Star Trek 09 review thread

[Darth Wong]

Because 24th century engineers have lost the secret of shielding their electronics? Why wasn't Spock's tiny gyroship affected by proximity to the drill head, when he attacked it?

Considering the 'Spockmobile' had been specifically commissionned by the Vulcan Science Academy to deal with what are deemed extremely hazardous environments (supernovae and small black holes), I'd speculate that its electronics are actually extremely well-shielded even by 24th century standards. Thus, even if the drill generated enough interferences to fuck up the electronics of 23rd century ships and most 24th century ones, it would have much less effects on the SM.

So Spock's ship would have been specifically designed to deal with hazardous environments in general, thus including this drill, yet the Narada could not have been designed to deal with its own drill? Do you even listen to yourself?

And how could the drill create such deadly radiation and/or powerful electromagnetic fields, when the fucking drill head has two biological crewmen stationed inside it?

[General Zod]

Because 24th century engineers have lost the secret of shielding their electronics? Why wasn't Spock's tiny gyroship affected by proximity to the drill head, when he attacked it?

The drill only affected communications and transporters, didn't it? It could just be Spock's ship was better protected simply by being from the same century as Nero's ship and having more advanced systems than the 23rd century Federation ships.

[Darth Wong]

Because 24th century engineers have lost the secret of shielding their electronics? Why wasn't Spock's tiny gyroship affected by proximity to the drill head, when he attacked it?

The drill only affected communications and transporters, didn't it? It could just be Spock's ship was better protected simply by being from the same century as Nero's ship and having more advanced systems than the 23rd century Federation ships.

I'm fielding certain peoples' feeble attempts to explain the stupid chain hanging down from Narada. Some people are saying that it needs to be isolated from the ship because it emits such powerful and deadly radiation and/or fields that it would damage Narada's electronics, even though there are two crewmen sitting inside the drill head. I brought up Spock's ship as an example of a 24th century ship (like Narada) which was unaffected by much closer proximity.

[General Zod]

I'm fielding certain peoples' feeble attempts to explain the stupid chain hanging down from Narada. Some people are saying that it needs to be isolated from the ship because it emits such powerful and deadly radiation and/or fields that it would damage Narada's electronics, even though there are two crewmen sitting inside the drill head.

Yeah, I don't get the point of having the crewmen at the bottom except giving an excuse to have a fight scene. That part at least just seemed really contrived.

[Darth Wong]

I'm fielding certain peoples' feeble attempts to explain the stupid chain hanging down from Narada. Some people are saying that it needs to be isolated from the ship because it emits such powerful and deadly radiation and/or fields that it would damage Narada's electronics, even though there are two crewmen sitting inside the drill head.

Yeah, I don't get the point of having the crewmen at the bottom except giving an excuse to have a fight scene. That part at least just seemed really contrived.

Most of the movie seems really contrived. As I said earlier, the film only gets away with it because of much stronger characterizations and likable characters than Nemesis had.

[The Nomad]

So Spock's ship would have been specifically designed to deal with hazardous environments in general, thus including this drill, yet the Narada could not have been designed to deal with its own drill? Do you even listen to yourself?

And how could the drill create such deadly radiation and/or powerful electromagnetic fields, when the fucking drill head has two biological crewmen stationed inside it?

Mmh right, point conceded.

[Akumz Razor]

Perhaps the drill needs to be in an atmosphere to operate and the Narada itself is too large to descend that low?

[erik_t]

It would therefore be of negligible practical use in mining most of eg Sol's mineable orbiting bodies. Seems pretty silly to me.

Why are we so certain that the beam can stay coherent and focused over long distances? If the beam loses focus over distances in the thousand-km ballpark, this would be fine (and therefore probably cheaper to build and more reliable in operation from larger tolerances) for most mining purposes (asteroids, etc). However it would necessitate getting the drill head unusually close to a surface like a planet, if you really want to dig way down.

[General Zod]

Perhaps the drill needs to be in an atmosphere to operate and the Narada itself is too large to descend that low?

The Narada's a mining ship; if the drill absolutely had to have an atmosphere to operate in it would be worthless for extracting most of the materials in space, in which case why the fuck would you put it on a starship in the first place? Presumably the drill was NOT a retrofit and came as standard equipment, otherwise things get even stupider.

[Akumz Razor]

I agree with you guys that atmosphere only operation is useless for a huge starship, but going solely by footage from the movie which claims a supernova could destroy the entire galaxy it's the only thing I could think of.

Erik's idea that the drill has a limited useful range makes sense. Earth's radius is 6371 km, and the Narada probably doesn't mine from asteroids, etc. at that range as standard procedure.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Perhaps the drill is pulsed and pulsed lasers actually have self-focusing properties in atmospheres.

Though, this is absolutely speculatory, and the drill doesn't show apparent evidence of pulsing unless it was very fast.

[Themightytom]

I forget what the chain looks like, but could it be for transporting mining material to and fro? If the platform messes with transporters they would need a more mundane method of picking up ore and what not.

This seems unlikely I admit because it was specified to be atmospheric interference, and it would be easier to just mine places that don't ahve an atmosphere, and also the field dissipates instantly when they drill is turned off (Destroyed) so they could just turn the drill off and beam up rubble.

