Imperial Shield Technician

Welcome to the Imperial Shield Technician course! The point of this material is to educate you about various types of shields and their attributes, used on different starships, starfighters and other objects. After reading the course and passing the exam, the following career options become available (with further, more advanced training):

2ST-B0 Starfighter Shield Technician
2ST-C3 Fleet Shield Engineer
1ST-A0 Deflector Maintenance Technician
3ST-G5 Advanced Recon Tech Operator
1ST-F8 Projection Technology Analyst

For further information, please turn to your Fleet’s resident IU professor or Training Officer.

Introduction

The first term that comes to mind when talking about shielding, is the deflector shield. Deflector shields, also known as deflector screens, deflectors or simply shields, are translucent or transparent energy fields produced by deflector shield generators. These generators could be placed on planets, droids, starships, space stations and individual buildings. The primary purpose of the shield is to block or deflect projectiles and lasers from hitting the object under protection. They can also provide a significant atmospheric speed boost, in some cases 44 times the normal speed.

History

Deflector shields were first developed during the early years of space exploration, designed to absorb heat and radiation encountered in space and within a planetary atmosphere. Before the introduction of deflector shields, pilots had to rely solely on thick, armored hulls for protection against meteors and laser attacks. More advanced versions of the energy shield were developed centuries later, until eventually modern shielding was able to combine ray and particle protection. Eventually, shield technology improved enough to allow some ground vehicles to have dedicated shield generators.

Shield Types

There are two distinct types of deflector shield: ray shields, also known as energy shields, and particle shields. The former protects against energy-based attacks, such as blaster or laser cannon fire, while the latter was developed in response to physical attacks, ranging from projectile missiles and incoming vehicles to asteroids and meteors. Commonly, larger ships and structures are protected by both types of shield, though starfighters and Star Destroyers often only project ray shields. Ray shields were also used as capture devices onboard capital ships; Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker and Supreme Chancellor Palpatine were caught in a ray shield trap onboard Invisible Hand. Although designed to counter energy attacks, the energy given off by the ray shield would likely have disintegrated the Jedi duo had they attempted to pass through it.

A ray shield, a type of deflector shield, is a protective force field. There are two basic types of energy shields: ray shields, which absorb radiation and blaster bolts and particle shields, which repulse solid objects. Although ray shields can be used to defend planetary bases, they are more commonly associated with protecting starships from stellar radiation and enemy fire.

Many starships contain ray shields as a defense against laser weapons. They absorb lasers like a sponge, and sometimes they even manage to deflect some. When a shield has taken too many hits, it simply burns out, and needs to be recharged. Ray shields vary in size according to what they are protecting. Large capital ships such as an Imperial Star Destroyer have multiple arrays, and some wealthy systems even have planetary shields. Personal shields are on the other end of the spectrum: Jedi Kyle Katarn used one to protect himself during most of his battles, and Han Solo and Chewbacca used personal ray shields when they were gladiators in the Big Game.

The Death Star's thermal exhaust port was protected by a ray shield, since a particle shield would prevent it from venting; therefore, Alliance proton torpedoes could penetrate it, a fact which was pivotal in the destruction of the battlestation.

A particle shield is a type of deflector shield used to deflect physical projectiles or space debris. The shield must be deactivated to launch spacecraft such as shuttles or starfighters, or if a starship wishes to fire its own projectiles.

Shield Usage

The Gungan shields used during the Battle of Naboo blocked lasers, but droids could pass through because of their relatively slow movement in comparison to the laser bolts. Some shields only held back anything with a high-energy output, allowing sentients to pass through unharmed. Others were deadly to anything upon contact. Some Trade Federation droids, notably the droideka, were equipped with shields making them almost invincible in infantry combat.

Deflector shields work in a layered defense fashion: A volumetric field effect extends out from the surface of the shield projector, attempting to reduce the coherency of any beam attacks and deflect physical objects. The shield itself behaves in a manner similar to that of a thermally conductive material–energy applied was quickly diffused and re-radiated back into the environment, but the shield itself can also absorb some of the energy. The absorbed energy is shunted into heat sinks, and re-radiated at a lesser rate by the shield and neutrino radiators.

A heat sink is an environment or object that absorbed and dissipated heat from another object using thermal contact (in either direct or radiant contact). They can be found on starships and around reactors to cool them from overheating.

A neutrino radiator is a type of energy-dispersal mechanism, used primarily in shielding technology to eliminate excess energy. Without adequate dispersal, the energy absorbed by the deflector field would quickly build to critical levels, resulting in an overload and the collapse of the shield envelope. Thus, deflector shields require sophisticated energy management systems to provide insurance against the possibility of catastrophic failure.

Though their manufacturers tend to be unusually vague in regards to their particulars, knowledgeable technicians conjectured that neutrino radiators most likely function by converting excess energy into neutrinos, a type of particle with extremely low mass (thousands of times smaller than a proton) and no electromagnetic charge. Traveling at nearly the speed of light, they are virtually impossible to detect, due to their incredibly weak interaction with other matter. A single neutrino could easily pass through over a trillion kilometers of lead without hitting a single atom.

Because they have virtually no effect on nearby matter, they are nearly impossible to detect without advanced gravimetric detectors, and even then, neutrino signatures are difficult to pick out against the background neutrinos emitted in the quadrillions by every star in the galaxy. However, in most cases the energy signature of the shield envelope itself is readily apparent to a properly calibrated scanner, rendering the stealth of neutrino radiators irrelevant.

