Why does the Phoenix have Bussard collectors?

[Tiberius]

Bingo and if anyone doubts that reality

Just look at the stupidity of their apparently ability to minaturize a WARP CORE....(an Matter Antimatter/ Matter REACTOR) and it's containment technology into a Diamater of 3.05 meters for stable Rocket launch to orbit. It's already on the level of 24th century Runabout technology to even be capable of generating a warp field. Let alone launching more mass than the SPACE SHUTTLE's Orbiter and all at the hands of a rag tag organization...

And just emerging out of WWIII only 9 years ago...

Um, I thought Zef only installed the warp drive and the cockpit. All the rockets that were used to get the ship into orbit were already there. You don't think he built the P{hoenix from scratch, do you?

And let's not forget that a runabout's warp core can provide significant warp speeds for considerable time. Zef's ship barely managed warp 1 and only for a few seconds.

We have to assume that it is a M/AR.

Why?

Enterprise and the other ships were using M/AR's not fusion powerplants which would have made sense for the time period. The producers...(same ones on ENTERPRISE) are just taking our intelligence for granted.

Yeah, starting a century later.

Or the just had NO idea what they were doing. But it sounds like the former. Berman is a tight wad....he had no vision and that's why DS9 VOY and ENT are just the same iterations of the same form with no substance.

I get confused between those Voyager episodes with Odo trying to find his people and the DS9 episodes where they are trying to get home too.

You can't make a warp ship out TITAN II missle with 21 century Technology of Star Trek. That's why Trek made the transition from sci fi to Fantasy under Berman

You can't make a warp ship with 24th century technology either. Not in real life.

 

[Timo]

You can't make a warp ship out TITAN II missle with 21 century Technology of Star Trek.

Why not? People seem to be under the illusion that 21st century tech in Star Trek is somehow similar to 21st century tech in the real world. It's not. We have had interstellar probes for a decade now, artificial gravity for two. Why on Earth should it be even moderately difficult to build a starship out of garage junk when that junk in all likelihood consists of leftover antimatter batteries and flying belts?

[warp core] was supposed to be new tech for the Galaxy and onwards

Huh? Nothing in TNG was supposed to be new tech, save perhaps for holodecks. And even that "perhaps" was later clarified when it was revealed that the civilian world had operated passable holoentertainment devices for several decades before "Encounter at Farpoint" - thereby establishing continuity with TAS "Practical Joker".

M/AM was also supposed to be relatively new tech for the TOS era

Again, not. Nothing in TOS was said to be new technology, save for the M-5 multitronic computer and its predecessor technology duotronics. Phasers, transporters, warp drives, shields... They were all old news. If some technology was considered "old" and not up to the hero ship standards, it was centuries old, as in "Where No Man Has Gone Before" or "Balance of Terror".

It's not possible to nail down a timeline of technological breakthroughs from TOS and TNG and then claim that ST:FC somehow lies ahead of that logical curve. Every bit of relevant Trek technology was always developed well in advance of the respective shows and movies. ENT was basically the sole exception to this, its premise being that a new type of warp drive had just emerged and made mankind's first real deep space exploration mission possible.

Kirk and Picard were handed their superior technology on a platter. Why should we think Cochrane was not?

TOS explicitly said Earth did not have the nuclear holocaust

Where?

Of course, if the Phoenix had an intermix chamber, then it had to be a M/AM reactor...

Of course not. Saturn V had an intermix chamber, too - in fact eleven of them, 5+5+1 in three stages. "Intermix" is not inherently related to antimatter in any way.

which makes no sense.

Why not? Antimatter power could well be commonplace in the 2050s of Trek Earth. There's absolutely no reason for it not to be - it's purely up to the writers of the pseudohistory to decide whether Earth in a fictional alternate history operates antimatter batteries, Mr Fusion domestic power stations or perhaps cosmic energy taps. The writers of Trek have chosen antimatter, and have not deviated from that path.

