TechMemo:D-Warp Drive

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Star Fleet Engineering
Bureau of Starship and Starcraft Technology

Star Fleet Engineering
Technical Memorandum
Stardate: 80405 (5 April 1996)
Edited: 130807 (7 August 2001)
Edited: 140824 (24 August 2002)
Edited: 170406 (6 April 2005)
Edited: 321022 (22 October 2020) Edited 350326 (26 March 2023)

RE: Dimensional Warp Drive

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Dimensional warp drive has had a mixed past in its deployment by the United Federation of Planets. Still a relatively new technology, it has developed from a questionable endeavour in the late 2390's into a useful technology in the early 2410's.

Dimensional warp drive, or d-warp, was intended to be the ultimate means of moving a starship from point A to point B in an emergency. The drive, unlike normal warp drive which forms a subspace bubble in normal space, opens a gateway into hyperspace and allows the vessel to travel at speeds much greater than possible under conventional warp drive. Unfortunately, in early testing, the technology proved impractical for normal use. Thus a starship plots a hyperspace course into the navigational computer, then engages the drive. While a ship could come out of the hyperspace jump early and set a new course, it could not otherwise adjust course while using dimensional warp drive. Only a handful of starships were equipped with these devices. The power consumption, expense and difficulty of retrofitting the system into older ships, the stresses on the spaceframe, and the danger inherent in using d-warp were all factors in the decision to keep the device from wide-spread starship use.

The first starship to be equipped with the d-warp drive system was the USS Phoenix, a Galaxy-class explorer, then under the command of Captain Dalia Mar. In one of its initial test runs (late 2405/early 2406), an accident with the dimensional warp drive caused both high numbers of casualties and extensive damage to the ship. Star Fleet Engineering determined that the flaw in the testing was due to unexpected hyperspace dynamics rather than any error by the crew of the Phoenix. The other test vessel, USS Nova, was ordered not to make use of the d-Warp drive while the accident was under investigation. After the accident, the d-Warp underwent a major revision of its control systems and a second generation of d-Warp drive was produced. Testing on the USS Nova in late 2406 indicated that this drive system was far more stable than the first generation drive. This series of drives was incorporated from the beginning into the Caesar Augustus-class heavy cruiser to give the warships the ability to reach the a crisis area with greater speed.

A number of shuttlecraft were equipped with the second generation drive and put into service for rapid transportation of personnel. Each capitol ship in the fleet is equipped with a single d-Warp shuttle for emergency use.

Research continued and resulted in yet a third generation of d-Warp drive. This was the first Federation-developed hypespace drive capably of maneuvering in hyperspace. This drive was field tested in the USS Solar, the prototype ship of a new class of command cruisers in 2408. It proved even more stable that the second generation drive, but was still deemed too impractical for use aboard most starships. Still, it was fitted into all Endeavour-class heavy cruisers. All of the Solar-class command cruisers were subsequently fitted with the drive system. The third generation drive was retrofit into all serving starships and shuttlecraft with the d-warp drive system.

In 2410, after extensive testing aboard the USS Montu, the fourth generation of dimensional warp drive was depoyed in the Circe, Kirov, and Montu-class starships. The reduced power requirements of the fourth generation drive and advances in hyperspace shielding finally made broad deployment of the drive system practicle.

The dimensional warp system is partly powered by the matter-antimatter reactor, but is otherwise completely separate from the conventional warp system and does not make use of the nacelles. Instead, the ship has a pair of dimensional warp (or hyperspace) nodes. One node is near the bow of the ship, the other near the stern. (Separable ships equipped with d-warp will often have a pair of nodes amidship so that each section of the ship will be d-warp capable while operating independently.) It is these nodes that generate the gravity sail that allows a ship to safely navigate the gravity waves of hyperspace. If the conventional warp drives are employed while the ship is in a gravity wave in hyperspace, the resulting stresses will rip the vessel apart.

