Warp cores

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McAvoy
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Warp cores

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I was thinking about this for awhile. Warp Cores and it's capabilities what they bring to the top warp speed of the vessel.

They can be vertical or horizontal though from TMP onwards we have seen them vertical. They are very tall, usually going from the top to bottom of the secondary hull of major ships we have seen. With the exception of Defiant where it looks to be a shorter but wider than in proportion for a ship that size.

Outside their height, they really don't take up that much space. If height and width are proportional then you could see a small one like a meter in diameter for example on a small ship like a Oberth or Miranda class. If height is important then you could easily say the Galaxy class has the most powerful even potentially due their sheer size and height of the secondart hull. Even more so than the Sovereign which doesn't have the height as a GCS.

Then you got a Intrepid class which is supposed to be fast and powerful for her size and her warp core seems to be more or less like a Galaxy class or a Sovereign class. I haven't really looked into it but it might be the same size as a GCS.

Makes me wonder about the size of the warp core in relationship to the size of the vessel.

I wonder also if warp cores can be horizontal so that their length (height for vertical) can be at their maximum. Like I said, warp cores themselves really don't take up much space and it would seem a warp core like the E-D could be fitted into a much smaller ship like a Excelsior for example.
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Re: Warp cores

Post by AlexMcpherson79 »

Movie Constitution
16 decks tall

Ambassador
15 decks tall

Sovereign
15 Decks tall

Galaxy
13 decks tall

Excelsior
11 Decks Tall

Intrepid
7 decks tall

Sabre
6 decks tall

Nova
4 decks tall

Defiant
3 decks tall


Defiant is smallest ship with smallest core. Nova is a tad bigger, in both respects.
Sabre is a bit bigger than a Nova in length, but much wider.

Intrepid Class is only 7 decks tall.

For Excelsior, simply going off of a fan MSD because it's... an odd ship (like where Deck 15 is supposed to be vs where it's shown in Generations)

Galaxy class... it's not actually that big in regards to the size of the ship itself. we know the core goes up to around where the 'deuterium storage tanks' are which is in the the engineering hull decks where it flares back out from the neck to the widest point, the deck that bends 'up' into the nacelle struts. at a guess, this makes the core roughly twice the size of the Intrepid (NOT the same size). And no the intrepids is NOT like the Galaxy or Sovereign's core.

Sovereign also, we know from (low quality) canon MSD it's supposed to be almost entirely the height of the engineering hull - ventral surface up to the dorsal surface rear of the saucer shuttlebay. lop off roughly two decks worth for the connection stuff that's not 'part' of the core, and you get 15.

ambassador... eh I have a fan MSD but that's all.

Connie Refit.

According to a fan MSD, it goes from the 'glass dome' thing on the saucer dorsal near the sublights all the way down vertically through the neck to the ventral surface of the engineering hull. That. Is. 16 Decks.
For a ship a little shorter but taller than the intrepid class, it's got almost three times the length.
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Re: Warp cores

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Good info. I was thinking about counting the decks on the MSDs myself at a later time.

I think the core going up to the crystal of the saucer in the Connie refit we may have to ignore. I hthink I have heard about it in some official publications somewhere. The reason why we should ignore it, is due to how damn close it would be to the photon torpedo launchers. It would practically sit in between them. Then you got that docking port there too. Not to mention, the Reliant had her crystal destroyed. I am thinking it's just part of the impulse drive.

Though discussion on what that crystal does could be saved for another time. We have only seen it on the Refit, Miranda and the Excelsior (she has two). The TOS Enterprise doesn't have one and neither does the NX class or Daedalus class.

Abouf the height of the cores, the fact that the Galaxy class has a shorter core than the Ambassador class could have been seen as an improvement in design. But then it jumps in height again for the Sovereign class. Maybe height is involved in power.
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Re: Warp cores

Post by AlexMcpherson79 »

Starfleet: Why Antimatter?
Everyone Else: do they even USE Antimatter?

