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My take on the Daedalus class.











Mostly I've stuck to the original model, but I have added a deflector dish.

Actually I am very tempted to be a reinterpretation of this. For example, they have the struts attaching to the neck. But the neck is essentially just a tunnel from the engineering hull to the sphere - if big power conduits come down into there, it blocks access. You can probably work it, just, but I think I would like to move the struts to the cylinder below the neck at the front of the engineering hull, and have that be a sort of modular hull for the warp core. You could then possibly have that unit and nacelles arrangement be part of other ship designs from the same era.

Mulling some other changes, too. Any suggestions?

Flames and racing stripes.

Did the original have that truncated part at the the type of the primary hull, with a more traditional TOS style bridge sat on top? I don't recall. Anyway, as to the attachment point of the nacelle struts, I had the following idea which I will hopefully be able to explain somewhat clearly: I would simpy expand that "bottleneck" at the fore end of the engineering hull so that it has an ovoid, rather than circular, cross section. In that way, the neck doesn't extend rearward to sit on top of that bottleneck, but actually becomes consolidated into it just forward of where the nacelle struts attach - so in essence, the struts are attached to that fore part of the engineering hull rather than to the neck.

BTW, what are the probes/antennae justting from the bussard collectors? Are those a representation of the Daedalus' more primitive weaponry?

The thing on the top of the sphere certainly looks like a bridge, but it's one of the controversial things about the ship - at the size it's usually depicted, it's too small to be a bridge. So either it's just a housing for a sensor, or the ship is significantly larger than we think it is - like closer to 150, even 170 metres rather than 110-120.

As for the struts, here's my take on how I'd connect them. Plus, I've dropped the sphere so the neck connects at the top. I think it looks better that way, less ungainly.

That "bottle top" section on the front of the engineering hull would then house the warp core and matter/antimatter, with the neck passing above.

You could imagine various types of engineering hull attached to the back of that - whatever you wanted, like a hospital hull, a cargo hull, etc. And for that matter, any type of hull on the front of the neck in place of a sphere. Very flexible design!




The probe things on the nacelles, I don't know. The Enterprise herself had them in the original pilot episode :



But lost them in the main series. A lot of people assume they just represent a slightly older model of nacelle, so they tend to crop up on pre-TOS ships a lot. They're on the Daedalus model, probably for that reason :



One of the big questions about the Daedalus class is just how accurate that model is, in universe. The very small size combined with a large crew - this thing is a fraction the size of the NX-01, but has 229 crew compared to 80 - is a bit problematic. And the styling now looks odd next to the NX class, considering they are practically contemporaries.

But since we've never seen the ship on screen except as a model in people's offices, one can wonder if perhaps those models are not all that accurate. It might be the "real" Daedalus is indeed more like 170+ m long.

Lots of fans have their own take on the basic design. I love this one :



I could see that alongside an NX as a realistic ship! Plus, it's a waaay better model than I can make. So far.

I've always loved the Daedalus and Olympics. The spherical primary hull always appealed to me, though I can't precisely explain why.

It's a very logical shape. Maximum internal volume for a given amount of hull and all that.

Borg ships were originally meant to be spheres, but they were scared they'd look too much like Death Stars!

You can see the logic behind early starships being this sort of shape, "bang for buck" in terms of equipment and compliment for as little material as possible. Again, rings true for the Olympic in the maximum of space for triage as is physically possible. Makes you wonder why more Federation ships weren't spherical.

I can only assume there's a "targeting profile" argument in a more combat focused ship or a "warp field efficiency" argument in the distance explorers.

I think the Borg would look cool if their ships had no specific shape, like the unimatrix we see, just random outgrowing from a centre point since they dont care for design.

Doesn't gel well with the obsession on Order out of Chaos, though.

Ongoing tweaks. Some changes inspired by TOS, some inspired by the NX class.

That's definitely a lot more along the lines of what I'd expect from a ship that bridged the gap between ENT and TOS.

Indeed. I like how you fixed that little oddity while keeping the impression of being a primitive, early example of the technology.

Thank you both!