The most weird warship
Dott. PIergiorgio
This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
My entry is :
The two Russian CDB "Novgorod" and Vitse Admiral Popov"
I Don't quote the reason of their weirdness because the fact surely kill the
weak and drive mad the strong ;)
Best regards from Italy.
--
Dottor Piergiorgio d' Errico- MIlitary and Naval historian
Niitakayama nobore ichi ni rei ya
Thomas Schoene
news:m6XXa.228539$lK4.6...@twister1.libero.it
> Time for a new poll.
> This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
>
> My entry is :
>
> The two Russian CDB "Novgorod" and Vitse Admiral Popov"
>
> I Don't quote the reason of their weirdness because the fact surely
> kill the weak and drive mad the strong ;)
I'm hard-pressed to think of anything wierder, honestly.
Perhaps MONITOR (the famed Cheese box on a raft) was almost as strange
looking for her era, but she had the redeeming feature of actually being
somewhat effective, whereas the circular floating batteries were pretty much
worthless.
--
Tom Schoene Replace "invalid" with "net" to e-mail
"If brave men and women never died, there would be nothing
special about bravery." -- Andy Rooney (attributed)
Warren Okuma
"Thomas Schoene" <tasc...@earthlink.invalid> wrote in message
news:0dXXa.3162$jp...@newsread4.news.pas.earthlink.net...
> "Dott. PIergiorgio" <pg...@libero.it> wrote in message
> news:m6XXa.228539$lK4.6...@twister1.libero.it
> > Time for a new poll.
> > This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
> >
> > My entry is :
> >
> > The two Russian CDB "Novgorod" and Vitse Admiral Popov"
> >
> > I Don't quote the reason of their weirdness because the fact surely
> > kill the weak and drive mad the strong ;)
>
> I'm hard-pressed to think of anything wierder, honestly.
>
> Perhaps MONITOR (the famed Cheese box on a raft) was almost as strange
> looking for her era, but she had the redeeming feature of actually being
> somewhat effective, whereas the circular floating batteries were pretty
much
> worthless.
>
> --
http://www.reach.net/~stormy/marine/habbakuk.html
Andrew Toppan
>How about a pycrete aircraft carrier?
I think the ship would have to *exist* before it would qualify.
If we include ever weird concept, the list will never end.
--
Andrew Toppan --- acto...@gwi.net --- "I speak only for myself"
"Haze Gray & Underway" - Naval History, DANFS, World Navies Today,
Photo Features, Military FAQs, and more - http://www.hazegray.org/
Dott. PIergiorgio
>
> I think the ship would have to exist before it would qualify.
I want to precise exactly this, but you preceed me (I was engaged in a
quarry on ICQ)
William Hamblen
<pg...@libero.it> wrote:
>The two Russian CDB "Novgorod" and Vitse Admiral Popov"
>
>I Don't quote the reason of their weirdness because the fact surely kill the
>weak and drive mad the strong ;)
Apart from being circular?
Any of the US Civil War Monitors were pretty strange.
The US torpedo gunboat Alarm was strange. Far too slow at 10 knots,
even for an 1870s torpedo boat, with a downright weird propulsion
system: a feathering paddle wheel that stirred the water like an
eggbeater. The system was sort of a spiritual ancestor to the
thrusters installed on some modern vessels. "Spiritual" because the
modern versions work.
The rams HMS Polyphemus and USS Katahdin also were strange.
Strange name: the 19th c. Italian ship Affondatore ("Sinker") who
lived up to her name by sinking.
dwelsh46
> Time for a new poll.
> This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
The dynamite cruiser USS Vesuvius ought to be a candidate. It certainly had
the strangest armament I've ever seen, and was virtually useless as a combat
vessel since it could not fire its pneumatic tubes at a moving target (range
wasn't very impressive, either). It had enough speed and radius to be useful
as a dispatch boat although it cost at least 3x what a purpose built
dispatch boat would have cost.
Going back a little further, Fulton's Demologos is probably also worth
mentioning.
Going forward a bit, here are some candidates I'd like to get other opinions
on:
HMS Furious (the light battlecruiser version, 2x18 inch and probably
incapable of fighting a light cruiser)
HIJMS Ise and Hyuga (hybrid carrier version)
For weird looks, HIJMS Fuso (the ultimate "pagoda mast")
--
Dave Welsh
dave...@earthlink.net
Keith Willshaw
"Dott. PIergiorgio" <pg...@libero.it> wrote in message
news:m6XXa.228539$lK4.6...@twister1.libero.it...
> This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
>
> My entry is :
>
> The two Russian CDB "Novgorod" and Vitse Admiral Popov"
>
The USS Vesuvius with her compressed air guns
Keith
Andy Dingley
wrote:
>>How about a pycrete aircraft carrier?
>
>I think the ship would have to *exist* before it would qualify.
OK then, how about a Pykrete lake yacht ? You can still see the
ironwork at the bottom of a Canadian lake.
John Carrier
R / John
Gunter Krebs
> This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
>
> My entry is :
>
> The two Russian CDB "Novgorod" and Vitse Admiral Popov"
>
> I Don't quote the reason of their weirdness because the fact surely kill the
> weak and drive mad the strong ;)
>
> Best regards from Italy.
Although it is hard to find a more weird ship than the two russian
circle ships, some ships come to my mind, which bear a pretty amount
of weirdness:
- Battleship H.M.S. Agincourt with the seven large turrets
- Battleships H.M.S. Nelson and Rodney with three large turrets on the
foreship
- MHS Furious as completed with flight deck on the forship and a
single 18'' turret aft:
http://www.warships1.com/Weapons/WNBR_18-40_mk1_Furious_pic.jpg
- the monitors HMS General Wolfe and HMS Lord Clive featuring a
sidemounted, fixed 18'' gun from HMS Furious:
http://www.warships1.com/Weapons/WNBR_18-40_mk1_General_Wolfe_pic.jpg
Gunter Krebs
http://usnavy.skyrocket.de
Keith Willshaw
"Gunter Krebs" <gunter...@skyrocket.de> wrote in message
news:3f3ce5f8.03080...@posting.google.com...
> "Dott. PIergiorgio" <pg...@libero.it> wrote in message
news:<m6XXa.228539$lK4.6...@twister1.libero.it>...
> > Time for a new poll.
> > This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
> >
> > My entry is :
> >
> > The two Russian CDB "Novgorod" and Vitse Admiral Popov"
> >
> > I Don't quote the reason of their weirdness because the fact surely kill
the
> > weak and drive mad the strong ;)
> >
> > Best regards from Italy.
>
> Although it is hard to find a more weird ship than the two russian
> circle ships, some ships come to my mind, which bear a pretty amount
> of weirdness:
>
> - Battleship H.M.S. Agincourt with the seven large turrets
OK
> - Battleships H.M.S. Nelson and Rodney with three large turrets on the
> foreship
Unconventional perhaps but weird is a little strong for what were
pretty effective vessels.
> - MHS Furious as completed with flight deck on the forship and a
> single 18'' turret aft:
Well she has always was know as one of the Weird Sisters
> http://www.warships1.com/Weapons/WNBR_18-40_mk1_Furious_pic.jpg
> - the monitors HMS General Wolfe and HMS Lord Clive featuring a
> sidemounted, fixed 18'' gun from HMS Furious:
> http://www.warships1.com/Weapons/WNBR_18-40_mk1_General_Wolfe_pic.jpg
>
Keith
Andre Lieven
> "Dott. PIergiorgio" <pg...@libero.it> wrote in message
> news:m6XXa.228539$lK4.6...@twister1.libero.it...
>> Time for a new poll.
>> This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
>
> The dynamite cruiser USS Vesuvius ought to be a candidate. It certainly had
> the strangest armament I've ever seen, and was virtually useless as a combat
> vessel since it could not fire its pneumatic tubes at a moving target (range
> wasn't very impressive, either). It had enough speed and radius to be useful
> as a dispatch boat although it cost at least 3x what a purpose built
> dispatch boat would have cost.
>
> Going back a little further, Fulton's Demologos is probably also worth
> mentioning.
>
> Going forward a bit, here are some candidates I'd like to get other opinions
> on:
OK.
> HMS Furious (the light battlecruiser version, 2x18 inch and probably
> incapable of fighting a light cruiser)
Indeed. One could get off on a rant here, about such ships showing
the fallicy of trying to fit two, or more, vastly different *and*
competing jobs into one hull.