There are major corporations who have blown millions of dollars and multiple test flights trying to figure out how to recover a rocket stage at sea in the manner you describe. All of these organizations have far greater resources than Cochrane's team, more money, more infrastructure, and every one of them depends on the cooperation of NASA--using their tracking network and recovery ships--for the recovery effort to be even SLIGHTLY feasible.

Why quote organizations that are at least a full century behind Trek in technological prowess?

We can see with our own eyes the fantastic performance of the Newtonian (or perhaps non-Newtonian?) engine that pushes the Phoenix to outer space - a rocket a thousand times more powerful than anything we have ever even dreamed of. It would be trivially easy to use that fantastic drive to simply hover down to Earth's surface if that were necessary. With power like that, one can forget all about ballistics; if it amuses one, the ascent path to orbit can be the shape of one's signature, the escape velocity perhaps two miles per hour.

Of course, nothing in the movie indicates that Cochrane would even want to return the warp engine down to Earth. If it's the most valuable piece of hardware in the history of mankind, surely he'd want to keep it out of the greedy hands of just about anybody? Instead of pondering the engineering details of landing, Cochrane would spend his time well installing a powerful scuttling charge and then telling his customers that the bidding for the currently orbiting piece of technology starts at one trillion, with his finger on the big red button.

The winning bid would then result in the buyer being given the permission to pick up the warp engine with his corporate or personal space ferry, supposing he or she didn't prefer keeping it in orbit and preparing it for another test flight.

As for the Bussard collectors, I again remind everybody that we don't have the faintest idea of what they do in the Trek reality. We only know their name and their ability to belch out hydrogen or scoop in explosive gases for combat use.

In the real world, we know that a technology of that name was once considered for interstellar propulsion until it was found out it doesn't work, except as a huge drag chute (there's always more drag from it than can be countermanded by rocket power derived from it). We also know from the real world that names get recycled once the original meaning falls to disuse. And we know that those glowing red things are present in virtually all Federation warp drives, suggesting they are a vital piece of technology rather than an optional extra.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[lennier1]

Often you don't have to have super-futuristic tech with blinking lights and all the bells and whistles to get a job done.
Hell, just look at the primitive technology they used during the space race (example)!

As for the "bussard collectors", those are an integral part of any Trek ship's technobabble generator!

 

[Vance]

Why on Earth should it be even moderately difficult to build a starship out of garage junk when that junk in all likelihood consists of leftover antimatter batteries and flying belts?

In this case, simple physics. You cannot store anti-matter in a matter rich environment. Cochrane couldn't just happen upon some, and the resources to store anti-matter (with the high-yield ECM container) wouldn't be possible in a post-apoc setting as described in First Contact.

Huh? Nothing in TNG was supposed to be new tech, save perhaps for holodecks.

It's mostly production material leading up to TNG's launch, but the 'warp core' was a new concept for TNG, as a way of explaining how much better the new ship was. And, yes, everything was supposed to be new tech, or at least updated.

They were all old news. If some technology was considered "old" and not up to the hero ship standards, it was centuries old, as in "Where No Man Has Gone Before" or "Balance of Terror".

"Their power is simple impulse" meant that the Romulans were a few generations behind the Federation in terms of powerplants (akin to US vs. Soviet subs). Combined with the explicit statements about the new drive type in "The Menagerie", this seems to be the most logical conclusion.


It's not possible to nail down a timeline of technological breakthroughs from TOS and TNG and then claim that ST:FC somehow lies ahead of that logical curve. Every bit of relevant Trek technology was always developed well in advance of the respective shows and movies. ENT was basically the sole exception to this, its premise being that a new type of warp drive had just emerged and made mankind's first real deep space exploration mission possible.

Kirk and Picard were handed their superior technology on a platter. Why should we think Cochrane was not?

Because it's inconsistent with its own story, much less the rest of the Star Trek franchise. You're giving a justification that equates to the original Mayflower being a 200,000MT steamer.

Of course not. Saturn V had an intermix chamber, too - in fact eleven of them, 5+5+1 in three stages. "Intermix" is not inherently related to antimatter in any way.

