Odd question... why did they use scaffolding to connect the drive, crew, and hangar modules together? It would make for a far stronger space frame if they were all connected together. If they need the scaffolding for cooling, why not extend it at outwards? After all, this is space, and space is big.
"This cause of exploration and discovery is not an option we choose; it is a desire written in the human heart. We are that part of creation which seeks to understand all creation. We find the best among us, send them forth into unmapped darkness, and pray they will return. They go in peace for all mankind, and all mankind is in their debt." One of George W. Bush's better speeches, IMO.
@@draco84oz He (or rather his speech writer) kinda stole all of that from other sources though. That last part especially looks like Nixon's Apollo 11 mission failure speech.
I absolutely *love* how utilitarian the human spacecraft looks like in Babylon 5. A 6km long construction/exploration ship? Yeah, it looks like a a few modules connect by scaffolding with plenty of pointy antennas and radiators everywhere.
They did a great job of essentially designing a mobile space station. The design echoes between it and Babylon 5 are really neat, it's cool remembering that B5 is 100% a human-built operation, and it's easy to imagine that a lot of the tech for it was derived from Explorer prototypes.
I especially love the fact that it has radiators....how many sci-fi shows actually remember to design their ships with a way to get rid of their excess heat? Or even acknowledge that excess heat is a problem? Really, love all the human designs in the show.
@@MrGoesBoom Now for extra credit: cherry red radiators, to get a sensible emission rate. Or a shower of NaK as droplet radiators suffer less damage from micrometeorites. 😎
@@robertmartinu8803 Only show/movie I can recall showing the cherry red radiators would be Avatar. NaK, that's sodium droplet radiators right? Been awhile since I poked around Atomic Rockets so I might be remembering my elemental symbols wrong.
The Earth Alliance was the only race still settling new space in the time frame of the show. All the other races were either shrinking in territory, trying to regain lost territory or trying to hold onto what they currently had.
@@lukasvillar9328 just in B5 universe humanity was upstart new race. Basically all other races were already well established or did not had means or capability to expand.
@@modisp no, not just in B5. That's a standard trope across scifi. If there are worlds to settle there's no reason any given race wouldn't still be doing settling, in fact B5 falls for one of the worst tropes in scifi. They treat each race as a monolithic Culture each somehow still linked to a homeworld with perhaps some colonies. The Minbari have been traveling the stars at FTL speeds for over a thousand years, there caught to be hundreds or more entire systems populated by billions or trillions of Minbari that are each culturally distinct. But B5 has to toss reason aside just so it can make its story fit established genre fiction patterns.
Just to point out, interceptors in B5 protect against more than just missiles, they also stop energy bolts like plasma. The idea being that if you hit their energy bolt with one of your own they'll effectively cancel each other out. This means that the Explorer is a tad more survivable then you were suggesting, albeit probably only marginally so given it is still huge, lumbering and fragile on a structural level.
I think the scouts and survey probes are sent way in advance of the main ship before it arrives in a system. That way they know what to expect before they arrive.
Yeah its similar to todays military auxiliary ships, while not intended to fight they still have air defence and low to medium calibre guns to fight off pirates.
I think they meant compared to military vessels. An Explorer might hold it's own against an Hyperion Class and similar sized ships with a similar technology level, but that's it. Anything bigger, more numerous or with more fighters will be too much. Military ones that is. Pirates with their usually outdated material and substandard experience will have a hard time. A jump-capable pirate ship as we have seen in the first season might, again, might destroy an explorer with heavy losses, but that's not exactly profitable. At least that's my estimate.
Thrawn did something similar in his new novel. It’s not that it “cancels out”, but that a plasma projectile would necessarily require some kind of containment field to keep it together, and disrupting that field causes the plasma to dissipate harmlessly before reaching it’s target.
Lovely vessel. The Explorer is an interesting part of the survey portion of Earthforce. They were an interesting ship to fly in the tabletop miniatures game for Babylon 5 (aka Bablyon 5 Wars) since they could serve as a fighter equipped massive ELINT cruiser and jump gate construction vessel in one. They weren't designed for combat, but they could survive some with the interceptor arrays and their high sensor ratings. In campaign games, Earth could get a jump on exploration and colonization/jump gate construction of new worlds since the other races had either survey ships or jump gate construction crews, but not both in one unit.
It’s a bit of a shame we didn’t get a miniseries based on one of these leviathans, like Star Trek without the fancy tech and a much bigger engineering crew.
@@jedigecko06 Hmm...let's see. One carries a crew of 350 - and the other one supports 250,000 living beings; how is an Explorer-class ship like B5 again?
All the ships of The Black Hole. Plus VINCENT?. A nice friendly assistant robot with two _frigging laser guns_ mounted facing forward, so whenever "he" was looking at you, you were in his gunsights.
In case anyone cares... By my reckoning the habitat ring is approx 695m in diameter, so given the 8 meters of armor Danielle mentioned, let's assume an interior diameter of of 675m... so 1.6 rotations per minute to get 1g.
@@jedigecko06 the race that owns a jumpgate can shut it down. not impossible to reactivate but the enemy species may take some time. the gate network is very valuable but gates are destroyed. during the minbari war the earthforce did tests to see if they could destroy jumpgates to not only slow down the Minbari advance (minbari didn't know where Earth was and EA shut down beacons) but also destroy minbari ships that happened to be using the gate.
Babylon 5's Capt.Gideon's old ship before the I.S.A. Flagship Excalibur, 1 mile shorter than Babylon 5's 5 miles. still a awesome & lovely vessel. would love to see Babylon 5: Crusade return as a 4 Part Movie to conclude their story or Miniseries. even though it will be tough since we lost Galen.
Speaking of making a new series! They should have continued B5 with a series revolving around the Warlock-class destroyer they gave Susan Ivanova after the original series ended! Now, THAT was a character and a ship you could get up for!!!
One of my favorite ships from B5. Always wondered about the paint scheme and the reasoning behind it. In my headcannon the long scaffold beams were where several cargo containers would latch onto, we just never got to see this in the series. It would make sense for self-sustainment on years-long missions far away from known space.
that would make sense. and they would likely consume the supply pods too, for repairs and whatnot. would need to take a looooot of supplies with them if they were away from resupply for years at a time.
