Alternate warships of nations

I'm wondering about the 6" torpedo bulkheads and the 7.5" deck armor. Is that from the original QE? Also, the specified citadel length seems fairly short for a relatively fast ship with five centerline turrets.

From what i can understand of the wikipedia, yes, i did take the maximum thickness of the armour, and added 0.25" to the deck and quarterdeck. As well as adding 0.5" on the belt armour. The belt length is the minimum to cover the vitals according to Springsharp.
 
Faster QE?
10 15" 5 twins Iron duke layout
geared steam turbines and small tube boilers, longer hull finer lines 90,000shp = 26 Knots
35000 tons standard

1 for flagship 3 BC squadron
1 for flagship 2 BC squadron

8 more to give 5 BS Grand Fleet, 2 4 ship Divisions

No R's built

simpler just to give the QEs small tube boilers from the start and increase the number to 6
(as in the original Agincourt that was cancelled in 1914)

I agree no R BBs but 3 or 4 Renown like Bcs would be OK

Then as follow on to the QEs ... same main guns but lighter turreted secondaries
perhaps even all or nothing armour
 
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HMS Campania as converted to carrier by Beardmore instead of Cammell Laird at the start of WWI.
(Based on a 1912 Beardmore proposal)

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HMS Argus (I49)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

HMS Argus
was a British aircraft carrier that served in the Royal Navy from 1916 to 1944. She was converted from an ocean liner that was under construction when the First World War began, and became the first example of what is now the standard pattern of aircraft carrier, with a full-length flight deck that allowed wheeled aircraft to take off and land. After commissioning she soon after participated in the first ever carrier battle during the battle of Jutland.
300px-HMS_Argus_%281917%29.jpg

Argus had her genesis in the Admiralty's desire during the First World War for an aircraft carrier that could fly off wheeled aircraft and land them aboard. Existing carriers could launch wheeled aircraft, but had no way to recover them as they lacked flight decks. In 1912, the ship builder William Beardmore had proposed to the Admiralty an aircraft carrier design with a continuous, full-length flight deck, but it was not accepted. As the limitations of existing carriers became more apparent, this design was dusted off and the Admiralty located two large, fast hulls suitable for conversion into an aircraft carrier. Construction of the Italian ocean liners Conte Rosso and Giulio Cesare had been suspended by William Beardmore and Company at the outbreak of the war, and both where purchased soon after and the company began work on converting the ships.

Battle of Jutland
Main article: Battle of Jutland


During the battle of Jutland she carried 8 Admiralty-Short two-seat Type 184s that were intended for observation and were fitted with a low-power wireless and 4 single seat fighters that were intended to shoot down Zeppelins but did not take part in the battle due to lack of any air opposition.
Engadine accompanied the 1st Cruiser Squadron (Armoured Cruisers) Comanded by RAdm Sir Robert Keith Arbuthnot when the Battlecruiser Fleet sortied from Rosyth that evening to intercept the German High Seas Fleet. It has been suggested that Arbuthnot was not very happy with what he regarded as the demeaning job given to his squadron of escorting Argus as that this may have contributed to him abandoning it to join the surface action so unfortunately later on as the battle developed.

Beatty ordered Engadine to make a search to the north-northeast at 14:40. At 14:47 Lieutenant Frederick Rutland took off in his Type 184 and his observer signalled Engadine that they had spotted three German cruisers and five destroyers at 15:10. These were ships from the II Scouting Group, leading the battlecruisers of Vice Admiral Franz von Hipper. This was the first time that a heavier-than-air aircraft had carried out a reconnaissance of an enemy fleet in action. After a few other spot reports were transmitted, the aircraft's fuel line ruptured around 15:26 and Rutland was forced to try and touch down. He was sadly killed on impact and posthumous was awarded one of the many VCs awarded after for his historic achievement of scouting the beginning of the battle.

Argus attempted to relay the spot reports to Beatty's flagship and the flagship of the 5th Battle Squadron, but was unsuccessful. She trailed Beatty's force during the "Run to the South", during which time her four heavy escorts detached. She finally managed to make contact with Jellicoe at 16:20 at report that her 6 remaining scouts had found the position of the two German forces.
 
From Wiki,
USS Washington (BB-47), a Colorado-class battleship, was the second ship of the United States Navy named in honor of the 42nd state. Her keel was laid down on 30 June 1919 at Camden, New Jersey, by the New York Shipbuilding Corporation. She was launched on 1 September 1921.

