Good Bad Ugly: VOY

[Captain Picard's Hair]

How hard can it be to replicate a photon torpedo, really? It's not like they are big or anything.

Fueling them might be harder, given the power shortage Voyager faced and no Starfleet refueling depots for thousands of light years.

[Captain Seafort]

They're big enough to have problems getting them out of one of the usual food terminals, and there's the question of what the casings are made of - I can't recall any metal (or anything other than food for that matter)coming out of a replicator. Compared to the number of shuttles Voyager produced of course, especially when the design and construction of the Delta Flyer is considered, torpedoes are easy.

[Captain Seafort]

Fueling them might be harder, given the power shortage Voyager faced and no Starfleet refueling depots for thousands of light years.

Given the abundance of hydrogen in the universe fuel should never have been an issue, provided that the ship had some means of producing antimatter (which, given that they never mentioned AM shortages, is likely).

[Captain Picard's Hair]

We've never seen it done, but we have heard of parts being replicated; this at least may assure us that the materials might not be a problem. The size may be an issue, but it's conceivable that starships carry larger "industrial" replicator(s) for engineering/maintenance/field repair use.

[Blackstar the Chakat]

How hard can it be to replicate a photon torpedo, really? It's not like they are big or anything.

It was brought up in the second or third episode that they only had 38 torpedoes remaing, and the occasional comment about not wasting torpedoes. It seems odd to show concern like that if they weren't hard to replicate.

[Captain Picard's Hair]

Fueling them might be harder, given the power shortage Voyager faced and no Starfleet refueling depots for thousands of light years.

Given the abundance of hydrogen in the universe fuel should never have been an issue, provided that the ship had some means of producing antimatter (which, given that they never mentioned AM shortages, is likely).

There has to be some reason there was replicator rationing...

I also do wonder about how efficient producing antimatter is, how energy intensive the process is. This may make it "uneconomical" to refuel on the fly like Voyager had to (though this is technically just speculation). The TNG manual mentioned an antimatter generator, but that's not canon.

[Sionnach Glic]

Wasn't there an ep of TNG where they couldn't replicate a simple metal hatch? That would imply that they may not be able to replicate large, metalic objects.

[sunnyside]

Well regardless a photorp requires precious antimatter.

An antimatter generator is standard on Galaxy class ships at least. However it is considered something you don't use if you can avoid it and that it is slow and very energy wasteful.

So maybe for every couple photon torpedos they fire they have to waste a day sucking up deuterium in some nebula (which we get to see them doing once, of course that time they get attacked by some electrical nasty critter, but they might have done it a bunch).

And then they'd have to waste even more time generating the antimatter.

[Captain Seafort]

There has to be some reason there was replicator rationing...

The demonstrate the fact that they were a long way from home, and short of even the most basic supplies. Except, of course, when the plot demanded otherwise.

I also do wonder about how efficient producing antimatter is, how energy intensive the process is. This may make it "uneconomical" to refuel on the fly like Voyager had to (though this is technically just speculation). The TNG manual mentioned an antimatter generator, but that's not canon.

The process is probably enormously energy- and resource-intensive, as in the TM and real life. However, with the bussard collectors, that shouldn't be a problem - the universe is something like 99% hydrogen, so they've effectively got an inexhaustible supply.

[Captain Seafort]

It was brought up in the second or third episode that they only had 38 torpedoes remaing, and the occasional comment about not wasting torpedoes. It seems odd to show concern like that if they weren't hard to replicate.

Especially as they usually proceeded to spam the things out like there's no tomorrow the very next episode.

[Captain Picard's Hair]

The density of hydrogen gas in free space likely isn't enough to keep them going, requiring Voyager to stop at nebulae every now and then. It's conceivable that Voyager had a policy of limiting power use to essentials in order to minimize stopoffs. OTOH, the constant stopping by planets to say "hi" and scanning of every passing nebula indicates that they weren't in as much of a hurry to get home as some of the rhetoric made it seem...

[Captain Seafort]

So? Stop at stars, gas giants, nebulae, etc, to top up both hydrogen and, indirectly, antimatter supplies. Sure, it'll take time, but refueling is a pretty important part of the journey. Given that Voyager was expected to make about 1000ly/year during the journey, while the E-D expected to get back from J-25 at an average speed of about 2700c, that seems to take refuelling, and other resupply/maintainence stops into account pretty well.

[Aaron]

Wasn't there an ep of TNG where they couldn't replicate a simple metal hatch? That would imply that they may not be able to replicate large, metalic objects.

They can't replicate gold press latinum and a bunch of other stuff. The replicator isn't a magic do all machine, it only takes base materials (like whatever they use to make food) and rearranges them into something new. But if you don't have the base stock than you can't do it. For example if you had a stock of iron and wanted to replicate steel, you'd need carbon.

There's been quite a few comments on things they can't replicate or don't get replicated well. Like the cavier.

[Teaos]

Didnt it replicate Janeway a metal coffe cup? That proves it can do metal.

Industrial replicators can do advanced bits so there is no reason given time they could replace stuff.

[Blackstar the Chakat]

Didnt it replicate Janeway a metal coffe cup? That proves it can do metal.

Industrial replicators can do advanced bits so there is no reason given time they could replace stuff.

Playing devil's advocate for a minute a Cardassian replicator was turned into a transporter once. Since Federation technology is often more versatile it's possible it beamed the cup from storage, saving energy from having to replicate it.