Notes : Perhaps the most successful design of vessel in history, the Bird of Prey has been in service in larger numbers over more subtypes for a longer time than any other class in known space. First fielded as the D11 class in the late 2270s, the ship was built from the start to fill a variety of roles. As a special operations ship she could use her cloak to penetrate Federation border defences and attack lightly defended targets such as sensor outposts, communications relays and cargo craft, creating confusion in advance of a Klingon fleet attack. She was also a natural scout ship, ideal for locating and tracking Federation fleets from under cloak. During the long period of tensions between the Federation and Klingon Empire, many D11s operated as raiders, cruising deep inside Federation space to pick off occasional lone vessels or outposts.

The Bird of Prey was a potent threat to the Federation in this role, but many of its secrets were revealed when one was captured by Admiral Kirk in 2285. The Admiral was at this time operating outside of Starfleet authority, and the vessel concerned later sank in San Francisco Bay during an attempted landing; nevertheless, on his return to Starfleet Admiral Kirk and his crew provided full details of the vessel's operation. The ship itself was raised from the water and subjected to detailed analysis. This provided crucial help in devising countermeasures for use against the Bird of Prey, allowing Starfleet to modify the sensor networks already in operation on its ships and installations in order to significantly increase their effectiveness. Despite this coup, these vessels have remained a factor to be reckoned with ever since.

The next major variant seen by the Federation was the D11A, a prototype developed by a team working under General Chang in the early 2290s. The vessel was capable of firing torpedoes whilst still under cloak, making it a potent threat on the battlefield. Unfortunately for the Klingons, this development was rendered almost useless by the use of plasma homing torpedoes which homed on the ship's wake.

A variant which appeared in the 2350s was the D12, which featured a cloaking device equipped with plasma coils. Unfortunately these proved to be defective, rendering the ships cloak highly vulnerable to ionic pulses. This problem was considered so serious that the Klingons retired the entire class from service.

The D12s were replaced with the D13, a class which continues in service to this day, naturally having been vastly upgraded and refitted over the years.

In design the Bird of Prey conforms to Klingon norms, with a single torpedo tube at the extreme forward point of the hull. The command centre is above this, with crew quarters - such as they are - located in the 'neck' section directly aft. The rear of the ship comprises the engineering compartments and a small cargo bay. A pair of wings carry small disrupter cannon at their tips, while an emergency torpedo tube provides a backup to the main armament. The wings allow the B'Rel to operate in an atmosphere and landing gear is fitted, the first Warp capable craft known to have this ability.

Notes : One glance at the B'rel class cruiser is enough to see the intention of its designers. Virtually identical to the Bird of Prey in layout, the B'rel is three times the length and approximately twenty five times the volume of the smaller ship, putting it firmly into the cruiser bracket. The extra size has been used by the designers to provide an extra torpedo tube plus four emergency tubes in place of the Bird of Prey's one of each, replace the Mark 8 disrupters with Mark 10 models and install a secondary armament of six Mark 8 cannon. The thickness of armour across the ship has been more than doubled and the shield system has been considerably upgraded. Other systems have also been uprated in line with the ships cruiser status. Internally, the deck layout has been accommodated within the scaled up design by simply putting three decks in the place of every one. Like the B'Rel there are few windows on this ship; only one in three decks has any windows at all.

The B'rel class vessel entered service in 2327, and has remained in the fleet ever since. An extensive programme of refits has kept them front-line vessels for some forty years, although the Vor'Cha class Attack Cruiser has become the vessel of choice in this area. In the 2360s the B'rel mostly patrolled friendly areas, and was a common sight to Federation Starships during this time. With the Klingons war with the Cardassians and the brief conflict with the Federation the type was brought into conflict with Federation Starships for the first time, where it performed reasonably well. Recently it has also seen a great deal of action against the Dominion where it has not performed so well, its age and second rank status counting against it. Nevertheless, the sheer numbers deployed mean that this design should continue to see service in some form until the turn of the century.

