Trek tech question

[dirtbox]

Was just watching an ep of TNG and it did the whole saucer separation thing (which I always thought was corney) but I thought for a second and realised: How come the saucer section can go to warp without a warp core?

 

Are there two engine rooms?

 

And the battle bridge. Did they just make rooms up to break the monotomy? I'm suprised theres any room left for the 1,014 strong crew :)

[str82u]

Good questions, but I don't remember the epsode, did they seperate at warp or did it go to warp afterwards?

[dirtbox]

A few episodes: Encounter at Farpoint, Arsenal of Freedom and Best of Both Worlds - Part II. Encounter being the main one where they separate at warp then buzz off to Farpoint in it while the other half goes off to meet Q.

[favian]

From what i know the saucer, when separtated at warp, can coast at warp for a certain amount of time, then it will return to sublight speeds.

 

Another possibility (just a guess) what if the warp field were extended over the separated saucer? Could that keep the saucer at warp without being physically connected?

[TetsuoShima]

Another possibility (just a guess) what if the warp field were extended over the separated saucer? Could that keep the saucer at warp without being physically connected?

 

That was the correct answer! So, yes....

[SigmaSirrus]

That doesnt make any sense at all: whenever a ship's nacele is sevearly damaged the ship can no longer maintain warp, you can't coast. So that means that the two sections cannot go in different directions without them both having a warp drive. If they travel in the same direction then it's no problem; Colombia exended it's warp field to support Enterprise while at warp, logically the far more advanced Enterprise D could do the same.

[juhan]

Tetsuoshima... How can the warp field encompass two seperate ships at two different locations far far apart? thats absurd... The logical conclusion would be that theres a seperate temporary warp core on each part of the Enterprise to enable warp speeds on the saucer as well.

 

=Han=

[str82u]

While watching Voyager last night, I believe it was Janeway and Paris in a shuttle talking about the warp engines being off line. If a shuttle has limited warp capability then it's safe assume that The saucer section has the same ability to a limited degree. It may not be found on anyone's Voyager Blueprint Bath Towels, but they have a little warp reactor parked next to the extra food replicators, I bet.

[wargames]

The saucer section of the gaxlaxy class ship can not go to warp by itself it how evet have impulse to find a safe landing spot or go into orbit and wait for back up.

[juhan]

wargames... i'm pretty sure you're wrong. Try watching one of the movies with TNG cast.. I remember a saucer seperation somewhere there. And the first episode(s) of TNG where they saucer seperate so that the saucer section can carry the non-essential personnel home, I"m pretty sure the saucer travelled really far.

 

=Han=

[wargames]

i'am not saying it can not travel far but what i am saying is the saucer section can not go to warp under it's own power.

[favian]

look at a Galazy Class' MSD there is no warp core. It possible they forgot to include it but...ifyou look at an Intrepid class' MSD there is a secondary warp core visible.

 

according to memory alpha (a respectable source)

the saucer is not equipped with warp drive, only impulse engines. During a high warp separation, the stardrive section would need to slow down just long enough for the saucer, still riding the decaying warp energy, to clear. Otherwise, there would be risk of the stardrive section slamming into the rapidly slowing saucer

 

If the saucer is ever seen at warp i think it is an inconsistency

[TetsuoShima]

Tetsuoshima... How can the warp field encompass two seperate ships at two different locations far far apart? thats absurd... The logical conclusion would be that theres a seperate temporary warp core on each part of the Enterprise to enable warp speeds on the saucer as well.

 

=Han=

 

Who's talking about two locations far apart? Of course when the distance becomes to great, the battle section of the galaxy class can no longer generate a large enough warp field to encompass both sections and the saucer will gradually reverse to normal (=impulse) speed. When they are close together, like during a saucer seperation, the battle section can "easily" maintain a warpfield big enough to maintain both sections in warp speed, so that during the seperation the only movement that matters, is the movement of the two sections in relation to each other.

 

To conclude and support: the saucer section does NOT contain a warp engine, not even a partial one (don't know how that would function anyway). Only when the two sections are very close together can the saucer section be at warp while seperated from the battle section.

 

extra: this technique, of enlarging the warp field to encompass a 'different' space-vessel is seen quite a few times in StarTrek, it is not limited to the Galaxy class, but the seperation is, of course!

 

ps.: if you still don't believe me, read up on your warp-drive mechanics, it will support me! (btw. I'm not kidding here)

[Marcroft]

re a ships nacelle being damaged and forcing the ship out of warp - I would suggest that is due to an imbalance of the warp field - so by taking one "engine" out you are effectively leaving it with just the other - and the stresses that would place on the hull and the destabilising of the warp field, the best course of action would probably be to drop out of warp.

