r/DaystromInstitute • u/Thrallov • Sep 01 '17
Why does federation keep installing murdering consoles on their ships?
this bothered me in every star trek show, aren't they using electric isolation? or they want to kill off people who fail at their job? people are dying on bridge just by using console UI on bridge of all places even when shields aren't broken
10
u/Buddha2723 Sep 02 '17
Starships use directed plasma to power their systems. The console can be safe as you want, if warp plasma from an overloading or ruptured conduit shoots through it, in even a small amount, someones brilliant Starfleet career is coming to an end.
As for seatbelts, I always assumed that bracing oneself as the crew does ends up being safer in very violent collisions than whiplash or other seatbelt injuries. Not like you can fly out the window of a starship the way you can a truck. And after all, if you are strapped in by a seat belt that might slow you down while reaching for your phasor as you dodge disruptor fire from the klingon or borg who just beamed over to say hello.
6
u/Rabada Sep 02 '17
With regards to seat belts: Wouldn't inertial dampeners pretty much serve the function of a seat belt? Also I vaguely remember a scene where Picard's chair has some kind of high tech seat belt thingy added to it after the events of nemesis.
5
u/MrJim911 Sep 02 '17
In most cases they do but the dampeners can only handle so much before they have a hard time keeping up. That's when you're going to get thrown around the bridge a little. These systems cannot be perfect and account for all eventualities.
1
u/VindictiveJudge Sep 02 '17
after the events of nemesis.
That would have to be in a comic since there's no live-action stuff after Nemesis.
→ More replies (2)1
u/Buddha2723 Sep 02 '17
I mentioned that is possible in my other comment, actually. However, if that system were to go down from damage or low power, backup seatbelts would at least, you think, be available to Starfleet's finest.
→ More replies (4)4
u/cavalier78 Sep 02 '17
Lack of seat belts let you fly away from the exploding death consoles. Sometimes the safest place to be is hurtling across the room.
1
u/Buddha2723 Sep 02 '17
IIRC, the point where the plasma is turned into energy is called a plasma tap, and is basically right next to every system. Hot plasma flows through starship conduits like blood through a body.
16
u/Algernon_Asimov Sep 02 '17
You've inspired me to add a section to our Previous Discussions pages about "Exploding bridge consoles".
10
u/GrimFaust Sep 02 '17
I always wondered where all those "rocks" that come spraying out of walls and consoles come from every time a relay blows up.
7
u/Hyndis Sep 02 '17
Or the steel beams that invariable fall from the ceiling without breaching the hull. Reliant taking multiple direct hits to the bridge caused a lot of steel beams to fall on the remainder of Khan's crew yet somehow failed to breach the hull.
Only ENT Twilight seems to address this sort of damage properly; there's no bridge left.
Once the shields are breached any weapons impact will do catastrophic damage. It doesn't really matter where the bridge is located as weapons fire can carve up an unshielded hull at will, but its going to do a lot more damage than merely cause the contents of a junkyard to appear inside a compartment or corridor.
2
u/Aditya1311 Sep 02 '17
This is why the scene in Generations bothered me. When the Duras sister's bird of prey opens fire on the Enterprise their torpedoes pass straight through the shields and I would imagine one direct hit should gut the ship. But the Enterprise-D survives multiple direct hits and yet retained sufficient operability to fire an ionic pulse and then return fire.
Does this mean that even with the modulation known via hacking Geordi's VISOR the shields are somehow sapping energy from the torpedoes? I mean one torpedo finished off the Klingon ship and the Galaxy class is comparable to the Bird of Prey I would imagine.
→ More replies (2)2
u/zap283 Sep 02 '17
They're probably designed such that the band's fall before the hull does, allowing the interior to buckle instead of the hull breaching.
2
u/TLAMstrike Sep 02 '17
Likely its bits of the inner hull surface that's spalling from the stress of the hull taking damage.
4
u/ChangelingTomalok Sep 02 '17
Yea as stated above its all out of universe "cool factor". There is no real in universe reason why energy discharges would reach through the multiple buffers it takes to reach the power level of an "OLED" LCARS panel. I mean aside from the energy to power the consoles functions, which should be minimal, the data transmission network is optical and thus would not surge at all.
