Deflector Shields (not navigational deflectors)
- Thread starter therritn
- Start date
in an alternate timeline that happened during the Xindy arc, Archer was infected with temporal bugs that infected his brain preventing him from forming long term memories.
in this timeline, Andorians provided the NX-01 with deflector shield technology some 10 years (or was it more?) after the initial infection took place.
The Vulcans, Andorians and Tellarites all have deflector shields... only Earth lacked the technology at the time because their research into forcefields was relatively new (they had a few test emitters which produced an unstable and short-lived force-field in Season 2 but that was about it).
I would surmise that Earth would either develop shield technology sometime in between after the 4th season of Enterprise and before birth of the Federation (likely during or just before the war with the Romulans), or it would be given to them by the founding Federation members as a result of technological exchange.
in this timeline, Andorians provided the NX-01 with deflector shield technology some 10 years (or was it more?) after the initial infection took place.
The Vulcans, Andorians and Tellarites all have deflector shields... only Earth lacked the technology at the time because their research into forcefields was relatively new (they had a few test emitters which produced an unstable and short-lived force-field in Season 2 but that was about it).
I would surmise that Earth would either develop shield technology sometime in between after the 4th season of Enterprise and before birth of the Federation (likely during or just before the war with the Romulans), or it would be given to them by the founding Federation members as a result of technological exchange.
They always spoke of "polarizing the hull plating". I suppose someone is going to correct me
but what if that was used to deflect the dust in space. It couldn't stop large meteoroids, but the small stuff would deflect off a magnetic shield of sorts. Or is that total crap?Polarization of hull plating was definitely used on NX-01 and ships that came before it, but it's possible that this has little to do with deflecting incoming space dust or large meteoroids.
It might be possible that the subspace bubble around the ship serves this purpose.
We've seen the NX-01 and NX-02 having their own respective bubbles during warp... and it's possible they are present during sublight as well - since subspace technology was crucial to interstellar travel.
It might be possible that the subspace bubble around the ship serves this purpose.
We've seen the NX-01 and NX-02 having their own respective bubbles during warp... and it's possible they are present during sublight as well - since subspace technology was crucial to interstellar travel.
Also, NX-01 did have that dish thing at the bow - a feature often (and perhaps baselessly?) associated with the deflection of space dust at warp. Perhaps Earth simply hadn't yet mastered the trick of turning a deflector beam into a combat deflector? We did have steel snowplows before we had practical steel-armored fighting vehicles...
Timo Saloniemi
Timo Saloniemi
Agreed.
But the dish on the NX-01 could have been used for various purposes much like the deflector dishes on later ships... in this case it could have channeled the warp field generated by the nacelles to be present in low intensity during sub-light.
SF ships in the 24th century always generated a subspace field around them (during both sub-light and warp)... except that those ships could have used a combination of a low powered force field in conjecture with the low warp field at sub-light for deflection of space dust... a feature which would inherently be safer/better.
But the dish on the NX-01 could have been used for various purposes much like the deflector dishes on later ships... in this case it could have channeled the warp field generated by the nacelles to be present in low intensity during sub-light.
SF ships in the 24th century always generated a subspace field around them (during both sub-light and warp)... except that those ships could have used a combination of a low powered force field in conjecture with the low warp field at sub-light for deflection of space dust... a feature which would inherently be safer/better.
Perhaps NX-01's "navigational deflector" is based on gravitational technology, since Earth Starfleet has presumably mastered this (since the ships have artificial gravity plating).
You might imagine generating a gravitational field around a ship could deflect space dust, but perhaps it wouldn't be strong enough to resist energy beam weapons consisting of highly charged particles.
Just a thought anyway.
You might imagine generating a gravitational field around a ship could deflect space dust, but perhaps it wouldn't be strong enough to resist energy beam weapons consisting of highly charged particles.
Just a thought anyway.
^ A simple magnetic field would be sufficient to deflect charged particles. I think it's the more exotic varieties with neutral charges that would be harder to deflect with conventional shielding.
...
Unless, of course, the "shields" of Star Trek were just glorified electromagnets after all?
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Unless, of course, the "shields" of Star Trek were just glorified electromagnets after all?
It would seem that both the deflector shields AND the warp drive stem from mastery of anti-gravity technology.
Trip refers to the warp engines as a gravimetric displacement manifold, whatever that is.
Clara's Imaginary friend "Isabella" refers to the Enterprise's Deflector Shields as graviton generators or something to that effect.
Trip refers to the warp engines as a gravimetric displacement manifold, whatever that is.
Clara's Imaginary friend "Isabella" refers to the Enterprise's Deflector Shields as graviton generators or something to that effect.
That's the backstage story from the TNG Tech Manual, too: shields are gravitons suspended in space (by a subspace field, FWIW).
And it's sort of natural to think that warp drive is gravitic: if your mass is positive, you can't even reach lightspeed, but what if you crank up your antigravity devices and attain high negative mass?
Plus, artificial gravity in Trek is always described as dirt cheap and absolutely reliable. The baddies can jam just about anything the heroes use, but not gravity. Betting your basic space survival on that technology sounds like a good idea, then.
It would be rather elegant to postulate a development where artificial gravity is first created in rough 1G levels and applied on floor plates; then extended to the outer hull and gradually made stronger to give hull armor; and finally mastered so that extremely strong and localized gravity can be created in empty space, strong enough to bounce back even EM radiation and EM-based weapons.
Timo Saloniemi
And it's sort of natural to think that warp drive is gravitic: if your mass is positive, you can't even reach lightspeed, but what if you crank up your antigravity devices and attain high negative mass?
Plus, artificial gravity in Trek is always described as dirt cheap and absolutely reliable. The baddies can jam just about anything the heroes use, but not gravity. Betting your basic space survival on that technology sounds like a good idea, then.
It would be rather elegant to postulate a development where artificial gravity is first created in rough 1G levels and applied on floor plates; then extended to the outer hull and gradually made stronger to give hull armor; and finally mastered so that extremely strong and localized gravity can be created in empty space, strong enough to bounce back even EM radiation and EM-based weapons.
Timo Saloniemi
That's more or less my pet theory behind the use of impulse engines to attain FTL speeds. As also detailed in the TNG TM, the impulse engines utilise a Subspace Driver Coil which reduces the mass of the mass of the vessel, thus allowing for speeds of up to 25% of light by burning only a tiny amount of deuterium (the TNG TM says that this driver coil only came into use form Ambassador shipss onwards, but in fact this would be neccessary for any starship that wasn't mostly filled with fuel tanks).
However, by spinning up the SDC to a faster rate, the mass of the vessel could be reduced to almost zero (allowing 99% of light), then zero (lightspeed), then negative mass (allowing multiples of lightspeed). This might be a less efficient means of FTL travel than warp, but would still allow primitve vessels fitted with "simple impulse" to traverse the vast distances between solar systems.
YMMV
