I would’ve liked to have seen more of the XCV-330 Enterprise.
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The shuttles have warp nacelles. Those are required for warp. The saucer doesn’t have nacelles. How does it generate a warp field without them?
I’m fine with the saucer section. It makes sense to have a way to get the civilians out of danger when possible.
I also understand why the show barely ever used it, even in obvious situations like when Picard headed into the neutral zone.
But I never liked how the few times they did the separation, they showed scenes of people evacuating the stardrive section. Wouldn’t it make sense to keep that area off limits to civilians so you could do a quicker saucer separation when you needed it?
It doesn’t have those predominantly Federation style back nacelles, sure. And there are no obvious nacelles on the sides. But there are those two little bits that jut out from the back that clearly drive the system.
Given how relatively small the shuttle nacelles are, and considering that the saucer nacelles would be for emergency use only, it doesn’t seem like it would be that hard for them to have warp capability.
I know they canonically don’t. But, honestly, it would make more sense if they did. If it were me, that would have been my excuse right away. Even if it was something like “they can’t generate their own warp field, but they can sustain the one from main ship for a limited period of time, allowing them to get to the closest star system with an M-class planet”. Though usually the saucer would be rescued long before that was necessary."
Anything is better than “impulse only, except when the plot would demand otherwise.”
Couldn’t a shuttle “tow” the saucer at warp speed?
I like the original as wel good old 1701/:o
That’d have to be a helluva big shuttle.
Presumably not. I’ve always thought the concept of shuttles being able to fly in warp a bit silly, but if they can, one would have to believe the warp engine is just efficient enough to move the shuttle’s mass loaded, not haul around the mass of the saucer section…
In Star Trek TOS the shuttles had engine nacelles, or what looked like them, but I don’t recall them being protrayed as warp capable. In Voyager, where I primarily remember seeing them, and perhaps a few times in TNG, what seemed like the same vehicle to me was interchangeably called a shuttle or a runabout. The idea of using a warp capable shuttle to tow the saucer section at warp makes me wonder if it would be possible to extend the range a bit after a separation at warp. Not maintaining that speed, just making it go a bit longer.
Probably not, there would probably be some disasterous consequences when the saucer slowed enough to drop out of warp and the shuttle didn’t that would have to be hand waved with computer programming and remote piloting and what not. Still, a mildly interesting idea nonetheless, I think.
Scotty, engineering advances. Vessels this size with engines the size of shuttles!.
A starship engine the size of a shuttle? That’s impossible. But I don’t suppose there’d be any harm in looking over diagrams on it.
The shuttles were used several times in circumstances where it was clear they weren’t just scooting around inside a single star system, including “Metamorphosis” and “The Menagerie.”
Unfortunately, continuity of the original series means that isn’t sufficient to prove it one way or the other.
Oops, my mistake, I forgot those episodes.
How so? Warp capability, once established, would surely be maintained. Starfleet is hardly going to make its shuttles less fast than they once were. It’s a big galaxy!
Maybe the Federation reached an agreement with the Klingons and Romulans not to develop warp capable shuttles. Like the agreement not to develop cloaking.
Enterprise-refit (TMP) and -E (Sovereign-class) were my favorite Enterprises, tying for 1st place, but the Reliant (Miranda-class?) is still my overall favorite Star Trek ship-class.
One of my “common sense” gripes wrt Trek overall is when the main ship loses communications or sensors, and they then forget they have shuttles! And I am assuming a limited warp capability is most shipboard shuttles; the Galileo 7 model I built had discrete impulse thrusters, and mini-warp nacelles underneath.
They can launch shuttles, and form a communications relay back to Star Base (or other nearby ship) for help/rescue, or spread them out to form a kind of sensor net, relaying the info back to the main ship.
It’s clear (to this very day) that Hollywood writers have no idea how big space it, or how science works.
Memory Alpha says TOS shuttles are sublight, stated “Interplanetary Cruising Velocity: 350 million km/hr” which is appx .3c. I don’t think the show ever specifically mentioned how fast they go, but ever since 1968 I thought they were sublight, despite their mini-warp-engine-looking nacelles. That’s just (lazy) design aesthetics.
But if shuttles are sublight, then it’s stupid to use one to go somewhere in lieu of the warp driven starship taking you there and dropping you off. A shuttle could go a third of a light year in a year, while the Enterprise could do it in about, oh, five minutes.* There is absolutely no reason to take a shuttle farther than you can throw it.
The Defiant, which Kirk said had impulse engines, somehow made it to the edge of the galaxy(!). Romulans waged interstellar war apparently without warp drive, according to BoT. The Botany Bay was obviously STL, but somehow it ended up hundreds of light years from earth. So the writers clearly don’t understand how big space it.
I submit the writers just didn’t understand space at all. Shuttles are like speedboats to them. You can take your CVN-65 Enterprise to Europe in 4 days, and your “shuttle” cabin cruiser/cigarette boat can get to Europe in let’s say two weeks. So writers think starships are the same. But the Galileo 7 is more like tying yourself to a piece of wood and floating to Europe. Except 1000 times longer still.
In ST:TMP it was a special warp-capable shuttle that brought Spock to meet the Enterprise, implying that normal shuttles are not. If TOS shuttles were FTL, it makes sense in The Menagerie and Metamorphosis, but not much else. Why not send a warp-driven shuttle to drop off the urgent medical supplies in Obsession (or, why not have the Yorktown come to them?)? Why not use a shuttle to take Spock to Vulcan in Amok Time? These only make sense if it takes a Starship to get anywhere in a hurry. Why not send a shuttle to get help in Paradise Syndrome?
Of course, we have no idea what kind of engines Harry Mudd had, nor Dr. Sevrin, had. They must have had FTL drive, so that makes it seem small warp engines exist.
*speed is plot driven
Agreed that ST (and many sf) writers had and have no idea how vast space actually is. As to why not use FTL shuttles more often, I’d fanwank it to suggest that perhaps some regions of space are more dangerous than others, due to pirates, Klingons, navigational hazards, etc. For high-value cargoes and VIP passengers, it’s Starfleet policy to convey them via starship rather than shuttle wherever possible.
Or maybe shuttles can only manage warp 2, or maybe 3, which is pretty darn slow, compared to the Enterprise warping around at warp 5 or 6 (to say nothing of 8 or 9!).
My guess is that most SF TV writers know exactly how big space is, but they have stories to write and deadlines to meet, and they hope - correctly, it turns out - that audiences either don’t know this stuff or won’t be too bothered by it.