Memory Alpha
Advertisement
Memory Alpha
"What in the world made you think of using the transporter pattern buffer to survive?"
"We didna have enough supplies to wait for a rescue… so I had to think of something."
"Yeah, but locking it into a diagnostic cycle so that the pattern wouldn't degrade, and then cross connecting the phase inducers to provide a regenerative power source, that's absolutely brilliant."
– Geordi La Forge and Montgomery Scott, 2369 ("Relics")

Jury rigging, or to jury rig, jerry rig, or simply rig, was a term of nautical origins (i.e. rigging) used to describe a temporary, hastily done repair without proper attention to detail, designed to give quick results.

After the USS Enterprise had been thrown back into time to July 1969, Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott, while giving his progress report to Captain James T. Kirk, he explaining that "Everything's jury-rigged, but we're coming along with the repairs. We could re-energize in about four hours." (TOS: "Tomorrow is Yesterday")

In 2267, Nyota Uhura rigged a subspace bypass circuit in order to cut through the interference that prevented the Enterprise from contacting the landing party on Pollux IV. (TOS: "Who Mourns for Adonais?")

When the Enterprise NX-01 was invaded by a symbiotic lifeform in 2151/2152, and threatened to spread throughout the ship, Malcolm Reed considered a way to containing the organism. Reed proceeded to report on Starfleet's attempts to create "a stable EM barrier" (force field), and that they "just haven't found a way to control the particle density." He further noted that "all the specs are in the database," and during their mission, "I've been trying to jerry-rig a prototype of my own." (ENT: "Vox Sola")

Later in 2152, when Enterprise faced an oncoming neutronic wavefront, Trip Tucker had to come up with a way to transfer control of the ship to its catwalk. While touring the area with Travis Mayweather, Tucker pointed out that "we're going to have to jury-rig these panels, tap them into command functions," in order for the area to function like a bridge. (ENT: "The Catwalk")

During the USS Constellation and the Enterprise's combined encounter with the doomsday machine, Captain Kirk had Scott rig a thirty second delay detonation device that could be rigged to blow the Constellation's impulse engines from the ship's auxiliary control room.

Also during the same event, the Enterprise's transporter system went out. Scott was able to make a temporary repair to the main junction circuitry, in order to rescue Captain Kirk from aboard the Constellation, but warned that "this jury rigging won't last for long." His statement proved to be true and after a second attempt to jury rig the system, they were able to beam the captain aboard. (TOS: "The Doomsday Machine")

Following the Enterprise crew's discovery of an ancient insectoid starship in 2269, the landing party discovered a control room that was protected by a force field. Based on Spock's observations, what they were seeing was "not part of the normal equipment," adding that "it's like something they jury-rigged during an emergency." (TAS: "Beyond the Farthest Star")

Later that year, during the Enterprise's encounter with the spiroid epsilon waves from Terra 10, the crew began to shrink in size. As this occurred, the crew became less able to operate the ship's controls, forcing the crew to "jury-rig miniature control mechanisms" in order to function. (TAS: "The Terratin Incident")

In 2293, following the crash of the USS Jenolin, Montgomery Scott and Ensign Matt Franklin managed to create a transporter loop as an attempt to stay alive while awaiting their rescue. After discovering their work in 2369, and questioned on whether what was still floating in the buffers was alive, USS Enterprise-D chief engineer Geordi La Forge claimed "I don't know. I've never seen a transporter jury-rigged like this." (TNG: "Relics")

After inspecting the Captain Dirgo's Nenebek, La Forge noticed that the shuttles "maneuvering thrusters are rigged in a configuration I've never seen before." Dirgo explained that "It's my own modification. It's more efficient." Later, when the shuttle experienced an emergency and disappeared, La Forge noted on how Dirgo had his maneuvering thrusters "rigged a funny way." (TNG: "Final Mission")

External link[]

Advertisement