In Trek, "intermix" has a specific definition. A fusion-based system, or even a fission-based one, would not have an intermix chamber as described for the Phoenix test-ship. What's basically being described here is that Cochrane invented a TNG-style nacelle with all the tech, bells, and whistles, in a cave.. with a box of SCRAPS!

The writers of Trek have chosen antimatter, and have not deviated from that path.

But anti-matter has been treated with some technical acumen by Trek in years past. What you're asking us to believe is that the setting as established in FC still has enough tech and power left-over for anti-matter engines despite there being explicitly no major cities or major centers of manufacturing left to make it possible.

That's akin to saying you could build a fully-working and fully-safe nuclear reactor in the aftermath of Katrina or Fukushima.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

The Phoenix wouldn't have used fusion (lots of power but too slow, since even the best reactor would have to produce power little by little)

That's almost completely wrong. Antimatter doesn't automatically provide you with any more power more quickly than fusion, it depends ENTIRELY on how you're extracting useful energy out of the reaction. The only advantage of antimatter over fusion is that you can get the same power from a couple of miligrams of antimatter as you could from a couple of kilograms of hydrogen. The only disadvantage of antimatter--and it is a HUGE one--is that antimatter is unbelievably difficult to obtain.

probably in the form of positrons stored in a magnetic bottle, which pack the same punch per gram as antideuterium

And produce nothing but hard x-rays when they react. If gamma radiation is all Cochrane needs to run his warp drive, a simple fission reactor would suffice.

 

[TIN_MAN]

Just to add fuel to the fire (or anti-matter to the intermix?) TOS's Zefram Cochrane was the Discoverer of the space warp; FC/TNG's Zefram Cochrane was the Inventor of warp drive! The two are not the same thing by any means. And TAS, by the way, is consistent with TOS (or at least not inconsistant) in establishing the Bonaventure as the first ship with warp drive, but FC contradicts both TOS and TAS with its Phoenix.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Which is one of the reasons I think that FC and everything that comes after it is some sort of alternate universe, essentially a TNG reboot. The main reason I feel this way is that Zephram Cochrane gives the APPEARANCE of a guy who had an at best peripheral role in the Phoenix project and then happily (and/or drunkenly) accepted the Enterprise crew's misconceptions as a way of taking credit for somebody else's work.

Basically, at no time in the movie does he give any indication whatsoever that he ACTUALLY DESIGNED the Phoenix or its engines or spent any amount of time or energy building it. He's mister "I aint goin up in that thing sober," and "To hell with the Phoenix" when we first see him; he lets the Enterprise crew do all the repair work on his engine, he gets drunk and tries to bail when he realizes he's about to be famous, and the one time he tries to tell Riker that he has no vision at all and isn't a great man, Riker tells him "History doesn't care what really happened, and ten years from now neither will you." We can certainly thank the Enterprise crew for helping him get through the crisis caused by the Borg, but unless that was the first major setback in the entire program it's INCONCEIVABLE that Cochrane was able to come this far on his own, let alone lead an entire engineering team in the program. Simply put, left to his own devices Zephram Cochrane would have happily pissed away the rest of his life in a bar somewhere listening to old 60s music... in which case, who the hell was actually in charge of the program?

I don't think Cochrane INVENTED anything. I think he's a washed-up former astronaut that somebody (probably Lily) hired to test pilot the new engine design. I would imagine that in the primary (TOS through Gen/DS9) timeline, Cochrane is more of a Chuck Yeager-type character while the actual engine design is credited to someone else (again, probably Lily) who went on to design the drive system for the Valiant and later the Bonaventure.

 

[bryce]

You could ask the same question too about Enterprise's NX-Alpha ad NX-Beta warp test ships - which also has red glowing nacelle caps/"Bussard collectors"...even though they were only meant for relatively short test flights.

For some reason Bussard Collectors are an integral part of warp-engine design. Why...who knows? Some [TECH] related to how the function.

Yeah, it doesn't really makes sense - but I'm sure someone could think of a technobabble solution.

