Space Battleship Yamato (fictional spacecraft)
Space Battleship Yamato was the title spaceship from the anime series Space Battleship Yamato, designed by Leiji Matsumoto in the 1970s. According to the fictional continuity of the anime series, the spacecraft was built inside the remains of the Japanese battleship Yamato. In the American dub of the series Star Blazers, the spaceship has the same origin, but was renamed the Argo. In Spanish-speaking countries, its name was changed to Intrépido.
Construction
According to the fictional continuity of the Space Battleship Yamato anime series, the wreck of the World War II battleship Yamato, sunk near Okinawa, was used to hide a military spacecraft created by the Earth Defence Force in the late 22nd century. At this time, Earth was under attack from an alien race, the Gamilons, who were raining down radioactive asteroids that evaporated Earth's oceans and rendered its surface uninhabitable. The new space warship was built "inside" the wreckage of the ancient battleship, which was partially buried in what was now a dry seabed, thus hiding it from the view of the orbiting Gamilon vessels.The new Yamato spaceship was originally conceived as a "Noah's Ark", designed to transport the best examples of Earth life to seed a new world away from danger. A message from the planet Iscandar was received, containing plans for a space drive called the Wave Motion Engine, which would give a spacecraft immense power and let it travel faster than light. The message also urged humanity to travel to Iscandar and obtain a device which would cleanse Earth of its deadly radiation.
The original series was produced in 1974 and assumed that the Yamato sank in one piece, coming to rest upright on the bottom of the ocean. However, in 1985, the remains of the Yamato were found in two separate, badly mangled pieces, because an ammunition magazine exploded as the ship sank. The reboot Space Battleship Yamato 2199, therefore makes note that what appeared to be the wreckage of the Yamato was in fact a camouflage measure used to hide the unusually advanced ship from the Gamilons. In 2199, a crew member views a video message recorded just before the mission on April 6, 2199; this suggests that the Yamato launched on April 7, 254 years to the day after it sank.
Features
Main systems
The Yamato had three bridges; Bridge 1 contains the helm, radar, communications and command positions, and was the scene of much of the action and interaction in the series. In the second season, it gained a time radar system capable of viewing a region of space as it appeared hours previously. Bridge 2 was devoted to navigation. Bridge 3 hung below the ship, serving as a backup to Bridge 1, or, in Submarine Mode, as indicated in the 2012 anime, as the main bridge. In the anime Yamato Rebirth, it had been painted blue and converted into a radar post.At the top of the command tower were the captain's personal quarters, including a chair mounted on a vertical track giving him the capability of rapidly transiting to his command post in Bridge 1. On either side of the main bridge were radar units. Below that was Bridge 2, and directly below the command tower, on the underside of the ship, is Bridge 3. There were also observation domes on either side of the command tower, and larger windowed sections on either side of the main hull.
Elsewhere aboard the ship are a conference room and a hologram chamber for projecting images of Earth to combat homesickness. There is also a cryogenics chamber in which much of the crew apparently sleeps during the series. An engineering and development section contains an automated multi-purpose construction unit capable of building any required device. More mundane locations include the surgery wing, galley, staterooms and gym. Travel within the ship is achieved by means of lifts, moving walkways and, for emergencies, chutes.
In the 2009 anime, the walkways were removed and replaced with steel floors, and the conference room was converted to project holograms.
Propulsion
; The Wave Motion Engine: The ship's main engine, based on alien technology. It is capable of converting the vacuum of space into tachyon energy, as well as functioning like a normal rocket engine, and providing essentially infinite power to the ship, it enables the Yamato to "ride" the wave of tachyons and travel faster than light; in its first test it travels from Earth's Moon to Mars in one minute. However, this feature must be activated with perfect timing, at a point when space at the origin and destination are in the correct phase, otherwise the ship could become lost in the fourth dimension. In Yamato Rebirth, the engine can warp even faster than before.; Auxiliary engine: Twin jets below the main engine port, used for quick bursts of speed. When the Yamato first launched, it was used in place of the Wave Motion Engine, which was not yet ready at that time.
; Wings: These unfold from the sides of the hull, fully functional with ailerons. These provide lift in atmospheric environments.
; Rocket Anchors: On either side of the bow are rocket-powered anchors tied to strong chains, which the Yamato can use to anchor itself to asteroids and, if necessary, provide a gravity-assisted slingshot. They can also be used to deflect enemy ships from collision.
