I think you could use blender, there are also these: http://www.moddb.com/games/starpoint-gemini-warlords/tutorials

I too have an interest in making custom ships. I have a teensy weensy bit of experience in 3d modelling making 3d models for shapeways, so I kind of understand words like normals. I got as far as figuring out a basic understanding of the materialeditor model functions, but upon trying to import custom Obj files the game crashes! I came across these lines in the official tutorial:

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Now we’ll import new mesh. There are a number of restrictions on the mesh type that is imported:

Importer supports only Obj file format.
The obj file has to have vertex positions, normals and texture coordinates.
Mesh must be triangulated, that is each face must consist of only three vertices (triangle mesh).
For a triangle, texture UV coordinates in each of the three vertices must be different from each other. To explain this one further, if u coordinate has a value of say 0.123 for vertex 1, then vertex 2 and 3 must have different u coordinate value from vertex 1 (and vertex 3 from vertex 2 also). This is important for correctly calculating tangents during mesh import.
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Ok, I have NO clue how to attach vertex or texture positions. Nor do I have the ability to re-triangulate the exceedingly complex meshes I have. Does anyone know of good tutorials or programs to help make vast trove of 3d models I have work?

Blender: CTRL T to triangulate all selected faces. ALT J to return them to quads. The material editor will only accept .obj files from within the SPGW game file. Best bet. Build your mod file within the SPGW MOD folder ahead of time and place your exported .obj files in the same file you want your .mdl files to end up. Also when exporting your objects from blender make sure you have these boxes (selection only, apply modifiers, include edges, write normals, include UV's, write materials, objects as OBJ objects, keep vertex order) checked and your direction is set Z forward and Y up. Im sure this is not the only way but it has worked for me so far. As for UV coordinates and so forth, thats a whole other hornets nest. Looking for tutorial links on the blender site would be the best route there.