Centaur Class

[Johnny]

This was possibly one of the most inspired ship designs ive seen in a while. from a DS9 episode?

Loved the idea, the structure, and the long nacelles, harking back to some older design proportions.

Its also one of the only designs I know that has the nacelles outside the width of the main hull. anyone know of any others?

Does anyone know any history on it, who designed it, etc?

J.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Lots of details about the USS Centaur can be found HERE, along with photos of the shooting model - which was actually labelled "USS Buckner", and was covered in windows unlike the inaccurate CG model (created for the Star Trek Fact Files, I think)

It was made from AMT Excelsior (saucer, nacelles) and Reliant (bridge dome, torpedo launcher, roll bar) model parts, plus a ton of greebles. The ship is either the size of an Excelsior saucer, in which case the bridge module would be akin to that on the 2009 Enterprise (where the bridge itself is a room on the lowest level of the structure, at the front of the deck), or perhaps the saucer and nacelles are half the size of those on Excelsior and the bridge module is the same size as that on the Miranda and Constitution (prime) classes.

The ship appeared in the DS9 episode "A Time to Stand"

 

[Santaman]

Adam Buckner agrees with scaling the ship to the Miranda components, and we obtain a length of only 210m - considerably smaller than a Miranda.

^^ from the article, so its a fairly small ship.

 

[Albertese]

That makes sense. If the ship is small, then it makes sense that some of the bulkier components might protrude from the hull and make the surface sprout some greeblies...

--Alex

 

[F. King Daniel]

Adam Buckner agrees with scaling the ship to the Miranda components, and we obtain a length of only 210m - considerably smaller than a Miranda.

^^ from the article, so its a fairly small ship.

Odd that nobody seemed to tell the guy who made the CG version this.

IIRC, "A Call to Arms" shows the Centaur to be about the same size as the Jem'Hadar fighter, so I guess smaller is correct. A shame - I wanted a big Abramsverse-style bridge module on a Prime universe ship!

 

[Dukhat]

With the help of Adam Buckner himself and one or two others, I was able to build a replica of the Centaur which is about 95% accurate to the original. If I get some time I'll post pics of it.

And, by the way, it isn't "Centaur class." The ship's name is the Centaur (actually, the name printed on the model is "U.S.S. Buckner," but the script calls it the Centaur), and it's class is unknown. The DS9 Tech manual stated that this and the other kitbashes were just components of regular ships grafted together quickly. However, due to the scaling inconsistencies of the Centaur and the other ships, this is obviously wrong.

And, yes, the CGI model is wildly inaccurate to the original kitbash.

 

[Avro Arrow]

^ Just based on the names alone, I always thought the Encyclopedia's Chimera-class would be a good class name for the Centaur.

Although I believe the novels went with Centaur-class, so that may be where the OP got it from.

 

[yenny]

^ Just based on the names alone, I always thought the Encyclopedia's Chimera-class would be a good class name for the Centaur.

Although I believe the novels went with Centaur-class, so that may be where the OP got it from.

I had wrote Star Trek Communicator and told them that the USS Centaur should be a Chimera-class starship.

 

[Johnny]

It's interesting how bad that studio model is compared to others I've come across. I just think it's an inspired design. Also, I think I prefer Centaur to Chimera.

Though, just a small comparison...

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

Star Trek Online (not the be all and end all of course) makes it the same size as a Miranda class. in fact it's more or less a modernized variation of the Miranda.
There it's also called Centaur class.

 

[SeerSGB]

It's interesting how bad that studio model is compared to others I've come across. I just think it's an inspired design. Also, I think I prefer Centaur to Chimera.

Though, just a small comparison...

It looks pretty good flipped upside down like that.

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

I always see the Centaur-Class as a smaller "version" of the Excelsior-Class, similar to the Constitution/Miranda.

It was good to see the ship in action, though a pity it never appeared in any of the big fleet shots afterwards.

 

[Timo]

I like to think in terms of weapon systems: somebody at Starfleet probably went "Now what will it take to field the Mk 26 Quadruple Photon Torpedo Launch System and nothing extra?", as opposed to equipping a large and complex light cruiser with Mk 26 in addition to all the sensors and shuttlebays and laboratories and whatnot. And the answer turned out to be "A ship half the size of Miranda"...

That way, we don't have to search in vain for all the usual starship features in this model; it's not necessarily a 1:1 successor to some preceding type, but more like a 0.25:1 addition to Starfleet's arsenal in the early 24th century.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Dukhat]

^ Just based on the names alone, I always thought the Encyclopedia's Chimera-class would be a good class name for the Centaur.

The only problem with that is that the one known ship of the Chimera class, the Portland, has a registry of 57418, which tends one to think more of the more-advanced BoBW kitbash designs, not something made from Excelsior and Miranda parts. Of course, YMMV about the chronological canonicity of starship registries.

Star Trek Online (not the be all and end all of course) makes it the same size as a Miranda class.

Actually, if we base the size on the bridge dome and photon torpedo pod, it's only about half the size of a Miranda.

I always see the Centaur-Class as a smaller "version" of the Excelsior-Class, similar to the Constitution/Miranda.

Well, it's really smaller than the Excelsior, if it's only half the size of a Miranda

It was good to see the ship in action, though a pity it never appeared in any of the big fleet shots afterwards.

That's because by the time the fleet shots were used, all the ships were CGI. None of the kitbashes were scanned into CGI models, so they weren't used in the fleet.


I'd also like to point out that almost all depictions of the Centaur's photon torpedo pod placement are wrong. It's usually depicted as being entirely underneath the rear of the saucer, when in fact only the bottom half is. The top half is actually inside the saucer, and the end of the pod sticks out of the rear end of the saucer. You'll see what I mean when I post my pics.

 

[137th Gebirg]

Ah, yes - the Centaur. This was always my favorite of the DS9 frankenfleet kit bashes. Its design made sense and I loved how it drew from the Miranda-class pedigree for a lot of its architecture, scaling issues notwithstanding. A great little ship.