"Starships size comparison (Star Trek)"

[a425couple]

Youtubes showing "Starships size comparison (Star Trek)" 2:16
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d97PbTcW_t4

Starships size comparison (Star Wars) 2:15
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnxd3t6iUiM

And another, "Starships size comparison" 3:37
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_Loc7qX7FI

(Or, at least I thought they were interesting.
I had to stop the video and often study.)

[Jack Bohn]

Some of the numbers are wro...not the generally accepted figures. And one of the alien Star Trek ships is flying backwards, but that's an easy mistake to make.

It's a problem of the source material, but the smaller vehicles seem too small to actually work that way, and the largest too large.


So to *written* sf: what ships have at least rough dimensions and descriptions?

General Products #1-4 hulls, and Ringworld.
McArthur from _Mote_ has a well-known shape, but an actual size?
_Startide Rising_ included a diagram of its ship.
The Honorverse navies are well documented.
I'm thinking early space opera, such as by Evelyn E. "Doc" Smith, went with more practical spheres.

[Bill Dugan]

First couple that come to mind:
Doc Smith's Skylark of Valeron
Cordwainer Smith's Golden Ship

[Ahasuerus]

On Friday, March 24, 2017 at 10:41:18 PM UTC-4, a425couple wrote:
[snip]

> And another, "Starships size comparison" 3:37
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_Loc7qX7FI

Come on, even Doc Smith could do better than that! If you want *real*
scale, you can watch the last three minutes of the famous "Mecha size
comparison" video --
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CXNa_m52r0&t=197s (needless to say,
it spoils certain mecha series.)

[Bill Dugan]

On Sat, 25 Mar 2017 10:51:17 -0700, Bill Dugan <wkd...@ix.netcom.com>
wrote:

Oops. All the Skylark ships had dimensions specified.

[J. Clarke]

In article <6ffe1488-ce8d-4b22-a982-
aa8dd0...@googlegroups.com>, jack.bohn64
@gmail.com says...

For a while. Dauntless was a revolutionary
teardrop design IIRC.

[Don Kuenz]

General Products #4 hull more-or-less flies backwards on purpose. :0)

The puppeteer groped for words. "If you turned on the
reaction motors and the hyperdrive together, the flames
would precede your ship through hyperspace."
I got the picture then. Ass backward into the unknown.
With the control room at the ship's bottom, it made sense.
To a puppeteer, it made sense.

"At the Core" (Niven)

Thank you,

--
Don Kuenz KB7RPU

[a425couple]

"Jack Bohn" <jack....@gmail.com> wrote in message...
> Some of the numbers are wro...not the generally accepted figures. ----

>
> So to *written* sf: what ships have at least rough dimensions and
> descriptions?

As I'm recalling, Arthur C. Clarke's books give VERY little
description.

But then, he was greatly involved in the film "2001: A Space Odyssey"
so one would think he approved/accepted the spacecraft "Discovery One"
as shown.
Here is a lot of information from that:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discovery_One
Random pieces:
"Mass 5,440 tonnes
Length 140.1 m
Width 16.7 m
Height 17 m
Power - Nuclear reactor"
Crew was 2 active, 3 in suspended animation.

Here is more from that 'series':
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spacecraft_from_the_Space_Odyssey_series#The_Cosmonaut_Alexei_Leonov
https://www.google.com/search?site=&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=1536&bih=765&q=spacecraft+The+Cosmonaut+Alexei+Leonov&oq=spacecraft+The+Cosmonaut+Alexei+Leonov&gs_l=img.3...1584.6700.0.8018.13.9.0.4.4.0.60.437.8.8.0....0...1ac.1.64.img..1.11.416.0..0j35i39k1j0i10k1.SFUxwWWQe8c
And there are models of the spacecraft "The Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov".

About the only other piece we get about another of his spacecraft
is that in "Rendezvous with Rama" the "Endeavour" is also
described as 5,000 tons. Although vague, one senses the crew is
about 25 people plus 4 'simps'.

Interesting, in my mind, I consider how a Navy ship compares.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Hazard_Perry-class_frigate
Displacement: 4,100 long tons (4,200 t) full load
Length: 445 ft (136 m) overall,
Beam: 45 ft (14 m)
Draft: 22 ft (6.7 m)
Complement: 176

All spacecraft from Clarke that I've read about, must be very durable,
because the crews are very small!
(Noting that Demensional Traveler pointed out that Star Trek's
Constitution Class Starship Enterprise NCC-1701 had ~ 430 crew).

