How does the Navigation Computer work??

[buerger23]

My question is is that when they get past the point no one has ever gone past (cant remember term) is that how can they say they wont run into a star or something??

[Shane]

Could be a map table or based off the senor data that they have stored in the master computer.

[ShadowEnigma]

The red line when you FTL jump? I don't think they can know. If you remember in Razor, they discussed that situation briefly before Cain yelled to just jump. The navigation computers probably use surrounding objects to compute where they are, then predict where they'd end up based on readings they were getting at the moment plus any past information of the area.

[Lestat]

The red line could be the point from which the sum of the limit of the sensors and of the errors in computer calculations is so high that it makes the actual jump not so accurate and could put the ship in danger because you don't know what it is in the emerging point , it could be into a moon, a planet or too close to a star or even in the middle of it

[Neakal]

Yea I agree what the other posters have said. The Nav Com is probably used to get an estimated trajectory and pathway of nearby astral objects (which means the astrometrics lab (or something like that) is very important). Because its an estimate, it becomes more dangerous the further you get as theres a greater chance an object may have been missed (Hence the "Red Line" which means the least safe point of jumping after which the risk becomes too much). This is what happens to the Raptor in Caprica that jumped into the mountain and how Boomer almost jumped into Kobol. Neither objects were probably spotted or predicted to be there which shows theres always an element of risk involved with jumping. Can also explain why they were't enthusiastic about doing FTL jumps too much in the Miniseries. It's like Concordes in Real World. The fact that they were faster and more advanced didn't prevent them from being pulled down due to security risks.

Although that doesn't explain how Galactica after returning to the Fleet from a mission ALWAYS seems to jump in the middle of the fleet, yet not jump INTO the ships in the fleet. I mean look at shots in Scattered and Rapture. There were ships mere meters from where they jumped to :P

[ShadowEnigma]

James Edward Olmos is just that awesome =D

[Spencerian]

Based on several episode observations, particularly Galactica's escape from the algae planet in "Rapture" and a jump at the end of "Scattered", it may be easier to think of the Nav computer as an awesome GPS, but designed for precision jumps to a point. The farther the jump or the less accurate the jump coordinates are, the less accurate the jump will be to the desired location. The Cylons are living computers that are more accurate and so can calculate more accurate (and farther) jumps.

[Lestat]

The cylons can jump farther because they can use networked computers rather than mastering calculations better than humans


I don't think that our GPS satellites network is the best comparison , as said they're a network of satellites who allow you to know your exact position in their grid and thus your exact position on Earth.
Galactica is traveling into uncharted space there are no satellites to refer to, they might use known supergiant stars ,pulsars and nebulas but yet these celestial bodies are orbiting the Galaxy and have a reciprocal independent movement or have related orbits between them and other bodies or might have gone nova or supernova during the years their light took to reach the fleet so their positions aren't those they knew.
They must rechart the positions of all stars and referenced points at each jump.
Their limit could also be that one , to rechart their positions might take too much time if they jump too far , they could even get lost in space if they can't

[james968]

I've always wondered why Galactica doesn't 'land' on some other ship when it jumps to the fleet. (Or why doesn't/hasn't the fleet move/d some distance away). Most likely just writer's convenience.

In Scattered Tigh mentions that they have to update for 'inertial drift' (every so often)

[ShadowEnigma]

Well I would assume with the movement of everything in space, that the computers have to be updated, and therefore the coordinates for the jump have to be updated so often.

You know I've wondered that a few times, especially with how close the raptors jumped when they were going back to Caprica. You would think they'd keep some distance from each other, especially since they were using an experimental way of inputing the coordinates. (Using the Cylon brain)

[Spencerian]

Networked computers for the Cylons have nothing to do with their ability to jump farther. It's mostly hardware with a little software. Else, how did Starbuck's Raider in "Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I" do what it did--return to Caprica in one jump? That Raider would certainly NOT be in contact with other Cylons. (It couldn't. It's brain was gone. The Colonials added a human interface to the Cylon navigation technology so she could drive it and Kara took a Cylon transponder so other Cylons wouldn't shoot her down.) And Starbuck is a pilot, not a navigator. She would need a system that just worked.

Zoom forward to "Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I." Gaeta says:

What many of you don't know is that the captured Cylon Heavy Raider is capable of much longer jumps than our Raptors. In fact, we realized early on that if we could install a Heavy Raider navigational system aboard one of our Raptors, a strike team could make the entire trip back to Caprica in less than ten jumps. Now, the limiting factor up until now has been our inability in installing the Cylon computer with our computer. That obstacle has now been overcome.

That illustrates that (1) Colonial FTL hardware is not as refined as Cylons in terms of sheer jump distances, requiring more jumps in a given distance, but more important is (2) Cylon FTL avionics (the Heavy Raider nav system), which performs the high precision and distance checks aren't easy to retrofit with Colonial jump technology, but can be done if you have some help, as Gaeta did. The Colonials would still have a series of jumps, but at least they'd get there. And, if you remember...they still lost two Raptors in transit, despite the shared coordinates and simultaneous jumps, one permanently (http://en.battlestarwiki.org/wiki/Raptor_612).

[NEXUX]

Imagine that you have jumped with FTL
Imagine that your coordinate overlap
Is it possible?

[Spencerian]

I don't understand the question. You can only be in one place in space at a time. The ships move by apparent FTL, not genuine faster-than-light like in Star Trek, which causes all sorts of weirdness.

Thus, the ship must be one place or another. There cannot be any kind of "overlap" of themselves.

Materializing inside other objects, now that's possible (http://en.battlestarwiki.org/wiki/Raptor_612).

[NEXUX]

I mean at the end of FTL overlap with a meteor or some other objects...

