RP Log: About That Warp Field
| Roleplay Log | |
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Location(s):
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Stardate:
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| 2022-09-14 18:53 | |
- Engineering Lab 18A1 <USS Sao Paulo NCC-122004>
- The engineering labs aboard the vessel have similar design queues to one another, but each is configured for a slightly different purpose. This particular lab is general purpose and coule be utilized for a number of engineering experiments that have moved beyond the holographic or design phase. There are a number of stations along the back wall, each of which can be devoted to a specific project. A black, glossy panelling runs along the bulkheads at shoulder height near the entry door, allowing access to the LCARS interface, and tracers set into the bulkheads close to the ceiling indicate the current alert status.
Hauser has made this lab on deck 18 one of her homes away from home. A cutaway of a warp core spins in profile on one screen as stringed music of some sort plays. She appears, at the moment, to just be gazing at the spinning shape and sipping her tea, feet crossed on one of the empty lab benches.
LePage enters in, taking a look around and shaking his head with a silent chuckle. "You are... extremely brave, you know that yeah?" he says walking over and taking a look at what's on the displays around the pair of them.
Hauser starts, bringing her feet to the floor and hopping up. "O hi. Sir. Brave?" She asks. "I was just playing with some design specs. You get my memo, sir?"
LePage sighs, but there's still a quirk of a smile on his face. "Nevermind the fact you basically said read the manual, or that you called the command staff "the boys upstairs" on a shipwide mailer, OR that you told me to come "hang out" with you instead of scheduling a meeting..." the Chief rubs his face. "Please, Hauser, do me a favor and don't go so deep into being an Engineer that you get axed by Command. I'd appreciate having one of my more promising Ensigns around long enough she gets another pip on her collar" he chides gently.
"O." She actually blushes. Not something she does often. "Thought I sent that to the department only mailer. Sorry sir. And ... um, I didn't meant to suggest you hadn't read the manual. Sorry again."
LePage raises an eyebrow and pulls out a PADD from his kitbag, reading it over. "Oh, you did... Still, you know that Commander Worthington likes to peak in on these things, yeah? Look, I like the spirit, and you're an Engineer through and through. Part of the game though is knowing the time to stare the captain down and tell them they're dead wrong, and knowing the time to nod along and quietly research until you can prove it's not possible" LePage replies. "Just saying, I've seen better Engineers than you go wayside on a crappy posting for forgetting the Starfleet way"
Hauser nods. "I'll remember that," she says, appearing to mean it. "Thanks, sir."
"...The boys upstairs, heh" LePage chuckles. "Anyhow. Show me what you can show me better on screens then"
Hauser smiles, perking up. "Sure." She enters a long string of keystrokes, and her graphic disappears. It's replaced by another, an outline of a classic warp field graphic. "So, this is the warp field graphic we all got in the textbooks. But here's ours." She hits another control, and the graphic alters slightly. "So I went back and pulled the sensor logs and cross linked their data with the reactor logs, the matter antimatter exchange flow logs, and ... well," she blushes and just goes on. "When we go high, up to about 9.99974, our warp field is fine." She hits a toggle to animate the warp field, which appears to move against the backdrop of space. She taps a control, and a boundary line appears in bright, feminine pink. "This is the boundary, the subspace intersect, between our warp bubble and normal space. When we get up to around 9997457, it starts to get irregular." The pink line develops slight bulges. "And around 999749, it's reached boundary tolerance." The pink line develops a few more bulges. "I think if we actually tried 9.99975, the drag would destabilize the warp field, assuming the reactor didn't strip its gears first." The pink line collapses, revealing a starship cruising in normal space on impulse power. Little stick animated figures in red, labeled, DamCON, appear on the hull.
