Yeah, it does seem as though the shields drop a lot easier than they did on my Excelsior. In fact, it seems like that was the case on the other T5 cruisers I played with. I intend to stick with this ship for the long haul (including the C-store variant), so I'll be playing with it some more and see if I can't get the shields to hold like they did on the Excelsior.

I love the ship otherwise, even with it's dumptruck-in-space turnrate.