As for the Phoenix's power source - yeah, I would have *preferred* it be a fusion drive...but not only did they mention that it had an intermix chamber in that scene with Barclay - but Geordie went on the say that basic warp core design hadn't changed much in 200 years.

(Meaning that the NX-01, the 1701, the 1701 refit, and the TNG era ships all had essentially the same basic power plant design. Ugh, I know. But there you have it. And it doesn't explain why the all look so completely different from each other...why the TMP and Voyager warp core's looked so similar...yet so different from Enterprise D, E & NX-Defiant's warp cores...which looked NOTHING like the TOS warp...engines...yet the NX Enterprise is essentially a TNG design laid on it's side....and the nuTrek warp core is a brewery!)

Now...were Zef got antimatter...I dunno. Perhaps there was some limited use of - or development/research into - antimatter weaponry in WWIII...?

All we know is that Earth of that time *DID* posses anti-matter technology...because Friendship One was launched very shortly after Phoenix, with information about how to make the technology in it. (Yes, it's silly...but there you have it.)

What you have to ask yourself now...is where/how in the hell did Cochrane get DILITHIUM CRYSTALS!?!?! (I'll go with recovered from a crashed dilithium-rich meteorite!!! Eh, why not?)

As for how Phoenix landed...I have read that the cockpit *was* supposed to be a Apollo-type capsule that detached and had a chute and landed - but that they didn't have enough in the budget to film it landing. I swear that I have even seen production concept art of how it would land.

Uh...unless I imagined it? Maybe we could ask Sternbach...?

As for how the rest of the ship was recovered...maybe the Vulcans recovered it from orbit for study...?

 

[Timo]

and the resources to store anti-matter (with the high-yield ECM container) wouldn't be possible in a post-apoc setting as described in First Contact.

But that's the very setting where they would be common.

After all, what was the apocalypse that this is the "post" of? A high technology war of the future, fought between cultures that possessed interplanetary spacecraft and interstellar probes and artificial gravity. The culture that within just a few years would be launching yet another interstellar probe (this time a warp-propelled one), carrying the secrets of how to wage war with antimatter.

After WWI, the world had more internal combustion engines and wireless sets lying around for any hobo to exploit than it had had in "proper" hands before the war. After WWII, there were more electric batteries and AC and DC generators for the taking than ever before. After WWIII, anybody with access to a functional ICBM (or perhaps IPBM?) missile complex ought to have fair odds of securing an antimatter generator, too.

the 'warp core' was a new concept for TNG, as a way of explaining how much better the new ship was.

Where do you get this from? It was never part of the dialogue; every old crate our heroes ran into was supposed to have one of these.

And, yes, everything was supposed to be new tech, or at least updated.

Not according to the episodes themselves. There was no qualitative difference between old and new starships or their equipment in TNG.

Because it's inconsistent with its own story, much less the rest of the Star Trek franchise.

But it is not. Nowhere in Trek is it said or hinted that the 2050s lacked antimatter technology. Everywhere it is indicated that the 2050s would be fantastically more advanced than our 2550s will be.

If anything, Cochrane's technology is too primitive for the 2050s, because by that time, control of gravity ought to have made rockets outdated, and Cochrane could have bolted his warp engine onto the roof of his space car.

In Trek, "intermix" has a specific definition.

Why should it? It's just a word, with real-world meanings in addition to the fictional ones. Why would Cochrane be using one meaning and not another?

What you're asking us to believe is that the setting as established in FC still has enough tech and power left-over for anti-matter engines despite there being explicitly no major cities or major centers of manufacturing left to make it possible.

...A near-perfect analogy for post-WWII Germany, which e.g. had plenty of jet engines, advanced aircraft and ballistic missiles lying about.

That's akin to saying you could build a fully-working and fully-safe nuclear reactor in the aftermath of Katrina or Fukushima.

You could - and Japan will, even if the US can't handle a hurricane.