So, fitting a modern destroyer with a hangar and a pair of helos
isn't a competing task, wrt her other weapons and sensor systems,
but trying to make a 31 knot ship be a stout monitor is.
> HIJMS Ise and Hyuga (hybrid carrier version)
The same comment here. This competition of non-convergent tasks
also explains who no one else went for a battleship/carrier combo,
in spite of many designs, from the RN 16 inch battleship/carrier
to the pre WW2 USN light cruiser/carrier type.
It always pays to split up such competing roles, which is also
why you don't see many navies staying with half cruiser/half carrier
type ships. For instance, the Italians went from the two Doria missile
cruisers, to a more air capable, but otherwise similar ship, Veneto, yet
chose to follow that with a full carrier design, Garibaldi, while
placing the missile taskings onto destroyers.
Japan's policy wrt destroyer/helo carriers is as much political,
rather then just naval, as the debates on their latest " through
deck destroyer " would show. Since politicians fund ships, when
the pols get their undies into knots, ships get changed.
> For weird looks, HIJMS Fuso (the ultimate "pagoda mast")
Indeed. Styles will be what they will be... until that gets trumped
by the needs of things like signature reduction.
Andre
--
" I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
The Man Prayer, Red Green.
BF Lake
"Dott. PIergiorgio" <pg...@libero.it> wrote in message
news:m6XXa.228539$lK4.6...@twister1.libero.it...
> This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
>
> My entry is :
>
> The two Russian CDB "Novgorod" and Vitse Admiral Popov"
>
> I Don't quote the reason of their weirdness because the fact surely kill
the
> weak and drive mad the strong ;)
>
> Best regards from Italy.
>
This gun is mentioned in the Janes of WW1 USN gunnery table. It had two
barrels joined at the breech firing in opposite directions, with tracer
assist for aiming ISTR.
Regards,
Barry
Julian Barker
BF Lake <nos...@nospam.com> wrote
What about some of the Civil War ironclads? Manasas - hardly any
armour, almost submerged, hardly any armament, and a ram, for example.
The Union even had late war ironclads too overloaded to put turrets on
them so fitted deck mounted guns which seems to defeat the point!. How
about any vessel ever armed with a spar torpedo?
--
Julian Barker
"Many battles have been fought and won by
soldiers nourished on beer,and the King does not
believe that coffee-drinking soldiers can be
relied upon to endure hardships in case of
another war."
Frederick the Great, 1777
Peter H. Granzeau
<keith...@kwillshaw.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>> - Battleship H.M.S. Agincourt with the seven large turrets
>
>OK
The ship was capable of firing all 14 guns in a broadside, and did, at
Jutland. She was probably not armored sufficiently, but that was a
fault of virtually the entire RN at the time.
>> - Battleships H.M.S. Nelson and Rodney with three large turrets on the
>> foreship
>
>Unconventional perhaps but weird is a little strong for what were
>pretty effective vessels.
The French battleships Clemenceau and Jean Bart also had major caliber
armament forward only. although all 8 tubes could be fired on any
forward bearing.
Andy Dingley
wrote:
>For weird looks, HIJMS Fuso (the ultimate "pagoda mast")
How bad an idea was the "pagoda" really ?
In some ways it's a good idea. Lots of things, like directors, get
mounted high up. They're also forward of the fore funnel (Mutsu's S
bend notwithstanding) If it was a really bad idea, surely Fuso and
Yamashiro's conversions wouldn't have been such an enthusiastic
display of the pagoda style.
Obviously it puts a lot of weight up high. But there's no significant
armour or major weight up there, and these were big ships with
considerable armour belts low down. So how badly did they really
affect stability ? Did the Japanese ever have trouble with this ?
Did it limit the weather or sea state they could operate in ?
And unlike the US lattice mast, I don't believe any of them ever fell
over !
Andrew Toppan
>Kearsarge and Kentucky with their stacked turrets?
No. A number of other US ships of the era had similar features, so K&K are no
different from several others.
John Dallman
> On Wed, 6 Aug 2003 14:11:05 +0100, "Keith Willshaw"
> >OK
> The ship was capable of firing all 14 guns in a broadside, and did, at
> Jutland. She was probably not armored sufficiently, but that was a
> fault of virtually the entire RN at the time.
She was a little less armoured than RN-designed 12" ships of some years
earlier, having been designed for Brazil, who had somewhat different
priorities. Belt and decks were both thinner than RN designs, although
bulkheads and turret faces were fine.
---
John Dallman j...@cix.co.uk
Andy Dingley
wrote:
>>Kearsarge and Kentucky with their stacked turrets?
>
>No. A number of other US ships of the era had similar features, so K&K are no
>different from several others.
Of similar calibre ? AIUI, it was the large size of the guns, and the
resultant muzzle blast, that made the stacking on these two so
unworkable.
Andrew Toppan
wrote:
>Of similar calibre ? AIUI, it was the large size of the guns, and the
>resultant muzzle blast, that made the stacking on these two so
>unworkable.
KEARSARGE class (2 ships), 1900: dual 8"/35cal over dual 13"/35cal.
VIRGINIA class (5 ships), 1906: dual 8"/45cal over dual 12"/40cal
The later ships were equally bad in this respect.
dwelsh46
"Andy Dingley" <din...@codesmiths.com> wrote in message
news:tkq2jv4njibva9i61...@4ax.com...
The "pagoda mast" was not necessarily a bad idea, but it certainly looked
odd, particularly Fuso's towering and utterly tasteless jumble of
superstructure..
Mounting directors high up in a pagoda structure has some disadvantages:
1) Amplification of motion due to rolling and pitching
2) Vibration
OTOH things mounted high up in a pagoda are less likely to be affected by
hits in the main body of the ship. The pagoda masts made the ships look
topheavy, but since these structures were mostly light plating and glass,
the stability was not seriously affected.
No doubt this structure added much windage, but this probably was not a
significant issue because in heavy weather a ship's speed is limited by the
laboring of the hull. It might have affected steering at certain relative
wind angles in heavy weather.
--
Dave Welsh
dave...@earthlink.net
ken...@cix.compulink.co.uk
din...@codesmiths.com (Andy Dingley) wrote:
> AIUI, it was the large size of the guns, and the
> resultant muzzle blast, that made the stacking on these two so
> unworkable.
That is an interesting point. The double story turret was introduced,
abandoned and then reintroduced without any sea going experience due
to the difference between the US design and construction times. There
was no experience of blast effects available. From what I remember of
US Naval Weapons the increase in rate of fire reduced the time
available for a 8 inch shot due to exhaust gas interference with the
12 inch gun sights to the point where the 8 inch was no longer viable.
Remember as a bag charged power loading weapon there was little
difference between the 8 inch and 12 inch in firing cycles.
Ken Young
ken...@cix.co.uk
Those who cover themselves with martial glory
frequently go in need of any other garment. (Bramah)
Joachim Schmid
>
> This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
>
> My entry is :
>
> The two Russian CDB "Novgorod" and Vitse Admiral Popov"
Oh yeah, the "popovki" are my own favourites, too.
Nevertheless, I want to throw in another weird ship: The German SMS
"Mars", an all-iron replica of the old concept of a ship of the line.
Commissioned in 1877 at a time when this concept was really obsolete,
and due to the implementation in iron looking really strange.
<http://www.deutsche-schutzgebiete.de/webpages/S.M.S.%20Mars+.jpg>
She was intended as a gunnery training ship, to be armed with a few
pieces of any model of ordnance in use in the Imperial Navy. But it had
been overseen that "Mars" could neither take up the heavy pieces of main
artillery from the barbette, turret and casemate ships, nor give an
opportunity to practice the ways of aiming and firing on such vessels.
Due to the obsolete concept, the absence of armor, and the very
polymorphic battery "Mars" lacked any combat value, but she was for
years a popular enemy simulator in maneuvres, thus getting the nickname
"Simulaker".
Regards
Joachim
Ron Larham
"Dott. PIergiorgio" <pg...@libero.it> wrote in message
news:m6XXa.228539$lK4.6...@twister1.libero.it...