 

Then there is the phenomena of the drive plasma which can actually destabilise a warp field if released in its gaseous form.

 

Did anyone also notice that when Voyager was being attacked by the Kazon's once - that the warp nacelles weren't actually in their upright Warp positions, yet it was travelling at Warp?

 

That I assume was an effect error

 

But the saucer to reiterate the point has no warp drive.

 

Think of it like a ball being thrown - it has no propulsion of its own - but it borrows that from the hand that throws it, until it comes to a stop.

 

[dva2082]

From what i know the saucer, when separtated at warp, can coast at warp for a certain amount of time, then it will return to sublight speeds.

 

Another possibility (just a guess) what if the warp field were extended over the separated saucer? Could that keep the saucer at warp without being physically connected?

 

The saucer can move at warp until it leaves the main hull's warp field. At that time, the saucer reduces to sublight and the hull continues at warp. This has only happened a couple times, as it is EXTREMELY dangerous. Normally Saucer Sep is done at sublight velocity, if the ship is even moving at all.

 

Chris

[GhostShadow]

From what i know the saucer, when separtated at warp, can coast at warp for a certain amount of time, then it will return to sublight speeds.

 

Another possibility (just a guess) what if the warp field were extended over the separated saucer? Could that keep the saucer at warp without being physically connected?

 

I dont think so, you need a stable warp feild. In VOY eps. Scorpion part 1, when voyager encountered the armada of 15 borg cubes, voyager could not go to warp beacuse of sub space turbulince, so i would think that you need to create and hold a stabel warp feild in order to go warp. It might just be a mistake by the writers.. dunno.

A really good question, i will consult my encyclopidea.

[maverick]

an ep where a warp separation was successfully attempted was the one where dr sung set off data's homing beacon and data took over the ship. i think its called brothers.

 

the saucer was separated and immediatly dropped out of warp.

 

 

[Marcroft]

Not to be annoying but you don't need a warp field to go to warp.

This is suggested twice - in The Next Generation - when a Graviton Partical Wave is generated from a nearby planet to propel a vessel at warp speed, in Deep Space Nine, with the Bajoran Solar ships riding Tachyons, and in Voyager with Voyager Conspiracy - although the later wasn't technically moving at warp - it was faster then warp velocities.

 

I still think that if a subspace field is collapsed or can not be correctly maintained due to "turbulance" - that this forced disturbance means that the ship has to drop out of warp - otherwise the hull stresses of a partial field would tear the ship apart.

Almost evident in Enterprise Season 2 First Flight,

 

The only way I can equate this in practical terms is when two magnets are brought together, if they have the same poles the field patterns become quite distorted to the point whereby they repell one another, equally if they are different, they attract.

Just imagine the warp engines being magnets - and imagine the warp field as magnetic fields, and what would happen if fields changes do to the "disturbances".

[Weyoun]

Ok, as far as this thread goes, I asked the same (or at least a very similar) question, months ago, here.

 

 

Well' date=' apparently no one has an answer for that, being about a month and all. New question. I am rewatching Encounter at Farpoint. Around the beginning they perform an emergency saucer sep. at around warp 9.5. Now, while at warp that was "theoretically" possible (just about anything is with Data), I don't really understand that for this. They show the saucer pull ahead of the stardrive section of the ship and they don't decelerate until later. That would mean the saucer picked up speed without warp engines? And warp 9.2 or 9.3 was the "redline" for the ship at that time, which would mean that this should be causing structural damage or something at that speed anyway? I don't quite understand that one.[/quote']

 

 

And the answer I recieved:

 

The saucer section and engineering section were both within the same warp field at the time. Now, the way warp drive works is that it warps space-time in a limited area so as to allow faster-than-light travel without violating the laws of physics. Inside the warp field, the ship isn't moving at all, but rather staying stationary within a moving warp field, much as when you are on a train, it is the train, and not you, that is moving, even though you are, relative to the ground, moving quite a bit. All the saucer section has to do is turn on its thrusters within the warp field to move relative to the engineering section, while not appreciably changing speed relative to the rest of the universe.

 

To summarize: being inside a warp field is rather like being inside a train, in that while you are moving very fast relative to the outside, you are stationary relative to the inside, and can easily move about.

 

So yeah... this basically supports the TetsuoShima arguement, and makes sense to me.