Kepler

A new Federation science ship, which has supplanted the Oberth bringing a far more rounded performance rather than providing science alone. The Kepler is twice as survivable as the Oberth, a lesson driven home by the loss of the USS Suvek to macrocosmozoa, and improves on it by a similar or greater amount in most areas; five times the endurance, vastly better accommodations and some consular facilities to let it handle diplomatic missions, and even a tactical suite three times as effective. The only area it does not at least double the Oberth's capability, ironically, is its science suite, though specialist high-fidelity sensors reach that level of anti-cloak capabilities.

The Kepler is intended to serve the generalist response role and deal with the majority of Starfleet garrison tasks that do not require combat capability, hopefully taking over most duties in "safe" internal sectors from Centaur-B and Constellation-A-class ships in time, offering approximately Excelsior-A grade scientific and diplomatic capabilities on a frigate frame. It role was also expanded to handle yeoman scouting and electronic warfare duties, a role the Oberth was sometimes pressed into.

Thus far the Kepler has been enthusiastically received, with the leading wave already launching during 2324, culminating in the Sarquel ship HFMS Royal Astronomer, NCC-4113. Thus far four services in total have commissioned Keplers. However, many more ships are under construction, and the final count of Keplers build is expected to reach the 40s. Starfleet alone has built or is building thirty ships, and there are likely to be several variants and refits produced on this platform. The first of these is an automated version, losing some of the specialist crew and utilising shipboard automation techniques in part inspired by the refit of the ancient Orion explorer Maiden of Dawn.

Components & Construction
The Starfleet 900kt Concept Frigate Pattern serves as the underlying design guide to the Kepler, though it outwardly shares relatively limited superficially apparent structure to the later Comet. However, both ships do bear similar visual hallmarks to the Ambassador-class project, as opposed to the Excelsior and Centaur families. The Comet carries with it a large saucer section and an integrated "engineering" sector that occupies the tail of the ship and provides the mounting brackets for the nacelle pylons.

The Kepler is a large frigate, coming in a good 10% larger than the Centaur-B, and 50% larger than the Miranda-A, continuing a trend in modern Starfleet frigate design of larger, more independently capable vessels.

Warp Core
The Kepler employs the production variant of the Type-I Warp Core; the Type-I Block-A. This is designed by the 40 Eridani A Fleet Yard design bureau in conjunction with engineering teams from Delta Vega, where the cores will eventually be produced. The Delta Vega Core Yard, which operates in orbit around a moon to avoid the potential for ecological impacts from any core test failure, has taken on the task of supplying all Type-I Block-A warp cores for the Kepler. However, they have had to rely on an extended production run from a facility in the Arqueniou system that produces for the STO fleet to cope with the unexpectedly high surge numbers.

The Kepler has provided a test bed for the combination of the very successful Luna-VI High-Efficiency M/AM system. The Luna-VI uses a newly redesigned Class-V Pre-heater that brings the deuterium and anti-deuterium up from the superfluidic sub-1 Kelvin transport temperatures, into the 4 Kelvin injection temperatures. Sixteen nozzles provide injection to the dilithium core, each capable of separately mag-locking in mid-stream, providing a mixture of fine throttling and safety. The Mark VIII Mod L coolant system from Yoyodyne is a light-weight semi-active system that draws away heat with a combination of liquid neutron capture coolant, ray shielding, and laser refrigeration to handle the tremendous heat generated by the system.

The core assembly is about to eject at a moment's notice, with the Anak-Kreuger EM rail system able to dump capacitors through the rail system that can get the ship clear of a warp core breach with only three seconds of warning time. The core itself is located in the thickest part of the ship, where the secondary hull has begun to overlap ventrally, but the saucer section has not yet ended.

Nacelles
A pair of 2305-pattern Nacelles encase the same Yoyodyne-XII pattern coils used by the Renaissance, rather than the Centaur variant nacelles. A four-chamber warp matrix intermixes and conditions the warp plasma into a uniform temperature, then distributes it via eight valves to the nacelle plasma injectors. These valves have margin for increasing flow, and plasma can be redirected between outgoing conduits in the event of valve or conduit failure.

