The size of the Enterprise-E

The USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-E) was a 24th century Federation Sovereign-class starship operated by Starfleet. This ship was the sixth Federation starship to bear the name Enterprise.

I never really considered the size of the Enterprise-E until I looked at the LCARS graphics on the Enterprise-E's MSD (Master Situation Display).

There I noticed that the silhouette didn't match the real one of the spaceship.  

So I traced the Tourbolift LCARS graphic and that of the bridge's MSD (which are identical).

screen used tourbolift LCARS grahic by "Star Trek Fact Files"

 

According to this MSD the ship has 24 decks.

• The premise for all my deck calculations: a deck is 2.5m + 0.5m for EPS cables, power cables, ... = 3m height for a deck. 
• My calculations follow a purely mathematical approach. I do not compare bridge modules or disk heights with each other. I always pull in decks based on the rows of windows and then calculate a physically plausible room height.

And in fact, with this MSD, the total length of the spaceship is calculated to be 572.2m if one deck has a height of 3m.

A design sketch version was used to draw the decks that didn't correspond to the blueprints of the later model or the CGI Enterprise-E.

design sketch "The Art of John Eaves"

design sketch with MSD overlap

For the correct silhouette I used the CGI image from Santa Barbara Studios' CGI model of the Sovereign-class. (Star Trek: The Magazine Volume 3, Issue 11, page 50). 

Now I compared it with the silhouette of the spaceship. 

Without doing any calculations, it is immediately clear that the total length of the MSD can't be correct because the final blueprint wasn't used for the MSD.

If we now use the height of 3m for a deck, we calculate a total length of 718.8m for the Enterprise-E.
The official length of 685,8m is therefore wrong.
And one more thing: If you look closely at the side view of the Enterprise-E (the real one), it has 26 decks (and not just 24 decks, like in the MSD).

Only in this configuration would the main engineering on deck 16 and the upper shuttle bay in the correct position.

The configurations on the Enterprise-E for Star Trek Nemesis made it slightly shorter because the warp nacelles were raised a little and pushed forward by 3.5%.
Additional phaser strips and photon torpedo launchers have also been added.
In the end the extended saucer detail beside the upper Shuttle bay had no effect at all in the side view because it was too flat to be seen there. Nevertheless, this extended detail gives the appearance of the Enterprise-E a more smooth look.

 This results in a length of 706.1m for the Nemesis configuration.

The Size of the Excelsior II class

 The Excelsior II class was a Federation starship class that was in service with Starfleet by the early 25th century. In 2401, the USS Excelsior was amongst the fleet led by the USS Stargazer to meet a Borg faction. Cadet Elnor and Commander Raffaela Musiker were both assigned to the vessel which took part in protecting the quadrant from the massive energy released by the opening of a transwarp conduit by an unknown source.

• The premise for all my deck calculations: a deck is 2.5m + 0.5m for EPS cables, power cables, ... = 3m height for a deck. 
• My calculations follow a purely mathematical approach. I do not compare bridge modules or disk heights with each other. I always pull in decks based on the rows of windows and then calculate a physically plausible room height.

I have drawn decks based on the clearly visible screen opening of the bridge on deck 1. The ship was obviously designed in such a way that the number of decks is exactly based on the size of the bridge.

 

side view by Star Trek Online

 

The ship was marked with an official length of 588m.

 

With a height for each deck of 3m, the total length is 694.9m.  

If the ship were only 588m long, the decks would be 2.5m high, including the cables and technology. This would leave only 2m of headroom.

 

The original Excelsior class was also already calculated incorrectly. And this despite the fact that there was an Excelsior-MSD (Master Situation Display) with the decks.

The size of Timeship Relativity

The USS Relativity (NCV-474439-G) is a 29th century Federation Wells-class starship operated by Starfleet. The timeship was commissioned at the University of Copernicus, and was initially under the command of Captain Braxton.

• The premise for all my deck calculations: a deck is 2.5m + 0.5m for EPS cables, power cables, ... = 3m height for a deck. 
• My calculations follow a purely mathematical approach. I do not compare bridge modules or disk heights with each other. I always pull in decks based on the rows of windows and then calculate a physically plausible room height.

It's not so easy to see in the Star Trek Voyager episode, but the bridge of the USS Relativity has a large window structure on its ceiling.

image by Eaglemoss Collection

Using the high-resolution depiction of the USS Relativity in Eaglemoss magazine, you can draw the size of the decks in the side view and thus determine the length of the ship.

 

side view by Eaglemoss Collection

 Assuming a deck is 3m high, this gives a length of 263.7m for the USS Relativity.

The size of the Klingon Sarcophagus Ship

The Sarcophagus, or Ship of the Dead, was a Klingon starship that originally served as the command vessel of the House of T'Kuvma. In 2256, the Sarcophagus was encountered by the USS Shenzhou at the edge of Federation space.

The Set Designer David Moreau published a top view of the Sarcophagus ship's bridge. My calculations follow a purely mathematical approach. In this case I was able to use the correct dimensions from the bridge set.
On this you can see the dimensions of the opening of the front window (9'-6'' = 2.74m + 0.15m: overall 2.89m).

Sarcophagus ship bridge - by David Moreau

According to this set blueprint, the entire dome window has a diameter of 4.27m.
It is one of the largest bridge sets ever built for Star Trek. However, I had my doubts early on about the officially published length of the ship (2550.6m), because it seemed very gigantic (even for such a large bridge window).

This gives the entire spaceship a width of 472.7m.

 This results in a length of 993.06m for the Sarcophagus ship.

 

Olympic Class (USS Pasteur) studio model - reference photos

Here are my color corrections of the Olympic Class studio model photos. The photos were originally taken by Bill George, who designed and built the miniature in his own time, before offering it up for use in the final episode of The Next Generation, “All Good Things”. The design pays homage to Matt Jefferies’ concept art for the Daedalus class from the 22nd century. The photos feature George’s original name for the ship, the USS Olympic, before it was renamed into USS Pasteur to better reflect its use in the episode as a medical vessel. You can also see the Starfleet emblem from TNG on the spaceship. In the final episode, it was replaced with the Starfleet medical symbol. The color corrections are minimal. The photos were a bit overdriven.

Here you get to the COLOR CORRECTED PHOTOS.

The size of the Enterprise-E ARGO Shuttle

The shuttlecraft ARGO - seen in Star Trek Nemesis - was designed by artist John Eaves. Eaves classified the Argo as a heavy transport shuttle. It includes a buggy for planetary ground missions.

For my calculation I used the real size of the ARGO buggy. According to blueprint, the car is 5.33 m (17.5 feet) long.

Taking into account the size of the loading hatch, this results in a length of 20.04 m for the ARGO. In addition, this length allows a cockpit height of 2m.

blueprint ARGO buggy

STAR TREK Size Comparison Charts - Ships from TNG to DS9

 Here are the size chart with the ships from the Alpha, Beta and Gamma Quadrant.

PS: A special thank (and all copyright) for the picture material to: John Eaves, Drex Files, Star Trek Fact Files and Star Trek The Magazine, Starship Collection Magazine and The Light Works.

Size calculations:

USS Defiant

Vulcan Ship T'Pau

Hideki Class

VoDIeH Class (alternate Negh'Var)

Romulan Warbird

K'Tinga Class

Ferengi Marauder

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