Notes : The D-7 class battle cruiser was the backbone of the Klingon fleet for over sixty years. First entering service in 2245, the D-7 was a far more powerful and advanced vessel than its predecessor. Although the Federation Miranda class was at least the equal of the D-7, and the Constitution class somewhat superior, the D-7 was built in larger numbers than both of these classes combined.

In layout the D-7 set the standard for all Klingon designs up until the present day. The Federation tended to place most or all of the weapons on the primary hull, concentrating firepower forwards, then rely on speed and manoeuvrability to bring them to bear on the target. The D-7s engines were seriously under powered compared to Federation vessels; to compensate, the Klingons put the bulk of the ships systems in a large engineering hull attached to the nacelles, and attached a small secondary hull on the end of a long 'neck' section that projected forwards. This concentrated the vessels mass towards the rear, making it easier for the engines to change the vessels attitude in space. The weapons were also more evenly distributed - one torpedo tube is located in the forward hull, the other in the engineering section facing aft. Six of the ten disrupter cannon are also in the engineering hull. This gives the D-7 a greater distribution of fire than the Constitution or Miranda class.

 Facilities were also included to support up to five hundred ground troops; barracks accommodation was located adjacent to the ships six transporter rooms and the shuttle craft bay was considerably larger than previous Klingon vessels in order to support landing craft operations. Each D-7 was expected to be able to sustain ground operations for about twenty days without outside resupply.

The D-7 has seen comparatively little combat experience. Several skirmishes occurred with the Federation, generally pitting the D-7 against the Constitution or Miranda class. The Federation design was generally the victor in these encounters, although the Miranda class USS Outrider was heavily damaged in one engagement with a D-7 class.

Today the D-7 class is largely retired, but some one hundred and twenty units of the class remain in service with the Klingon fleet. They are no longer considered as combat units; instead they have been fitted with instrumentation from the K'T'Inga and Vor'Cha class cruisers to enable them to be used in training duties.

Notes : The Klingons are noted for their ability to wring every last drop of usefulness out of a design, even sometimes to the point of absurdity. The development of the B'rel class cruiser from the Bird of Prey is a case in point, but having successfully scaled up one design to make an entirely new ship, nobody could have imagined that they would then go even further in the same direction.

In the 2350s the Klingons decided that they needed a new class of ship which would easily match the most capable planned Federation designs. Given the difficulties they had experienced with the Vor'cha design, it was decided to develop a class based as much as possible on existing technology. The B'rel design had long proven itself in action, so the Klingon designers simply scaled up this design still further to an incredible 654 metres long! This resulted in a massive vessel which carried a pair of huge wing tip mounted disruptor cannon, a series of secondary disruptors, and two clusters of the triple fire torpedo tubes developed for the Vor'cha.

Although the development program was relatively quick and successful, the finished vessel was unfortunately not. The drawbacks are not a result of bad design, but are rather inherent to a vessel of this kind. The Klingons strengthened the hull structure to compensate for the larger mass, but modifications of this kind become inherently more difficult as the design is scaled more and more. While the B'rel has shown that it can function successfully, the D'tai proved to be a step too far. This led to limitations being placed on heavy manoeuvring. The placement of the warp coils within the main body of a ship this big led to further reductions in manoeuvrability, while difficulties encountered with shielding the radiation emitted from them led the designers to reduce the vessel's top speed to a mere warp 8.8.

While these problems were not sufficient to cause cancellation of the project, the Klingons did limit the production run to a dozen ships. These served on the Klingon/Romulan or Klingon/Federation border. Their service there was relatively uneventful, although three fo them participated in the Enterprise D's mission into the Romulan neutral zone following the defection of Admiral Jarok.

Following the suspension of the class, the Klingons decided to press ahead with a totally new design of large starship in the project which became the Negh'var.

During the Dominion war all twelve D'tai class vessels saw extensive service. Although they gave a good account of themselves, all were lost during that conflict.