[Cryptoengineer]

"a425couple" <a425c...@hotmail.com> wrote in
news:ob6vl...@news3.newsguy.com:

> "Jack Bohn" <jack....@gmail.com> wrote in message...
>> Some of the numbers are wro...not the generally accepted figures.
>> ----
>>
>> So to *written* sf: what ships have at least rough dimensions and
>> descriptions?
>
> As I'm recalling, Arthur C. Clarke's books give VERY little
> description.
>
> But then, he was greatly involved in the film "2001: A Space Odyssey"
> so one would think he approved/accepted the spacecraft "Discovery One"
> as shown.
> Here is a lot of information from that:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discovery_One
> Random pieces:
> "Mass 5,440 tonnes
> Length 140.1 m
> Width 16.7 m
> Height 17 m

Kubrick apparently borrowed some Tardis tech from the BBC, since if
you look at the exterior views of the Discovery, you'll realize
that there is no way in hell that the EVA pod deck and the bridge
windows can be reconciled with the centrifuge section - they just
can't all fit in a 16m sphere at the same time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Discovery1b.JPG

pt

[Don Kuenz]

The centrifuge built for the movie measures 38 feet in diameter. [1]
There's just enough room for a 12 meter centrifuge behind the EVA pod
deck and the bridge windows. [2]

Note.

1. http://www.visual-memory.co.uk/sk/2001a/page1.html
2. http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/deckplans.php
(scroll about half way down)

[Cryptoengineer]

Interesting, thanks.

pt

[a425couple]

"Don Kuenz" <g...@crcomp.net> wrote in message...

> Cryptoengineer <treif...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> "a425couple" <a425c...@hotmail.com> wrote in

>>> "Jack Bohn" <jack....@gmail.com> wrote in message...
>>>> Some of the numbers are wro...not the generally accepted figures.
>>>>

Very interesting. I thank you.

"There is nothing quite as mentally stimulating as a good cut-away
diagram. You can really put yourself in the picture."
Yes, indeed!!!!!!

I am particularly enjoying reading one offshoot -
http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/mining.php
Thank You.
"

[Stephen Allcroft]

Culture ships are often approximately dimensioned.

[Jack Bohn]

Smith's Skylark ships are given here:

https://omnivorenz.wordpress.com/2012/08/05/the-skylark-spaceships/amp/

I'd have to refine the models, learn how to use the program I have for the animation, and learn how to get a Youtube account before something else shiny catches my attention, but over the last week I looked up some ships. Starting with the smaller:

http://www.bright.net/~jackbohn/SF1.jpg

A black speck of a Hydrot "spaceship" from Blish's "Surface Tension". A two-inch tube, the book sez (5 cm). Either there are some large paramecia and diatoms on that planet, or those people built their first puddle-jumper along the lines of the Skylark Three.

General Products #1 hull; I gave it quite the index of refraction because that's what the 3-D program I happen to have was made to play with.

Beyond it the pinlighter from Cordwainer Smith's "Game of Rat and Dragon".

Way back, Verne's Moon shell. These last two ships are not self-contained.

http://www.bright.net/~jackbohn/SF2.jpg

The Verne shell, again.
A Heechee ship, a One, from Pohl's _Gateway_.
General Products #2 hull.
The Ark as described in the book _When Worlds Collide_. It's height is given a 135 feet (41 meters), whereas the one in the movie was more than 400 feet long; this one runs on "atomic energy" where the movie one used chemical fuels more known and believable in the '50s.
The Red Peri from Weinbaum's "The Red Peri". The ship isn't all red, it should just have a red peri painted on the uppermost hull, but this makes it stand out.
General Products #3 hull.
McAndrew balanced drive, from the fixup _The McAndrew Chronicles_ or _One Man's Universe_, shown accelerating away from us. It is a hundred-meter disk of neutronium; a small personnel capsule rides up and down a 250-meter-long shaft to the point where the gravitational pull of the disk counters the effects of the acceleration of the ship, up to 50 gs.
Way far back, Honor Harrington's first command, the Fearless. I threw it in here because it doesn't have much company at a larger scale. I'm afraid ships of this size will generally have a description of a single significant digit of the hundred of feet/meters/yards long they are, maybe prefixed by a modifier like "almost" or "more than". (James White's Sector General is famously 384 levels. Assuming a level is equivalent to a story, and assigning it a generous 5 meters, we get a nearly 2 km high space station.

Skipping straight to:

http://www.bright.net/~jackbohn/SF3.jpg

General Products #4, Skylarks, Sector General, _Gateway_, Cities in Flight, Rama, _Titan_, _Mutineer's Moon_, _The Wanderer_, Mongo, Bronson Alpha and Bronson Beta are all shrunk to dots. (In fact, I had to exaggerate the size of Ringworld's sun to make sure it didn't fall between pixels.) Ringworld, Cuckcoo from _Wall Around a Star_ and one of the golden ships from "Golden the Ship Was, Oh- Oh- Oh_" (well, my conception of it, it's hard to get eyewitness accounts). The ship was said to shimmer like fire. Thinking about animating that, it occurs to me that any change propagating across it at even the speed of light would take 8 minutes to go from end to end. If the whole ship filled a hi-res display of 1920 pixels, the pattern would move at 4 pixels per second; we are all old enough to remember download bars that moved that slowly. Reading the story closely, the ship appeared to the enemy fleet for 20 to 30 thousandths of a second. *This* is what would produce a shimmer, as the image of the closest part appears first, for a fraction of a second, then light from farther parts arrives, giving the effect of a circular spotlight sweeping along the hull in afterimages for -again- up to eight minutes.
(Cuckcoo was just a place to check for umbra and penumbra -- I get just a hint of it from the shadow squares. The background was made a bit lighter than black because the whole scene is lit solely by Ringworld's sun.)