Earth didn't die in WWIII; damage to certain cities appears to have been minimal, as e.g. Paris and New Orleans and and San Francisco and even Boston appear in various episodes, sporting their prewar architecture in rather pristine condition. And no, it's not postwar replica construction, either, because neither Paris nor San Francisco makes any effort to "protect the old milieu"; the old buildings happily coexist with new and futuristic ones, without any attempt at preservation.

Earth surviving WWIII with minor course changes only is a well-established Trek fact. There was a nuclear winter and a period of lawlessness, but apparently neither did any serious harm to the overall infrastructure. The "major cities" lost in the war must have been Cairo, Mumbai and Mexico City...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Timo]

...where/how in the hell did Cochrane get DILITHIUM CRYSTALS!?

Now, those weren't actually mentioned in the movie. We don't know if warp engines with antimatter powerplants have a need for those; we have heard of several such engines that do use dilithium (NX-01, NCC-1701, NCC-1701-D) but we haven't heard of a reason that would make it absolutely necessary to have dilithium in there.

Assuming Cochrane had an antimatter reactor, and further assuming it was one that needed dilithium, he no doubt got his dilithium from the same place where the USAF went shopping. Perhaps there were mines on the Moon for the stuff? Perhaps it was synthesized in some lab, at astronomical expense? Perhaps an early sublight expedition to nearby stars had returned with some?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Rick Sternbach]

You could ask the same question too about Enterprise's NX-Alpha ad NX-Beta warp test ships - which also has red glowing nacelle caps/"Bussard collectors"...even though they were only meant for relatively short test flights.

For some reason Bussard Collectors are an integral part of warp-engine design. Why...who knows? Some [TECH] related to how the function.

Yeah, it doesn't really makes sense - but I'm sure someone could think of a technobabble solution.

As for the Phoenix's power source - yeah, I would have *preferred* it be a fusion drive...but not only did they mention that it had an intermix chamber in that scene with Barclay - but Geordie went on the say that basic warp core design hadn't changed much in 200 years.

(Meaning that the NX-01, the 1701, the 1701 refit, and the TNG era ships all had essentially the same basic power plant design. Ugh, I know. But there you have it. And it doesn't explain why the all look so completely different from each other...why the TMP and Voyager warp core's looked so similar...yet so different from Enterprise D, E & NX-Defiant's warp cores...which looked NOTHING like the TOS warp...engines...yet the NX Enterprise is essentially a TNG design laid on it's side....and the nuTrek warp core is a brewery!)

Now...were Zef got antimatter...I dunno. Perhaps there was some limited use of - or development/research into - antimatter weaponry in WWIII...?

All we know is that Earth of that time *DID* posses anti-matter technology...because Friendship One was launched very shortly after Phoenix, with information about how to make the technology in it. (Yes, it's silly...but there you have it.)

What you have to ask yourself now...is where/how in the hell did Cochrane get DILITHIUM CRYSTALS!?!?! (I'll go with recovered from a crashed dilithium-rich meteorite!!! Eh, why not?)

As for how Phoenix landed...I have read that the cockpit *was* supposed to be a Apollo-type capsule that detached and had a chute and landed - but that they didn't have enough in the budget to film it landing. I swear that I have even seen production concept art of how it would land.

Uh...unless I imagined it? Maybe we could ask Sternbach...?

As for how the rest of the ship was recovered...maybe the Vulcans recovered it from orbit for study...?

Couple of things - I don't believe the Bussard collectors were necessary as collectors on this sort of early flight. However, the primitive ionizing beams and mag fields projected by the
Bussard units would have been critical to debris removal in Phoenix's flight path. Also, for early warp engines, dilithium would not be necessary to do a proof-of-concept flight. Deuterium and antideuterium could still provide hot plasma in the engine system, just not super-tuned. It's the space-warping qualities of the nacelle coil alloys that's the key thing. Meteoric materials, lab-grown verterium cortenide or its nearest equivalent in the higher atomic numbers could achieve FTL. The refinements came in time.

