The Horizon Blake's 7 Technical Manual

Zine
Title:	The Horizon B7 Technical Manual
Publisher:	Horizon
Editor(s):	Paul Holroyd
Type:
Date(s):	Part 1 1988, Part 2 1990, Part 3 1992
Medium:	print
Size:	Full-sized
Fandom:	Blake's 7
External Links:
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The Horizon B7 Technical Manual is a non-fiction canon resource for Blake's 7. It has three parts.

front cover of part 1

From a distributor, Knightwriter:

Full-sized, loose-leaf. THE definitive visual guide to the Blakes 7 Universe. Detailed drawings/plans/scales of all the spacecraft, weapons etc. Part One (which comes with a Starter Folder) includes the Liberator (exterior); Liberator, Scorpio and Federation hand-guns, Liberator teleport bracelet, Federation Supreme Command Headquarters and Starburst Class Pursuit Ship. Part Two includes detailed interior plans of the Liberator, Scorpio (exterior), Scorpio teleport bracelet, Federation Transport Ships (including the 'London'). Part Three includes detailed interior plans of the Scorpio, Orac and the Liberator's instrumentation. Also included is a guide to Federation uniforms, more on Spaceworld and on The System. Further parts to follow... An invaluable guide for all fans, especially modellers and writers! Designed, drawn and written by Paul Holroyd.

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  part 2

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  inside page from part 2

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  inside page from part 2

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  inside page from part 2

Reactions and Reviews

The technical manual to which I referred is Horizon's Blake's 7 Technical Manual. It has been published in 3 parts so far, with, I understand, another two to go.

I'm not absolutely certain on the contents of the various parts, having long since amalgamated it all but I think it's as follows:

Part 1: The folder, external plans of various ships, including Liberator and Scorpio, and equipment, including teleport bracelets and guns. Part 2: Liberator floorplans, text on various ships, more extrenal ship plans. Part 3: Scorpio floorplans, Liberator instrumentation, Federation uniforms, plans for Orac.

Promised for the next part are Xenon floorplans, and more on Federation ships, Liberator and Scorpio.

The TM is visually superb, and fascinating: Ever wanted to know where the loos were on Liberator? It's also an excellent reference and support text for anyone of a role-playing bent, wonderful for showing players who aren't necessarily hardcore B7 fans...

The Technical Manuals parts 1 to three arrive in a 2 ring A4 paper size binder. Parts 2 and 3 are supplements intended to be placed into part 1 of the Technical Manual. There is a promise of parts 4 and 5 to appear 'real soon now'.

First impression: Really cool stuff. Lots and lots of spiffy drawings.

Second impression: The drawings of the Federation uniforms appear to have been traced from the Star Trek technical manual. The boots and people outlines are very close.

Third impression: Oohh, I want to build some toys!

Good stuff: Lots and lots of nice line drawings of stuff. Look is very much like the old Star Trek technical manual. Nice drawings of props and sets.

So-So stuff: Details of the props such as the Liberator and Scorpio handguns; however, details about holsters and power cords are missing.

The first part of Horizon's B7 Technical Manual (part one of three, to date) consists of about 40 pages of plans and technical information complete with a very smart loose-leaf folder in which to store it along with any subsequent installments you might buy.

The folder is A4, plastic, with a clear acetate front cover, blue back cover, and reinforced spine. Binding is via those metal prongs that you slip through the holes in the inserts and then bend back, no doubt there's a proper technical term for it. It's a bit clumsy but sturdy and functional.

Of course, it's the contents that matter. What you get in this first batch of sheets is divided into four sections - Liberator, Scorpio and Xenon Base, Federation, and Non-Federation. Since this is the first part, you get straight down to the real essentials. There are technical side, front and rear profiles of Liberator, Scorpio, Space Command HQ, a Starburst Class pursuit ship, a C-16 Transporter and a Spaceworld patrol ship. Similar treatment is given to Liberator handguns, Scorpio Clipguns, Federation sidearms (blaster and pistol) and teleport bracelets (Liberator and Scorpio). These plans are large, very clearly drawn, colour-coded and I wouldn't mind betting they're as close to dead accurate as any but the pickiest purist could want them. The introductory blurb claims that many of the schematics have been drawn from original props used in the series, and I know at least some of the illustrative work was done by Paul 'perfectionist' Holroyd. Many of these sheets are A3, folded in half - pretty big. The weapons and bracelets are illustrated actual size. Ships are scaled either in feet or millispacials, with no indication as to how long a millispacial actually is.

I should stress that these are technical drawings, not pretty pictures. If, like me, you have trouble interpreting such things, they are of limited use. I suspect, however, that skilled modellers would find them extremely useful and informative. As someone who can't cut a straight-edged strip of plasticard, there's not much use I can put them to myself. That's not all. All the above derives directly from the series. Some invention and original input comes in elsewhere, such as with the Liberator deck plans. The crew floor looks a right bloody maze, with the flight deck sitting in the middle like the Millennium Falcon (honest, it does - look at it and you'll see what I mean), surrounded by loads of cabins, rest rooms, corridors etc. The crew deck is assumed to bisect the hull in a section just behind the nose, something neither confirmed nor denied by the series. A less intricate schematic interior shows vast energy banks, gravity generators, detector systems etc, along with some technical specifications (maximum speed etc), Short notes elaborate on these, but not into any great detail ("The neutron blasters are the Liberator's main weapons. They emit a pulsed stream of high-energy neutrons... Oh, really?). An A3 fold-out gives a larger scale floor-plan of the flight deck, which looks a bit under-detailed to me and not halt as claustrophobic as it ought to be. The teleport bay is likewise mapped out, with two detailed plans of the main console as it varied over the seasons. Deck plans are also given for the C-16 prison ship, but not for Scorpio or the Starburst pursuit ship. Some additional technical specs are given for these and other vessels.

Overall, this is hard to evaluate. The plans and schematics are, as I said, likely to prove very useful to skilled modellers, or so I imagine at any rate. As far as material drawn directly from the series is concerned, I noticed no glaring errors, though I might disagree with some of the inferences. The technical notes are not, to be honest, all that technical, nor do they go into any great detail. There is hardly a wealth of subcreated material here. I can only envisage it as being of limited use to fan writers, and any fan writer who would use the information contained herein should be more than capable of making it up for her/himself. I see no reason why you shouldn't use the limited information in Part One if you want to, but I likewise see no real reason to go by what it says. Ultimately, it's only as definitive as you want it to be.

On the other hand, of course, if there were loads of invented material, all you would get is stacks of things to disagree with. It's hard to define an optimum middle path, and the Technical Manual as rendered here is probably the safest option.

I should add that these comments refer only to Part One of the Technical Manual. 1 haven't seen the other two parts, and don't really know what they contain. If scratch-building models and props is your forte, Part One may well prove invaluable. Otherwise I would think twice before buying it.