Is DS9 a bad design?

[Deepcrush]

Considering Terok Nor had a measly 6 torpedoes at the beginning of DS9, its unlikely the designers cared even a jot about her defensive capabilities.

Considering her intended function, defense isn't really a good thing. If a bunch of Bajorans rebels take the station over you don't want to have to send a fleet to take her back.

[Mark]

Mikey...good point.

Reliant....the Cardies took, broke, or otherwise made the entire tactical system non existant. Those six torps could have been left overs they missed, or some spare ammo the E-D gave the station, not expacting any trouble. We have no idea what the initial armnament for a "Nor" class station is.

Deep....seems to me that the Cardies would just destroy the station and all aboard, and build a new one, if that automated defense system they had on there didn't work.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

Why not curve the outer pylons out but shorten their length so they'd still fit within the old shield bubble?

[Deepcrush]

Deep....seems to me that the Cardies would just destroy the station and all aboard, and build a new one, if that automated defense system they had on there didn't work.

That automated defense system seemed to be a last resort rather then just a general plan.

[Mikey]

Why not curve the outer pylons out but shorten their length so they'd still fit within the old shield bubble?

If you shorten the pylons enough to do that, you lose more than you gain as far as docking space a/o room for larger ships to maneuver to dock.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

Why not curve the outer pylons out but shorten their length so they'd still fit within the old shield bubble?

If you shorten the pylons enough to do that, you lose more than you gain as far as docking space a/o room for larger ships to maneuver to dock.

You sure? I'll admit to being bad at visualizing, but I think with proper curvature you'd gain room for larger ships and still keep it within the shield bubble.

[Deepcrush]

Only way to maintain the shield bubble and improve docking would be to have extending docking rings on the pylons. Though they wouldn't be very stable in all likely means.

[Coalition]

Only way to maintain the shield bubble and improve docking would be to have extending docking rings on the pylons. Though they wouldn't be very stable in all likely means.

The engineering to maintain an airtight seal where the docking ring bends would be 'interesting'. Sections that stick outside the shield bubble, but are detached during an attack might be possible, but then you have to armor the corridor entrance.

RK Striker likely has the right idea, so instead of having the three docing ports meeting near the top, you'd cut those pylons in half height-wise, and have the tops of the three pylons meeting about halfway between the Habitat ring and the Docking Ring.

To help visualize, Ex-astris Scientia has a page with links to some images of DS9 (near the bottom).

[Mikey]

I think the easiest mod to increase docking area would be to leave the pylons alone, but add rings connecting the pylons (probably about 2/3 of the way "up" or "down" the pylons) to make rings parallel but slightly smaller in radius to the main habitat ring.

[Teaos]

That would work well, reseve the pylons for capital ships and smaller firgates get the ring.

[Deepcrush]

I think the easiest mod to increase docking area would be to leave the pylons alone, but add rings connecting the pylons (probably about 2/3 of the way "up" or "down" the pylons) to make rings parallel but slightly smaller in radius to the main habitat ring.

To be honest, if its just a focus on the smaller craft we so often see. You could easily fit two extra rings both top and bottom.

The engineering to maintain an airtight seal where the docking ring bends would be 'interesting'. Sections that stick outside the shield bubble, but are detached during an attack might be possible, but then you have to armor the corridor entrance.

RK Striker likely has the right idea, so instead of having the three docing ports meeting near the top, you'd cut those pylons in half height-wise, and have the tops of the three pylons meeting about halfway between the Habitat ring and the Docking Ring.

Problem is that connecting them would mean you could only fit one large ship instead of three on the upper/lower pylon. This means supplying cruisers would become a very slow task.

[Tyyr]

You could angle the pylons out but not greatly increase the shield bubble by moving them from the outer ring to the inner.

Second, the docking ports seemed a bit pointless anyways. They're not terrible big making them useless for bulk material transfer. You might have some umbilicals running beneath the decking but it's not going to be much given the space to work with. The only use the docking ports seemed to have is so that personnel wouldn't have to beam to and from the station and yet the only way they appear to have been able to move all the ore they should have been generating is by transporter. So you're not saving any power by docking the ships since moving a few thousand kilograms of people back and forth pales in comparison to moving a few thousand tons of ore around by transporter.

The hab ring would actually make the most sense on the far outer ring. I'd put shelters for non-essential personnel towards the core. That way the first area to take damage, the outer ring, is also full of stuff that is totally non-essential to the defense or survival of the station.

[Jim]

it is basically designed like an airport, but in 3D. It needed to have lots of docks for ships to connect to without tripping over eachother (big design flaw in B5). Look at an arial picture of an airport and you will see that they are thin and have fingers sticking out in all directions. The only odd thing is that the docks at the end of the upper and lower pylons are pointed inward... outward would be more usable.

[Mikey]

Right, as has been said the inward-pointing pylons save shield efficiency.

[Tyyr]

Which is ridiculous anyways as you could have compressed the station into a much tinier volume by not having dozens of pointless docking points.