> This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
>
> My entry is :
>
> The two Russian CDB "Novgorod" and Vitse Admiral Popov"
>
> I Don't quote the reason of their weirdness because the fact surely kill
the
> weak and drive mad the strong ;)
>
Italia and Lepanto must be in the running for
the title, though behind the Russians' effort ;o)
RonL
Dott. PIergiorgio
>
> Italia and Lepanto must be in the running for
> the title, though behind the Russians' effort ;o)
Please explain.
Having six sleek funnels (only in Italia) don't qualify them as "weird".
Personally I consider them between the most beautiful ships ever.
Best regards from Italy.
P.s For all: I'm watching carefully the thread and taking notes....
Jack Linthicum
No one has mentioned Sourcouf, so I will.
Andy Dingley
Linthicum) wrote:
>No one has mentioned Sourcouf, so I will.
If we're counting subs, then surely the K class were weirder than
Surcouf ?
ken...@cix.compulink.co.uk
nos...@nospam.com (BF Lake) wrote:
> This gun is mentioned in the Janes of WW1 USN gunnery table.
It originated as an airborne anti-Zeppelin gun. The countershot was a
mixture of lead shot and grease. The commonest was a 2pdr. It was used
by the RNFS during WW1. US use was probably also in aircraft.
Keith Willshaw
How about the M class, submarines with 12" guns yet.
Keith
Fred J. McCall
:Personally I consider them between the most beautiful ships ever.
Between the most beautiful ships ever and what?
[I think the English word you meant to use is 'among' rather than
'between', even though they mean pretty much the same thing in many
contexts. Tricky stuff, this English.]
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
K26 - the v.2.0, bug-fixed version, seems to have worked pretty well and
lasted until sub. tonnage became an issue (start of the 30s, IIRC), as
did some of the earlier boats after they'd had the more obvious horrors
worked out. I'd rank them as more useful (and less hazardous to
health) than some of the French steam-driven boats of Big Mistake One,
though their particular horrors were mostly due to a mix-and match
approach to detail design - valves which turned in opposite directions
or differed in where they were open or closed: Just what you want when
fighting the nation which invented airbourne ASW tactics (Austria-Hungary)
and was rather good at them..
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
"Who dies with the most toys wins" (Gary Barnes)
ken...@cix.compulink.co.uk
ronald...@baesystems.com (Ron Larham) wrote:
> Italia and Lepanto must be in the running for
> the title, though behind the Russians' effort ;o)
Actually their design made sense at the time. The limitations on rate
of fire and accuracy of big guns of the time did mean that large
amounts of armour could be considered a waste of weight. What had not
been foreseen was the rapid increase of size of QF guns.
Jack Linthicum
I agree any of the cruiser subs qualifies. X1, Surcouf, Argonaut, Type
XI and would take K-22 as stranger than fiction. Halibut in its SSG
configuration.
Dott. PIergiorgio
>
> If we're counting subs, then surely the K class were weirder than
> Surcouf
But the top weirdo for me is that M1 or X1 (don't remembre well), with a 12"
gun whose was intended to fire when the sub is emerging only with the
muzzle and the tip of the conn above water....
Best regards from Italy.
Dott. PIergiorgio
> [I think the English word you meant to use is 'among' rather than
> 'between', even though they mean pretty much the same thing in many
> contexts. Tricky stuff, this English.]
Yes, this is what i mean... Actually I vas agonizing five minutes to
remember the correct term, and I don't came, so put this "between".
Best regards from Italy.
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
Dott. PIergiorgio <pg...@libero.it> wrote:
>Andy Dingley wrote:
>
>>
>> If we're counting subs, then surely the K class were weirder than
>> Surcouf
>
>But the top weirdo for me is that M1 or X1 (don't remembre well), with a 12"
>gun whose was intended to fire when the sub is emerging only with the
>muzzle and the tip of the conn above water....
Given RN tactics for the use of submarine guns, it almost makes sense
- there's an excellent description in Brown's "Nelson to Vanguard" of
gunnery trials in a A-boat he served in just post-war (the champion
gunnery submarine in the fleet), where they came to periscope depth,
sighted in, closed to a couple of hundred yards off the stern of the
target (where any defensive gun would be mounted on a merchant ship)
and began to surface - at the same time as which the biggest blokes
in the boat would open the forward hatch - they reckoned to get a
couple of tons of water down the hatch at this stage - and the gun
crew would pile out - a first-round hit was generally a certainty.
Now, multiply that to the M-boat closing at periscope depth to 500-100
yards, poking the muzzle out, sighting in, opening the tompion and BLOMP.
First round hit pretty much a certainty, and no water down the hatch.
Lack of suitable targets is about the only major objection to the attack
plan, though if you can do it in an ordinary boat (at the cost of getting
wet) it's hard to see the need for a specialist.
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
Feng Shui: an ancient oriental art for extracting
money from the gullible (Martin Sinclair)
Andy Dingley
wrote:
>Now, multiply that to the M-boat closing at periscope depth to 500-100
>yards, poking the muzzle out, sighting in, opening the tompion and BLOMP.
How did the M's tompion work ? Could it be closed from within the
boat ? If it was opened for a first shot, could the boat dive again,
or did it need to surface fully to have a crewman re-install it from
out on the casing ?
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
Could be opened from within the boat, from what I understand, but it
didn't work that well. M1 regularly blew the end of the barrel off
as a result of water in the tube. Doesn't seem to have bothered
anyone much - at the ranges she was intended to use her gun at
accuracy wasn't a major issue, and 12"/35 guns were lying around doing
nothing much..
The gun could only be re-loaded on the surface, so I imagine that the boat
would surface after doing the dirty on $WHOEVER. No idea whether the
tompion had to be replaced bt hand, but the idea of one opened from inside
the boat suggests something that either floated out or fell out (in which
case someone gets to go out and put it back) or swung to one side (unsure,
unless of course the last foot of barrel had blown off again).
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
I've been thinking about this one. It's not enough for a ship to look odd
with hindsight if she worked OK when built or was a decent technical
answer to the problems as they then were: Temeraire (1877) is an example -
funny looking device, but she seems to have worked well enough in her day.
Similarly, when a technology was very new you get some odd devices, simply
because it's far from clear how to make things work. Actually, some of
what now look like some of the odder early topedo ships (Vesuvius,
Polyphemus, Zeiten) were, I'd say, better bets than things like Lightning
- all the experiance of later years was that torpedo attacks worked best
if delivered from close in at low speed. Lightning, with mimimal
seaworthyness and much sound and fury - no.
The Russian circular ships - wierd, but a decent technical fix to
providing semi-mobile batteries in very shallow water.
In their natural habitat they could have been a menace -
in much the same way as flatiron gunboats could have been
nasty in tightly confined waterways.
My nominations, then:
Waterwitch (Britain, 1867, armoured gunboat) - the three Vixen-type
armoured gunboats were odd enough in all conscience - one of those doomed
attempts at the smallest armoured warship, but the double-ended,
waterjet-propelled Waterwitch seems to have been an especially dubious
purchase, more to do with an odd hull form than her propulsion system. A
gunboat intended to fight in confined water which can't manoever is a Bad
Thing (TM).
Any of the three US spar-torpedo vessels (Sputyen Duyvil, Alarm,
Intrepid) of the 1864-1874 period. Spar torpedoes were never a good idea
(particularly from the end-user perspective) but these three seem to have
been especially vile jobs.
The Japanese Matsushima/Itsukushima type protected cruisers
with the big Canet 12.6" which fired a round roughly once
a fortnight and might hit something once in the ship's lifetime, if the
gunnery officer were especially good and lucky. Why, dear $DEITY, why?
The German Brummer class armoured steamers of 1884, best
described as the result of a torpedo boat being molested
by a Rendel flatiron. High-speed attack craft armed with a
single big gun point forwards. Minus the gun, they seem to
have made reasonable fishery protection craft..
The Austrian corvette Donau: Right - it's 1894. You've just built a
fully-rigged sailing steam frigate. Nice one, lads..
<WHACK>
The French Tonnerre/Tempete classes of monitors (1879). The superstucture
was 8' wide to allow the turret to fire on an after
bearing. Yeah. Right. Somewhere I've seen a picture
of one with 20' of superstructure missing and the bridge
dangling over the void after someone tried. Horrible.
The Italian non-ironclad Conte Verdi (1871), which had *wooden*
"armour". Excuse me, but why? Missing the point,
or what?