Hyperspace travel is not, contrary to popular belief, instantaneous. Instead, a ship under d-warp traverses hyperspace much as a ship under normal warp traverses normal space (n-space). Every point in hyperspace corresponds to a point in n-space. However, the distance between these points is contracted. Thus, traveling a meter in hyperspace may allow a ship to travel a kilometer in real space. At no time during hyperspace travel, however, is the ship's actual velocity greater than the speed of light. Instead, its apparent velocity relative to a point in n-space seems to be greated than the speed of light because of the distance contraction property of hyperspace.

Hyperspace is divided into a series of bands. In each subsequent band, the n-space distances are contracted relative to the lower band. Thus, as a ship travels into higher and higher hyperspace bands, apparent velocity relative to n-space increases.

Band	Contraction	Apparent Velocity at 0.5c	Approximate Warp Speed	Apparent Velocity at 0.75c	Approximate Warp Speed
Alpha	3.50	1.75	1.18	2.63	1.34
Beta	12.25	6.1	1.72	9.19	1.95
Gamma	42.88	21.44	2.51	32.16	2.83
Delta	150.1	75.03	3.65	112.55	4.12
Epsilon	525.2	262.6	5.32	393.9	6.01
Zeta	1838	919.1	7.74	1378.70	8.75
Eta	6434	3217.0	9.91645	4825.45	9.97119
Theta†	22519	11259.4	9.99478	16889.07	9.99736
Iota	78816	39408	9.99924	59111.73	9.99956
Kappa	275855	137927	9.99984	206891.05	9.99990
Lambda‡	965492	482746	9.99996	724118.68	9.99997

† Normal starship cruising band.

‡ Maximum band at which Federation radiation shielding will continue to allow human life functions with current starship shielding

Generation I dimension warp could not operate above the eta band. There is a special shielding system in use on shuttles which allows them to traverse higher bands and thus travel at speeds comparable to subspace radio, making them practical for transport of small numbers of personnel over longdistances.

Most ships will not cruise above the theta band for extended periods of time, so this band is designated maximum cruising speed. Range under d-warp drive varies greatly depending on several factors. The high bands of hyperspace require greater power expenditure to radiation shielding and travel in iota and kappa bands is relatively limited in duration. Also, each ship type has a different power reserve. Even with the most power efficient Generation IV system, d-warp power consumption is high enough to drain ship's batteries even with all mater-antimatter and fusion reactors outputting at full power. Thus, it is very important to keep track of power stores when suing d-warp. A ship that is in d-warp that does not have enough power for transition back down the hyperspace ladder into normal space will be lost forever as there is no way to recharge power stores in hyperspace without exposing the crew to fatal radiation levels.

Note, despite these dangers and limitations, that theta band transit is more than 28 times faster than warp 6 (standard cruise for many ships) and more than 7.4 times as fast as warp 9. Further, kappa band transit is more than 90 times as fast as warp 9! D-Warp shows its real uses in long tansits. Cruising in the theta band allows a ship to cross a sector in less than 16 hours instead of 19 days at warp 6. If a ship pushes its drives to 0.75c (which corresponds to the maximum limit of radiation shielding), then a ship in the kappa band can achieve a speed more than 136 as fast as warp 9 and over 34 times warp 9.98.

Most major alien races are known to possess dimensional warp drive systems. The systems employed by the Klingons, Romulans, and Cardassians are approximately equivalent to those used by the Federation. Powers near the galactic core appear to have discovered hyperspace travel before normal space warp travel and tend to use dimensional warp technologies prefferentially. As would be expected, their systems are correspondingly more advanced and efficient. The Dalriadan Alliance, in particular, has a very efficient hyperspace drive system which is capable of operating over extended distances using only fussion power. It is believed that the Dalriadan hyperspace technology owes largely to technology originally developed by the Sidhe Imperium.

While Federation starships are limited to travel under their own power into the Kappa band, hyperspace booster gates in normal space can help them reach the Lambda band.

While conventional warp drives are very dangerous to use inside systems because of high particle densities, it can be fatal to use hyperspace drive inside the warp limit of a system. Stars and other massive objects create gravitational singularities in hyperspace. It is fatal to attempt to enter or leave hyperspace inside these singularities.