There's a lot of things we never get to see like the mine launchers on the human destroyers. You do get to see the same concept used once by the Narns when they get wtfpwned by the shadows. They just didn't have the budget to do the details that were needed. Another one that was never added was the human destroyers having gimbled engines to counter the effects of the rotating section... In the video itself there is a picture that shows a jump gate stills connected to the longest section of the scaffolding. At 3:03 in this video you can see the "paddles" that hang off the jump gate when you look at the ship. It's intended that a jump gate is assembled attached the ship and then dropped off when completed.
@@artembentsionov War Zone was an episode rushed out of demand from TNT wich wanted a pilot episode with much more action (original pilot was "Racing the night") thats probably why they forced Gideon rushing back to earth in a ginormous behemoth totally useless for combat..it doesnt make any sense.. (i allways wondered why the hell was Gideon going back to earth in a non combat vessel)
@@sparrowlt because all ships with any fight capability were being called since Earth was in danger of being destroyed by a shadow planet killer. its called last ditch defense.
I have the Babylon 5 tabletop RPG. It's actually quite good. I've wanted to run a "everyone is the crew of an Explorer class" ship for years. Basically Star Trek, but in B5.
I liked how their C&C was a redressed B5 C&C with a different backdrop outside the door. Very creative set crews on the show making the most of what they had. Like all the corridors of Green, Blue, or Red sectors just had their colors changed and lighting adjusted to make them look a bit different.
I like the look of the Explorer-Class but damn the ship is extremely vulnerable just a small complement of a weapons system and a wing of 16 Aurora-class Starfurys.
We never saw them, but we can assume the other races had similar ships for exploration and construction. No one would want a heavily armed ship near their borders, so arming them just enough to keep raiders away was the best choice.
It exclusivley flys around uncharted space which no other race has claimed and which isnt connected to the gate network, so its more likely to encounter pre-spacefaring civilisations, and if it encounters ruins it will flag it for a dedicated survey ship to followup on.
I always thought 16 Starfuries was a low number to protect such a massive ship. (Modern carrier has approx 40 fighters. Even RDM Galactica had 40 Mk. II's) Learning the pilots were dual-duty explains some of this; reminding me that Earthforce doesn't _only_ build warships.
Criticize it at your own risk. Honestly, this is just an example of our fantasy of one ship exploring space. In reality? I'll take Star Trek as an example, the setting with the most exploration going on. Ideally a Galaxy class would be escorted/followed by several Miranda or Oberth Class ships to explore a star system thoroughly. Added would be several smaller, more combat capable ships and maybe one or two Nebula or Ambassador Class ships. The Galaxy might even have some weapons removed to provide more R&R facilities and some repair capability for the escort ships. Even with the sensors in Star Trek it takes time to map an entire solar system, checking for resources or making sure the ecosystem of a potentially habitable planet doesn't kill anyone without protection. We also don't want a repeat of Ceti Alpha VI, do we?
It's main defensive measure was it's enormous jump engine that could recharge faster than typical unit --> Ship would jump in to hyperspace when potential danger would be detected. Fighters and guns were there to buy time for jump engine.
No such thing as a mobile space station, some people (writers and editors) use the term but it's incredibly inaccurate. If it's thrust capabilities exceeds what is needed for station keeping, orbital adjust ment, and especially escape thrust for the object it orbits it's a spacecraft not a space station. If it has faster than light capabilities it's a starcraft or starship. It can still be fricken huge but if it can relocate to orbit a different object or different star system it's not a station. As Daniel said in a video from last month. ua-cam.com/video/SNEOL1OdLxA/v-deo.html
The mass of the Explorer seems way off compaired to the B5 station. From the season 1 intro monologue for Babylon 5 it has probably been 10+ years since I last watched it so I cannot remember the whole thing, but in referance to the B5 station itself "five miles long" was definately in there somewhere but I cannot remember where it was in relation to the rest of the monologue "Babylon 5 was a dream given form, its goal to prevent another war by providing a place for humans and aliens to sort out their diferances peacefully" "it's a port of call, home away from home for diplomats, entropenours and wanderers" "Two million, five hundred thousand tons of spinning metal, all alone in the night. It's a dangerous place but it's our last best hope for peace. The year is 2258, the place Babylon 5" I am probably missing a few lines in there but the most important parts in relation to this video are 5 miles long and 2,500,000 tons The Explorer ship is almost four miles long to B5's five, is extremely skinny compaired to the station and has 15 times the mass? that seems wrong, considering how much bulkier than the Explorer B5 was (along most of the explorer's length it must be less than 100m wide while B5 was about 800m-1km along most of its length), yes the Explorer's 8 metres of armor could be thicker than B5's armor but even if B5 only had half a meter B5 would have had a much higher mass due to the far far greater surface area and as B5 was able to beat an Omega class destroyer (in the episode Severed Dreams B5 with 2 Rebel Omega class ships killed 3 Loyalist Omega class ships) it must have fairly thick armor to take those hits without penetrating the stations armor.
Yea you pretty much nailed it. Although I question the mass of both. B5 is either made out of pop cans or the explorer is made out of lead. Not sure which. B5, given that weight, always seemed way to light. Just for comparison, the galaxy class from Star Trek is supposedly just about 5 million tons and a bit over a half kilometer long. A real world example, the great pyramid, is estimated at 5.9 million tons and 230 meters along the base. Take that as you will. Still one of the best monologue intro's in sci fi history.
@@marsm9 Likely a highly dense metal of some kind. If it's meant to explore uncharted space it would make sense to try and give it some form of armor or resistance to space debris.
@@marsm9 b5 has a quarter of million residents who need open space, air and has to be constantly resupplied with food, spare parts etc. the explorer has a crew of 350 and is meant to repair, build jump gates as well as carry supplies for several years without resupply.
Serving on an Explorer is inherently dangerous because they go to unknown regions away from established hyperspace beacons. It’s easy to get lost in hyperspace without proper navigation.
The idea of an exploration ship you would be lucky to see even once in your life because it spends so much time in uncharted space is such a cool concept to me. It reminds me somewhat of Star Trek, but even Trek never really delivered on the idea of an exploration vessel separated from everything we as humans are familiar with (looking at you, Voyager.)
That is kind of what Crusade was like, one big ship out on its own exploring. Except, of course, Excalibur had the biggest guns of any younger race ship. :)
I always thought the struts are where they secured jumpgate parts. When they wanted to build a jumpgate they unstraped the pieces from the struts and set them up like a lego set.