The Greek armoured ships of the Spetsei class have to be
in there somewhere, if only for the odd two-story gun battery with the
bridge perched atop it and the belt cunningly placed below the
waterline. 1889, which is
too late to be easily excused.
There are some other oddities that spring to mind, but most were
improvisations or wartime lash-ups, and therefore have more excuse. Few of
the above do.
--
Andy Breen ~ Speaking for myself, not the University of Wales
"your suggestion rates at four monkeys for six weeks"
(Peter D. Rieden)
Isaac Kuo
> What about some of the Civil War ironclads? Manasas - hardly any
> armour, almost submerged, hardly any armament, and a ram, for example.
I'm surprised no one has mentioned the Civil War ironclad USS Keokuk
(Moodna), one of only two ironclads ever to be sunk by gunfire.
Her weirdest feature was her ineffective armor--alternating planks
of wood and iron! Admittedly, Civil War availability of iron armor
plate was limited, but this was truly a bizarre case of half of
something being worse than nothing at all. It's not surprising that
in action her armor was ineffective and she ended up riddled with
penetrating hits. What's surprising is that the concept ever left
the drawing board.
She was also strange in that her twin casemate layout combined the
disadvantages of both turrets and casemates without any of the
benefits of either. Each casemates, as big as any turret, was only
big enough for one 11" smoothbore. Thus, the total armament was
actually no better than the single turret monitors! Furthermore,
the guns had extremely limited fields of fire due to the gunports
(3 ports each set at 90 degrees for sideways and fore/aft fire).
But hey, at least she didn't have twin paddlewheels immediately
one in front of the other...
Isaac Kuo
Dott. PIergiorgio
> The Japanese Matsushima/Itsukushima type protected cruisers
> with the big Canet 12.6" which fired a round roughly once
> a fortnight and might hit something once in the ship's lifetime, if the
> gunnery officer were especially good and lucky. Why, dear $DEITY, why?
Firstly, if you think the guns on the Matsushima class was slow, look at the
time needed to load the ML behemoth guns on Duilio and Dandolo: 15 minutes!
Also, The Matsushima class was used well at the Yalu battle, and their
exceptional acheviememt is evidenced by the fact that the prize ship Chen
Yuen fought well in the new hands at Tsushima.
Dott. PIergiorgio
> The Italian non-ironclad Conte Verdi (1871), which had wooden
> "armour". Excuse me, but why? Missing the point,
> or what?
Ehm... The unarmoured ship of the Principe di Carignano class was the
Principe Umberto, whose was left unarmoured and was used as normal frigate.
The PdC class was converted steam frigates, along the line of US frigates (a
legacy of the Decatur squadron; i'm working on a post on this) and in three
ships out of four was putted armour in different pattern for each ship; in
fact, they was test-bed for armour layout.
Last thing: the correct name of this ship is "Conte Verde" the Musician
Verdi was never ennobled.
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
Dott. PIergiorgio <pg...@libero.it> wrote:
>ANDREW ROBERT BREEN wrote:
>
>> The Japanese Matsushima/Itsukushima type protected cruisers
>> with the big Canet 12.6" which fired a round roughly once
>> a fortnight and might hit something once in the ship's lifetime, if the
>> gunnery officer were especially good and lucky. Why, dear $DEITY, why?
>
>Firstly, if you think the guns on the Matsushima class was slow, look at the
>time needed to load the ML behemoth guns on Duilio and Dandolo: 15 minutes!
Dandolo and Duilio were, hoever, pretty well protected. The Matsushimas
were not. This is not a good thing if tt'other fellow is shooting back.
>Also, The Matsushima class was used well at the Yalu battle, and their
Their 4.7" QF guns were useful, yes, but the Canets might as well have
not been there. A waste of time, space, weight and crew - and an addition
of powder charges which very nearly did for Matsushima when she was
hit. With an all-4.7" armament (like Chiyoda) they would have been much
more useful.
The big-gun cruiser was, at its best, a dumb idea.
--
Andy Breen ~ Not speaking on behalf of the University of Wales....
Nieveler's law: "Any USENET thread, if sufficiently prolonged and not
Godwinated, will eventually turn into a discussion about
alcoholic drinks."
Dott. PIergiorgio
>
> Their 4.7" QF guns were useful, yes, but the Canets might as well have
> not been there. A waste of time, space, weight and crew - and an addition
> of powder charges which very nearly did for Matsushima when she was
> hit. With an all-4.7" armament (like Chiyoda) they would have been much
> more useful.
I agree on this, but I suspect that the big gun have also a good effect on
morale of the Japanese side, meaning that going against an adversary with
two BB, having ships with big guns surely put confidence along the Japanese
echelon.
Also, on this powder issue, the Matsushima blown up later with a great loss
of precious cadets :(
a...@a.com
ROBERT BREEN) wrote:
> or differed in where they were open or closed: Just what you want when
> fighting the nation which invented airbourne ASW tactics (Austria-Hungary)
> and was rather good at them..
Not a student of Big Mistake #1; can you supply any sources to read up
on Austro-Hungarian airbourne ASW?
Thanks much!
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
I've not come across a single good reference - what I've found out has
been culed from a variety of places. Certainly, though, the Austrians were
early starters with convoys (late 1915, for some reason, comes into my
head as the date) and by mid-1916 were using air patrols (naval flying
boats) to cover their convoys.
If I remember where I dug this info up then I'll post it.
Julian Barker
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN <a...@aber.ac.uk> wrote
>In article <a-9CAE44.22...@news.earthlink.net>, <a...@a.com> wrote:
>>In article <bgvjjs$cm7m$1...@central.aber.ac.uk>, a...@aber.ac.uk (ANDREW
>>ROBERT BREEN) wrote:
>>
>>> or differed in where they were open or closed: Just what you want when
>>> fighting the nation which invented airbourne ASW tactics (Austria-Hungary)
>>> and was rather good at them..
>>
>>Not a student of Big Mistake #1; can you supply any sources to read up
>>on Austro-Hungarian airbourne ASW?
>
>I've not come across a single good reference - what I've found out has
>been culed from a variety of places. Certainly, though, the Austrians were
>early starters with convoys (late 1915, for some reason, comes into my
>head as the date) and by mid-1916 were using air patrols (naval flying
>boats) to cover their convoys.
>
>If I remember where I dug this info up then I'll post it.
>
Alfred prices book, Aircraft versus Submarine covers the AH episodes.
http://www.bookfinder.com/search/?ac=sl&st=sl&qi=I8cAtlgNlmpWtN1HnxnrRKhw
Yi8_3028994105_2:19:76
--
Julian Barker
"Many battles have been fought and won by
soldiers nourished on beer,and the King does not
believe that coffee-drinking soldiers can be
relied upon to endure hardships in case of
another war."
Frederick the Great, 1777
Kristan Roberge
Andre Lieven wrote:
> "dwelsh46" (dwel...@cox.net) writes:
> > "Dott. PIergiorgio" <pg...@libero.it> wrote in message
> > news:m6XXa.228539$lK4.6...@twister1.libero.it...
> >> Time for a new poll.
> >> This time the question is : What was/is the most weird warship ?
> >
> > The dynamite cruiser USS Vesuvius ought to be a candidate. It certainly had
> > the strangest armament I've ever seen, and was virtually useless as a combat
> > vessel since it could not fire its pneumatic tubes at a moving target (range
> > wasn't very impressive, either). It had enough speed and radius to be useful
> > as a dispatch boat although it cost at least 3x what a purpose built
> > dispatch boat would have cost.
> >
> > Going back a little further, Fulton's Demologos is probably also worth
> > mentioning.
> >
> > Going forward a bit, here are some candidates I'd like to get other opinions
> > on:
>
> OK.
>
> > HMS Furious (the light battlecruiser version, 2x18 inch and probably
> > incapable of fighting a light cruiser)
>
> Indeed. One could get off on a rant here, about such ships showing
> the fallicy of trying to fit two, or more, vastly different *and*
> competing jobs into one hull.
>
> So, fitting a modern destroyer with a hangar and a pair of helos
> isn't a competing task, wrt her other weapons and sensor systems,
> but trying to make a 31 knot ship be a stout monitor is.
