USS Shadowfax Orthos

This is probably my most unusual star trek ship.  It was mostly an exercise in "what if."  That is, what if we'd gone with rings instead of nacelles?  What would Starfleet ships look like then?  

So, I had more-or-less free reign to do whatever I wanted.  But, I did still want to refer back to the XCV-330 to tie it into Trek lore and I wanted to give the ship a few recognizable components so that it would fit in the universe.  

So, it has the basic layout of the 330; two big rings, a long stem, and a forward mounted habitation module.  I even threw in the under-slung deflector dish, a sub-light propulsion module that you can see between the rings, and a bit of asymmetry in the habitation module with the shuttle bay.  

I tried to give the ship a basic Starfleet feel.  So, it has
~ Sleek, curving lines with minimal greebles,
~ Many small windows, docking bays, main cargo bay doors, shuttle bay doors, and a set of arboretum windows, which are larger than normal.
~ An obvious bridge in the top center of the main hull,
~ Vents in the pylons similar to the pylon vents from the 1701-A, 
~ Similar weapons (little ball phasers and spinally mounted torpedo launchers)
~ Starfleet-style decals, naming, numbering convention, and hull coloring
~ A warp core similar to the TOS 1701 with multiple cores mounted longitudinally in the engineering section.  
This list would get stupidly long if I kept going - it's got star trek stuff.  

But, this is a completely different layout with different mechanics, so I could do a few new things and I could have a little fun with individual details.  
~ Mooring clamps with pipe attachments for docking and refueling at the front of the ship and refueling attachments for in-flight refueling at the top of the forward ring,
~ A bridge mounted high above the main hull, similar to a modern navy ship's bridge.  
~ An "observation platform" on the top of the main hull with a railing all around.  I imagine standing out there in a space suit would be an amazing experience.
~ Large communication and sensor antennas
~ A sublight drive that (in my imagination) is something of a cross between an ion drive and a particle rail gun.   

Once again, I think this ship has some problems.  The big one is that there are too many windows.  This is the same problem that the Independence had.  I guess I like looking at space?  Another is that I literally got bored and stopped drawing the hull plating detail.  I suppose I could go back and fix it now, but I'm still bored with it and this ship would end up getting a modeling skill upgrade overhaul that I don't want to do.  The last major issue is that the top and bottom pylons are too similar.  This is a design leftover.  Originally, they were going to be mounted up and at an angle like nacelle pylons.  This left too much unsupported ring on the bottom, so I added a third downward-facing pylon, but then it was too crowded.  So, I tried to make them horizontal like wings, but that conflicted with the general vertical feel that I was trying to develop and had already started in the habitation module, so I rotated them 90 degrees to vertical.

I think this ship has a lot of good stuff in it too.  For one, it's got that epic ship length to it, which I really like.  Bad for TV, great for movies.  I really like the way that both shuttle bays turned out.  (It's my only ship with more than one!)  The small one at the back is theoretically for work bees ans other very small shuttle pods.  I really like the row of horizontal windows in the habitation module.  That's the only place where I wouldn't remove windows.  I like the shape and design of the bridge, the stem, and the rings.  I especially like the detail where the rings meet the pylons.  (although, there's an error in there that irks me...)  

Once again, you can download my model here:
3dwarehouse.sketchup.com/model…

And, feel free to use this for anything (other than financial gain).  If you do, let me know because I'd like to see it!  

An awesome video clip from CINEMATIC-FILMS !
vimeo.com/198711434