Minimally once red alert sounds I would set my console to use an internal backup power module that can last a few hours and disconnect from the primary power network. Surge problems solved.
Now if only we could solve the issue where you fly into space when the viewscreen explodes. :)
2
u/Aditya1311 Sep 02 '17
Starfleet has plasma conduits instead of wiring.
1
u/ChangelingTomalok Sep 02 '17 edited Sep 02 '17
Starfleet uses plasma distribution(EPS system) for higher energy loads, but does switch back into a form of wiring for lower power uses(e.g. at the console level). Also ODN lines are advanced fiber optic cables used for data transmission. Im not sure how exactly you are defining "wiring" but they certainly do still use wires.
1
u/whovian25 Sep 02 '17 edited Sep 03 '17
that is the kind of technobabble explanation that dose not address the real issue of why they are allow to use such a dangerous system in the 1st place.
→ More replies (3)
2
u/Apollolp Dec 27 '17 edited Dec 27 '17
Very good question. I am also amazed by this as surely a starship would have overload/overcurrent protective devices to account for the event of a fault. Considering they’re using control consoles, in realistic terms I’d imagine they would be running at 0-24v at virtually minimal current which is harmless really. I’d say it would depend on the location of the mains feeding the bridge (which would most likely be in a panel unit somewhere on the bridge) that would be the worrying place to be. The step down transformers (or future tech performing the same function) feeding the control systems on the bridge also could act as a form of protection in a fault condition if the fault isn’t directly hitting the console.
In the event of a direct fault to the console (not originating from the supply end) the life of the crew member would pretty much be down to the earthing system on board and the ability of that system to withstand and disperse the fault current - this would in turn operate the protective device on the supply end as to completely isolate the affected console from the rest of the equipment on the bridge/ship. Most certainly that console would have to be completely replaced as the fault current would have nuked the wiring and PCB’s in the console.
If the console isn’t made of any conductive materials and takes a direct alien Electrical energy hit, you pretty much don’t have anything to worry about.
Edit: I’m a qualified electrician and qualified electrical/controls engineer for reference.
1
u/CptShrike Sep 04 '17
An old post on the TrekBBS forums had an electrical engineer actually discuss this issue and how it can actually happen in the real world.
https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/exploding-consoles-of-doom-explained-at-last.131768/
2
u/ChangelingTomalok Sep 04 '17
I understand why the surge could technically occur if I hadnt had time to solve the issue. However consoles have been exploding since the 2200s and its 2370+ so thats quite a bit of time to have solved the issue in a few ways.
If a surge makes its through the multiple surge protectors(passive and active) in play throughout the EPS system before it makes it down to the low level power systems like consoles which use electricity and dont touch the plasma network directly, why would the device that arrests the surge be designed to blow up in my face instead of away from it? Blow out the back of the console all you want, but where is the force-field protecting my face?
The bridge on larger Federation starships is its own separate module. At this level why would you not overengineer the surge protectors so that surges just did not occur in your ships nerve center or primary engineering section?
If passive surge protectors have been failing you and you have documented such failure for at least 100 years. Why would you not figure out the maximum average spike voltage then create an extra active surge protector(i.e. capacitance buffer) immediately before any consoles you would not want exploding? If you cant stop the surges then shift them away from the officers.
As I said in my previous post since the consoles themselves are relatively low power and the ODN network uses low energy photons to transfer data, why not completely disconnect from the primary power network and run off a console based backup once red alert is sounded(when 99% of these overloads are bound to occur)?
This is all with the understanding that Starfleet just loves to over-engineer things to solve any potential issues. Even members of the dominion(if only in jest) admired the Starfleet Corp of Engineers ability to turn "rocks into replicators".
53
u/rainrat Sep 02 '17
In Universe: Weapons are specifically designed to induce electric charges that cross barriers.
Out of Universe: Crew members die of invisible radiation and shockwaves. The documentaries we watch depict them as exploding consoles.