LePage nods along. "Not bad. I like the animation, makes it easy to explain to others... What are our avenues of improving this situation?" the Chief asks. "Anything is on the table for the moment, I just want to know what you've identified as a potential solution to this issue and then we can run through them to determine feasability"
"Well, I see two possibilities, both risky," she says. "The more theoretical of them would be to tweek our actual warp field bubble shape to make it more ... ameable to the max warp number we have. The other would be to try and get more capacity, even just a little, out of the reactor. Wouldn't do anything to the bubble's shape exactly, but it might ease the EPS overloading on the inside of the ship, sir."
"I will bring it up in the next staff meeting. If we get pushback from Commander Worthington or Captain Shulon, we'll revisit those options. If we don't we can leave it at that" LePage says resolutely.
Hauser nods. "Got it," she says. "I um, saw your list of to-dos," she says. "Was there anything in particular you wanted me to work on? Or may I help pick?"
"The list is a free for all, but do me a favor and update the Engineering distro. You'd list these updates we discussed under 0001-1-A. I tried to make it as.. sensible as I could" LePage says. "After that, feel free to take one another sub-objective.
Hauser makes notes with a stylus on a pad, "got it, sir," she says. She pulls out a copy of your list. "I was thinking it'd be fun to work out the wet-dry airlock issue. I've never been on a ship with water-dwelling crew. And the Huang He's slipstream, is there more information about that problem written somewhere, sir?"
"Hold on, let me see here... I'll forward you the report from Commander Worthington" LePage says, tapping on his PADD
Hauser reads over the XO's report. A furrow appears above and between her eyebrows. "Computer command control interface issue?" She says to herself. She keeps reading, making notes. "So, if the XO used the computer to run the diagnostics, which is understandable, the diagnostics of the drive and EPS systems, etc. might not be quite on spec. Someone'll have to crawl over those systems in the bay and check them over with an eyeball and an engineering tricorder. If they check out, then he's totally right that it's a computer issue, which I think he might be right anyway, sir."
"Worth's been around the horn enough times to know... He's had more ships blow up under his feet than I can count" LePage notes. "But he needs us to check it out. I'd say that would be a good place to start, yeah"
Hauser nods. "Guess I better do that one with someone. Think I should ask the XO to lend me a hand with spooling up systems and stuff like that?"
"I don't think he'd mind per se, especially seeing as how he's all into this shakedown. He's hands on" LePage nods.
Hauser nods and stands. "Well, sir, with your permission, I'll go ask him. And about the other stuff ... thanks."
Lieutenant Commander Worthington arrives from Deck 18 - Aft Corridor.
"Like I said, don't be so yellow-shirted that you get boiled before your time. That's all" LePage chuckles. "You learn these things in time"
Hauser grins and nods, extending her hand to shake LePages at the last thing he said. "Maybe we can all," and then the door opens.
Worthington walks in and finds 2 engineers. He makes his way toward the female one with the ensign's rank ensignia on her uniform. "Good day ensign, chief," he says with a nodd to LePage. "I saw your report. This is interesting. First ship I've served on that couldn't reach the drive's max rated velocity. Looks like warp 9.9997499 is the best we'll get for now." He considers. "Your thoughts. Any relationship between the shere size of the ship and her nacelles and why we can't reach max warp? I was kind of thinking the size may have something to do with it."
LePage shoots Hauser a very "I told you so" look at the comment on Worth reading her report. "I concur with Ensign Hauser's analysis and find it to be mathmatically sound. We're one of the biggest ships in the fleet, we may be approaching some sort of barrier in regards to the subspace-space interface that nobody's encountered before"
She smiles at Worthington. "I'm Ensign Hauser, sir. Not sure we've actually met yet." She extends a hand. "I crunched some numbers on that problem. I could show you what I found? But basically, Lieutenant LePage is right."
Worthington smiles. "We did meet ensign. Remember, initial shakedown of propultion, or was it the message coming through. I remarked on your work where you were working to make our warp geometry more efficient, and starting your experiments," he says. "I remember you pretty well."
