[Commodore]

Originally Posted by Captain Tom Coughlin

I must be missing something here though, because what we are talking about is a real world space craft that happens to look like the Enterprise, no?

I mean, things like warp coils and what not don't exist, they probably never will. I have suspicion that if man ever does invent some form of FTL travel, and I'm not convinced that we will, it will probably look nothing like Star Trek.

So, what does fictional warp field dynamics have to do with a real world ship?

Zip. Zero. Nuthin'.

[Roysten]

I we ever did discover how to travel faster than light (which IMO isn't going to happen), it would be awesome to have it as part of a version of the Enterprise.

[Saquist]

Originally Posted by DNA-1842

The ship (living quarters cargo areas etc etc) would form a torus shape. The engine would be in the centre, and the field coils would be aligned in vertical rings through the centre of the sphere. Sort of imitating loosely the structure of a planet with a magnetic field.

Vertical Rings?

So the Living quarters would be be a do-nut shape. Would that go all the way to the out side of the ship?

The engines in the center. How would you eject a core or install the core?
So the space left over must be the area above and below the living quarters and center engine room. That sounds pretty good just off the top of your Head but one of the biggest problem Trek ships except for Galaxy and Voyager never account for is fuel storage.

Honestly....Galaxy doesn't have enough for a five year mission...and Voyager not by far a two year mission. However I've been doing a lot of research on space travel methods as of late and I'm astounded by the amount of interstellar hydrogen there is. It seems our entire solar system is flying through a clear zone of space evacuated by a supernova some 1 million years ago but we are heading rapidly into heavy concentrations of interstellar shells of hydrogen from other exploded stars and nebula that we can see through but at warp speed you might be able to gather MORE than enough hydrogen just passing thru any part of the Galactic arm...

So maybe Trek ships don't need a lot of deuterium but rather antimatter.

(It's completely another matter how a ship survives an encounter at thousands the speed of light with interstellar hydrogen even with shields)

[omegaman]

The engines in the center. How would you eject a core or install the core?

Easy, the same way your core an apple.

A hatch at the north or south poles perhaps.

[martok2112]

Come on folks, all we need is a flux capacitor, or a power source capable of producing 1.21 gigawatts, and all the ship has to do is achieve a speed of 88 miles per hour and.....oh.....never mind.

[Saquist]

Originally Posted by omegaman

The engines in the center. How would you eject a core or install the core?

Easy, the same way your core an apple.

A hatch at the north or south poles perhaps.

Gotta pass through the coils first.