Rick

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Which is one of the reasons I think that FC and everything that comes after it is some sort of alternate universe, essentially a TNG reboot. The main reason I feel this way is that Zephram Cochrane gives the APPEARANCE of a guy who had an at best peripheral role in the Phoenix project and then happily (and/or drunkenly) accepted the Enterprise crew's misconceptions as a way of taking credit for somebody else's work.

Basically, at no time in the movie does he give any indication whatsoever that he ACTUALLY DESIGNED the Phoenix or its engines or spent any amount of time or energy building it. He's mister "I aint goin up in that thing sober," and "To hell with the Phoenix" when we first see him; he lets the Enterprise crew do all the repair work on his engine, he gets drunk and tries to bail when he realizes he's about to be famous, and the one time he tries to tell Riker that he has no vision at all and isn't a great man, Riker tells him "History doesn't care what really happened, and ten years from now neither will you." We can certainly thank the Enterprise crew for helping him get through the crisis caused by the Borg, but unless that was the first major setback in the entire program it's INCONCEIVABLE that Cochrane was able to come this far on his own, let alone lead an entire engineering team in the program. Simply put, left to his own devices Zephram Cochrane would have happily pissed away the rest of his life in a bar somewhere listening to old 60s music... in which case, who the hell was actually in charge of the program?

I don't think Cochrane INVENTED anything. I think he's a washed-up former astronaut that somebody (probably Lily) hired to test pilot the new engine design. I would imagine that in the primary (TOS through Gen/DS9) timeline, Cochrane is more of a Chuck Yeager-type character while the actual engine design is credited to someone else (again, probably Lily) who went on to design the drive system for the Valiant and later the Bonaventure.

Yeah, but it's like...that doesn't have anything to do with anything that's actually in the movies or TV shows, you know?

 

[Captain Robert April]

You could ask the same question too about Enterprise's NX-Alpha ad NX-Beta warp test ships - which also has red glowing nacelle caps/"Bussard collectors"...even though they were only meant for relatively short test flights.

For some reason Bussard Collectors are an integral part of warp-engine design. Why...who knows? Some [TECH] related to how the function.

Yeah, it doesn't really makes sense - but I'm sure someone could think of a technobabble solution.

As for the Phoenix's power source - yeah, I would have *preferred* it be a fusion drive...but not only did they mention that it had an intermix chamber in that scene with Barclay - but Geordie went on the say that basic warp core design hadn't changed much in 200 years.

(Meaning that the NX-01, the 1701, the 1701 refit, and the TNG era ships all had essentially the same basic power plant design. Ugh, I know. But there you have it. And it doesn't explain why the all look so completely different from each other...why the TMP and Voyager warp core's looked so similar...yet so different from Enterprise D, E & NX-Defiant's warp cores...which looked NOTHING like the TOS warp...engines...yet the NX Enterprise is essentially a TNG design laid on it's side....and the nuTrek warp core is a brewery!)

Now...were Zef got antimatter...I dunno. Perhaps there was some limited use of - or development/research into - antimatter weaponry in WWIII...?

All we know is that Earth of that time *DID* posses anti-matter technology...because Friendship One was launched very shortly after Phoenix, with information about how to make the technology in it. (Yes, it's silly...but there you have it.)

What you have to ask yourself now...is where/how in the hell did Cochrane get DILITHIUM CRYSTALS!?!?! (I'll go with recovered from a crashed dilithium-rich meteorite!!! Eh, why not?)

As for how Phoenix landed...I have read that the cockpit *was* supposed to be a Apollo-type capsule that detached and had a chute and landed - but that they didn't have enough in the budget to film it landing. I swear that I have even seen production concept art of how it would land.

Uh...unless I imagined it? Maybe we could ask Sternbach...?

As for how the rest of the ship was recovered...maybe the Vulcans recovered it from orbit for study...?

