A Better Rifle at Halloween

von Motke
21st August 1914, Coblenz.

Colonel General Helmuth von Motke was worried, he had just replaced Karl Von Bulow as the commander of the 2nd Army with Paul von Hindenburg. Von Bulow had failed to capture Liege and so the attack into Belgium was still hung up on the fortress. The attempt by Erich Ludendorff to lead a night attack by one of the infantry brigades had been a disaster, thousands of men had died in the failed assault. Ludendorff had not been killed but he had been wounded in the action and it was likely he would take several months to recover from his injuries. Ludendorff had been recommended by von Bulow for the Pour Le Merite, had he succeeded in the action he would have received the award, but his heroics had not delivered the city.
While von Motke was having to deal with the failure to capture Liege and enable the decisive blow to swing into France, he was faced with a limited Russian offensive into East Prussia. The General there von Prittwitz was not sure that he could hold the Russians and had requested permission to fall back behind the Vistula. Von Motke was adamant that the fortress at Konigsberg be held, he would do to the Russians what the Belgians were doing to him. A defensive posture would have to do in the east, with the attack in the west so far behind schedule and the Allies including the British reinforcing rapidly he would need every man available to win in the West, in the east he could trade space for time.
 
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You can pretty much get a 28 knot version of the Queen Elizabeth Class for pretty much the same displacement as the above ship in Springsharp which is more likely for the current circumstances.
A QE with boilers switched to small-tube, geared turbines, and a hull shape changed to allow for the higher power output would do the job.
Optional extras: Weight saved in the machinery goes to make the armour belt wider and/or torpedo protection.
Replace secondary casemate 6" with turreted - 5.5", or 4.7", or 4". (5.5s more likely at the time, 4.7 or 4s better for interwar butterflies on AA/DP upgrades & butterflies).
Drop the useless torpedo tubes.
 
Nontrivial Problem
21st August 1914, London.

Percy Ludgate was exhausted; he had not stopped since arriving in Holyhead only 2 days ago. He was staying at a hotel in Central London, close to the War Office and Admiralty he had been shuttled between both locations on an almost hourly basis, first they wanted to know if the Analytical Engine could calculate ballistic performance, he replied that it could, if an equation existed which could be entered into the machine. Another man at the admiralty wanted to know how it could be used to calculate better hull shapes, again Ludgate commented that it could. He had demonstrated its ability to rapidly calculate a variety of nontrivial problems, his main concern was not to be a performing monkey showing off the magical counting machine. He needed to be meeting specialists in fabrication so they could start to build multiple machines. At the same time, he needed to be meeting suitable mathematicians who could write the applicable programmes that needed to be run. So far, the people he had met all understood the need for the machine, they knew what they wanted it to do and indeed they kept thinking of knew things that it might be applied to. However, the problem was supply of the machine and its scale, the device which he had assembled and brought over was a somewhat limited proof of concept. It was limited to 10 digits in its calculations, this could impact some calculations as it would reduce precision with very small steps. Ludgate was happy to have initial discussions with the army and navy, he needed their funding and their access to the necessary artificers to make the device, but he also needed to have the machine built. He would discuss this with the professor again, pointing out that without more machines nothing could be done. He thought that he should also suggest a priority list, so that decisions could be made about what area’s would benefit first from having access to their own Analytical Engine. Also as much as Ludgate was enjoying being in London, he did not want to be permanently there, his desire was to return to Dublin to carry on his research, the University had access to good machinists, after all that was how he had developed his prototype. The new versions could be prototyped and tested in Dublin before being approved and sent for series production. Ludgate was, despite his fatigue rather glad, his invention and his single-minded determination to bring it to fruition was paying off. Once the machines started to be produced in large numbers the number of tasks they could be put to perform would increase rapidly, Ludgate was sure that the development of the engine would change the world.
 
A QE with boilers switched to small-tube, geared turbines, and a hull shape changed to allow for the higher power output would do the job.
Optional extras: Weight saved in the machinery goes to make the armour belt wider and/or torpedo protection.
Replace secondary casemate 6" with turreted - 5.5", or 4.7", or 4". (5.5s more likely at the time, 4.7 or 4s better for interwar butterflies on AA/DP upgrades & butterflies).
Drop the useless torpedo tubes.

The RN won't go for turrets for small guns, they're heavy and basically they had a bad experience with the turrets for the Monmouth class of armoured cruisers, finding them too slow in the traverse and very difficult to precisely aim. Maybe shielded upper deck mounts could be more useful and they'd be lighter without the hull penetrations of casemates, but then you've got the worries about the battery being exposed.
 
Indeed he is. The title of this timeline is now almost disingenuous- the rifles will have a much lower impact than series production of these machines.
It wasn’t my intention but Percy has become a more important figure. I will see how the story evolves. But don’t worry the fqh mk1 will be in action.
 
It wasn’t my intention but Percy has become a more important figure. I will see how the story evolves. But don’t worry the fqh mk1 will be in action.
It’sa sign of a good organically developing timeline that things don’t go the way the author first thought they would 😋
 
The RN won't go for turrets for small guns, they're heavy and basically they had a bad experience with the turrets for the Monmouth class of armoured cruisers, finding them too slow in the traverse and very difficult to precisely aim. Maybe shielded upper deck mounts could be more useful and they'd be lighter without the hull penetrations of casemates, but then you've got the worries about the battery being exposed.
Having looked into it on navweaps that seems to be right, about turreting,
Refit and Repair had no casemate guns, but had 17 4", 15 of them in 5 very clumsy triple mounts, and 2 as singles, all as upper deck mounts.
The spurious class had 18 4", all of them in the same clumsy triples.
According to Navweaps, commenting on the 4": "Admiral Fisher had always objected to heavy secondary batteries on capital ships, so at his insistence, the 4" (10.2 cm) caliber was chosen for the secondary weapons on the battlecruisers of the Repulse and Courageous classes."