It's length is determined by the length of the four main pieces of a jump gate when building the gate. They carry some of the more fiddly bit preassmbled.
While a fascinating concept i think lots of small drones are a better method of exploring, but if i got that correctly, this one is meant to harvest those resources it finds.
This is what the B5 Encyclopedia has to say about it. Probably more than one of the first ones invented them separately before they encountered one another. "The earliest gates were left behind by the First Ones and provided a leg up for civilizations that later discovered pre-existing gates in their systems and were able to reverse engineer the technology, gaining access to faster-than-light travel."
Jumpgates were seeded by the first ones using the vorlons style jumpgates after the kirisiac war. Basically to give younger races tech, but not to much, to watch the younger races evolve and not come to the same level as fist ones. The kirisiac war started by the first ones not noticing the kirisiac evolve to first one level until it was too late and they became a threat.
My favorite ship from B5. Love the utilitarian nature and the design elements taken from the Babylon stations, such as the radiator fins and hab section.
I do like the Explorer-class a lot - I believe it's one of the best starship designs out there, and it makes a lot of sense. It's awesome, especially considering it only appeared in a single episode. However, I always wondered what the point of the large support structure is. I'm certain one could remove all the empty space and instead attach all the modules to each other. That would not only save a lot of building material, it might also make the ship a bit more maneuverable and certainly make it less vulnerable. Right now, any attacker could just target the unarmored support structure and break the ship in two. Saying hostile encounters are unlikely is naive, considering they go "where no man has gone before", and probably boldly so. After all, you never know what lurks beyond the borders of known space.
Since there is only like a half dozen built and its built by only one of the three Earth shipyards, as a sideline for it predominantly manufacturing starfuries, yes even if you work at a shipyard you may not see many.
I don't work at a shipyard, but I understand it - being able to work on rare or unique projects (especially such a large construction project like that) is something that any engineer would give their eyeteeth for.
Since the context of the quote was a space station commander speaking to his ops center crew as one of these ships was arriving for a visit, your condition can be said not to apply to the quote's audience.
Well, for one thing...they wouldn't need rotating sections anymore, like the rest of Earth Force. The redesigned ship could probably carry more crew or Starfury pilots..since you could devote more and new interior space to life supported areas. They probably added more internal power as well; so there'd be more room for labs, medbays, etc. I would probably guess that the overall SIZE of the ship decreased...but that the new design would be far more efficient, and could carry more crew; especially scientists. An Explorer would be hideously expensive to build; but, with new technologies through the Interstellar Alliance, you'd end up with physically smaller ships, but better-designed and more efficiently laid out. Probably multi-species crews, and more people working in science would be aboard them as well! People who wanted the excitement of finding new star systems, civilizations, etc., would be lining up to serve on one of those ships - even though it might mean they'd be on literal multi-year missions!
I was referring to the Cortez that basically destroyed the Aztecs I believe it was. Unless the ship was named for a Cortez more known for exploring than conquest.
I had forgotten the name of the ship. Really shows how much American society has changed since the 1990’s, as it would have a different connotation today.
@@ryank5424 the Aztecs were destroyed by all the neighboring tribes the Aztecs had been at war with centuries to do their human sacrifices. you don't know shit what Cortez did. he was in fact an explorer
@@pitui1987 Yep, but it isn't just modern American society... A few decades is actually a long time. B5 holds up pretty well, but is a product of its time. Speaking of which, does Zima still exist?
There are so many differences between an Explorer-class ship, and the Enterprise....it's not even funny. You'd be more realistic in comparing an EAS Omega-class destroyer to Enterprise, than you would an Explorer-class ship!
Star Trek and its ship designs have always been my "home turf" and favorites, but as a new Babylon 5 watcher I like the utilitarianism of this design. Looks more or less how I'd imagine an actual future human space explorer vessel to look.
Excellent work! Although the Explorer Class vessels were seen only twice in the Babylon 5/Crusade series' it remains one of the most realistic ships conceived.
Well, that was sparse. Good for what it was though. I'm not complaining. Have you thought about contacting JMS directly and asking him to fill in some of the holes for things like this? He or some of the other writers might be willing to provide assistance.
I would have liked it if in the video you would mention that these ships were so costly they only built less than 10 of them and each had to build at least 6 gates in heavy traffic areas to pay for itself. Also if their starfuries were damaged they had no way to repair or replace them and captains had to choose to continue on unprotected or return for a batch of new ships to Earth Alliance space which would result in massive loss of mission time.
Good Looking Ship. Also, as always, excellent choice with the Supreme Commander music. Still say you should do a video on the ACUs one day, but, Babylon 5 is always nice too. :)
At 37.5 million metric tons, those struts are probably solid material. That means the even the smallest strut is tens of meters thick. They're not armored because they ARE armor.
I don't think even the rough Earth Alliance would be using photo-voltaic panels. One of the biggest problems in space is heat management: when all the reactors are cranked up, and ship systems are using that power, there's an awful lot of waste heat that has no where to go, except to heat up the ship, which would be bad. The fins that stick out on the Explorer (and Babylon 5) make far more sense as heat radiator surfaces to dump heat into space.
Warner Brothers is sitting on a gold mine with the property rights to Babylon 5. If given a proper budget,cast, and production it could be one of the best Sci-fi shows on TV. However they won't do anything with it.
Are there any official sources for the logistics of how Explorers create Jump Gates? It would be interesting to see what the full process would look like -- from the initial survey for a good location all the way to sending a shuttle through to informing EarthForce of the new gate.
I've been jumping around your video's he last few days and found them all interesting, I kinda doubt you'd consider this suggestion for a video especially since there is little to no info on it but would you consider doing a video on the three massive Getter Emperor ships?
I would love to see the Gundam universe explored, I know its not super realistic but a lot of the ships do make sense, such as the Argama and Pegasus class, the Dendrobium mobile armour is also awesome.
I think being assigned to one of these ships would be an act of the utmost judgement of your abilities as a military officer/service member: either you're the best and they're sending you out to prove it, or you're the biggest pain in the ass they could find that couldn't just be thrown out completely, so they effectively exile you from the eyes of man & god. Maybe both. If the events of the series of Babylon 5 never happened, perhaps Sinclair would've been the captain of one of these.
