Star Trek & Star Wars - theories about technology and stuff

[Picard]

Title says it all. If you have any theory that explains some of wierd stuff and headscratchers in Star Wars / Star Trek, post it here. I understand that these will also be discussed in many other threads where they are relevant, but will also get lost among other stuff. So here all the theories should be grouped and discussed; you can also post already posted theories.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So, let's start:

1) Warp factor does not seem to be good measure of speed - there are cases of ships that, with lower warp factor, achieved greater speeds than ships with higher one. As such, it seems that Star Trek writers are bunch of drunken politicians with case of heavy amnesia. However, there might be way out of that mess, and is hidden in name of unit itself. Warp factor. What if, instead of being unit of speed, warp factor is measure of timespace curvature created by the ship? That would mean that, depending on gravitational influence of large space objects (stars, planets, black holes) starship will move with different speeds at different times, despite warp factor always remaining same. That might also explain Federation undertaking so many mapping missions, as well as mentions of highly used corridors of space, in which heavy use of high warp damaged subspace.

2) Now one formula. We know that warp 1 corresponds to the speed of light (normally). However, only other velocity we are given for warp speed without gravitational influences (or with quite slight ones) is 9 000 c for warp 9.2. Closest formula I got is V(w) = 3^(wf -1), which is incorrect since it leaves lack of almost 1 000 c. If you got and idea, post it here, but you have to keep in mind two things formula must accomplish:
1) warp 1 must be 1 c
2) warp 9.2 must be 9 000 c
Only other possibility is that I misremembered something, and that maximum sustained warp of E-D is not warp 9.2. If it's warp 9, formula could go V(w) = 3.12^(vf - 1).
V(w) - warp speed in c; wf - warp factor

[Praeothmin]

In Voyager we have Warp 9.9 which is 4 Billion miles per second...

[Picard]

Actually, we have helluva lot of speed coupled with warp factors. However, it is clear from nature of warp drive that these are not useful for discerning "normal" speeds, since warp drive is affected by gravitation (what warp drive does is to put a timespace anomaly - think of a black hole - in front of ship, which then tows starship's warp bubble at FTL speeds. As such, another large gravitational anomaly roughly in front of ship will speed it up, anomaly behind the ship will slow it down, while those to the left and right will affect heading and will be given priority when it comes to compensation - as long as anomaly in front of ship is not exactly in front of ship). This also means that ship will have to chart and process all anomalies light years ahead quite fast.

[Mike DiCenso]

An episode like TNG's "First Contact" gives us a good average speed for well-charted territory since that is one of the few episodes where we are given a firm distance of at leat 2,000 light years with which we can plug in with the fact that just less than 5 months prior, the E-D was at Earth, and on the way out to Malcor III stopped at least 12 times at various places.

This jives well with TOS, where at high speed, the E-1701 made trips across 1,000 light years in one day or less in "Obsession", and "That Which Survives".
-Mike

[mojo]

Actually, we have helluva lot of speed coupled with warp factors. However, it is clear from nature of warp drive that these are not useful for discerning "normal" speeds, since warp drive is affected by gravitation (what warp drive does is to put a timespace anomaly - think of a black hole - in front of ship, which then tows starship's warp bubble at FTL speeds. As such, another large gravitational anomaly roughly in front of ship will speed it up, anomaly behind the ship will slow it down, while those to the left and right will affect heading and will be given priority when it comes to compensation - as long as anomaly in front of ship is not exactly in front of ship). This also means that ship will have to chart and process all anomalies light years ahead quite fast.

that's fucking fascinating. where did you get the stuff about the black hole and that?

[Picard]

From visualization.

http://picard578.hostoi.com/startrek-vs ... _Field.png

http://media.photobucket.com/image/blac ... ole_44.gif

and some descriptions of both phenomena (warp drive and black hole).

[mojo]

that is a fantastic concept. it seems like if you could actually hold the black hole in front of the ship somehow, it would actually work. assuming the ship could withstand the stress of a BLACK HOLE being what looks like about 10 feet in front of it. man. i love it.

[Mike DiCenso]

I hate to sound like KSW, but ST shields and warp drive are gravity based, so it does make some sense that it would act kind of like that where a subspace warp bubble is concerned.
-Mike

[Picard]

Mojo : correction. I did not say that ship has black hole in front of it. What I said was this:

what warp drive does is to put a timespace anomaly - think of a black hole

It is similar to black hole but probably not a true black hole. Black hole is a point; this would probably be more of a line in order to disperse stress on warp bubble and on ship itself.

Black hole: .

Warp distortion: ----

EDIT: Also, it is not starship being towed. It is entire warp bubble. Inside warp bubble, thought, there is no timespace distortion at all - ship itself is actually stationary, and does not suffer any stress at all, either from distortion, acceleration, etc. It is also reason why ship's crew is not crushed when going to warp - inertial dampening is probably used mainly when warp field is nonactive, since it would be redundant with ship actually being stationary (despite moving at FTL speeds).