by tato_713

This is the spaceship where it takes place the hard science fiction novel Tau Zero, by Poul Anderson. It is perhaps the longest lasting and most massive spacecraft of the entire science fiction. It was designed using SolidWorks 2018 with a sketch of the side of the ship that I cannot track where is originally from, and following some description from the story. The model was designed in four scales: 1:500 ; 1:600 ; 1:1000 ; 1:3000 . The first three scales are divide in ten parts, while the last and smaller one is divided into four parts.
The file's names explained: name_1_x_10_y.stl is 1 : x * 10^y. So _1_6_10_7 is 1:600000000 or one in 60 million.

Parts of the model

The size of Leonora Christine

Although you can get a good idea of the shape of spaceship with the description in the book, the author never gave a solid clue about it size. At first I compared with other Bussard ramjet based spacecraft, and I calculated a 2 km length for the Leonora Christina. However this raise a problem. A spacecraft of this size must be craft in orbit, most likely in a low Earth orbit, which maximal height is 2000 km. In the book the main characters see the ship orbiting from Earth as a "small star"; an object of that size, orbiting that close, would be more resoluble than a simple point. The naked eye can resolve at low as 1 minute of arc so I took this info to calculate a max size of 580 m. On the other hand, the tip of the spacecraft would not be as visible as the rest of it; so to approximate an "effective diameter" of the light reflected by the ship I "blured" an image of the model side view until I had an ellipsoidal spot. This blur spot is about 75% the original length, so the new calculated length about 770 m. Anyway this is a max size, but I think it is a good estimate, because the habitable part is 50 m diameter in its wider section, comfortable enough for 50 people.

The Leonora Christine with its simulated light reflected.