Former Propulsion
; 4 shafts and 4 Steam turbinesWeaponry / defences
; The Wave Motion Gun: The "trump card" of the Yamato, the Dimensional Wave Motion Explosive Compression Emitter, or Wave Motion Gun for short, functions by connecting the Wave Motion Engine to the enormous firing gate at the ship's bow, enabling the tachyon energy power of the engine to be fired in a stream directly forwards. As of the 2009 movie, it has six reactors, and it can fire six shots instead of one large one. However, when combined to fire a single shot, it may rip the hull apart. Enormously powerful, it can vaporize a fleet of enemy ships with one shot or an object the size of Australia; however, it takes a brief but critical period to charge before firing. It used to require all non-essential power systems be deactivated, but now it only leaves the ship unable to warp a short time after firing. The recoil absorption mechanism can be manually deactivated with a lever; this was used to save the ship on one occasion.; Shock Cannons: The nine main 46 cm and six secondary 15.5 cm guns of the original Yamato, with the 46 cm guns housed in three triple-barreled turrets and the 15.5 cm guns housed in two triple-barreled turrets fore and aft respectively; have been converted into powerful energy guns. Each turret fires three energy beams which spiral around each other to form a single, more powerful beam, capable of severely damaging or destroying enemy warships. The cannons are operated by seated human controllers, whose aiming orders are transmitted from Bridge One. In addition to firing energy blasts, the guns can be loaded with other ammunition, most notably cartridges containing the devices used in the Rotating Asteroid Defense. Space Battleship Yamato 2199 sometimes features the shock cannons firing Type 3 projectiles, designed to pierce enemy armour a few seconds before detonation. In the film Be Forever, Yamato, they are used to fire missiles containing Wave Motion energy, which even with a hundredth the power of the Wave Motion Gun cause tremendous destruction.
; Pulse Lasers: Based on the 127 mm and 25 mm anti-aircraft guns of the original Yamato, the Pulse Lasers are a set of two- and four-barrelled gun turrets lining the sides of the spaceship, firing energy pulses which can destroy fighters and detonate missiles. The turret clusters generally aim at the same targets; it was not stated in the series whether each contains a gunner, or whether they are controlled from a central source.
; Torpedo Tubes: Six forward-firing and six aft-firing torpedo tubes, principally for use underwater. In the 2009 anime, they can fire barrier defense missiles.
; Side Missiles: A set of anti-missile missiles launched from missile ports in the hull of the Yamato; rather than hitting directly, they explode at a safe distance and form an energy web that detonates incoming missiles.
; Stack Missiles: Rocket missiles fired vertically from what was once the smokestack of the original Yamato.
; The Black Tigers/Cosmo Tigers: Cosmo Pulsars and Cosmo Pulsar Bombers. A fleet of fighter planes, contained within a hangar in the ship's rear underside. The Black Tiger fighters of the first season are superseded by the Cosmo Tigers of the second season, though both seasons feature the Cosmo Zero fighter piloted by Susumu Kodai, which was usually launched from one of the catapults on the top deck near the stern. The hangar also contains other, non-combat planes for reconnaissance and transport. In the 2009 anime, all the Black Tigers and Cosmo Tigers are replaced with Cosmo Pulsars, which are more advanced. Another new fighter was the Cosmo Pulsar Bomber, which has two Wave Motion Torpedoes attached to it. Large robotic arms move the jets out of their hangar spaces.
; Rotating Asteroid Defence: Used in the first and second seasons, this involves using the Shock Cannons to fire showers of small metal probes into asteroid fields; these devices are magnetically controlled and can bring the asteroids close to the ship, forming a hard shell resistant to enemy fire. This can then be turned into a fast-rotating orbiting ring, its angle controlled from the bridge, which can be used to block individual shots. As a final act, the asteroids can be expelled at high speed in all directions to destroy any ships that venture too close.
; Reflective shield: A defence conceived by chief scientist Sanada, who borrowed the idea from the satellite reflection plates used by the Gamilon base on Pluto, this involves quickly covering the Yamato with a reflective energy coating. This shield was only used once, when Gamilon leader Desler used his self-titled Desler Gun against the Earth ship, and successfully reflected the blast back against its source.
; Air-tight Cover: Although, aside from the reflection shield previously mentioned, the Yamato lacks defensive shields like those used in Star Trek, on one occasion a transparent, physical bubble was constructed over its upper decks which protected it from the winds of a space storm, and even maintained a breathable atmosphere.