www.ditl.org

Just a quickie semi-kitbash, this, inspired by the recent discussion of non-Constitution Starfleet ships that could have been knocking around in TOS. This is based on the Enterprise I did a while back, and intended to compliment that "my version of Trek" design aesthetic.

It's obviously heavily based on the Franz Joseph Saladin class Destroyer and Hermes class Scout. Those never made a lot of sense to me - essentially identical ship designs with the same endurance, the same speed, much the same crew size, but a slightly different weapons fit. And they were a bit too kitbashy, with identical Constitution saucers mounted on Constitution nacelles.

So I set out to do this. Still somewhat kitbashed, but...



Size comparison to the Enterprise. Note that the saucer section is significantly smaller - the outer, flatter part of the saucer has been hacked off. A deck has also been taken out of the rim thickness, and another out of the dorsal saucer bulge. All in all, the saucer is about half the size of a Constitution saucer - and remember, no Engineering hull. So this ship is probably around 1/3 the size of a Constitution overall. I figure a crew of 250 - deliberately more than 1/3 the Connie crew, so that there is less space available for quarters. The ship would seem more crowded and more cramped.



Dorsal view. Note the single twin phaser bank. My version of the Connie has no less than seven of those. Plus there is a single torpedo tube to my Connie's four. In battle, this ship would be severely overmatched by the Enterprise.



Ventral view. See the torpedo launcher, and travel pod docking ring on the side?



Impulse engine housing up top. Note, only one impulse engine to the Constitution's two; given the smaller size, it would likely still have similar or better flight characteristics than a Constitution, but would lack the redundancy for long endurance or combat damage that the Constitution would have. And a shuttlebay below. I always felt this was a serious lack for the Joseph designs, and I never like it when somebody just sticks a big door in the side of a saucer section and puts a shuttlebay behind, because if you can do that then why have Connie style shuttlebays at all? But at the same time I wanted reduced capability again. So this seems like a nice solution to me. It's a Connie style bay, but sized down so it can just about take two TOS shuttles sitting side by side. Nice for away missions, but without the extensive size and support facilities the Enterprise would have.



Clear access foward for the Bussard collector, the photon tube, the Deflector dish, phaser bank, and bridge. The deflector is significantly smaller than the Connies.



Side view.

So this whole thing only took two or three hours, since it was mostly rearranging parts from the Connie blend. I think it's turned out remarkably well, though! Obviously a lot more detailing which could be done, though.

Now with updated detailing. Hull lines I've always found difficult, but I've come up with a new way of doing them which seems to work really well! So yay!

Windows are fiddly, but not that difficult. The fiddliest part is that you really have to build a room inside of the window, with a light source in the roof. There's just no straightforward way of doing that, although you can make a basic shell of a room and copy it around.



And here we have a ventral view. More windows in the neck. I tried putting one of those hull cutout airlocks in the lower saucer, like so, but it didn't come out well. Maybe will try again on that later.

Actually my deck spacing may be off here - I think the dorsal and ventral saucer might have weird odd numbers of deck in them, like 2.5 decks? I'm almost afraid to look into it, because the only way to fix it would be to redo most of the stuff here, lol.

Note also, the NCC number has changed. That's because the NCC-1101 I had before was just a rearrangement of the Enterprise's NCC-1701 number. The new number and name is the name of a Saladin class Destroyer from the TOS TM, which is the design that inspired me to do this one.



Anyway, hope you like these!

I certainly like the attention to detail and the thought process behind it; what I don't like is the idea of the original Joseph-designed single-nacelle ships in general (which is nothing to do with your effort, GK.)

Thanks!

What's up with single nacelled ships? I always rather liked the idea myself. I know Gene's "rules for Starships" specify nacelles in pairs, but given that he seems to have invented those rules specifically to invalidate Franz Joseph's work I've never been much minded to pay attention to them. And we've seen that one broken in canon anyway, with both single and three nacelled ships.

IDK, it's more of a visceral thing for me. It's not symmetry, because the single-nacelle ship can obviously be as horizontally symmetric as a two-nacelle ship. It's not the rules for starship design, because I knew the petty reasons behind them. Obviously it's not IU warp dynamics, since those are a fairy tale anyway. It might just be the simple fact that I was "born and raised" as it were to a paradigm of two-nacelle ships - whether UFP, Klingon, Rommie, or whatever; throughout the TOS and movie era - and anything else just carries a touch of the outre with it.

*nods*

Within the show, I think of it as being like ship's propellors myself. Obviously you can have any number of propellors you like, but the practical limitations mean it's pretty much going to be between one and four. In general, bigger or faster ships will have more propellors... and having a pair (or pairs) can help with manoeuvrability because you can somewhat steer with differential thrust, and gives redundancy since you can lose one and keep going. But a single nacelle offers advantages of reduced complexity and cost, simpler to maintain, etc.

Aesthetically, I agree it does look a little odd. But as I've played with the model I've actually come to kind of like it. It's not as graceful as the Enterprise, certainly, but it kind of works for me.

I have been shinking of shrinking the nacelle down, though, since it looks a little out of proportion to the smaller saucer. Not just a direct scaling of the Enterprise nacelle, but rather trimming one or two of the glowy warp coils out to shorten the nacelle.

I may also try it with two nacelles down there...

Okay, the Mikey-inspired Very Fast Destroyer!





With so little mass to push, and as much nacelle as the Enterprise herself has pushing it, I would think this ship would be fast as hell. Speeds in excess of Warp 11.5, comfortably. Assuming she can generate the power to reach it, of course. Perhaps used as a very high speed interceptor on the borders? Or as a VIP courier to carry Admirals around?



Close up!

Woo-hoo! I've never inspired anything before except nausea and annoyance.

My guess would be that with a Hermes/Saladin-sized core, but two nacelles, it would be hella fast but have a fairly low endurance for high-end warp travel... sort of like a NOS-fuelled dragger. Of course, that nub of a section between the nacelles could mean a slightly larger core, extra torp mounts, a/o a second or expanded shuttlebay. Even emergency supply, evac, or triage room, considering the probably high top speed.

I don't envisage the core being in the little mini engineering hull. Since it's based on the Saladin design, I'd still have the core in the saucer. The little eng hull is just a shuttlebay, the deflector support gear, travel and ion pods, and conduits for power feeds and whatnot.

Makes sense. Maybe a little convertible area for evac/MASH/etc. use?

There's about a 50 foot long space between the shuttlebay and the pod ports. Would be ideal for something like those "mission bays" they're building into destroyers nowdays, configurable for whatever role.

Exactly what I was thinking. Perfect addition for a high-speed ship like this.

So I'm thinking to split these two into two different designs. I need a name for the two nacelled version.

Would it be terribly, terribly twee for me to call it the USS Mikey...?

Probably not a great "Starfleet" ship name. But if you have a name you'd like, Mikey, I'll put it on there. Go ahead...

After looking up the term "twee," the answer is a resounding yes.

I know it's a little unwieldy, but I've always been an admirer (as point of cultural pride) of Berek Joselowicz.

As far as comparing nacelles to propellers, there were ships out there with multiple props per shaft. Turned out to be rather redunant. Wonder what that would look like if a single nacelle was a single prop.

I like the single nacelle look even though it gives the ship a very top heavy look. The second ship looks pretty good though. Almost like a hotrod.