesn't.

(And I still think it would.)

I would assume, flat out, there's small fleets constantly making rounds and dropoffs.

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I would be astonished were it otherwise, yes.

I would assume they think, properly, your numbers rely on statistical models that we have no clue even apply.

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I mean, I've stated explicitly every single assumption I'm basing my reasoning on, and nobody has said boo about disagreeing with any of them except the existence of a meaningful degree of interstellar trade, addressed above.

The average response times is just straight up geometry, though, there's no room for debate there. That's just math.

I mean sure you could argue that it only applies if both ships and emergencies are randomly distributed, which is obviously not true, but unless you want to make a combinatorial map of travel times between all the star systems and stopover points in and near Federation space, weighted for ship time spent there, and weighted again for emergency distribution probability, then I'm just continue assuming "random distribution is close enough to go on with".

 

[Ash19256]

I'm going to link a post by Sayle to remind people about the limitations of Extended Length, actually. Quoting Sayle's post directly, assuming we were porting our nacelles onto the Sagarmatha, the best case scenario is baseline efficient cruise at 5.6, maximum cruise at 6.2, and a sprint of 6.8. Which is no faster at maximum warp than a design that is at this point approximately two decades old (the Type 2 nacelle first debuted with the Curiosity-class of 2164). And that's assuming we get perfect results on every single prototype roll in this nacelle project. The worst case has the "new" baseline be efficient cruise at 5.6, maximum cruise at 6.1, and a sprint of 6.6. That is slower than the old baseline, and a functionally negligible increase over every other statistic even if every ship we build gives the option to increase maximum warp by 0.4.

Assuming we account for how nacelle placement can alter performance characteristics:

Extended Length Nacelles​

Best Case	Worst Case
Efficient Cruise: 5.6 - 6 (up to 0.4 increase from nacelle placement when cruise optimized)	Efficient Cruise: 5.4 - 5.8 (up to 0.4 increase from nacelle placement when cruise optimized)
Maximum Cruise: 6.2 - 6.4 (up to 0.2 increase from nacelle placement)	Maximum Cruise: 5.9 - 6.1 (up to 0.2 increase from nacelle placement)
Maximum Warp: 6.8 - 7.2 (up to 0.4 increase from nacelle placement when sprint optimized)	Maximum Warp: 6.4 - 6.8 (up to 0.4 increase from nacelle placement when sprint optimized)

By contrast, here's that same table for standard length nacelles.

Standard Length Nacelles​

Best Case	Worst Case
Efficient Cruise: 5.2 - 5.6 (up to 0.4 increase from nacelle placement when cruise optimized)	Efficient Cruise: 5 - 5.4 (up to 0.4 increase from nacelle placement when cruise optimized)
Maximum Cruise: 6.3 - 6.5 (up to 0.2 increase from nacelle placement)	Maximum Cruise: 6 - 6.2 (up to 0.2 increase from nacelle placement)
Maximum Warp: 7.4 - 7.8 (up to 0.4 increase from nacelle placement when sprint optimized)	Maximum Warp: 7 - 7.4 (up to 0.4 increase from nacelle placement when sprint optimized)

Edit: corrected the math for the spread between Efficient Cruise, Maximum Cruise, and Maximum Warp. Thanks to Estro and thpsyborg for pointing out that something was wrong.

Ah, no, actually, right now we're not in a Starfleet ship design bureau. Right now we're in a Federation warp drive bureau. We need to consider more than just Starfleet.

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Okay, at this point I think we need to get this resolved.

@Sayle is this nacelle project genuinely for all shipping not just Starfleet, or is this "what you're going to use when it comes time to design the next slate of ships", with civilian shipping getting their own nacelle program?

Even if you straight up don't believe me about there being any economic benefit whatsoever, I have no idea how people are valuing four point seven percent emergency response over more than forty percent science and diplomacy and surveying accomplished.

Click to shrink...

I'm arguing for a configuration that accounts for the insistence of people like you that range and efficient cruising speed trumps literally everything else.

 

[Fouredged Sword]

I think, and I hate to say this, you're making the mistake of using our real world stuff in Star Trek, which handwaves a lot of this away. I would assume, flat out, there's small fleets constantly making rounds and dropoffs.

