Post by Finarvyn on Jun 13, 2015 8:04:12 GMT -6
Han's statement that the Falcon could go "point four past light speed" has bothered me for a long time, particularly when I try to compare Star Wars to Star Trek technology.
Bear with me for a moment -- I'm not 100% certain of the origin of the Warp Factor equation, but I do recall that as early as the 1970's the Franz-Joseph technical manual established the rule that the warp factor in Star Trek is the speed of light cubed (e.g. warp 3 is 3x3x3=27 times the speed of light). So, if one interprets "point four past light speed" as 1.4c, then the Falcon topps out at something like warp 1.1, which is pretty lame in the Star Trek universe and not too awesome for Han to brag about. However, if you go to TOS canon then warp factor 8 is the maximum speed according to TOS physics. (I know that some alien creatures topped that on occasion and that TNG established W/F 10 as the top.) This curvy graph would tell me that the "ultimate speed" would cap out at 512c.
I had an interesting thought today: what if the Star Wars scale is linear instead of cubic?
So, we have a Star Wars speed scale that starts at c and ends at 512c. What if "point four past light speed" actually represents 40% of the way along the scale to the ultimate speed? Same physics, only a different scale by which folks measure the speed compared to the speed of light.
Light speed = c = W/F 1
Point one past light speed = W/F 3.7
Point two past light speed = W/F 4.7
Point three past light speed = W/F 5.4
Point four past light speed = W/F 5.9
Point five past light speed = W/F 6.4
Point six past light speed = W/F 6.8
Point seven past light speed = W/F 7.1
Point eight past light speed = W/F 7.4
Point nine past light speed = W/F 7.7
Ultimate speed = 512c = W/F 8
This would mean that the Falcon at "point four past light speed" would be cruising at nearly W/F 6, which is typical cruising speed for the TOS Enterprise.
What say you?
TECHNICAL NOTE: I calcuated this on an Excel spreadsheet and can post numbers if anyone actually cares. There is one issue I ran into where a simple calcuation ended up with W/F 1 equal to zero, so I had to tweak the spreadsheet to calculate the correct endpoints on both ends and not just one. I also did a second calculation assuming that TOS's W/F 10 is the ultimate speed, but I don't like that TNG piece of the canon and the numbers didn't have a pattern as nice at the end. I can post those also if anyone is interested.
Bear with me for a moment -- I'm not 100% certain of the origin of the Warp Factor equation, but I do recall that as early as the 1970's the Franz-Joseph technical manual established the rule that the warp factor in Star Trek is the speed of light cubed (e.g. warp 3 is 3x3x3=27 times the speed of light). So, if one interprets "point four past light speed" as 1.4c, then the Falcon topps out at something like warp 1.1, which is pretty lame in the Star Trek universe and not too awesome for Han to brag about. However, if you go to TOS canon then warp factor 8 is the maximum speed according to TOS physics. (I know that some alien creatures topped that on occasion and that TNG established W/F 10 as the top.) This curvy graph would tell me that the "ultimate speed" would cap out at 512c.
I had an interesting thought today: what if the Star Wars scale is linear instead of cubic?
So, we have a Star Wars speed scale that starts at c and ends at 512c. What if "point four past light speed" actually represents 40% of the way along the scale to the ultimate speed? Same physics, only a different scale by which folks measure the speed compared to the speed of light.
Light speed = c = W/F 1
Point one past light speed = W/F 3.7
Point two past light speed = W/F 4.7
Point three past light speed = W/F 5.4
Point four past light speed = W/F 5.9
Point five past light speed = W/F 6.4
Point six past light speed = W/F 6.8
Point seven past light speed = W/F 7.1
Point eight past light speed = W/F 7.4
Point nine past light speed = W/F 7.7
Ultimate speed = 512c = W/F 8
This would mean that the Falcon at "point four past light speed" would be cruising at nearly W/F 6, which is typical cruising speed for the TOS Enterprise.
What say you?
TECHNICAL NOTE: I calcuated this on an Excel spreadsheet and can post numbers if anyone actually cares. There is one issue I ran into where a simple calcuation ended up with W/F 1 equal to zero, so I had to tweak the spreadsheet to calculate the correct endpoints on both ends and not just one. I also did a second calculation assuming that TOS's W/F 10 is the ultimate speed, but I don't like that TNG piece of the canon and the numbers didn't have a pattern as nice at the end. I can post those also if anyone is interested.