>
> > HIJMS Ise and Hyuga (hybrid carrier version)
>
> The same comment here. This competition of non-convergent tasks
> also explains who no one else went for a battleship/carrier combo,
> in spite of many designs, from the RN 16 inch battleship/carrier
> to the pre WW2 USN light cruiser/carrier type.
Apparently no one doesn't include the soviet navy, or are we forgetting
that that heavy anti-ship missile armament of the Kiev's put them well into
cruiser
category for firepower. And which pre-WW2 USN light cruiser/carrier type are you
referring to? Saratoga and Lexington, having those four twin-8" guns, and at 47k
tons
they were hardly light-anything, plus armored to a battlecruiser scale.and
carrying some
70+ aircraft. They at least put the turrets high up on the island where they'd be
useful if
needed (not down low or in casements like the japanese did).
> It always pays to split up such competing roles, which is also
> why you don't see many navies staying with half cruiser/half carrier
> type ships. For instance, the Italians went from the two Doria missile
> cruisers, to a more air capable, but otherwise similar ship, Veneto, yet
> chose to follow that with a full carrier design, Garibaldi, while
> placing the missile taskings onto destroyers.
the Garibaldi still carries missiles actually having 8 Otomak Mk2s, not
to mention she also has 2 triple 12.75" ASW torpedo tubes as well. She also
has a pair of 250-man launches for SAR, Amphibious assault, logistics, disaster
relief, etc (in addition to the standard carrier fare of CIWS and SAMs).
Kristan Roberge
of packing larger and larger calibers of anti-tank and anti-bomber
guns on their aircraft. I seem to recall they even planned to hang a
monster 128mm recoiless gun under a Stuka at some point. Of
course the problem with recoiless guns on aircraft was that invaribly
they were single-shot weapons. Really they would have been better
off fitting aircraft with semi/full automatic taper-bore guns as they had
the muzzle velocity to make swiss-cheese out of most tanks, with hardly
anymore recoil effects to deal with. But since they used Tungsten
penetrators
at a time when tungsten was in short supply...
Kristan Roberge
period that had subs
tried it at least once. The french and germans included observation
planes into theirs and
the japanese managed to squeeze in a catapult for launching scout
planes.
Kristan Roberge
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN wrote:
Did they have some way to pump out the barrel as the muzzle clears the water?
Shooting
thru water is really gonna muck up the muzzle velocity. Plus how do you reload
the damn thing
while the breech is below the waterline?
Julian Barker
Kristan Roberge <krob...@ca.inter.net> wrote
>The luftwaffe also used similar recoilless guns in WW2 as a means
>of packing larger and larger calibers of anti-tank and anti-bomber
>guns on their aircraft. I seem to recall they even planned to hang a
>monster 128mm recoiless gun under a Stuka at some point. Of
>course the problem with recoiless guns on aircraft was that invaribly
>they were single-shot weapons. Really they would have been better
>off fitting aircraft with semi/full automatic taper-bore guns as they had
>the muzzle velocity to make swiss-cheese out of most tanks, with hardly
>anymore recoil effects to deal with. But since they used Tungsten
>penetrators
>at a time when tungsten was in short supply...
>
>ken...@cix.compulink.co.uk wrote:
>
I have not heard of 128mm guns, but some Hs129s were fitted with a 75mm
gun that had IIRC eight rounds. It was used operationally in the East. A
128mm would seem overkill as the 75mm gun could destroy all Russian
tanks used a the time.
http://www.simviation.com/fsdcbainhs129.htm
Kristan Roberge
right now but the Junkers Ju88P-1 was produced in a version carrying the
Pak40L
75mm gun (at least 40 produced) and at least one example of the Ju88P-4
carried
a 65mm solid-fuel rocket launcher with a 22 round magazine (instead of a 50mm
Bk5 gun
normally carried) and it was planned to mount a 88mm Duka 8.8 U-boat gun on
the P-4s
as well but none reached operational units. Ahh found the reference... let's
see, the british
experimentally fitted a 32 pdr (94mm) into a Mosquito. In the recoilless arena
the germans had
PLANNED (never actually did it) to fit the Gerat 104 to aircraft, which was a
350mm recoilless
gun firing a 1400 pound AP shell )the cartridge case weighed the same and thus
served as
the countershot itself) in a bid to go after the home fleet at Scapa Flow.
Later they DID actually fit
a 540mm Munchausen cannon to a Junkers Ju87 Stuka but apparently the
unpredictable effects of
firing such a large gun, recoilless or not, from such a small aircraft led to
the project being cancelled.
BF Lake
"Kristan Roberge" <krob...@ca.inter.net> wrote
snip of various WW2 aircraft guns. There was a recoilless artillery piece
in WW2
http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/r1/recoille.asp
which vents the gas,
but the WW1 Janes mentioned a Davis recoilless gun which was aided by
tracers ( USN gunnery table)
Ken thought it must be an aircraft anti -Zeppelin gun . A wade through
some sites turns up this about the early days of USN flying---October 1912,
3--The Davis recoilless aircraft gun was given initial tests at Naval
Proving Ground, Indian Head. This gun was designed by Commander Cleland
Davis to fire a large caliber shell from aircraft.
http://www.history.navy.mil/branches/avchr1.htm
Regards,
Barry
Tony Williams
The Davis guns (in 2, 6 and 12 pdr) plus a whole load of other WW1+
aircraft cannon, with be dealt with in detail in 'Flying Guns: World
War 1' due out in November. They were intended for use both against
Zeppelins and against ground and naval (eg surfaced submarine)
targets. However, they saw very little use because the backblast
caused major problems to the fragile aircraft structures of the day.
Tony Williams
Military gun and ammunition website: http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk
Military gun and ammunition discussion forum:
http://forums.delphiforums.com/autogun/messages/
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
>> yards, poking the muzzle out, sighting in, opening the tompion and BLOMP.
>> First round hit pretty much a certainty, and no water down the hatch.
>> Lack of suitable targets is about the only major objection to the attack
>> plan, though if you can do it in an ordinary boat (at the cost of getting
>> wet) it's hard to see the need for a specialist.
>
>Did they have some way to pump out the barrel as the muzzle clears the water?
>Shooting
>thru water is really gonna muck up the muzzle velocity. Plus how do you reload
The tompion sealed the barrel - allegedly - until just before firing, when
it was released (swung to one side, I think) - so the barrel should have
been dry. In practice the tompion leaked, and blowing the end off the
barrel was not uncommon. At the ranges envisaged this didn't matter
overmuch as the unexpected arrival of 12" HE from a hundred yards or so
off was likely to fluster the most phelgmatic.
>the damn thing
>while the breech is below the waterline?
The gun was re-loaded on the surface. The isea seems to have been that
if you weren't going to use torpedoes to follow up, then you came to
surface immediately on firing, presumably with gun-crew coming to station
as the boat broke sirface (as in Brown's account of how the A-boats
did it). With ready-use ammunition in watertight lockers in the gun-house
I'd reckon the second round could be on its way within a couple of minutes
of surfacing, probably less.
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
Peter McLelland
"ANDREW ROBERT BREEN" <a...@aber.ac.uk> wrote in message
news:bh0cpv$efn3$1...@central.aber.ac.uk...
> In article <s0NYa.233246$lK4.6...@twister1.libero.it>,
> Dott. PIergiorgio <pg...@libero.it> wrote:
> >Andy Dingley wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> If we're counting subs, then surely the K class were weirder than
> >> Surcouf
> >
> >But the top weirdo for me is that M1 or X1 (don't remembre well), with a
12"
> >gun whose was intended to fire when the sub is emerging only with the
> >muzzle and the tip of the conn above water....
>
> Given RN tactics for the use of submarine guns, it almost makes sense
> - there's an excellent description in Brown's "Nelson to Vanguard" of
> gunnery trials in a A-boat he served in just post-war (the champion
> gunnery submarine in the fleet), where they came to periscope depth,
> sighted in, closed to a couple of hundred yards off the stern of the
> target (where any defensive gun would be mounted on a merchant ship)
> and began to surface - at the same time as which the biggest blokes
> in the boat would open the forward hatch - they reckoned to get a
> couple of tons of water down the hatch at this stage - and the gun
> crew would pile out - a first-round hit was generally a certainty.
