(#5)B'Leanna Torres (ST: Voyager): Last because Voyager sucks, that's basically it. I mean what kind of an engineer would have allow the machine under his or her watch be so badly kept. Think about it, how many times have the shields failed because of some spacial phenomenon or enemy attack. She has done nothing innovative or at least cool for or to the ship. The worst thing ever was when they had some kind of alien tech and they just removed it. An example of this is when the ship was adapted by the borg, the ship looked "borgified" and had improved senses and weapons. Why would they get rid of that? The reason they gave was that the borg may be able to take control of the ship or something. If this were the case then how could they keep the alcoves that sustain 7 of 9 and the borg children? This is a problem of continuity of course. But still, she should have adapted the ship to use some of the new technology they have encountered.
(#4)Scotty (ST: TOS): Probably the most famous of this group. He is only slightly higher than B'Leanna because he was able to fix the ship when it was needed. But he is near the bottom because of his famous line "I don't have the power". Then do something about it! I don't think any other Star Trek engineer has said this. The only innovative thing I can remember him doing was the transparent aluminium in ST 4: The Voyage Home, and even then he just rehashed an idea that is standard in his time. Its like me going to the old west and saying "I have an idea, let's create the horse-less carriage." Nothing inventive about that. But the fact that he could produce a futuristic material using less adavanced techniques makes him a pretty good engineer.
(#3)Charles "Tripp" Tucker (ST: Enterprise): Okay, he is pretty high on the list for a guy from the latest series. The reason is that I have seen some pretty cool things coming from this guy compared to the last 2. The latest being when he deciphered the alien discs containing the information on the Xindi, when he figured out the weakness of the spheres, and figured out the Triellium D shielding. He hasn't yet been in the kind of situation that Star Trek engineers are famous for when they solve a problem on the fly, but I think he wil be soon.
(#2)Geordi La Forge (ST: TNG): I like ST: TNG the best so I guess I think very highly of him for that reason. Geordi has been involved in a lot of very cool things like the plan to destory the borg using Hugh. He is high on the list because although a lot of his work wasn't as action packed as some of the other guys, he fits my criteria of being innovative. He has said many times how he has changed the ship to make it better. He also finds a way everytime for the shields to stay up. The reason he isn't number 1 is because even though he has come up with some cool things and whatever, its always him and Data that work on it. He rarely does things alone. Its always Data and Geordi that work up the solutions together. Although this is more realistic, it doesn't fit what a Star Trek engineer is suppsoed to be like.
(#1)Miles O'Brien (ST: DS9): Its odd that he is this far up the list but both Matt and I agreed the very first time we ever discussed this. He basically handles the entire station's maintainence on his own. He has done a lot of on the fly engineering as well. Its been a while since I have watched a DS9 episode but I do remember the one episode where I made up my mind about him. He was stuck on a planet with nothing to work with, and he managed to make himself a compass from some rocks and sticks. Also in an old TNG episode he came up with a way to save Dr. Polaski by using her transportor trace to filter out any alien bacteria. He fits all my criteria.
This list may not change at all, unless Tripp gets a chance to do some really cool stuff next season.