--
Jack

[Don Kuenz]

> nearly 2km high space station.

>
> Skipping straight to:
>
> http://www.bright.net/~jackbohn/SF3.jpg
>
> General Products #4, Skylarks, Sector General, _Gateway_, Cities in Flight,
> Rama, _Titan_, _Mutineer's Moon_, _The Wanderer_, Mongo, Bronson Alpha
> and Bronson Beta are all shrunk to dots. (In fact, I had to exaggerate
> the size of Ringworld's sun to make sure it didn't fall between pixels.)
> Ringworld, Cuckcoo from _Wall Around a Star_ and one of the golden ships
> from "Golden the Ship Was, Oh- Oh- Oh_" (well, my conception of it, it's
> hard to get eyewitness accounts). The ship was said to shimmer like fire.
> Thinking about animating that, it occurs to me that any change propagating
> across it at even the speed of light would take 8 minutes to go from end
> to end. If the whole ship filled a hi-res display of 1920 pixels, the
> pattern would move at 4 pixels per second; we are all old enough to
> remember download bars that moved that slowly. Reading the story closely,
> the ship appeared to the enemy fleet for 20 to 30 thousandths of a second.
> *This* is what would produce a shimmer, as the image of the closest part
> appears first, for a fraction of a second, then light from farther parts
> arrives, giving the effect of a circular spotlight sweeping along the hull
> in afterimages for -again- up to eight minutes.
> (Cuckcoo was just a place to check for umbra and penumbra -- I get just
> a hint of it from the shadow squares. The background was made a bit
> lighter than black because the whole scene is lit solely by Ringworld's sun.)
>

Your effort, with its focus on literary space ships, is more meaningful
to me than the TV and movie ships that appear earlier in this thread. TV
and movies tend towards gimcrackery from my perspective. YMMV.

What's the big ship in http://www.bright.net/~jackbohn/SF3.jpg that
dominates Ringworld? TIA.

[Jack Bohn]

Don Kuenz wrote:

> Your effort, with its focus on literary space ships, is more meaningful
> to me than the TV and movie ships that appear earlier in this thread. TV
> and movies tend towards gimcrackery from my perspective. YMMV.

A bit of gimcrackery can add to visual interest. The attitude jets around the top and bottom of the ship in _When Worlds Collide_ are described as like cannon and working on the same principle, which I take to mean recoil, but the artist for the 1975 Sphere paperback interprets as turrets. If I'd had time I would have incorporated all his exterior detail onto the cylinder.

> What's the big ship in http://www.bright.net/~jackbohn/SF3.jpg that
> dominates Ringworld? TIA.

The sphere is the Dyson Sphere Cuckoo from _Farthest Star_ and _Wall around a Star_ by Frederik Pohl and Jack Williamson. I'm not sure I still have the books, I pulled the diameter from the Internet.

The spindle under the Ringworld is a 90-million-mile golden ship -- when Earth is threatened, the Instrumentality of Man does not mess around, and Cordwainer Smith as a psychological warfare specialist knew the value of going the extra mile.

[T Guy]

On Tuesday, 4 April 2017 15:22:57 UTC+1, Don Kuenz wrote:
> Jack Bohn <jack....@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Smith's Skylark ships are given here:

...

Reading the story closely,
> > the ship appeared to the enemy fleet for 20 to 30 thousandths of a second.
> > *This* is what would produce a shimmer, as the image of the closest part
> > appears first, for a fraction of a second, then light from farther parts
> > arrives, giving the effect of a circular spotlight sweeping along the hull
> > in afterimages for -again- up to eight minutes.
> > (Cuckcoo was just a place to check for umbra and penumbra -- I get just
> > a hint of it from the shadow squares. The background was made a bit
> > lighter than black because the whole scene is lit solely by Ringworld's sun.)
> >
>
> Your effort, with its focus on literary space ships, is more meaningful
> to me than the TV and movie ships that appear earlier in this thread. TV
> and movies tend towards gimcrackery from my perspective. YMMV.

I'm with you. More, this is rec.arts.sf.*written*.

[Titus G]

So was the spindle 90 million miles long or 90 million and 1 miles long?

I'll get m' coat.

[johnny1...@gmail.com]

On Saturday, March 25, 2017 at 7:44:25 PM UTC-5, Cryptoengineer wrote:

>
> Kubrick apparently borrowed some Tardis tech from the BBC, since if
> you look at the exterior views of the Discovery, you'll realize
> that there is no way in hell that the EVA pod deck and the bridge
> windows can be reconciled with the centrifuge section - they just
> can't all fit in a 16m sphere at the same time.
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Discovery1b.JPG
>
> pt

Yeah, they can. They just _barely_ can, if you make conservative assumptions about the size of the EVA pods and so forth. I've seen various fan drawings and models that show it can work...just.

[Joe Pfeiffer]

And of course in real space exploration (as opposed to Star Trek and
Star Wars fantasies), everything *just* fits.

[johnny1...@gmail.com]

At the tech level of 2001, yeah, there'd be no space and no mass to waste. At higher tech levels, matters could easily be different.