>
Whilst certainly 'surface gun action' from a submarine such as an 'A' boat
was a speedy affair, the gun tower hatch was typically opened when it was
some 10 ft below the surface, aided by a good bit of overpressure in the
boat which also kept some of the water out, it would be very rare for the
first shot to go near the target, Each of the crew carried a round, and the
first up was the gun trainer, who loaded his round, and jumped into his
seat, and pressed the fire button and started traversing the gun, the gun
layer would do the same, and the expectation was that the gun captain, the
third member of the team would load the first effective round. The gun
barrel was very liberally greased and required one or two shots to clear it
before the gun functioned properly.
I never served on a boat with a 4 inch gun, but was present at the second
last 'surface gun action' which was carried out by Andrew, the very last
occasion was reserved for VIPs, and I was just a lowly staff officer.
I did however serve on a 'P' boat with a 20mm Oerlikon.
Peter
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
Peter McLelland <peter.m...@nospambae.com> wrote:
>
>"ANDREW ROBERT BREEN" <a...@aber.ac.uk> wrote in message
>> - there's an excellent description in Brown's "Nelson to Vanguard" of
>> gunnery trials in a A-boat he served in just post-war (the champion
>> gunnery submarine in the fleet), where they came to periscope depth,
>I never served on a boat with a 4 inch gun, but was present at the second
>last 'surface gun action' which was carried out by Andrew, the very last
>occasion was reserved for VIPs, and I was just a lowly staff officer.
One of the earlier ships I got taken around was Andrew, shortly before
she was decommissioned..
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
Peter McLelland <peter.m...@nospambae.com> wrote:
>
>news:bh0cpv$efn3$1...@central.aber.ac.uk...
>> in the boat would open the forward hatch - they reckoned to get a
>> couple of tons of water down the hatch at this stage - and the gun
>> crew would pile out - a first-round hit was generally a certainty.
>>
>Good to see your comments flowing freely again Andy.
Good to be in a position to do so!
>Whilst certainly 'surface gun action' from a submarine such as an 'A' boat
>was a speedy affair, the gun tower hatch was typically opened when it was
>some 10 ft below the surface, aided by a good bit of overpressure in the
>boat which also kept some of the water out, it would be very rare for the
>first shot to go near the target, Each of the crew carried a round, and the
>first up was the gun trainer, who loaded his round, and jumped into his
>seat, and pressed the fire button and started traversing the gun, the gun
>layer would do the same, and the expectation was that the gun captain, the
>third member of the team would load the first effective round. The gun
>barrel was very liberally greased and required one or two shots to clear it
>before the gun functioned properly.
Thanks for this input - the line about "first rouind hit" comes from
Brown, so I'm disinclined to argue...
:)
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
Andrew Chaplin
> One of the earlier ships I got taken around was Andrew, shortly before
> she was decommissioned..
Was ANDREW named for Captain Andrew Millar of notorious press gang
efficiency?
--
Andrew Chaplin
SIT MIHI GLADIUS SICUT SANCTO MARTINO
(If you're going to e-mail me, you'll have to get "yourfinger." out.)
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
Andrew Chaplin <abch...@yourfinger.rogers.com> wrote:
>ANDREW ROBERT BREEN wrote:
>
>> One of the earlier ships I got taken around was Andrew, shortly before
>> she was decommissioned..
>
>Was ANDREW named for Captain Andrew Millar of notorious press gang
>efficiency?
Story I was told was that it was for The Andrew, thus emcompassing the
whole Navy. Suspect I was being told stories to, though..
Peter McLelland
> In article <3F379715...@yourfinger.rogers.com>,
> Andrew Chaplin <abch...@yourfinger.rogers.com> wrote:
> >ANDREW ROBERT BREEN wrote:
> >
> >> One of the earlier ships I got taken around was Andrew, shortly before
> >> she was decommissioned..
> >
> >Was ANDREW named for Captain Andrew Millar of notorious press gang
> >efficiency?
>
> Story I was told was that it was for The Andrew, thus emcompassing the
> whole Navy. Suspect I was being told stories to, though..
>
fact that most of the crews were pressed by said Andrew Millar.
Peter
Peter McLelland
to agree.
Peter
Andrew Chaplin
Well, then I had a namesake that was a ship -- my parents had me
christened "Andrew" because my father was conscripted into the RN.
Dott. PIergiorgio
>
> Finally found a photograph...
Traumatic eh? a round warship.. This REALLY kill the weak an drive mad the
strong ;)
Richard Casady
<krob...@ca.inter.net> wrote:
Massive Snip
>the Garibaldi still carries missiles actually having 8 Otomak Mk2s, not
>to mention she also has 2 triple 12.75" ASW torpedo tubes as well. She also
>has a pair of 250-man launches for SAR, Amphibious assault, logistics, disaster
>relief, etc (in addition to the standard carrier fare of CIWS and SAMs).
If you put "otomak" into a search engine, it tells you to try
"otomat". The missile has a 210 kg warhead, and will skim the sea for
up to 80 miles. It has INS, GPS all modern conveniences. Terminal
active radar. Data link back to the ship. Sucker seems to have it all.
Or so the website would have it, and there doesnt seem to be too much
salesman's puff.
http://www.deagel.com/Anti-Ship-Missiles/Otomat-Mk2-Block-IV_a001120001.aspx
Casady
Richard Casady
<krob...@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>Really they would have been better
>off fitting aircraft with semi/full automatic taper-bore guns as they had
>the muzzle velocity to make swiss-cheese out of most tanks, with hardly
>anymore recoil effects to deal with. But since they used Tungsten
>penetrators
>at a time when tungsten was in short supply...
Rudel killed more than 500 tanks, mostly with ordinary 37mm guns
mounted on a Stuka. Semi auto, five rounds carried per gun. One gun
under each wing. One must remember that a dive bomber gets to shoot at
the thin top armor. He aimed at the engine, I believe.
Casady
Eugene Griessel
An answer to a 4 year old message. Wow. Impressive. Almost as good
as a time machine.
Eugene L Griessel
I live in my own little world... but that's okay.
I know everyone there.
- I usually post only from Sci.Military.Naval -
La N
"Eugene Griessel" <eugene@dynagen..co..za> wrote in message
news:4750345...@news.uunet.co.za...
> richar...@earthlink.net (Richard Casady) wrote:
>
>>On Sun, 10 Aug 2003 21:28:51 GMT, Kristan Roberge
>><krob...@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>>
>>>Really they would have been better
>>>off fitting aircraft with semi/full automatic taper-bore guns as they had
>>>the muzzle velocity to make swiss-cheese out of most tanks, with hardly
>>>anymore recoil effects to deal with. But since they used Tungsten
>>>penetrators
>>>at a time when tungsten was in short supply...
>>
>>Rudel killed more than 500 tanks, mostly with ordinary 37mm guns
>>mounted on a Stuka. Semi auto, five rounds carried per gun. One gun
>>under each wing. One must remember that a dive bomber gets to shoot at
>>the thin top armor. He aimed at the engine, I believe.
>
> An answer to a 4 year old message. Wow. Impressive. Almost as good
> as a time machine.
>
>
A minor nit, since I'm currently doing some editing work while sick at home.
It would be "weirdest warship", not "most weird warship".
Carry on ... ;)
- nil
Eugene Griessel
A major nit - he's not even discussing warships. Not even
battleships. Or concrete foists. Or supersonic hydrofoils.
Come back Cantspellwell - all is forgiven ....
Eugene L Griessel
The Last Law of Product Design: If you can't fix it, feature it.
La N
"Eugene Griessel" <eugene@dynagen..co..za> wrote in message
Shush! You might invoke that underwear guy again!
Richard Casady
<krob...@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>they were hardly light-anything, plus armored to a battlecruiser scale.and
>carrying some
Light refers to caliber of guns, not weight of hull. We build 6 inch
and 8 inch cruisers to the same 10 000 ton treaty limit. We built '
light fleet carriers ' on cruiser hulls. One third the air group of an
Essex made them light, but they were as fast as one and with some
armor. Not to be confused with escort carriers of similar tonnage, but
on merchant hulls. To digress, my uncle, who server on one, said that
CVE stood for Combustable,Vulnerable,Expendable.
Casady
Ray O'Hara
"Richard Casady" <richar...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:ahmol5tumm7e0vt38...@4ax.com...
the weirdest warships were those round{like a plate} Russian battleships.
Eugene Griessel
I wonder if it's really fair to call these things battleships as that
was never their intended role (woefully bad as they were at fulfilling
any role other than oddity). More like large monitors. What were
they, around 2500 tons?
