ahh so the game isn't intelligent enough to add my missile defense tech to my beam defense tech, I see. I thought it was supposed to be artificial INTELLIGENCE. What was I thinking? Forced to use the ship designer. Not all of us get into that. Some just want to play. If I have a ship with 73 beam defense and I research point defense technology, it would make sense to ADD the defense tech to the ship so now I have 73 beam defense and 82 missile defense. but no it makes you mad by taking away all defenses and using only the best one? wow.
I hear you. I wasn't happy at all when this change happened and that's why I got in the habit of just taking a few minutes to create new ship designs when I reach certain levels of tech for what ever ship class I'm into using. The good news is you only have to do it once and they will only appear when the appropriate techs are researched. Again, it only takes a minute or two at most to tweak an existing design. I toyed around with making my own ship design when we were first given this ability but it's not really my thing so I never really got into it like some around here do. You can also download ones but then you're not always aware of what needs to be researched to have it show up when you want it to unless you look closely at the design and what it's tricked out with and remember it. Personally, I just find it easier to take an existing ship and take away what I don't want and add what I do. If an impatient SOB like me can deal with it I'm willing to bet you can to. 
EDIT: Forgot to say again that I find it important to name the ship to help me remember what it has/does as the older I get the less free space in my brain RAM I have... 