Notes : Yet another variant on the Bird of Prey design, the K'Pak is a scaled down version which the Klingons use as a Corvette or light escort vessel. The basic Bird of Prey shape has been kept, but reduced to some thirty five metres in length. At this size the forward section is just large enough to accomodate a small control compartment with a compact torpedo launcher beneath. The aft section contains a single 4.6 metre tall deck which is divided into a 3 metre work area with a 1.6 metre crawlway beneath.

As usual, the wings carry a pair of disruptor cannon, but the reduction in size means that there is no emergency torpedo tube.

Notes : The K'T'Inga class battle cruiser was fielded by the Klingons during the 2270's to replace the D-7 class. The Klingon intelligence service had learned in 2263 that Starfleet was soon to engage on a major rebuild of the Miranda and Constitution class ships which would, among other things, equip them with the latest weapon and propulsion technology. Since the Miranda class had always been the equal of the D-7 one-on-one, and the Constitution had always been considered markedly superior, the prospect of these ships becoming significantly more powerful was not one the Klingons welcomed.

The Klingon high command judged that developing and building an entirely new class of battle cruiser would take at least ten to fifteen years, leaving nearly a decade when they would be vulnerable to attack. It was therefore decided that the new vessel would be based around the hull of a standard D-7, but would include the latest weapon and engine technology. The K'T'Inga therefore bears a close resemblance to the D-7; major external differences lie in the colour scheme, which is rather darker on the K'T'Inga, and in the forward hull, which is somewhat bulkier on the K'T'Inga. The K'Tingas nacelles are also distinctive.

The Armament of the K'T'Inga was upgraded throughout. A new heavier model torpedo was installed, cutting the number of torpedoes carried from 260 to 230. A Mark 10 disrupter cannon was mounted directly above each torpedo tube. The Mark 7 disrupters of the D-7 were replaced with Mark 8 models, of which an extra pair was worked in to the design. The ground forces barracks was eliminated so as to allow more space to engineering; this measure allowed a larger warp core to be installed and left space for a 20% increase in the fuel supply.

The first of the K'T'Inga class was launched in 2269; by the time the USS Enterprise was due to completed her refit in 2271 - the first Constitution to complete this procedure - there were six K'T'Inga class vessels in service. Records of the time indicate that the Klingon High Command seriously considered launching an offensive against the Federation at this point; General Melkarr proposed sending two major attacks into Federation space, one headed for Earth and the other for Vulcan. Each attack would comprise thirty ships, twenty seven D-7s led by three of the K'T'Inga class. These forces were actually assembled while the council debated the matter, but before a decision was made reports reached the High Command of a large energy cloud penetrating Klingon space. The K'T'Ingas from the Earth attack fleet were dispatched to investigate, but as soon as they intercepted the cloud all three were destroyed by plasma weapons from within by the entity which was at the heart of the cloud. The loss of half of their newest battle cruiser fleet in the space of minutes threw the high command into a near panic; the attack on the Federation was postponed and the fleet was ordered to escort the anomaly out of their space from a safe distance. When the USS Enterprise apparently succeeded in destroying the intruder, the Klingons concluded that the new Constitution design was far more powerful than they had assumed and cancelled the attack altogether. By the time the truth behind the V'ger incident emerged, Starfleet had upgraded its fleet sufficiently to make a new attack unfeasible in any event.

The K'T'Ingas have continued in service to the present day, having received the normal upgrades and refits over the years. They are now considered as second line units, and are generally to be found patrolling friendly borders such as that with the Federation or acting in support of the Vor'Cha class attack cruiser.
 

Klingon Negh’Var Battleship

Notes : Built during the 2360's, the Negh'Var was designed for unparalleled protection and firepower; her sheer size was intended to allow her to carry an armament powerful enough to overwhelm any opponent, present or future. She emerged from the shipyards as the largest vessel ever built by the Klingon Navy, at over twenty two hundred feet long.