Eugene L Griessel
The biggest liar in the world is: 'They Say'.
- I post only from Sci.Military.Naval -
William Black
"Ray O'Hara" <raymon...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:hjhslb$mtn$1...@news.eternal-september.org...
Oh I don't know...
They at least both made it to sea in their original design form and didn't
sink in reasonably calm weather...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Furious_(47)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Captain_(1869)
When you're way out in front sometimes it's difficult to see where the next
turn is...
--
William Black
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Barbeques on fire by the chalets past the castle headland
I watched the gift shops glitter in the darkness off the Newborough gate
All these moments will be lost in time, like icecream on the beach
Time for tea.
Andrew Robert Breen
Richard Casady <richar...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>On Sun, 10 Aug 2003 21:02:45 GMT, Kristan Roberge
><krob...@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>
>>they were hardly light-anything, plus armored to a battlecruiser scale.and
>>carrying some
>
>Light refers to caliber of guns, not weight of hull. We build 6 inch
Ahem. It originally stood for armouring scheme, as witness the Wierd
Sisters (Courageous, Glorious and Furious[1]) being "large-light cruisers"
and the Raleigh class "Heavy light cruisers" - this to show their
design descent (and relationj in armour scheme) to light cruisers
as opposed to the old armoured cruisers.
"Heavy cruisers" (8" guns) were a product of the Washington Treaty,
by which time the old armoured cruisers (CAs, to the USN) were all
but gone. Everything else stayed as "Light cruisers".
[1] AKA Outrageous, Curious and Spurious.
--
Andy Breen ~ Not speaking on behalf of the University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Feng Shui: an ancient oriental art for extracting
money from the gullible (Martin Sinclair)
Andrew Robert Breen
Coast defence ships - a common breed at the time - and, indeed, one that persisted: the
Finns and the Thais both went for new designs of coast defence ship in the 1930s, and
the Swedes spent serious money on updating theirs. Not that they did well as a breed
during BM2: the Thais lost both of theirs (IIRC), one to a French cruiser force, and
the Finns lost theirs too. Most of the other coast defence ships active in 1939
(Norwegian, Danish, Dutch..) ended up as German flak ships or were sunk. Small
armoured ships didn't have a lot of bouyancy reserve and were vunerable to underwater
attack or bombing.
dott.Piergiorgio
> I wonder if it's really fair to call these things battleships as that
> was never their intended role (woefully bad as they were at fulfilling
> any role other than oddity). More like large monitors. What were
> they, around 2500 tons?
this was the actual classification of many predreadnought-era ships
intended for mobile coast defence: Coast defense Battleship. This type
sacrificed everything for big guns and decent enough armour. Their
demise was because of lack of reserve buoyancy and torpedo protection.
Best regards from Italy,
Dott. Piergiorgio.
Eugene Griessel
Breen) wrote:
>In article <ahmol5tumm7e0vt38...@4ax.com>,
>Richard Casady <richar...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>On Sun, 10 Aug 2003 21:02:45 GMT, Kristan Roberge
>><krob...@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>>
>>>they were hardly light-anything, plus armored to a battlecruiser scale.and
>>>carrying some
>>
>>Light refers to caliber of guns, not weight of hull. We build 6 inch
>
>Ahem. It originally stood for armouring scheme, as witness the Wierd
>Sisters (Courageous, Glorious and Furious[1]) being "large-light cruisers"
>and the Raleigh class "Heavy light cruisers" - this to show their
>design descent (and relationj in armour scheme) to light cruisers
>as opposed to the old armoured cruisers.
>
>"Heavy cruisers" (8" guns) were a product of the Washington Treaty,
>by which time the old armoured cruisers (CAs, to the USN) were all
>but gone. Everything else stayed as "Light cruisers".
>
>[1] AKA Outrageous, Curious and Spurious.
At least the were handsome looking ships (as originally built),
despite their other failings ... Furious may have qualified in the
"weird" category in one of her mid-life guises to being a full carrier
though .
Eugene L Griessel
Unfortunately, the crud passed off as 'Operating Systems' for 90% of
the desktop market basically spread their legs and scream INFECT ME!
CRASH ME! CORRUPT ME!
Ray O'Hara
"William Black" <willia...@hotmail.co.uk> wrote in message
news:hjhu9r$tfb$1...@news.eternal-september.org...
they were just badly designed conventional ships.
nothing weird about them.
Eugene Griessel
All my literature merely says "Coastal Defence Ships". The term
"battleship" as applied to a heavily armoured and heavily armed
ironclad seem to postdate, in the English speaking world at any rate,
these Russian monstrosities. (Not describing their size, only their
weirdness!)
Eugene L Griessel
Exploitation and government are two inseparable expressions of politics.
tankfixer
dott.Pierg...@KAIGUN.fastwebnet.it says...
The USS Oregon was very much this sort of ship.
Yet even with her low freeboard she made a trip round the Horn in time
to be present in assisting with the destruction of the Spanish fleet off
Cuba
tankfixer
>
> In article <ahmol5tumm7e0vt38...@4ax.com>,
> Richard Casady <richar...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> >On Sun, 10 Aug 2003 21:02:45 GMT, Kristan Roberge
> ><krob...@ca.inter.net> wrote:
> >
> >>they were hardly light-anything, plus armored to a battlecruiser scale.and
> >>carrying some
> >
> >Light refers to caliber of guns, not weight of hull. We build 6 inch
>
> Ahem. It originally stood for armouring scheme, as witness the Wierd
> Sisters (Courageous, Glorious and Furious[1]) being "large-light cruisers"
> and the Raleigh class "Heavy light cruisers" - this to show their
> design descent (and relationj in armour scheme) to light cruisers
> as opposed to the old armoured cruisers.
>
> "Heavy cruisers" (8" guns) were a product of the Washington Treaty,
> by which time the old armoured cruisers (CAs, to the USN) were all
> but gone. Everything else stayed as "Light cruisers".
I had understood that part of the reason for 8 inchs as the maximum gun
was the Hawkins class the RN was just finishing..
The old armored cruisers in USN service were about done, the only new
ships built at that point were the Ohmaha's with too many 6 inch guns on
a smallish hull..
Andrew Robert Breen
tankfixer <paul.c...@gmail.com> wrote:
>In article <Ee%6n.95047$813....@tornado.fastwebnet.it>,
>dott.Pierg...@KAIGUN.fastwebnet.it says...
>>
>> Eugene Griessel ha scritto:
>>
>> > I wonder if it's really fair to call these things battleships as that
>> > was never their intended role (woefully bad as they were at fulfilling
>> > any role other than oddity). More like large monitors. What were
>> > they, around 2500 tons?
>>
>> this was the actual classification of many predreadnought-era ships
>> intended for mobile coast defence: Coast defense Battleship. This type
>> sacrificed everything for big guns and decent enough armour. Their
>> demise was because of lack of reserve buoyancy and torpedo protection.
>
>The USS Oregon was very much this sort of ship.
Oregon was about 10000 tons, not 2500. A battleship, albeit a limited and
dated one, rather than a CDB. Certainly not anomalous when compared with
the (rather earlier) RN Admiral class.
>Yet even with her low freeboard she made a trip round the Horn in time
>to be present in assisting with the destruction of the Spanish fleet off
>Cuba
Given that she wasn't a CDB, this is hardly world-shattering. After all,
even CDBs could round the Horn (how did you think Huascar reached Peru, or
Cochrane and her sister got to Chile?), and even a proper paving-slab of a
CDB like BelleIsle could be taken out to the Far East (in 1878, IIRC: one
of the Russian war scares), and get there before a Russian cruiser could.
Hell, the USN got a monitor across the Atlantic in the 1860s (admittedly,
they had to tow it)..
guy
> In article <39bu27xcb7....@news.aber.ac.uk>, a...@aber.ac.uk says...
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> > In article <ahmol5tumm7e0vt387tq1e33q6p3u1a...@4ax.com>,
> > Richard Casady <richardcas...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> > >On Sun, 10 Aug 2003 21:02:45 GMT, Kristan Roberge
> > ><krobe...@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>
> > >>they were hardly light-anything, plus armored to a battlecruiser scale.and
> > >>carrying some
>
> > >Light refers to caliber of guns, not weight of hull. We build 6 inch
>
> > Ahem. It originally stood for armouring scheme, as witness the Wierd
> > Sisters (Courageous, Glorious and Furious[1]) being "large-light cruisers"
> > and the Raleigh class "Heavy light cruisers" - this to show their
> > design descent (and relationj in armour scheme) to light cruisers
> > as opposed to the old armoured cruisers.