Couple of things - I don't believe the Bussard collectors were necessary as collectors on this sort of early flight. However, the primitive ionizing beams and mag fields projected by the
Bussard units would have been critical to debris removal in Phoenix's flight path. Also, for early warp engines, dilithium would not be necessary to do a proof-of-concept flight. Deuterium and antideuterium could still provide hot plasma in the engine system, just not super-tuned. It's the space-warping qualities of the nacelle coil alloys that's the key thing. Meteoric materials, lab-grown verterium cortenide or its nearest equivalent in the higher atomic numbers could achieve FTL. The refinements came in time.

Rick

After all, one doesn't look under the hood of a Model T and complain about how there's no power steering or turbocharger, right?

 

[lennier1]

After all, one doesn't look under the hood of a Model T and complain about how there's no power steering or turbocharger, right?

But sooner or later someone would try to shove a V8 in there anyway.

 

[Timo]

...Which is why I have no doubt that at some point, this

http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/scans/phoenix.jpg

was modified for further testing into this (cut and paste)

http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/schematics/early-warp-uncertain.jpg

Cochrane is more of a Chuck Yeager-type character while the actual engine design is credited to someone else

But Cochrane is not really willing to fly the thing - hardly a "Yeager characteristic".

Really, he seems very much like an academician who gets to play Mad Max the manly survivor thanks to WWIII, but finds that role way too demanding...

Being drunk never stopped people from being great intellectuals or scientific geniuses, or vice versa. It sounds profoundly silly to decide that Cochrane can't have been a great scientist because he reeks of alcohol or wears a leather crown. It's not that different from saying that Daystrom must have been some sort of a mechanic in his corporation rather than the actual leading computer scientist because he was tall and black and wore coveralls.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Crazy Eddie]

But Cochrane is not really willing to fly the thing - hardly a "Yeager characteristic".

Of course he's willing to fly. He's being paid a ridiculous amount of money to fly, so as long as the check doesn't bounce and the liquor doesn't run out, he'll fly it anywhere you ask him to.

Really, he seems very much like an academician...

Answer me this much: did Cochrane say or do ANYTHING in First Contact that could be described as "Academician"? Other than attempting to identify the constellation Leo while piss-faced drunk?

Being drunk never stopped people from being great intellectuals or scientific geniuses, or vice versa. It sounds profoundly silly to decide that Cochrane can't have been a great scientist because he reeks of alcohol or wears a leather crown.

Let's be clear on this: Cochrane is not a great scientist AND he reeks of alcohol and wears a leather crown. I say this because, drunk or sober, motivated or not, he never does anything in the entirely of FC that demonstrates the quality of actually being a scientist. He doesn't even get involved in the Phoenix's repairs, he leaves it up to Geordi and Barclay to do all the work.

It's not that different from saying that Daystrom must have been some sort of a mechanic in his corporation rather than the actual leading computer scientist because he was tall and black and wore coveralls.

The difference is Daystrom 1) is actually seen WORKING on the M5 unit and 2) actually appears to give a shit what happens to it. Cochrane does neither; the closest he comes to demonstrating any engineering knowledge whatsoever is when Geordi hands him a PADD and he glances at it for two seconds and says "looks like you got it right."

You could ask the same question too about Enterprise's NX-Alpha ad NX-Beta warp test ships - which also has red glowing nacelle caps/"Bussard collectors"...even though they were only meant for relatively short test flights.

First of all, the red caps on the nacelles have only occasionally been identified as "bussard collectors," and then only on ships designed 200 years later. There's no indication that the caps on earlier warp engines are anything of the kind; they could be floodlights for all we know.

Second of all, they're clearly NOT integral parts of warp drive design, or else all ships used by all races would have them. They don't, so they're not.

As for the Phoenix's power source - yeah, I would have *preferred* it be a fusion drive...but not only did they mention that it had an intermix chamber in that scene with Barclay - but Geordie went on the say that basic warp core design hadn't changed much in 200 years.

Not that the word "intermix" exclusively refers to a matter-antimatter reaction, considering the first time we hear the word in TMP it's in reference to the impulse engines, not the warp drive.