EPS Layout
The EPS Manifold is controlled by VSA-7 Pulse Injection, which is capable of putting out its power at both the 120hz six-phase used by most Starfleet equipment, and the 180hz eight-phase electro-plasma employed by a variety of high-energy science equipment. The VSA-7 is a performance manifold, part of a design family that dates back to the Vulcan Science Academy's need for a customised power management system for their own high-energy physics lab. The Gaeni, who are early adopters of the Kepler, are big fans of this system, and are looking to include it in their Tech-Cruiser-A refit program (after early attempts at an adopted system destroyed nine test rigs in Gaeni orbit).

The Kepler's EPS conduit layout is traditional, conservative Starfleet approach. A Primary Radial EPS Trunk contains a quartet of separate conduits that service deflector shield and SFI systems, the navigational deflector, and sensor arrays. A Secondary Upper Radial Trunk runs on an upper deck of the saucer section, closer to the interior, and services the Science Labs, Sickbay, and the living quarters. The Secondary Lower Radial Trunk covers the computer core and bridge The warp nacelles are served by the typical PTC to warp matrix to nacelles shunting. A Tertiary Trunk handles most other general-purpose duties, including the Transporters and the shuttlebay.

Antimatter tankage is separately managed by a loop that comes from Mains Batteries known as the Antimatter Isolation Trunk that runs through the engineering hull. Other general-purpose engineering hull power need sare met by the General Engineering Trunk.

Phasers are supplied by a secondary loop off of the Primary Trunk, known as the Bow Tactical Manifold Loop. This arrangement came about because of lessons learned by explorer corps captains on how to have their phasers set for near-instant readiness without taking an outwardly threatening posture. For a ship that is not much of a line combatant, the Kepler benefits greatly from the non-escalatory means of self-defence.

Impulse
Arguably the most elderly piece of technology aboard ship, the SDB-65 Standard is a venerable Starfleet workhorse. Most of these systems were delivered from refurbished stock by a Caitian facility, but as the new facility spins up, the Burzizz Propulsion Yard is producing entirely new build SDB-65d7 impulse engines, incorporating all the latest safety and reliability features. The deliver twin-ducted impulse power from a triple-fusion plant battery located forward of the warp core. The ducting splits the impulse plasma conduits around the warp core sub-frame to deliver to the impulse engines along the rear saucer rim. The Kepler's use of the SDB-65 was criticised in some quarters who wanted the more capable SDB-97 employed by the Renaissance, if not the high-performance -09 system. In the end, however, the Vulcan Design teams at 40 Eridani A opted for the most reliable available system, reasoning that for ships that might be employed on extended independent operations, sublight reliability trumped acceleration.

Navigational Deflector
Like a majority of Starfleet frigate designs, the Kepler makes use of a saucer-only tactical-pattern deflector array rather than the dish of a larger vessel. This takes the form of a fifty meter strip across the bow of the ship and is integrated with the tactical deflectors. For the Kepler, the navigational deflector array operates as modulate graviton beam, where the deflector employs the eponymous graviton beam to push its path clear of most obstructions. The modulated nature of the beam allows for a very minimal approach to be taken, which recovers a lot of the stealth losses inherent to earlier versions of the graviton beam deflector.

Computing
The computer core of the Kepler is a Type-IV-B Informatics Core, produced by the Amash Kadan Production Branch on Kelda IV. The Type IV-B is significantly lighter than the Type-III for only modestly increased power consumption. However, the downside is that its need for advanced, rare, or exotic materials is far higher. In many ways, the Type-IV-B represents the final apex of the duotronic computer core, and was chosen for the Kepler project on the basis that this level of computing was necessary to handle the multiple explorer-grade laboratory systems. It also was deemed important for handling the lack of a dedicated targeting computer. There are paper designs for a Type-V family of duotronic computers, but it is doubtful any of these will enter use. However, one day may see an upgrade to a Mk VI - an isolinear core - design.

Only a primary core is employed by the Kepler, with no backup cores.