I enjoy your work. If you ever need more content, the battletech setting has some logical designs for ships that don't have the "magic" of artificial gravity. Also, a question. If a ship has artificial gravity, wouldn't it need to be able to support it's own weight? I think a lot of the battleships from Halo, Babylon 5, Star Trek and Star wars would collapse under the weight of their own mass.
this is what made babylon 5 so great, it just fits. not fancy, but functional and a realistic approach to design that makes all the vessels look useable unlike startrek. And this is where starwars and trek fall short for me, Babylon 5 makes the technology look useable like in starwars but mixes it with realism unlike startreks tech wizardry. the result are in my opinion some of the best designed spacevessels of any science fiction IP.
Is there any news as to the sojourn? I dint have twitter or anything so i dunno if i have missed anything, it seemed really interesting and i was hoping there might be some info. Cheers
I kind of wish we could, but I don't expect to get, the EC/AS Norway and/or Finity's End 6013 m= 3.792 mi. or 20,020 ft. 37,500,000 t= 4.134e7 sh.tn. or 3.691e7 l.tn. I'm surprised anyone would want to command or crew it. It sounds like the last job you'd ever have. But that might be why. Te back pay you get back to civilization could be massive.
I most say that all spacecrafts should have at least some kind of armaments heck even trading ships back during the age of sail had cannons for safe defence now a days our trading ships have to wait for nearby warships to support them or use thier water cannons
If you're going for realism, any inter-stellar (or even fast in-system) ship would have at least one big ass gun. Not for combat, but to clear debris from out of its path. Some stories get around this with shields, but a laser powerful enough to vaporize small rocks is probably more realistic/sensible.
in the show its about a handful. they are very costly to make and they are only one of the few earthforce ships in which family members can come with the crew since they would potentially be years before they got back.
Scratch my last, I just saw the video where you talked about Dark Matter. You should catch up on it! Season 1 is low budget on the locations they visit but they get better and I’m assuming a larger budget season 2 and the locations get much better! I love the show, plus it has a StarGate Atlantis actress that is good to see again 😊
Ever going to be a chance you gor for some of the writen scifi universes with realy well established ship designs? Honoverse from David Weber comes to mind.
They do have jump capacity but they also need nav data to safely open a window or they risk running into something. The problem was they'd lost track on the beacon and didn't know where they were.
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Odd question... why did they use scaffolding to connect the drive, crew, and hangar modules together? It would make for a far stronger space frame if they were all connected together. If they need the scaffolding for cooling, why not extend it at outwards? After all, this is space, and space is big.
I'm not a subs member, but great Vid.
Just noticed that 'million' is misspelled milluon when you list the ships dry mass. Hope you notice :D
Do more warhammer 40k. Specifically the orcs. Never seen one of their vehicals
"An old friend of mine once quoted me an ancient Egyptian blessing: 'May God stand between you and harm in all the empty places where you must walk.'"
"This cause of exploration and discovery is not an option we choose; it is a desire written in the human heart. We are that part of creation which seeks to understand all creation. We find the best among us, send them forth into unmapped darkness, and pray they will return. They go in peace for all mankind, and all mankind is in their debt."
One of George W. Bush's better speeches, IMO.
@@draco84oz He (or rather his speech writer) kinda stole all of that from other sources though. That last part especially looks like Nixon's Apollo 11 mission failure speech.
@@davidkelly4210 Apollo 11 didn't fail. It was 13.
@@davidkelly4210 The things you learn...
@@sleepingbackbone7581 People pre-wrote speeches for if Apollo 11 DID fail.
I absolutely *love* how utilitarian the human spacecraft looks like in Babylon 5. A 6km long construction/exploration ship? Yeah, it looks like a a few modules connect by scaffolding with plenty of pointy antennas and radiators everywhere.
They did a great job of essentially designing a mobile space station. The design echoes between it and Babylon 5 are really neat, it's cool remembering that B5 is 100% a human-built operation, and it's easy to imagine that a lot of the tech for it was derived from Explorer prototypes.
I especially love the fact that it has radiators....how many sci-fi shows actually remember to design their ships with a way to get rid of their excess heat? Or even acknowledge that excess heat is a problem? Really, love all the human designs in the show.
@@MrGoesBoom Now for extra credit: cherry red radiators, to get a sensible emission rate. Or a shower of NaK as droplet radiators suffer less damage from micrometeorites. 😎
@@robertmartinu8803 Only show/movie I can recall showing the cherry red radiators would be Avatar. NaK, that's sodium droplet radiators right? Been awhile since I poked around Atomic Rockets so I might be remembering my elemental symbols wrong.
@@MrGoesBoom Agreed! Heat management is very important.
The Earth Alliance was the only race still settling new space in the time frame of the show. All the other races were either shrinking in territory, trying to regain lost territory or trying to hold onto what they currently had.
This is standard in science fiction when humanity gets involved.
@@lukasvillar9328 just in B5 universe humanity was upstart new race. Basically all other races were already well established or did not had means or capability to expand.
@@lukasvillar9328 Yes, we make it better!
Have yet to find a universe where that isn´t (to at least some degree) the case.
@@modisp no, not just in B5. That's a standard trope across scifi.
If there are worlds to settle there's no reason any given race wouldn't still be doing settling, in fact B5 falls for one of the worst tropes in scifi. They treat each race as a monolithic Culture each somehow still linked to a homeworld with perhaps some colonies. The Minbari have been traveling the stars at FTL speeds for over a thousand years, there caught to be hundreds or more entire systems populated by billions or trillions of Minbari that are each culturally distinct.
But B5 has to toss reason aside just so it can make its story fit established genre fiction patterns.
Just to point out, interceptors in B5 protect against more than just missiles, they also stop energy bolts like plasma. The idea being that if you hit their energy bolt with one of your own they'll effectively cancel each other out. This means that the Explorer is a tad more survivable then you were suggesting, albeit probably only marginally so given it is still huge, lumbering and fragile on a structural level.
I think the scouts and survey probes are sent way in advance of the main ship before it arrives in a system. That way they know what to expect before they arrive.
Yeah its similar to todays military auxiliary ships, while not intended to fight they still have air defence and low to medium calibre guns to fight off pirates.