FWIW, the original script of First Contact had the Phoenix being powered by a plutonium reactor Cochrane had constructed using an old nuclear warhead; in point of fact, Geordi's team spent most of their time repairing a damaged throttle assembly for the booster rocket since the warp drive survived the attack completely undamaged (this is echoed in the script, where the only damaged physically described to the Phoenix is its throttle assembly). The copper tubing Barclay hands Geordi was originally (when the props were being designed) supposed to be a fuel line that Geordi fabricated by melting some copper pipes with a phaser.

 

[Timo]

...he never does anything in the entirely of FC that demonstrates the quality of actually being a scientist. He doesn't even get involved in the Phoenix's repairs, he leaves it up to Geordi and Barclay to do all the work.

And that alone should already qualify him for an academician!

the closest he comes to demonstrating any engineering knowledge whatsoever is when Geordi hands him a PADD and he glances at it for two seconds and says "looks like you got it right."

What else do we need? Everybody around Cochrane seems to credit him with the invention. Nobody expresses a contrary sentiment, not even Lily Sloane. And that ought to rule out the idea that the ST:FC "Cochrane" is some random guy who stepped in the boots of the real Cochrane who looked like Glenn Corbett. Unless Sloane is in on a conspiracy and wants to promote her lover in hopes of a zillion-dollar future.

Second of all, they're clearly NOT integral parts of warp drive design, or else all ships used by all races would have them. They don't, so they're not.

They're a must-have for the Federation style of warp, though. Other cultures use different technologies (most of which don't pack warp coils in standoff nacelles), but aren't such central players in the Federation; seems that humans and red endcaps are a package that cannot be separated.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Albertese]

A transporter accident involving The Doctor's mobile emitter and Seven's nanoprobes results in the creation of a 29th century Borg.
_____________________

Whaaa??? Non-sequitur, your facts are uncoordinated.

How is this relevant at all?

--Alex

 

[ProwlAlpha]

Dogs don't like cats

 

[Vance]

Timo, the anti-matter problem is pretty simple. You can't just keep around a large lead container to store anti-matter like you can a fuel cell or fusion/fission material. You have to have an incredibly high amount of energy to keep the anti-matter suspended. And since Cochrane was planet-bound, he would also have to create the anti-matter.

First Contact, perhaps erroneously, describes a setting where there are explicitly no major cities or centers of manufacturing. It was a 'dire world in need of rebuilding' and Cochrane saved it. As described by Riker, there could be no facilities available for this.

You can argue about salvaging nuclear piles, of course, and by scrapping a nuclear missile (which the Titan was), but that's a different kettle-of-fish than anti-matter. You have to have the facilities to make it, store it, move it to the rocket, store it WITHIN the rocket it, harness it, etc..

Again, my Fukushima example. You cannot build a fully-functioning working nuclear reactor from the debris of Fukushima alone. Yet you're asking us to believe that Cochrane did a couple of hundred years of tech better with less materials, less technology, and no possibility of outside help. It's akin to saying that DaVinci could have gotten men to the moon since he was just that smart.

We're explicitly told that FC had a nuclear war (in direct opposition to TOS, which explicitly said we didn't get one after all). We're explicitly told that all the major cities and manufacturing centers were destroyed (in opposition to TOS, TNG, and DS9). We're lastly told that Cochrane made the Phoenix .. in a cave.. with a box of scraps.

Keep in mind, we can create anti-matter now, and have done so (more specifically, anti-hydrogen and anti-deuterium!). We have the mathematic theories for warping space in place, along with some scientific testing for it. We have both fission and fusion technology. We also have a very high-tech infrastructure in much of the world. By the logic that First Contact puts forward, we should have had warp travel thirty years ago.

It's beyond suspension of disbelief to expect that one man (and a handful of subordinates) can bring Earth from a post-apoc ruined setting to better than TNG technology (as ENT presented it) within literally a couple of years without any of the pre-requisites for that technology being remotely available. The idea that Cochrane created a pair of micro TNG-like warp nacelles with all the bells and whistles, is simply careless writing. FC presents a scenario where space-exploration leap-frogs two-hundred years of technology from Trek's own universe, while starting from less than zero.