And "Warp core" to me is a false nonemclaturewhateverthesuitablewordis.
An ACTUAL Warp DRIVE would simply be the entire system dedicated to getting a ship in, sustain, and out of a warp bubble. So, nacelles, and the "warp plasma conduits". But the M/AM Reactor colloquially called 'warp core', well, isn't. (Or right, Colloquial. whatever.)

Because we know, when that 'Warp core' is shut down, the ship doesn't have much power.
So its a POWER CORE, not a WARP core.. well technically a Reactor.

So the ships they're in, use a LOT of power, because matter-antimatter reactions are... bloody phenominal, I'd wager. (I'm not a scientist.) to NEED the so-called "Warp Core"...

So the question is sort of answered. Why antimatter? Because starfleet ships require a LOT of it, available practically immediately. I don't know lore wise if it's onscreen, behind the scenes or otherwise, but the Defiant's weapon systems are supposedly tied directly into the M/AM power system... or more directly than the regular phaser system, hence how those pulses can obliterate the dominion bugships and klingon birdships so quickly. (Headcanon: They DO have shields, they're just bloody overwhelmed, and fleet battles from the dominion war, ships DID have shields, we just had the production limits of manpower and rendering capabilities for the depiction thereoff.) But even through buffers, there's a significant power draw.
So, Shields and Weapons. By TNG, the Galaxy class is basically a match or more for most, AND it's massive.

As for actual Warp Drive.. Maybe it's more... efficient in some way in generating warp plasma... and not, as we think, the actual SOURCE of warp plasma? THIS means that the Galaxy's Saucer Section impulse fusion drives can produce warp plasma for 'warp sustainers', but not to the level needed to generate a warp field. (think of the warp field energy requirement chart we saw in Enterprise at one point, that basically means, there are warp factors that are power-cheap once you're there, but power HOGS to GET up to speed. The "Warp Sustainers" of the gal saucer and torpedoes may have the power capabilities to HOLD speed, just not GET there... )

So A M/AM trades the dangers and SPACE requirements for sheer energy POTENTIALS. Like, "hey, we're the fastest kids on the block because we've got a 987 Hemi Antimatter Bigblock under the hood of this Dodge Viper of starships", whilst that scowling kardassian looks at their Ford Fiesta of starships and thinks their 2.0 litre Fusion Reactor is pitiful, but it fulfills their requirements anyway. That, Cubic-for-cubic, their Fusion Reactor actually has more power produced by cubic, but it's like... lets use more cars for the metaphor. It's like a Ford Fiesta that revs up from idle to full-bore of 5,000 rpm (I haven't driven a fiesta) in the same time that the *cough* 987 Hemi Antimatter Bigblock would go from idle to 15,000 rpm... But the Fiesta would almost break from being held at 5,000, and is a deuterium-hog because deuterium doesn't actually have as much pound for pound energy potential as a fuel for fusion as it and anti-deuterium have as fuel for a m/am reaction. That, and the down to idle time is different, like, both at full bore suddenly letting off the throttle, the fiesta, to not stall it, the fuel feed slowly reduces and so it takes longer to drop to idle (from 5,000) than the M/AM does from three times the feed.

And one more thing. Replication. do Klingons even HAVE that technology? Or use it for anything other than "food that isn't meant to be alive when eaten or drink that isn't bloodwine".

2309, a fine vintage. Buuuut... was it a replicated pattern of a 2309 bloodwine made on Boreth? Or do they REALLY make SOOO Much bloodwine?
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Re: Warp cores

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We could look up who what as a power generation core. Like dialogue saying 'their warp core is going critical' or 'their power core is shut down'. Kind of thing.

We know Romulans use quantum singularities instead of the typical antimatter/matter design we see in Trek for the most part.

Its also possible and most likely probably that alien ships have a M/AM reactor of some kind but it doesn't look like Starfleet's. Maybe it's configured differently or something.

I think though in the end, warp drives require more or less the same components to operate. Even if they don't look quite the same or called the same thing.
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