I think they meant compared to military vessels. An Explorer might hold it's own against an Hyperion Class and similar sized ships with a similar technology level, but that's it. Anything bigger, more numerous or with more fighters will be too much. Military ones that is. Pirates with their usually outdated material and substandard experience will have a hard time. A jump-capable pirate ship as we have seen in the first season might, again, might destroy an explorer with heavy losses, but that's not exactly profitable.
At least that's my estimate.
Thrawn did something similar in his new novel. It’s not that it “cancels out”, but that a plasma projectile would necessarily require some kind of containment field to keep it together, and disrupting that field causes the plasma to dissipate harmlessly before reaching it’s target.
@AKUJIRULE Yes the but scout ships can survey further into the system. Letting the explorer class survey more planets in a quicker time.
Lovely vessel. The Explorer is an interesting part of the survey portion of Earthforce. They were an interesting ship to fly in the tabletop miniatures game for Babylon 5 (aka Bablyon 5 Wars) since they could serve as a fighter equipped massive ELINT cruiser and jump gate construction vessel in one. They weren't designed for combat, but they could survive some with the interceptor arrays and their high sensor ratings. In campaign games, Earth could get a jump on exploration and colonization/jump gate construction of new worlds since the other races had either survey ships or jump gate construction crews, but not both in one unit.
Certainly miss B5 wars!
This ship really stuck in my imagination over the years. Probably more than any other ship from Babylon 5.
Each Explorer class basically _IS_ Babylon 0.5!
It’s a bit of a shame we didn’t get a miniseries based on one of these leviathans, like Star Trek without the fancy tech and a much bigger engineering crew.
@@jedigecko06 Hmm...let's see. One carries a crew of 350 - and the other one supports 250,000 living beings; how is an Explorer-class ship like B5 again?
Well done ! She reminds me of the USS Cygnus from “The Black Hole”. Speaking of which perhaps one day do a vid on her!
Aye, agree with ya, mate.
All the ships of The Black Hole.
Plus VINCENT?.
A nice friendly assistant robot with two _frigging laser guns_ mounted facing forward, so whenever "he" was looking at you, you were in his gunsights.
Agreed
I'm a big fan of that ship. You might say I'm down with the Cygnus.
It was a great vessel, or is? Maybe it will be built in 200 yeaes by an exentric billionair
More B5 starship lore! Thank you.
One of if not the best ship in the show. This hulking gargantuan really looks like something that screams deep space exploration.
The best ship in B5 was the IA Destroyer prototype ship class; of which there were two vessels; "Excalibur," and "Victory."
Daniel's become sufficiently good at explaining the features and advantages of things that he made me almost want to try Squarespace.
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One of my favorite ships in the series, I love how B5 blends classic scfi and hard scfi in a beautiful and unique way.
When I saw this ship as a kid in the 90's I had high hopes they would do a series just around this, "exploring new worlds and new civilizations."
And we got Star Trek for that.
In case anyone cares... By my reckoning the habitat ring is approx 695m in diameter, so given the 8 meters of armor Danielle mentioned, let's assume an interior diameter of of 675m... so 1.6 rotations per minute to get 1g.
This made me think, 🤔 Has there ever been a video done on Jump gates in Babylon 5? If not that's something I'd like to see!
Especially the immunity from attack. Even in war, _nobody_ attacks the gate network.
@@jedigecko06 the race that owns a jumpgate can shut it down. not impossible to reactivate but the enemy species may take some time.
the gate network is very valuable but gates are destroyed. during the minbari war the earthforce did tests to see if they could destroy jumpgates to not only slow down the Minbari advance (minbari didn't know where Earth was and EA shut down beacons) but also destroy minbari ships that happened to be using the gate.
Ah yes, the rumblings of when the Shadows were becoming more of a problem in B5. Loved that show, one of my favorite sci-fi series!
"Babylon 5," "The Expanse," "Star Trek - Deep Space Nine," and "Andromeda" are the top 4 best science fiction shows of all time!
Babylon 5's Capt.Gideon's old ship before the I.S.A. Flagship Excalibur, 1 mile shorter than Babylon 5's 5 miles. still a awesome & lovely vessel. would love to see Babylon 5: Crusade return as a 4 Part Movie to conclude their story or Miniseries. even though it will be tough since we lost Galen.
I love the Explorer class. The fact that is can lay jumpgates is a fantastic idea.
One of the coolest ships from B5. The Explorer class and the Warlock class are my favorite Earthforce ships.
Speaking of making a new series! They should have continued B5 with a series revolving around the Warlock-class destroyer they gave Susan Ivanova after the original series ended! Now, THAT was a character and a ship you could get up for!!!
FWIW: The Explorer and Omega Classes {and the Warlocks, although they were rarely seen} were my faves....
it's always good to see Babylon 5 content
Remember first seeing this vessel in the show. The music alone they used when the ship appeared on screen let u know know it was massive
One of my favorite ships from B5. Always wondered about the paint scheme and the reasoning behind it. In my headcannon the long scaffold beams were where several cargo containers would latch onto, we just never got to see this in the series. It would make sense for self-sustainment on years-long missions far away from known space.
that would make sense. and they would likely consume the supply pods too, for repairs and whatnot. would need to take a looooot of supplies with them if they were away from resupply for years at a time.
There's a lot of things we never get to see like the mine launchers on the human destroyers. You do get to see the same concept used once by the Narns when they get wtfpwned by the shadows. They just didn't have the budget to do the details that were needed. Another one that was never added was the human destroyers having gimbled engines to counter the effects of the rotating section...
In the video itself there is a picture that shows a jump gate stills connected to the longest section of the scaffolding. At 3:03 in this video you can see the "paddles" that hang off the jump gate when you look at the ship. It's intended that a jump gate is assembled attached the ship and then dropped off when completed.
I think that you should do Discovery One from 2001
And the Leonov from 2010.
Maybe some of the ships from the Books, including the later ones?
I believe Gideon commanded an Explorer before being given the Excalibur.
Indeed he did
Zerebrat Eightyseven yep, they even mention that they were late to the party even before entering hyperspace
yep.. EAS Phoenix
@@artembentsionov War Zone was an episode rushed out of demand from TNT wich wanted a pilot episode with much more action (original pilot was "Racing the night") thats probably why they forced Gideon rushing back to earth in a ginormous behemoth totally useless for combat..it doesnt make any sense.. (i allways wondered why the hell was Gideon going back to earth in a non combat vessel)
@@sparrowlt because all ships with any fight capability were being called since Earth was in danger of being destroyed by a shadow planet killer. its called last ditch defense.
