Starship Enterprise

[Mallus]

... though if you have that gravity control technology, it's easier to build a starship in space.

Sure. But audiences have seen the Enterprise being built/refit in space. This is the first time we've seen her being built on a --presumably-- Iowan plain, and it looks pretty cool.

 

[Sir Brennen]

Sure. But audiences have seen the Enterprise being built/refit in space. This is the first time we've seen her being built on a --presumably-- Iowan plain, and it looks pretty cool.

Though wouldn't it have made more sense to at least build it in a hangar instead of out in the open?

 

[Mark]

Though wouldn't it have made more sense to at least build it in a hangar instead of out in the open?

It would be easier to build such a hangar in space. Wait a minute . . .

 

[Mallus]

Though wouldn't it have made more sense to at least build it in a hangar instead of out in the open?

Not if the intended goal was to look cool. If they were trying to make sense they would have built the ship in orbit.

Never underestimate the importance of looking cool in SF films.

 

[Umbran]

... though if you have that gravity control technology, it's easier to build a starship in space.

With gravity control, it is easier to build a ship in space than it is to build it in space without the gravity control.

With gravity control, it is not necessarily easier to build in space than on the ground. In the clip, they're still using welders - so we can take a guess that replicators aren't up to Next Gen standards. That would perhaps imply having to actually lift all the mass of parts off the ground into orbit, and assembling it there. This may not be a savings.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

With gravity control, it is easier to build a ship in space than it is to build it in space without the gravity control.

With gravity control, it is not necessarily easier to build in space than on the ground. In the clip, they're still using welders - so we can take a guess that replicators aren't up to Next Gen standards. That would perhaps imply having to actually lift all the mass of parts off the ground into orbit, and assembling it there. This may not be a savings.

And getting workers into space, supplying them there with air, food and water is also more difficult then its on the ground. I suppose they eventually decided that building a giant space dock that could do all that was worth all the effort (especially with technological advancement), but they aren't there yet.

[/fanwank]

 

[Pbartender]

Okay, I didn't want to do it, but you guys forced me into it...

[PEDANTIC GEEK]

First, notice that the sign in the lower left has corner of the constuction picture says "AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY, 1213N IA" IA, as in Iowa.

Also, remember that the famous Utopia Planitia Shipyards on Mars, not only had orbital starbases and drydocks, but also manufacturing facilities and construction yards on the planet's surface. In the ST:TNG episode Parallels, Cardassians were using the Argus Array to spy on several Federation installations, including the Utopia Planitia Shipyards. At one point, as Geordi is running through the Array's sensor logs, a picture of the shipyards appears showing the major structural components of a Galaxy-class ship being assembled in a yard on the surface of Mars... See below.

[/PEDANTIC GEEK]

Guh. Now I feel dirty. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to go take a shower.

 

[Staffan]

Doesn't physics state that when an object that big flying on the Earth's surface would cause hell on the gravity of the surrounding area.

Not really, no.

A Constitution-class starship has a mass of "less than 1,000,000 tons" according to Memory Alpha. For the sake of ease of calculating, let's say all that mass is concentrated in one point. At a distance of 10 meters from that point, an object would experience a gravitational accelleration of:

a = G*m/d^2, where
a = accelleration
G = Gravitational constant, approximately 7E-11 Nm^2/kg^2
m = the attracting object's mass (1E+9 kg)
d = distance (10 m)

Which gives us a = 7E-11 * 1E+9 / 10^2 = 7E-4 = 0.0007 m/s^2, or about 1/14,000th of Earth's gravity.

 

[Arnwyn]

At one point, as Geordi is running through the Array's sensor logs, a picture of the shipyards appears showing the major structural components of a Galaxy-class ship being assembled in a yard on the surface of Mars... See below.

That's pretty cool... (or, in more appropriate parlance, "neat-o")

 

[Umbran]

Which gives us a = 7E-11 * 1E+9 / 10^2 = 7E-4 = 0.0007 m/s^2, or about 1/14,000th of Earth's gravity.

Or, perhaps more conceptually useful - the force needed to lift the thing off the surface is only equal to its weight. Sure, you don't want to be directly under it when it lifts off, but the same can be said for a normal rocket.