[ShadowEnigma]

Imagine that you have jumped with FTL
Imagine that your coordinate overlap
Is it possible?

Do you mean if two ships both jumped to the same spot? I'd imagine the second one would end up jumping into the first one, destroying both of them, if that is what you're asking.

[Shane]

Two objects can not occupy the same space -- even in the real world. And if anyone says atoms share the same space need to head back to Physics 101. :detective:

[NEXUX]

Do you mean if two ships both jumped to the same spot? I'd imagine the second one would end up jumping into the first one, destroying both of them, if that is what you're asking.


thx and yes :)

[ShadowEnigma]

If you want my basis for my theory, it's the same idea as what happened to the second raptor on the Caprica rescue mission. It jumped into the mountain. It ended up meshing into the mountain.

I wouldn't be surprised if somehow the FTL system is able to push stuff out of the area, like particles and so forth to keep from damaging key systems. But if there was an object too large in the area it wouldn't be able to and the ship would just jump into it.

[Lestat]

I don't think that could happen , it might be possible , but I believe they would maintain their own spatial position in the fleet before the jump

[JDS]

As for the question about the Red Line that they jumped beyond, I THINK it's the point at which the errors in the jump calculations become so great that it becomes impractical and/or unsafe to try to make a single jump back to your point of origin, hence you'd need two jumps to get back safely. So a jump "way beyond the Red Line" means they'd be making a lot of jumps to get back.

As for the differences between Cylon and Colonial FTL tech, I've gotten the impression that it's not the hardware at all, it's the calculations. I mean think about it, if the hardware were the problem, the calculations that the Heavy Raider computer did wouldn't help the other 19 Raptors going back to Caprica. So long as you tell the FTL where to go, it should be able to take you there.

[jp2542as]

I think the GPS analogy is an accurate one. They could pick pulsars/quasars located in other galaxies. They would be far enough away to seem fairly stationary. And they would be easy to find due to the unique period and spectrual characteristics of eact beacon. And yeah, the farther you jump the bigger the delta from desired destination. And you will need to recalibrate if you go far enough from the known space.

Also, there may be an inherent "safety" system built into to FTL's jump theory. Maybe you can't materialize into something unless it is big enough and you jump into it...But if you're small relative to something at the arrival point, you get a bumper car push to the side.

That's my theory anyway... No help for you if you find a massive object.

[ShadowEnigma]

The recalibrate fits in well. I remember every time they jumped, or every so often they had to redo the numbers to send them out to the fleet. Caused problems for the fleet when Tigh first took over in Season 2.

I don't know if the FTL system would know if something is there to materialize into. I think you just tell it where you want to be. The raptor jumped into the mountain that one time.

[jp2542as]

The raptor in the mountain thing works with my theory. The FTL causes an effect within a limited region (around the ship). So when it gets to it's destination it must have some effect on the space it jumps into. I am suggesting that when the ship arrives at it's destination, there is a interaction that might cause smaller objects to be pushed out of the area if they are small enough than the ship. Or might cause the ship to shifted away from a larger object. So the fleet can all jump to the same coordinates and the presents of the first ships will push the new arrivals slightly off from the same spot. But if the space is occupied an object that is significantly bigger than the ship, it's toast.

So if you are jumping to known places, you're probably bigger than the dust. But if you jump to where a planet or sun or something "interesting" exists... You become an art piece...

[Catrope]

Although that doesn't explain how Galactica after returning to the Fleet from a mission ALWAYS seems to jump in the middle of the fleet, yet not jump INTO the ships in the fleet. I mean look at shots in Scattered and Rapture. There were ships mere meters from where they jumped to :P

I've always wondered why Galactica doesn't 'land' on some other ship when it jumps to the fleet. (Or why doesn't/hasn't the fleet move/d some distance away). Most likely just writer's convenience.

As for the differences between Cylon and Colonial FTL tech, I've gotten the impression that it's not the hardware at all, it's the calculations. I mean think about it, if the hardware were the problem, the calculations that the Heavy Raider computer did wouldn't help the other 19 Raptors going back to Caprica. So long as you tell the FTL where to go, it should be able to take you there.

The reason that ships in the Fleet always jump so closely to each other is probably that they make the exact same jump, using the exact same coordinates based on the exact same calculations. As JDS pointed out, inaccuracies caused by the hardware (FTL drives and related stuff) are probably negligible compared to the ones caused by calculations, if they exist at all. For this reason, two ships in the Fleet would still have the same distance between them after a jump as they did before it.

[Sparrow]

I don't understand the question. You can only be in one place in space at a time. The ships move by apparent FTL, not genuine faster-than-light like in Star Trek, which causes all sorts of weirdness.

Thus, the ship must be one place or another. There cannot be any kind of "overlap" of themselves.

Materializing inside other objects, now that's possible (http://en.battlestarwiki.org/wiki/Raptor_612).

Thats another example of RDM and company mistakes and fault of caring..

when the Raptor 612 incident jumping into a mountain.. RDM said the Raptor and crew would horrible melt into the mountain like a "Transport accident from Star Trek".
That would mean when they jump they would merge with anything in the way.. but there is plenty evidence that suggest the contrary..
For example.. if that would be true.. when they jump into the passage they would die instantly all because their ships would became filled with radioactive toxic ultra-high-temp gas from that burning nebula.. i think when a ship jumps it unfolds to say in a microsecond in the exit displacing everything sorrounding.. as seein in the atmospheric jump in New Caprica.. The Pegasus jumping from the Scorpia fleetyards or Galactica jumping away from the Nova..
Still.. objects jumping conserve the forward momentun.. so that Raptor 612 even if it could survive displacing rock and so inside the mountain ..would be instantly destroyed smashing against the inmediatly wall