Deflector dishes

[Jim]

I put this in TOS because it came to my attention last night while watching WoK. The Miranda does not have a deflector dish. How many Federation ships do and don't have "dishes"? Is it actually not important to have? If not, then why do so many have them so prominent? If so then why do they all not have them?

[Graham Kennedy]

I've heard it suggested that ships with no deflector put up their combat shields at a low level whilst at warp, so that any impacting mass vapourises against them.

[McAvoy]

Seems like only Federation ships have them.

I think the deflector dish is used as part of the exploration mission of the ship.

[Mikey]

Supposedly it is necessary to FTL navigation, as it protects the ship from what would be catastrophic impacts with micrometeroids, etc. I'm not sure exactly how that coincides with warp as the preferred form of FTL travel since "warp travel" implies - and is expressly cited to involve - subspace, which would obviate the idea of impact with items in space, but...

[Graham Kennedy]

Subspace isn't like hyperspace in Babylon 5 - a ship at warp does not leave our universe and go into subspace. The analogy I've heard is more like normal space is the air, subspace is the sea, and warp drive is like surfing. You use the nacelles to create a wave and ride along on it whilst remaining above the surface of the sea. Therefore you are just as likely to run into things at warp as you are at sublight.

[Mikey]

Subspace isn't like hyperspace in Babylon 5 - a ship at warp does not leave our universe and go into subspace. The analogy I've heard is more like normal space is the air, subspace is the sea, and warp drive is like surfing. You use the nacelles to create a wave and ride along on it whilst remaining above the surface of the sea. Therefore you are just as likely to run into things at warp as you are at sublight.

I've always thought the comparison was more like the balloon model of space-time - realspace travel being from point to point along the surface of the balloon, subspace travel being more akin to going through the interior.

[Graham Kennedy]

But if that were so then you wouldn't be in our universe when you went at warp. So you wouldn't need deflectors to shove meteors and such aside.

Unless there are meteors in subspace. Which seems odd on several levels.

[Mikey]

But if that were so then you wouldn't be in our universe when you went at warp. So you wouldn't need deflectors to shove meteors and such aside.

Unless there are meteors in subspace. Which seems odd on several levels.

Exactly my point. I thought navigational deflectors were for high STL speeds.

[Jim]

But if that were so then you wouldn't be in our universe when you went at warp. So you wouldn't need deflectors to shove meteors and such aside.

Unless there are meteors in subspace. Which seems odd on several levels.

Wasn't there a meteor in their path in the Motion Picture?

[Graham Kennedy]

An asteroid, yes. It was pulled into the wormhole with the ship. Presumably dragged in when they went to warp - that is the "risk" they spoke of in going to warp within the solar system, I suppose, that you will drag some passing asteroid in with you.

[Sonic Glitch]

An asteroid, yes. It was pulled into the wormhole with the ship. Presumably dragged in when they went to warp - that is the "risk" they spoke of in going to warp within the solar system, I suppose, that you will drag some passing asteroid in with you.

I thought the risk was in creating a wormhole in the first place? Something to do with the warp field and gravity well?

[Graham Kennedy]

No, the wormhole was created by the engine imbalance. There's all sorts of dialogue about Scotty not being able to balance them quite right, and then Spock helping him get it right after they pick him up.

Scotty : "Captain, it was the engine imbalance that created the wormhole in the first place. ...It'll happen again if we don't correct it!"

Of course, the odds of an asteroid being in the vicinity of the ship after it passed Jupiter are rather low. Unless the warp field sucks in everything within a rather large radius... like hundreds of millions of kilometres or more. If that were so, it would certainly explain why it was risky to engage warp drive within the solar system. Although if that was the problem, then it makes no sense for them to head out of the system in the plane of the ecliptic, which they would have to do to pass by Jupiter. Why not simply head up or down out of the ecliptic instead? You'd be in relatively empty space way, way faster.

And then of course, there are many, MANY examples of ships going to warp within a solar system, in TOS, in the movies, in TNG, in DS9, in Voyager, even in Enterprise. As for example :

It is one of the more blatant inconsistencies of Trek, that it's very dangerous to go to warp in a solar system... except for all the many times that it isn't.

[Jim]

In TNG, I could be totally off base but it seems like every time they leave a planet they go directly to warp.

[Graham Kennedy]

Let's not forget that in ST IV, a Klingon Bird of Prey goes to warp whilst within Earth's atmosphere.

Let's also not forget that in Redemption Part 2, another Bird of Prey goes to warp whilst directly above the surface of the sun.

[Mikey]

Let's not forget that in ST IV, a Klingon Bird of Prey goes to warp whilst within Earth's atmosphere.

Let's also not forget that in Redemption Part 2, another Bird of Prey goes to warp whilst directly above the surface of the sun.

Hey, that's right. Wouldn't just the speed alone, regardless of the mechanism, cause all sorts of horrific eddies in a fluid medium like a planetary atmosphere or solar corona?