The use of deflector shields on starfighters and other small craft makes them capable of hypersonic speeds in planetary atmospheres. The strength of a deflector shield is a factor depending on how close the shield is to the projector, the efficiency of the projector, the power applied, and the surface area of the shield. It is common for starship deflectors to be projected a few molecules underneath the hull plating, and then extended outwards to protect hull integrity. Starship shields can handle massive amounts of energy or punishment, although it is possible to disable a shield by concentrating fire on a specific location.

Shield generators were used on Podracers as well, both custom and factory-built models. Typically low-output, these shield generators were installed within the cockpit and were meant to protect the pilot from exhaust wash and debris kicked up by the engines. In most instances, the shields were useless in the event of a crash, though some racers invested in full-spectrum generators to protect themselves and their vehicle from destruction.

Other Types of Shields

Aside from the standard defensive shields carried by most ships, there are other variants:

Shift shields: These shields protect any ship traveling in hyperspace from collisions with interstellar atoms, dust, or dark matter. An unprotected collision would destroy the ship. Failure of the shift shields in a meteor shower was how Darth Vader explained the loss of Tantive IV to the Imperial Senate prior to its dissolution.
Relativistic shields: Not shields in the classic sense, but relativistic shields still insulate the user from outside forces, thus justifying their name. Under the normal application of physical laws, as one accelerated to speeds approaching that of light, time would dilate. Relativistic shields or Stasis fields effectively anchor the contents of the field to a specific relative condition of time passage. This function is essential for travel in Hyperspace as it is strongly indicated that physical laws and phenomena do not behave the same there as in Realspace. Without Stasis fields, after a brief hyperspace jump, perhaps only seconds would have passed, or perhaps one would find themselves untold thousands of years in the future. This would mean that, due to special relativity, the ship traveling in hyperspace would move forward in time faster than from the perspective of an outside observer. Relativistic shielding affects the process somehow, forcing the transit of time in the ship to pass normally compared to outside observers. This means that while only 2 hours would pass for the person inside the ship, outside many years could pass if the ship doesn’t use Stasis shields.

One famed example was that of Bosbit Matarcher, who gained brief attention on HoloNet News when his relativistic shielding failed and he ended up traveling 190 years forward in time, from 212 BBY to 22 BBY, on what to him was a two-hour trip.

Personal Shields

From the era of the Jedi Civil War, personal shielding for individual units was commonplace. There were melee shields, energy shields, and Verpine shields.

By the time of the Battle of Naboo, personal shields that covered an entire being existed, but produced radiation and magnetic fields that were dangerous for sustained use.

During the Galactic Civil War onward, however, personal shield tech was all but lost. Very few armies equipped their soldiers with personal shielding, due to their ineffectiveness with modern weapon technologies, assuming that they were small enough for personal use. Notable exceptions include the Trade Federation droidekas, Republic clone commandos, and possibly the bounty hunters Boba Fett and Jango Fett.

Notable Shield Systems

The SLD-26 planetary shield generatorwas a deflector shield generator manufactured by CoMar Combat Systems and capable of protecting a small moon or a large space station with a near impregnable energy shield for an indefinite period of time. It was the model used by the Galactic Empire to protect the construction of the Death Star II over the forest moon of Endor. The generator featured a base with a self-contained power station underneath the focusing dish, with the power station's power core being both efficient and sustainable by necessity. A large, concentric dish enabled large objects in space to be shielded, while eight smaller shield projectors lined the dishes edges, helping deliver an energy shield to protect an object in space. A large 'spike' emerged from the center of the focusing dish, which was in reality a positioning emitter antenna designed to help align the shield.

The shield also aided in keeping the Death Star II in a stationary orbit around Endor, causing massive geological disturbances.

The DSS-02 shield generator was a defensive unit manufactured by Kuat Drive Yards early on in the time of the Galactic Empire. One such generator was used by the Rebel Alliance to protect a portion of the ice-planet Hoth during the Battle of Hoth. This generator was powered by the base's main reactors, which were stolen from a derelict Praetor-class battlecruiser.

The shield was strong enough to withstand bombardment from an Executor-class Star Dreadnought and a flotilla of Imperial-class Star Destroyers. It was largely because of this, as well as Admiral Ozzel's tactical blunder that the Empire was forced to land on the planet and do a ground battle against the Rebels.

Shield Manufacturers

Chempat Engineered Defenses, sometimes identified as Chepat, is a starship technology manufacturing corporation, specializing in the development and sale of shipboard deflector shield projectors and sensors. Chempat is jointly owned by the Corellian Engineering Corporation and Kuat Drive Yards.

CoMar Combat Systems, also called CoMar Weapons, is a weapons manufacturing corporation, based in the Corporate Sector. They specialize in surface-to-air weaponry, and one of their more widely used pieces of equipment is the G-003 Tri-Tracker, which was used by both the Galactic Empire and the Rebel Alliance during the Galactic Civil War. They also manufactured the SLD-26 planetary shield generator.

Nordoxicon is a company that manufactures a variety of components for starships, such as anti-concussion field generators and tractor beams. Its Micro Instrument division makes weapon sights and targeting systems.

Novaldex is a company which manufactures a wide range of space technology products. Though their products include such diverse items as heavy-duty tractor beam projectors and entire starships such as the Space Warper, they are best known for producing deflector shield generators. Of the few Imperial starfighter classes that had shields, most used Novaldex units.

Phoah-Kingsmeyer is a company that specializes in the production of shield projectors and unique shield screen controls for use aboard starships.

Taibolt is a company that manufactures anti-concussion field generators for various starships.

Torplex is a company that notably manufactures deflector shield projectors. They also produce a model of flight computer.