You make some if the best vids. I'm always excited when i get a notification that there's a new Spacedock episode. 🤘 Rock on!
Babylon 5 video makes my day
I have the Babylon 5 tabletop RPG. It's actually quite good.
I've wanted to run a "everyone is the crew of an Explorer class" ship for years. Basically Star Trek, but in B5.
I liked how their C&C was a redressed B5 C&C with a different backdrop outside the door. Very creative set crews on the show making the most of what they had. Like all the corridors of Green, Blue, or Red sectors just had their colors changed and lighting adjusted to make them look a bit different.
Good point! You gotta admit, though - B5's "C&C" was just about the crappiest bridge/control area you'd ever want to see in space!
I'm surprised how much I like the Explorer, especially when you consider how grounded its design for the period.
I miss the old B5 technical manual website. Nice to see B5 get some attention.
I like the look of the Explorer-Class but damn the ship is extremely vulnerable just a small complement of a weapons system and a wing of 16 Aurora-class Starfurys.
We never saw them, but we can assume the other races had similar ships for exploration and construction. No one would want a heavily armed ship near their borders, so arming them just enough to keep raiders away was the best choice.
It exclusivley flys around uncharted space which no other race has claimed and which isnt connected to the gate network, so its more likely to encounter pre-spacefaring civilisations, and if it encounters ruins it will flag it for a dedicated survey ship to followup on.
I always thought 16 Starfuries was a low number to protect such a massive ship.
(Modern carrier has approx 40 fighters. Even RDM Galactica had 40 Mk. II's)
Learning the pilots were dual-duty explains some of this; reminding me that Earthforce doesn't _only_ build warships.
Criticize it at your own risk.
Honestly, this is just an example of our fantasy of one ship exploring space. In reality?
I'll take Star Trek as an example, the setting with the most exploration going on. Ideally a Galaxy class would be escorted/followed by several Miranda or Oberth Class ships to explore a star system thoroughly. Added would be several smaller, more combat capable ships and maybe one or two Nebula or Ambassador Class ships.
The Galaxy might even have some weapons removed to provide more R&R facilities and some repair capability for the escort ships.
Even with the sensors in Star Trek it takes time to map an entire solar system, checking for resources or making sure the ecosystem of a potentially habitable planet doesn't kill anyone without protection. We also don't want a repeat of Ceti Alpha VI, do we?
It's main defensive measure was it's enormous jump engine that could recharge faster than typical unit --> Ship would jump in to hyperspace when potential danger would be detected. Fighters and guns were there to buy time for jump engine.
I don't know if its less a starship but more a mobile space station/factory. Great vid :)
No such thing as a mobile space station, some people (writers and editors) use the term but it's incredibly inaccurate. If it's thrust capabilities exceeds what is needed for station keeping, orbital adjust ment, and especially escape thrust for the object it orbits it's a spacecraft not a space station. If it has faster than light capabilities it's a starcraft or starship. It can still be fricken huge but if it can relocate to orbit a different object or different star system it's not a station. As Daniel said in a video from last month.
ua-cam.com/video/SNEOL1OdLxA/v-deo.html
Daniel prefered the term Mobile platform, as the term is more accurate
The mass of the Explorer seems way off compaired to the B5 station.
From the season 1 intro monologue for Babylon 5 it has probably been 10+ years since I last watched it so I cannot remember the whole thing, but in referance to the B5 station itself "five miles long" was definately in there somewhere but I cannot remember where it was in relation to the rest of the monologue "Babylon 5 was a dream given form, its goal to prevent another war by providing a place for humans and aliens to sort out their diferances peacefully" "it's a port of call, home away from home for diplomats, entropenours and wanderers" "Two million, five hundred thousand tons of spinning metal, all alone in the night. It's a dangerous place but it's our last best hope for peace. The year is 2258, the place Babylon 5" I am probably missing a few lines in there but the most important parts in relation to this video are 5 miles long and 2,500,000 tons
The Explorer ship is almost four miles long to B5's five, is extremely skinny compaired to the station and has 15 times the mass? that seems wrong, considering how much bulkier than the Explorer B5 was (along most of the explorer's length it must be less than 100m wide while B5 was about 800m-1km along most of its length), yes the Explorer's 8 metres of armor could be thicker than B5's armor but even if B5 only had half a meter B5 would have had a much higher mass due to the far far greater surface area and as B5 was able to beat an Omega class destroyer (in the episode Severed Dreams B5 with 2 Rebel Omega class ships killed 3 Loyalist Omega class ships) it must have fairly thick armor to take those hits without penetrating the stations armor.
Maybe because Babylon 5 is hollow in big parts? 🤔
Yea you pretty much nailed it. Although I question the mass of both. B5 is either made out of pop cans or the explorer is made out of lead. Not sure which. B5, given that weight, always seemed way to light. Just for comparison, the galaxy class from Star Trek is supposedly just about 5 million tons and a bit over a half kilometer long. A real world example, the great pyramid, is estimated at 5.9 million tons and 230 meters along the base. Take that as you will. Still one of the best monologue intro's in sci fi history.
@@marsm9 Likely a highly dense metal of some kind. If it's meant to explore uncharted space it would make sense to try and give it some form of armor or resistance to space debris.
@@marsm9 b5 has a quarter of million residents who need open space, air and has to be constantly resupplied with food, spare parts etc. the explorer has a crew of 350 and is meant to repair, build jump gates as well as carry supplies for several years without resupply.
Serving on an Explorer is inherently dangerous because they go to unknown regions away from established hyperspace beacons. It’s easy to get lost in hyperspace without proper navigation.
I'd assume it would attract the same kind of people that nowadays might serve on submarines.
@@Coolman13355 makes sense. Or the same people who sailed on distant voyages back in the age of sail. “Here there be dragons” and all that
Still waiting for that Omega remaster. You've remastered the following
Galaxy class
Venator class
BC-304 Deadalus class
Need I say more?
The idea of an exploration ship you would be lucky to see even once in your life because it spends so much time in uncharted space is such a cool concept to me. It reminds me somewhat of Star Trek, but even Trek never really delivered on the idea of an exploration vessel separated from everything we as humans are familiar with (looking at you, Voyager.)
