Make the Y8 worth its size

Make the Y8 worth its size
This idea/suggestion is Open. You can respond to ask questions or discuss the idea and either vote it up or down if you believe it should or should not be implemented, respectively. Popular suggestions and ideas will be considered by the development team to become reality in-game.
Proposal
I suggest giving the Y-8 access to use gunboat components and making a new shield that is around 120% the shield of a gunboat, to make up for how easy it is to hit, even compared to gunboats. With this new ability to act like a mobile base, it might be needed to reduce the speed of the ship 5-10%, to make sure its a slow behemoth.
Justification
The Y-8 will be a slow alternative and steppingstone to a gunboat, that can be viable to bring to PvP battles, without altering the balance.
Motivation
The Y-8 is a great looking ship, and has the potential to be a social hub in space where you can get great group play without the long grind of a gunboat.
Currently the Y8 minig ship is a ship you almost never see, which is really sad as its the closest you get to an actual capital ship in space. The ship might be made for mining, but as the alliance has shown, refitting ships for a military purpose can work in most situations. Unfortunately the ship as it is is quite big and outperformed by pobs or gunboats in all roles, even its dedicated mining role.