Click to shrink...

I mean, the yeast synthesis thing is a direct reference to one of the early Star Trek: Enterprise stuff where they talk about how a pre-replicator ship feeds itself. They joke about Vulcans not eating meat despite the meat being yeast with no animal dead.

We are somewhere between that and replicators. Technology has likely only advanced from the very early years and if we don't have food replicators we likely have extremely automated food production.

 

[Josiah]

[X] Standard Length

 

[Aged_Urbanist]

I think, and I hate to say this, you're making the mistake of using our real world stuff in Star Trek, which handwaves a lot of this away. I would assume, flat out, there's small fleets constantly making rounds and dropoffs.

Click to shrink...

Why? What utility is there? It'd be like shipping corn from Montevideo to Boston in 1810.

Sure, it's physically possible but it makes no sense at all!

All the things Starfleet and its advancement actually depend on would benefit from the extended nacelles, even if the wider economy doesn't.

Click to shrink...

Why are we presuming that state-of-the art military and exploration propulsion systems are being used in civilian passenger liners or even fast couriers as opposed to purpose-designed spin-offs?

 

[Derpmind]

[X] Extended Length (-0.6 Maximum Warp, +0.4 Cruise)

I feel like the arguments here have all been using unclear and confusing mathematical comparisons. Let me try something simpler:

Cruise Speed: Normal speed and maximum operational range.
Max Cruise: Emergency response speed.
Max Sprint: Tactical speed.

A larger cruise speed extends our ship's range greatly. The more our ships are able to go places, the more likely they'll be patrolling closer to emergency events than if their operational range was less. Therefore I'd argue that a marginal 0.1 loss of Max Cruise is more than made up for by a large 0.4 increase in Cruise Speed.

Max Sprint only lasts for a brief period of time, and is most useful in warfare and combat scenarios. And while that's important, it's not as important as either Cruise Speed or Max Cruise. I think the tradeoff here is very much worth it as long as we don't end up in a war.

 

[KNakamura]

Why? What utility is there? It'd be like shipping corn from Montevideo to Boston in 1810.

Sure, it's physically possible but it makes no sense at all!



Why are we presuming that state-of-the art military and exploration propulsion systems are being used in civilian passenger liners or even fast couriers as opposed to purpose-designed spin-offs?

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Trek doesn't make sense frequently if you stop and think about it's logistics. Starfleet should have far more ships than it does, for example. It needs more starbases, etc. I am also directly referencing the ECS, which has ships constantly moving between places. Just.. v e r y s l o w l y.

 

[Ash19256]

[X] Extended Length (-0.6 Maximum Warp, +0.4 Cruise)

I feel like the arguments here have all been using unclear and confusing mathematical comparisons. Let me try something simpler:

Cruise Speed: Normal speed and maximum operational range.
Max Cruise: Emergency response speed.
Max Sprint: Tactical speed.

A larger cruise speed extends our ship's range greatly. The more our ships are able to go places, the more likely they'll be patrolling closer to emergency events than if their operational range was less. Therefore I'd argue that a marginal 0.1 loss of Max Cruise is more than made up for by a large 0.4 increase in Cruise Speed.

Max Sprint only lasts for a brief period of time, and is most useful in warfare and combat scenarios. And while that's important, it's not as important as either Cruise Speed or Max Cruise. I think the tradeoff here is very much worth it as long as we don't end up in a war.

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My argument against this is mostly from a standpoint of not wanting to force future designs into a pigeonhole to get decent performance out of them. As noted in the table I provided above, if the prototype rolls work out perfectly, then Extended Length does actually have a decent boost to performance - but if they don't (and veterans of the old thread should know that relying on Warp Prototype rolls to work out is not a good plan) then any ship which benefits from a high sprint speed is inherently handicapped, to the point that even a maximized sprint configuration will be no faster than the Sagarmatha-class. Which, I should note, is a five year old design in 2180, using nacelles that are roughly twenty years old in a configuration that provides a 0.2 boost to cruise and sprint velocities. Sure, the sprint ship would cruise faster than a Sagarmatha - but when you have to get a 0.4 boost to sprint velocity from ship configuration just to keep up with an explorer that's at best half a decade old, someone on the warp drive team fucked up.