Sciences & Sensors
For principal sensors, the Kepler punches well above its weight by employing the Standard Heavy Sensor Package - two full Mark-VII Heavy arrays, both Long-Range and Navigational. At over 80,000 ton, these sensors alone comprise nearly 10% of the Kepler's internal weight. Collating that much sensor data is a large part of the reason behind the normally cautious Vulcan design team opting for a full Type-IV-B core (which will be discussed in more depth later) rather than the more modest Type-III employed by the Comet. Nearly 90,000 tons are set aside for the extensive array of scientific instruments that comprise the two Spock-C labs. Stellar Tomographics at Kadann produce the Mark-VIIs for the Excelsior-A, Kepler, and Ambassador, with the wave of Keplers neatly taking over the production slack left by the extensive Excelsior-A refit project.

Short-Range sensors are Mk VIs, the lateral sensor arrays shared with the Ambassadors, although only a pair of systems as opposed to the quartet employed by the more tactically capable explorer. These are used by the Blue Nova Order at Selindra, a point of pride for the Amarkians. As is becoming standard Starfleet practise for frigates, the Kepler features a high-fidelity sensor array with exceptional sensitivity to cloaked ships.

Endurance
The Kepler has relatively modest tankage for a long-range frigate, with 2310-Light deuterium tankage arrangements. However, the Kepler was always envisioned to spend less time in transit and more time on station, putting more of a focus on the Starfleet Medical Mk VI protein synth system for supporting crew health. Crew exercise and mental enrichment is provided by the same 2260s pattern recreation frame that has kept Starfleet officers and crews from bouncing off the bulkheads since the Constitution-class came online.

Sickbays
Like with its fellow 1000kt concept frigate, the Kepler carries three large sickbay assemblies, placed in a triangle pattern through the hull, with Main Sickbay forward ahead of the bridge. With over thirty medical officers and crew, plus many others around the ship who are suitably trained, there is plenty of capacity for assisting mass-casualty events, and enough space that additional medical crews can base on a Kepler to assist. As a result, combined with the smaller three-sickbay set-ups on the Centaur-B, the frigate force of Starfleet effectively has a hospital ship everywhere. One immediate effect has been to take the strain off the still-undersized Starfleet Medical Hospital Ship Command, as Keplers are exceptionally well-suited to taking on the expedition and small colony check-up roles usually performed by Hospital Ships.

The move to extra medical capacity has its roots in reviews that followed on from the vicious pandemics that caused mass havoc in the 2300s and 2310s among the Seyek and Rigel. A mix of Council directives, request from the Surgeon-General, Colony Command, and Starfleet Operations, saw guidelines issued to the Ship Design Bureau to expand upon medical capacity for Starfleet's frigates.

Weapons
A pair of Model 83 phaser banks - nearly as venerable as the impulse drive - provide the offensive component of the Kepler's tactical load-out. Produced by the Tales Har Nadionworks in what was a relatively simple retooling of their old "Spring Lance" P7 system used in orbital defence platforms. This saved those production lines from closing down and leaving a lot of very bored nadion technicians in Tales Har. This is the same phaser bank employed by the Centaur-B, and by the Renaissance. Originally, all of these platforms employed refurbished phasers pulled from Constitution-A spare parts stocks, however, the Constitution-B program and the unexpected extensive Renaissance build program (with 39 and counting, each equipping three twin-mounts), soon emptied these stocks, requiring the Amarkians to save the day.

The forward-mounted burst launcher system is adapted to launch an extensive range of probes, in addition to standard torpedoes.

Protection
The Kepler shares a deflector arrangement with the Centaur-B, consisting of five Mk-V-E shield emitter systems, and a quartet of backup systems. These are positioned three forward, two back for the regular emitters, and mid-fore and mid-aft dorsal and ventral for the backups. Closer to the hull, structural integrity is provided by Type VI SIFs produced by 40 Eridani Field Systems. This field system was developed in concert with the Kepler design team to meet specifications, resulting in the local producer, which has carried through to Comet production.

The hull armour is largely unprotected, with only a thin plating of "Light Alloy 3", an Office of Naval Architecture codename for a lightweight duranium alloy.