"Most notable in Ensign Hauser's simulations are the indications of what looks like subspace drag, which is... well, I've never seen that. As far as any of us knew, subspace didn't have mass in that sort of sense" LePage points out. "Play him the animation" he says to Hauser
Hauser smiles at Worthington. "O yeah! Sorry, sir. Crowded bridge. I was just trying to stay out of the way. But like the lieutenant says, I can show you a little something about this." She heads to a control station and enters a long string of keystrokes, and an outline of a classic warp field graphic appears. "So, this is the warp field graphic engineering students get in the textbooks. But here's ours." She hits another control, and the graphic alters slightly. "So I went back and pulled the sensor logs and cross linked their data with the reactor logs, the matter antimatter exchange flow logs, and ... well," she pauses and then just goes on. "When we go high, up to about 9.99974, our warp field is fine." She hits a toggle to animate the warp field, which appears to move against the backdrop of space. She taps a control, and a boundary line appears in bright, feminine pink. "This is the boundary, the subspace intersect, between our warp bubble and normal space. When we get up to around 9997457, it starts to get irregular." The pink line develops slight bulges. "And around 999749, it's reached boundary tolerance." The pink line develops a few more bulges. "I think if we actually tried 9.99975, the drag would destabilize the warp field, assuming the reactor didn't strip its gears first." The pink line collapses, revealing a starship cruising in normal space on impulse power. Little stick animated figures in red, labeled, DamCON, appear on the hull.
Worthington nodds, looking at the graphics. "So it would seem that you have discovered an as yet unheard of subspace phenomenon. Congratulations are in order ensign," he says. "Our quantum mechanics and physics experts would likely enjoy seeing this discovery as well. If there is a chance we can learn more about this effect from continued observation, more testing may be warranted. Knowing more about the effect may lead to Starfleet developing ways to counter it for large ships in future, enabling faster warp speeds." He considers. "That does explain a lot. I'll consider the warp drive properly shaken down then, as no mechanical or technical issues have been found."
LePage smiles. "That works for me. We'll look into that more, and we can always keep in contact with Starfleet Science, I'm sure they'll keep us busy on this deep-space mission"
Hauser looks slightly embarrassed. "Thanks, sir. Speaking of going faster, I was interested in what you found with Huang He's slipstream. Sometime soon, I'd be happy to give you a hand with that. Lieutenant LePage showed me your report, and I've been kicking the problem around a little."
Worthington nodds. "I was initially thinking the issue lies in the main computer. I noted as much in my report on the matter," he says, particularly to LePage. "Though a thorough investigation is in order. The computer reported damaged to the drive and overdrawing, then reported that no such overdrawing actually happened, but something was triggering its monitoring parameters. I had to bypass those parameters to get back to Sao Paulo. The drive would show as slightly damaged, then show as fully repaired, and the computer would announce that it was fully functional. I definitely want to be sure that no other systems are effected before completing her shakedowns and approving her for service."
"Noted, I'll consider her unstable until we can prove otherwise" Gordon nods. "We'll run phantom tests, trick it into thinking something's really wrong to make sure the correct responses are being invoked"
Worthington nodds and smiles. "That's what I think it's already doing," he says. "Maybe check the sensors responsible for reading power transfers to the slipstream drive and the computer subroutines, make sure those are all in working order. The response appears to be to disengage the drive, and I saw that response on 3 separate occasions. Just want to know what's actually causing it. Does the drive have an issue, the computer core, which could potentially effect other systems, internal sensors?"
"We'll look into it" LePage says. "Shouldn't take too long to track down the gremlin"
Worthington nodds. "In the mean time, I've got a type 11 shuttle that needs to be shaken down, and our chief engineer. How about we put those 2 things together and see what happens?" he says with a smile.
LePage rolls his eyes. "Any excuse to pry me from my office. Fine, fine, I suppose I can do some REAL work, can't leave it all to the Ensigns"
Worthington nodds. "Let's go then, see what sort of trouble we can get up to."