I dunno maybe it was just giant bling

[tim31]

Since we're all about modern analogies here, you do not collect ore while drilling. Mining is done in several ways; for example they use bucket wheel excavators(giant scary saw-looking thing), or direct bore drills, or they use(in conjuction with drilling) demolition charges to blow out catherdral sized chambers. THEN they collect the ore.

Now watch as someone tells me I have it all wrong.

[Surlethe]

Here's a thought: Could the drill be some sort of particle accelerator that needs length to, well, accelerate?

[Drooling Iguana]

Maybe the long, hanging drill was necessary because, if you're going to be digging a hole to the centre of a planet you're going to have to do something to prevent said hole from collapsing on you before you get anywhere close to your goal. They likely needed a sophisticated system of force fields to keep the hole intact long enough to drop the red matter in, and they might have been difficult to align from orbit.

[Oskuro]

Also, a minor reference that I noticed easily, and greately liked, when standing up to walk down to Kirk during the disciplinary meeting, Spock does the Picard Manuever!

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Here's a thought: Could the drill be some sort of particle accelerator that needs length to, well, accelerate?

You would think the chain is a lot more rigid though to allow the particle to travel down the entire length in a straight line.

[Uraniun235]

Maybe the long, hanging drill was necessary because, if you're going to be digging a hole to the centre of a planet you're going to have to do something to prevent said hole from collapsing on you before you get anywhere close to your goal. They likely needed a sophisticated system of force fields to keep the hole intact long enough to drop the red matter in, and they might have been difficult to align from orbit.

You're saying the mining ship was designed to drop red matter into planets?

[Drooling Iguana]

You're saying the mining ship was designed to drop red matter into planets?

Whatever the reason might be to drill more than a relatively small distance into a planet (which this ship was obviously designed to do as I can't imagine them being able to retrofit a ship built to take chunks out of a planet's crust into something that can drill to its core) you're going to need something too keep the hole open long enough to do whatever you intended to do with it in the first place. Otherwise what's the point of drilling the hole at all?

[Darth Wong]

Maybe the long, hanging drill was necessary because, if you're going to be digging a hole to the centre of a planet you're going to have to do something to prevent said hole from collapsing on you before you get anywhere close to your goal. They likely needed a sophisticated system of force fields to keep the hole intact long enough to drop the red matter in, and they might have been difficult to align from orbit.

And this would be easier on a small hanging platform on a flexible chain?

Let's face reality here: the creators of the film clearly had no idea that a planet is mostly liquid. They treated Vulcan as a giant rock, so if you can drill into it, then you can just drop something down the resulting hole. Remember that the platform was disabled before they dropped the red matter down the hole, and you could clearly see the hole. If Vulcan were a more realistic planet, hot lava should have been shooting up out of it. Even when the planet collapsed, it looked all dry on the inside.

[Kodiak]

I know that space-born lasers will dissipate such that they are ineffective after passing through enough atmosphere. I thought that the dangling-chain drill was there so that it would be at an effective operating range while the ship itself remained in orbit. If the drill has to be, for instance, within 20-40 miles of the drilling surface in order to function properly, this would explain the need for a chain when the ship can't get that close to the surface by itself.

Also, it's entirely feasible that since the mining ship is supposed to be an all-in-one utility vehicle that this drill platform is designed to be lowered into the hole, once complete, and assist in the extraction of materials.

[Erik von Nein]

Yeah, but the Narada wasn't firing a laser, it was firing something more akin to a phaser, which have been demonstrated to work from orbit, even in a drilling capacity. I can't remember which episode of The Next Generation it was, but they used the phasers on the Ent. D to release pockets of gas for some inexplicable reason, and it worked well in that regard.

[Drooling Iguana]

And this would be easier on a small hanging platform on a flexible chain?

Maybe it required a lot of power to operate, necessitating a large, unwieldy conduit? Besides, since when has anyone in Star Trek done things the easy way?

I'm trying to justify a plot point in a very badly-written movie here, and when presented with a choice between the impractical and the impossible I have to choose the former.

[Darth Wong]

I know that space-born lasers will dissipate such that they are ineffective after passing through enough atmosphere. I thought that the dangling-chain drill was there so that it would be at an effective operating range while the ship itself remained in orbit. If the drill has to be, for instance, within 20-40 miles of the drilling surface in order to function properly, this would explain the need for a chain when the ship can't get that close to the surface by itself.

Also, it's entirely feasible that since the mining ship is supposed to be an all-in-one utility vehicle that this drill platform is designed to be lowered into the hole, once complete, and assist in the extraction of materials.

A valiant effort, good sir! However, still doomed. Even if this is the case, the drill has to shoot through thousands of kilometres of material to reach the core, and there will be huge amounts of material evpourating and getting in the way throughout the process. Dropping it through a few dozen km of atmosphere to get closer will not make any significant difference.

[Darth Wong]

And this would be easier on a small hanging platform on a flexible chain?

Maybe it required a lot of power to operate, necessitating a large, unwieldy conduit?

If something requires a lot of power to operate, you keep it closer, not farther. Why give yourself the headache of needing to run it through such a long conductor?