>
> > "Heavy cruisers" (8" guns) were a product of the Washington Treaty,
> > by which time the old armoured cruisers (CAs, to the USN) were all
> > but gone. Everything else stayed as "Light cruisers".
>
> I had understood that part of the reason for 8 inchs as the maximum gun
> was the Hawkins class the RN was just finishing..
> The old armored cruisers in USN service were about done, the only new
> ships built at that point were the Ohmaha's with too many 6 inch guns on
> a smallish hull..
>
>
>
>
>
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
If that was the case why was the limit not 7.5"?
AFAIK some of the old US armoured cruisers lasted into the '30s
Guy
guy
> In article <ahmol5tumm7e0vt387tq1e33q6p3u1a...@4ax.com>,
Thinks - how much better would Courageous / Glorious have been with
Furious's 5.5" secondary battery ? Big Difference
Guy
j...@cix.compulink.co.uk
<39efc483-826a-4616...@21g2000yqj.googlegroups.com>,
guyswe...@googlemail.com (guy) wrote:
> Thinks - how much better would Courageous / Glorious have been with
> Furious's 5.5" secondary battery ? Big Difference
Not enough better to make them worth keeping as "Large Light Cruisers"
rather than converting them to carriers.
--
John Dallman, j...@cix.co.uk, HTML mail is treated as probable spam.
Richard Casady
Breen) wrote:
>Given that she wasn't a CDB, this is hardly world-shattering. After all,
>even CDBs could round the Horn
It is always referred to as ' rounding the Horn ', but how many
actually take the Magellan Strait?
William Hamblen
<guyswe...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>On 25 Jan, 01:20, tankfixer <paul.carr...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> In article <39bu27xcb7....@news.aber.ac.uk>, a...@aber.ac.uk says...
>>
>>
>> I had understood that part of the reason for 8 inchs as the maximum gun
>> was the Hawkins class the RN was just finishing..
>>
>
>If that was the case why was the limit not 7.5"?
>AFAIK some of the old US armoured cruisers lasted into the '30s
The US didn't have any 7.5" guns. There were some 8" gun projects
neing developed.
Bud
Andrew Robert Breen
Peter Skelton
Breen) wrote:
>In article <ggurl5tqe8lisiq4f...@4ax.com>,
>Richard Casady <richar...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>On Mon, 25 Jan 2010 11:59:32 +0000, a...@aber.ac.uk (Andrew Robert
>>Breen) wrote:
>>
>>>Given that she wasn't a CDB, this is hardly world-shattering. After all,
>>>even CDBs could round the Horn
>>
>>It is always referred to as ' rounding the Horn ', but how many
>>actually take the Magellan Strait?
>
>I'd imagine "anyone with a brain"...
Since Panama opened, there's seldom been reason for a ship to go
through Magellan. Anything handy enough to handle Magellan is
small enough to go by way of Panama.
(Magellan is nasty but, before Panama steamships used it. The
Great White Fleet, for example went that way.)
Peter Skelton
Richard Casady
wrote:
>On Mon, 25 Jan 2010 22:50:46 +0000, a...@aber.ac.uk (Andrew Robert
>Breen) wrote:
>
>>In article <ggurl5tqe8lisiq4f...@4ax.com>,
>>Richard Casady <richar...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>>On Mon, 25 Jan 2010 11:59:32 +0000, a...@aber.ac.uk (Andrew Robert
>>>Breen) wrote:
>>>
>>>>Given that she wasn't a CDB, this is hardly world-shattering. After all,
>>>>even CDBs could round the Horn
>>>
>>>It is always referred to as ' rounding the Horn ', but how many
>>>actually take the Magellan Strait?
>>
>>I'd imagine "anyone with a brain"...
>
>Since Panama opened, there's seldom been reason for a ship to go
>through Magellan. Anything handy enough to handle Magellan is
>small enough to go by way of Panama.
>
>(Magellan is nasty but, before Panama steamships used it. The
>Great White Fleet, for example went that way.)
My parents went part way through, and then back to the Atlantic side,
on a cruise ship.
Casady
tankfixer
@h34g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>, guyswe...@googlemail.com says...
I would have to go back and reread about the negotiations leading up to
the treaty.
Some of thos old cruisers had 10 inch main guns too, IIRC..
tankfixer
richar...@earthlink.net says...
The Oregon's transit around south america was faster than the USN or the
Spanish expected.
Andrew Robert Breen
Peter Skelton <skel...@cogeco.ca> wrote:
>On Mon, 25 Jan 2010 22:50:46 +0000, a...@aber.ac.uk (Andrew Robert
>Breen) wrote:
>
>>In article <ggurl5tqe8lisiq4f...@4ax.com>,
>>Richard Casady <richar...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>>On Mon, 25 Jan 2010 11:59:32 +0000, a...@aber.ac.uk (Andrew Robert
>>>Breen) wrote:
>>>
>>>>Given that she wasn't a CDB, this is hardly world-shattering. After all,
>>>>even CDBs could round the Horn
>>>
>>>It is always referred to as ' rounding the Horn ', but how many
>>>actually take the Magellan Strait?
>>
>>I'd imagine "anyone with a brain"...
>
>Since Panama opened, there's seldom been reason for a ship to go
>through Magellan. Anything handy enough to handle Magellan is
>small enough to go by way of Panama.
F'sure, but there haven't been that many CDBs built or active since Panama
opened, aside from the Thai pair and the various Baltic/Scandinavian
ships, of course, and I don't think that global Swedish strategic
interests ever required passage around the Horn ;)
Andrew Robert Breen
And Belleisle (a real ugly-mug of a CDB, and one of the few shipe
aesthetically improved by being used as a heavy-gun target..) made
it out to the far East faster than anyone expected...
I'm sure there's a point lurking here somehwere, but I'm damned if I can
see it.
tankfixer
>
> In article <MPG.25c827e...@news.bytemine.net>,
> tankfixer <paul.c...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >In article <ggurl5tqe8lisiq4f...@4ax.com>,
> >richar...@earthlink.net says...
> >>
> >> On Mon, 25 Jan 2010 11:59:32 +0000, a...@aber.ac.uk (Andrew Robert
> >> Breen) wrote:
> >>
> >> >Given that she wasn't a CDB, this is hardly world-shattering. After all,
> >> >even CDBs could round the Horn
> >>
> >> It is always referred to as ' rounding the Horn ', but how many
> >> actually take the Magellan Strait?
> >
> >The Oregon's transit around south america was faster than the USN or the
> >Spanish expected.
>
> And Belleisle (a real ugly-mug of a CDB, and one of the few shipe
> aesthetically improved by being used as a heavy-gun target..) made
> it out to the far East faster than anyone expected...
>
> I'm sure there's a point lurking here somehwere, but I'm damned if I can
> see it.
I guess the point is that Oregon made what was a rather quick passage
for that time period and arrived able to enter battle not long after
arrival off Cuba
mike
> In article <net237xru2....@news.aber.ac.uk>, a...@aber.ac.uk says...
> > I'm sure there's a point lurking here somehwere, but I'm damned if I can
> > see it.
>
> I guess the point is that Oregon made what was a rather quick passage
> for that time period and arrived able to enter battle not long after
> arrival off Cuba
Design Speed 15.5 knots
Trial Speed 16.7 knots
14,000+ miles in 66 days averaging 11.5 knots a day,
with no major breakdowns, and not much time for Boiler
or hull scraping before joining the Blockade.
During the chase with the newish Spanish armored cruiser Cristobal
Colon, launched 1896, she exceeded her trial speed for near an
hour before the Spanish Captain had enough, and run his ship
ashore as Oregon closed.
**
mike
**
Eugene Griessel
wrote:
It's always a pleasure when a ship handsomely exceeds her design
speed! In fact I have heard that some yards actually charge/used to
charge a sort of "penalty" per knot that their ship exceeds design
speed on trials. Dunno how true this is!
Eugene L Griessel
Lysdexia: a peech imspediment we live to learn with...