Hood had no casemates, but had 12 5.5" in single mounts on the upper deck.

So, with Fisher in charge, 4" upper deck mounts seem more likely than not, and if the historical cramped and unwieldy triples can be replaced by doubles as a (minor) butterfly that would be all to the good.

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Just had another look on navweaps.
The guns on refit, repair, and the spurious were the 4" BL MK IX & X.
At the same time the 4" QF Mk V was being fitted to the Arethusa light cruiser.
Again from navweaps: "During the period just prior to World War I, the Admiralty decided to change the main armament for destroyers and cruisers away from bag guns (BL) over to quick firing guns (QF). QF guns had a higher rate of fire than did BL guns, an important factor for ships intended to be used in short range battles with enemy destroyers. The Mark V was first introduced as a low angle weapon on HMS Arethusa in 1914 and it was later chosen for use as an AAA gun near the end of World War I."
"Up until the late 1930s the Mark V was the main British long-range AA weapon and was fitted in a majority of capital ships and cruisers."

So getting single/twin 4" QF Mk V, in a low angle mount, on Alt british capital ships is not that big a stretch in 1914.

Interwar switching to a high angle mount is non-trivial, but easier than switching calibres and much easier than replacing casemate guns.
 
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thanks for those posts, I now have a better understanding of how the guns were used in action. I like the idea of doing away with the Casemented Guns, and given that Fisher and Scott are both back we might do that for the last QE, also Scotts director firing project may bear fruit in regards to the lighter guns. I am thinking that the R's might get a short pause in construction whilst they are re-evaluated and some improvements to the design are made. I have also been looking into steam plants, there is reference to an experimental steam plant being used in HMS Acheron which wasn't replicated but no detail on what the problems were.
 
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The Five point five inch Coventry Ordinance Works BL gun as used on Chester and Birkenhead would seem to be a good compromise choice as a secondary gun for the later QE's and follow on classes. It is lighter than the 6", still throws a slightly lighter shell but carries sufficient wallop to seriously hurt a WW1 destroyer with a single hit.
 
I suspect that it was a combination of a conservative Admiralty, failure to treat the Acheron like an experimental ship and a lack of money to throw at the problem during the inter-war period.
 
The Five point five inch Coventry Ordinance Works BL gun as used on Chester and Birkenhead would seem to be a good compromise choice as a secondary gun for the later QE's and follow on classes. It is lighter than the 6", still throws a slightly lighter shell but carries sufficient wallop to seriously hurt a WW1 destroyer with a single hit.
The shell is still heavy for continuous rate of fire with no power loading. 82 lbs. Preferably it would be around 60. But it may well be the best option actually available at the time.

IOTL Fisher wanted a 5” gun with a 60 lb fixed shell as an upgrade from 4”. In an ideal world I think either that 5 “ or an earlier development of the 4.7” LA gun, again with a 60 lb fixed shell, would be optimal. They could probably be developed into HA guns like the 4.7” was built as. Maybe even DP guns in the Interwar. But it is probably a little late for that ITTL.
 
The shell is still heavy for continuous rate of fire with no power loading. 82 lbs. Preferably it would be around 60. But it may well be the best option actually available at the time.

IOTL Fisher wanted a 5” gun with a 60 lb fixed shell as an upgrade from 4”. In an ideal world I think either that 5 “ or an earlier development of the 4.7” LA gun, again with a 60 lb fixed shell, would be optimal. They could probably be developed into HA guns like the 4.7” was built as. Maybe even DP guns in the Interwar. But it is probably a little late for that ITTL.
USN's 5"/51 seems to fit the bill fairly nicely.
 
Hindsight tells us that a 50-60 lb shell seems to be about the useful upper limit for a gun without power assistance.

I would think that going to something similar to the RN's 4.7inL45 QF Mark IX destroyer gun for capital ship secondary armament would be worthwhile. It had a 50lb shell with a 30lb cartridge, with an all up weight of 80lbs. This is about the same weight as the 5.5inL50 shell and would allow you to go with a fixed cartridge for a decent sustained rate of fire.
 
I suspect that it was a combination of a conservative Admiralty, failure to treat the Acheron like an experimental ship and a lack of money to throw at the problem during the inter-war period.
I wonder if the Acheron was named after the French privateer captured by lucky jack aubrey🤣
 
I wonder if the Acheron was named after the French privateer captured by lucky jack aubrey🤣

in RL the first HMS Acheron was indeed a Napoleonic navy vessel
but with a much more interesting (and honourable) history than a French commerce raider

She was a British merchantman taken up by the RN and converted into a fighting vessel, RN manned, in 1803.
With 2 large mortars for her main armament and 8 carronades for self-defence, she was Intended only as a specialised NGS vessel,
but the lack of ships meant she also had to act as a convoy escort (sound familiar?)

In 1805 near Gib, sailing with a sloop (HMS Arrow, 20) , she was escorting ~ 30 merchant ships
. BTW Arrow was already needing repair & carrying invalids home.
They were confronted by two powerful French Frigates (40s) armed with cannon and each carrying many extra troops as sharpshooters.
Both fought until totally wrecked to allow their charges to scatter and most escape (3 or 4 only taken on the day)
(though some that did escape were also picked off by other enemies later)

Arrow actually sank in action and Acheron was a CTL that the French scuttled.
However the damage A & A inflicted meant that the French Frigates also scuttled their merchant prizes and returned to port for repairs.

Jervis Bay and Achates were not the first

Added Later: in 1847. the Admiralty issued a dated clasp to survivors for this action
(unusual for a simple trade defence fight rather than a noted battle)
 
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