One of the best looking ships in B5 if you ask me.
It makes me incredibly happy to see a video about Babylon 5 after so many years since it ended. Thank you for your service Spacedock.
I have been wanted to see a spin off series of that explorer ship since I saw it on B5!
That is kind of what Crusade was like, one big ship out on its own exploring.
Except, of course, Excalibur had the biggest guns of any younger race ship. :)
@@nitehawk86 true true
The long skeletal frame could hold loads of cooling panels and sensors and other stuff, but I wander if it should have been shorter.
Justice, I was thinking along similar lines.
Why such a long length with so much empty space?
I always thought the struts are where they secured jumpgate parts. When they wanted to build a jumpgate they unstraped the pieces from the struts and set them up like a lego set.
@@ELCADAROSA keeps the radiation away. Its shielding via distanc3
Ferdinand Rosenthal, doesn’t sound very efficient. Surely they would have better protection than simply distance.
It's length is determined by the length of the four main pieces of a jump gate when building the gate. They carry some of the more fiddly bit preassmbled.
While a fascinating concept i think lots of small drones are a better method of exploring, but if i got that correctly, this one is meant to harvest those resources it finds.
Goin on a binge here got my notepad out few books spread out yeeyee. Spaceshiping is a great hobby
Always wondered who invented the jump gates in the B5 universe. I still dont know.
I'm pretty sure they revealed that they were Vorlon technology deliberately left were younger races could find and copy them.
This is what the B5 Encyclopedia has to say about it. Probably more than one of the first ones invented them separately before they encountered one another.
"The earliest gates were left behind by the First Ones and provided a leg up for civilizations that later discovered pre-existing gates in their systems and were able to reverse engineer the technology, gaining access to faster-than-light travel."
@@joshuachase9742 the current oldest ones are vorlon but the vorlons learned about hyperspace from prior species such as Loriens.
Jumpgates were seeded by the first ones using the vorlons style jumpgates after the kirisiac war. Basically to give younger races tech, but not to much, to watch the younger races evolve and not come to the same level as fist ones.
The kirisiac war started by the first ones not noticing the kirisiac evolve to first one level until it was too late and they became a threat.
This is a fascinating B5 starship. It looked great the first time I saw it.
My favorite ship from B5. Love the utilitarian nature and the design elements taken from the Babylon stations, such as the radiator fins and hab section.
I do like the Explorer-class a lot - I believe it's one of the best starship designs out there, and it makes a lot of sense. It's awesome, especially considering it only appeared in a single episode. However, I always wondered what the point of the large support structure is. I'm certain one could remove all the empty space and instead attach all the modules to each other. That would not only save a lot of building material, it might also make the ship a bit more maneuverable and certainly make it less vulnerable. Right now, any attacker could just target the unarmored support structure and break the ship in two. Saying hostile encounters are unlikely is naive, considering they go "where no man has gone before", and probably boldly so. After all, you never know what lurks beyond the borders of known space.
That quote from the intro doesn't make sense if you work at a shipyard
Since there is only like a half dozen built and its built by only one of the three Earth shipyards, as a sideline for it predominantly manufacturing starfuries, yes even if you work at a shipyard you may not see many.
I don't work at a shipyard, but I understand it - being able to work on rare or unique projects (especially such a large construction project like that) is something that any engineer would give their eyeteeth for.
Since the context of the quote was a space station commander speaking to his ops center crew as one of these ships was arriving for a visit, your condition can be said not to apply to the quote's audience.
I imagine once they got hold of artificial gravity technology new exploration ship classes were designed.
Well, for one thing...they wouldn't need rotating sections anymore, like the rest of Earth Force. The redesigned ship could probably carry more crew or Starfury pilots..since you could devote more and new interior space to life supported areas. They probably added more internal power as well; so there'd be more room for labs, medbays, etc. I would probably guess that the overall SIZE of the ship decreased...but that the new design would be far more efficient, and could carry more crew; especially scientists. An Explorer would be hideously expensive to build; but, with new technologies through the Interstellar Alliance, you'd end up with physically smaller ships, but better-designed and more efficiently laid out. Probably multi-species crews, and more people working in science would be aboard them as well! People who wanted the excitement of finding new star systems, civilizations, etc., would be lining up to serve on one of those ships - even though it might mean they'd be on literal multi-year missions!
Definitely an interesting vessel especially when u first see it onscreen. Not sure that Cortez is the best name for an explorer ship
@@Predator42ID same thing really just with a bit more enslavement of the locals during the exploration process.
I was referring to the Cortez that basically destroyed the Aztecs I believe it was. Unless the ship was named for a Cortez more known for exploring than conquest.
I had forgotten the name of the ship. Really shows how much American society has changed since the 1990’s, as it would have a different connotation today.
@@ryank5424 the Aztecs were destroyed by all the neighboring tribes the Aztecs had been at war with centuries to do their human sacrifices. you don't know shit what Cortez did. he was in fact an explorer
@@pitui1987 Yep, but it isn't just modern American society... A few decades is actually a long time.
B5 holds up pretty well, but is a product of its time. Speaking of which, does Zima still exist?
b5's answer to the uss enterprise. they could have built an entire show around one.
There are so many differences between an Explorer-class ship, and the Enterprise....it's not even funny. You'd be more realistic in comparing an EAS Omega-class destroyer to Enterprise, than you would an Explorer-class ship!
More b5 ships pls
Star Trek and its ship designs have always been my "home turf" and favorites, but as a new Babylon 5 watcher I like the utilitarianism of this design. Looks more or less how I'd imagine an actual future human space explorer vessel to look.
Nice work Daniel
Excellent work! Although the Explorer Class vessels were seen only twice in the Babylon 5/Crusade series' it remains one of the most realistic ships conceived.
Well, that was sparse. Good for what it was though. I'm not complaining. Have you thought about contacting JMS directly and asking him to fill in some of the holes for things like this? He or some of the other writers might be willing to provide assistance.
I would not be able to do that job. Flying to the farthest to put down jumpgates....
Most of the systems are also uninhabitable and will probably be used only to mine roids and to harvest gas from gas giants.
@@attila535 it's the no backup part that gets me. They are out there alone...
Man would it be cool to get Homeworld's Explorer-class mining ship next
but that would just be confusing, wouldn't it?