The main armament of the Negh'Var comprises a pair of huge disruptor cannon, the largest such weapons ever built. Although they are the most powerful mobile weapons on any alpha quadrant ship, the weapons are able to fire over a very limited arc. Since the Negh'Var herself is not exactly a manoeuvrable ship, the intention of these weapons seems to be to deal with the heavy shielding associated with large space installations, fixed defensive systems and planetary arrays. Engaging other vessels falls to the 18 Mark 12 disruptor cannon distributed across the hull; while these are only a fraction as powerful as the Mark 18 weapons, they are at least equal in firepower to the Starfleet Type X phaser array and hence among the most powerful in service.

The Negh'Var is equally well equipped for defensive operations. The shield systems are based on those used in the defence platforms protecting the Klingon home world, and the hull itself is constructed of a high density armour plate. As with recent Federation designs, the structural integrity field is rated at more than triple the normal standard, allowing it to considerably reinforce the armoured hull and provide a powerful backup protection.

Although its primary role is in destroying fixed defences and enemy vessels, the Negh'Var apparently has a considerable secondary role in landing and supporting troops. Some ten thousand can be carried on board, and the ship has over thirty personnel transporters and large numbers of landing craft to carry them. She can carry supplies for up to ten days of surface fighting, and if necessary can support the ground forces by both orbital bombardment and warhead transporting.

Launched in 2371, the Negh'Var is currently serving as the Flagship of the Klingon fleet. Her first combat action was during the Klingon-Cardassian war, where she was responsible for destroying six Cardassian vessels, twenty three defence platforms and overwhelming the planetary shields on eight Cardassian worlds. She thereafter fought an action at Deep Space Nine, where she was able to breach the stations shields for long enough to land several hundred troops. She has since seen considerable success during the Dominion war, adding to her fearsome reputation.

Notes : The Vor'Cha class was originally the Klingon response to Starfleets Ambassador class design. Intended to be significantly more powerful than the Ambassador, the ship had something of a troubled beginning. The project was approved in 2332, and immediately ran into snags; the Klingons experienced problems with the manufacture of the Warp Coils, a problem Starfleet would later encounter for itself. In addition, despite much effort the Klingons could not match Starfleets development of the burst fire torpedo tube. However, the materials problems were overcome and the first designs indicated that the new ships would comfortably meet the design requirements using larger numbers of single fire torpedo tubes. However, by the time construction of the first vessel was begun in 2341, Starfleet had issued the requirement for the Nebula class Starship. This would clearly be more than a match for the proposed Vor'Cha class, leaving the Klingons with a major new warship design which would be obsolete the moment it left the shipyards.

The Klingons responded by going back to the drawing board and re draughting the design. Three of the Mark 10 disrupter cannon were replaced with more powerful models, designated the Mark 12. These were capable of operating in a 'pulse fire' mode, increasing their effectiveness against shield systems. High density armour plating was added around the ships Warp Core, nacelles, and around the weapons platforms. Efforts continued to field a burst fire torpedo system; in 2343 a group of six torpedoes exploded wile being fired from a test vessel, destroying it with the loss of two hundred personnel, including nine of the projects best design specialists. Despite this tragedy the Klingons pressed on, albeit with a less ambitious tube design capable of firing three torpedoes at a time, and were eventually successful.

The re-designed Vor'Cha began construction in 2345 and launched in 2351, three years before the first of the Nebula class. Comparisons between the two are inevitable; the Vor'Cha is generally considered to be about 15% more powerful than the standard Nebula design because of its superior armour and pulse fire disrupters. However, when fitted with an enhanced weapons pod the Nebula is generally reckoned to be more than a match for the Vor'Cha. The advent of the Galaxy class swung the balance further toward Starfleet, and the Vor'Cha class is decidedly behind the latest designs beginning to enter service in the quadrant. The Klingons are reported to be planning to upgrade the Vor'Cha fleet with more powerful disrupters, the latest torpedo tubes, and enhanced shielding systems to keep them on the front lines. It is not known when this process might begin.

The information for these alien ships was derived from the Daystrom Institute website: http://www.ditl.org/

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