Babylon 5's long boi
I would have liked it if in the video you would mention that these ships were so costly they only built less than 10 of them and each had to build at least 6 gates in heavy traffic areas to pay for itself. Also if their starfuries were damaged they had no way to repair or replace them and captains had to choose to continue on unprotected or return for a batch of new ships to Earth Alliance space which would result in massive loss of mission time.
Good Looking Ship. Also, as always, excellent choice with the Supreme Commander music. Still say you should do a video on the ACUs one day, but, Babylon 5 is always nice too. :)
We should have gotten a show about one of them.
At 37.5 million metric tons, those struts are probably solid material. That means the even the smallest strut is tens of meters thick. They're not armored because they ARE armor.
0:55 "37.5 Milluon Metric Tons"
I don't think even the rough Earth Alliance would be using photo-voltaic panels. One of the biggest problems in space is heat management: when all the reactors are cranked up, and ship systems are using that power, there's an awful lot of waste heat that has no where to go, except to heat up the ship, which would be bad. The fins that stick out on the Explorer (and Babylon 5) make far more sense as heat radiator surfaces to dump heat into space.
Warner Brothers is sitting on a gold mine with the property rights to Babylon 5. If given a proper budget,cast, and production it could be one of the best Sci-fi shows on TV. However they won't do anything with it.
It’s a shame JMS and Warner Bro’s couldn’t come to an agreement on the future of B5 but what can you do.
@@imeize IIRC JMS still owns the rights to make movies, but WB has the rights to make TV shows, although he did try to buy it back off them.
I love this vessle!
It could be made into a fully believeable ship for the Expanse with just a few ajustments!
Now that is a ship I would really enjoy serving on. 😎👍
Sheridan "If you're supremely lucky, you may see two ships like her in your lifetime."
Firstones "Are we a joke to you?"
Are there any official sources for the logistics of how Explorers create Jump Gates? It would be interesting to see what the full process would look like -- from the initial survey for a good location all the way to sending a shuttle through to informing EarthForce of the new gate.
I've been jumping around your video's he last few days and found them all interesting, I kinda doubt you'd consider this suggestion for a video especially since there is little to no info on it but would you consider doing a video on the three massive Getter Emperor ships?
I would love to see the Gundam universe explored, I know its not super realistic but a lot of the ships do make sense, such as the Argama and Pegasus class, the Dendrobium mobile armour is also awesome.
I wanted a series based on this ship
Since you asked. I DID stick around to the end ;)
I think being assigned to one of these ships would be an act of the utmost judgement of your abilities as a military officer/service member: either you're the best and they're sending you out to prove it, or you're the biggest pain in the ass they could find that couldn't just be thrown out completely, so they effectively exile you from the eyes of man & god.
Maybe both.
If the events of the series of Babylon 5 never happened, perhaps Sinclair would've been the captain of one of these.
That is a very long shaft of a ship.
I enjoy your work. If you ever need more content, the battletech setting has some logical designs for ships that don't have the "magic" of artificial gravity. Also, a question. If a ship has artificial gravity, wouldn't it need to be able to support it's own weight? I think a lot of the battleships from Halo, Babylon 5, Star Trek and Star wars would collapse under the weight of their own mass.
this is what made babylon 5 so great, it just fits. not fancy, but functional and a realistic approach to design that makes all the vessels look useable unlike startrek.
And this is where starwars and trek fall short for me, Babylon 5 makes the technology look useable like in starwars but mixes it with realism unlike startreks tech wizardry.
the result are in my opinion some of the best designed spacevessels of any science fiction IP.
Has anyone ever noticed the spelling mistake? Dry mass: 37.5 milluon metric tons.
Is there any news as to the sojourn? I dint have twitter or anything so i dunno if i have missed anything, it seemed really interesting and i was hoping there might be some info. Cheers
I kind of wish we could, but I don't expect to get, the EC/AS Norway and/or Finity's End
6013 m= 3.792 mi. or 20,020 ft.
37,500,000 t= 4.134e7 sh.tn. or 3.691e7 l.tn.
I'm surprised anyone would want to command or crew it. It sounds like the last job you'd ever have. But that might be why. Te back pay you get back to civilization could be massive.
I would watch a show about the adventures of one of these ships.
Your should make a ship breakdown of the Orville
Just got to this part in the series a little while ago. So I guess I won't read down into the comment section too far.
What do you want! You moon faced assassin of Joy! (Londo to Vier)
Impressive video. Thank you.
I most say that all spacecrafts should have at least some kind of armaments heck even trading ships back during the age of sail had cannons for safe defence now a days our trading ships have to wait for nearby warships to support them or use thier water cannons
If you're going for realism, any inter-stellar (or even fast in-system) ship would have at least one big ass gun. Not for combat, but to clear debris from out of its path. Some stories get around this with shields, but a laser powerful enough to vaporize small rocks is probably more realistic/sensible.
@@travcollier yeah I agree therefor I put a single gun on my cargoships in EVE even if they wont do more then scratch the paint job of a hostile
Can you do a video on Dryden Vos’s yatch the first light?
Have you done the ship's from event horizon?
White star next!!!
How's the cave? The reverb is good, but does the dampness get annoying?
How many of this class were commissioned?
in the show its about a handful. they are very costly to make and they are only one of the few earthforce ships in which family members can come with the crew since they would potentially be years before they got back.
Thank you .
Can you do a video on the ship Raza from the scifi show Dark Matter?
Scratch my last, I just saw the video where you talked about Dark Matter. You should catch up on it! Season 1 is low budget on the locations they visit but they get better and I’m assuming a larger budget season 2 and the locations get much better! I love the show, plus it has a StarGate Atlantis actress that is good to see again 😊
Ever going to be a chance you gor for some of the writen scifi universes with realy well established ship designs? Honoverse from David Weber comes to mind.
Can you do a video on the star wars Tafanda bay. Please
*I ♥ BABYLON 5!!!!!*
Can you do the adamant frigate or arachne cruiser from battlestar galactica deadlock please?
How is it possible that a ship designed for exploration and building jump gates can't open its own jump point and must be rescued from hyperspace?
They do have jump capacity but they also need nav data to safely open a window or they risk running into something. The problem was they'd lost track on the beacon and didn't know where they were.
Love this ship
Looks like the Event Horizon