On 8 February 1922, two days after the signing of the Washington Naval Treaty for the Limitation of Naval Armaments, all construction work ceased on the 75.9%-completed super dreadnought. After a breif time the USN realized it could convert the ship into a CV as it could be cut under the unlimited 27,000t WNT limit (so not count as one of USN two conversions). This would give a slow and short CV but it was better than nothing and would save a lot of cash so she was slowly finished in late 20s to join Lex and Saratoga against the advice of some air minded officers. CV4 was to spend her life with the gun line due to her lacking speed mainly to provide fighters and spotters for the fleet. She missed pearl due to transport duties and then spent the war mostly providing CAP for invasion forces as flagship to the CVEs.

CV4.png

(apologies to the two original artists this is very much a cut and kit bash)


Just curious, do you have specifications for the Washington carrier conversion? Such as hanger size, speed, AA armament, underwater protection, length and so on? I'm quite interesting in making a little scenario with her if it's alright with you.
 
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USS Washington (CV-4)
Detailed Specifications after much hard analysis... (my guess work, err.... I just cut the top of her hull off and replaced it with Yorktown/Lex mix topside and created as long a bow and stern as I thought still looked ok to increase deck length as that was the biggest limiting factor.... I spent like 20 minutes on making her)

Feel free to use her and do send me a link!
 
HMS Campania as converted to carrier by Beardmore instead of Cammell Laird at the start of WWI.
(Based on a 1912 Beardmore proposal)

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HMS Campania after her Post Jutland Refit. During the battle she was unable to heave to to recover her scouting aircraft. A flight of the Campania Scouting squadron then proceeded to land on while she was underway despite only having done so while she was at anchor before. 3 of the 5 were wrecked due to eddies in the airflow over her landing on deck. Wind tunnel trials pointed the blame at her funnel arrangement and flying bridge. It was suggested that all the funnels and the bridge be removed but this would have crippled the elderly ships performance. As a compromise the two portside funnels and bridge were removed.

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I hope i'm not diverting too far off the topic, but as this is about warships, can i ask if anyone knows whether the french Foch class CVs could be made to operate Rafales and the extent of modifications needed, if say a country like India would have bought one or both and wanted the Rafales on them? Is it worth it? Thank you.
 
I hope i'm not diverting too far off the topic, but as this is about warships, can i ask if anyone knows whether the french Foch class CVs could be made to operate Rafales and the extent of modifications needed, if say a country like India would have bought one or both and wanted the Rafales on them? Is it worth it? Thank you.
Brazil looked at buying them sometime after Brazil bought the Foch so I suppose they reckoned the navalised Refale could operate on that ship.
 
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Continuing my HMS Resistance ideas.

The Royal Navy is more or less committed to 45 calibre 15" guns, meaning that they don't reduce the maximum gun calibre to 14 inches in the London Naval Treaty.
An idea I'm toying with is that they don't insist on reducing carrier sizes to a maximum of 23ktons rather than the 27k allowed in the Washington Treaty.

What would the Ark Royal look like with an extra 4000 tons to play with?
Would some form of armoured flight deck be possible without compromising endurance and stability?
 
What would the Ark Royal look like with an extra 4000 tons to play with?
Would some form of armoured flight deck be possible without compromising endurance and stability?
Why would the added 4,000t be used for an armoured deck? I was under the impression that the armoured deck (and sides) was only decided on later when the focus was a Mediterranean war (implying attack from land that would have the numbers to get through anyway so hits where inevitable) prior to that was Ark not designed more like USN/IJN to fight in pacific CV v CV fights?
 
Guys I need an engineering check on this one.

I want to put a twin 8 inch gun turret on a CV like the Kaga and need to know if something like that would even be possible.

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HMS Illustrious (HMS Resistance Edition)

With the new class of battleship having been finalised in October 1935, there was renewed debate within the admiralty as
to the future structure of the Royal Navy. The following year it was agreed that the Fleet Air Arm would revert to Royal Navy
control.

Although the second London treaty allowed for five aircraft carriers of 27 thousand tons,
planns called for six aircraft, meaning seeking compromise of smaller designs with the same overall tonnage, resulting in designs
of 23 thousand tons.

However, at American insistence, the tonnage limits included a "Escalator Clause" allowing an extra 4000 tons per ship if
the Italians or Japanese did not sign the treaty by April 1937. The unique Aircraft carrier Ark Royal, and next three ships
were ordered before Britain invoked this clause.

The Illustrius class were built with two requirements in mind. Firstly, that they would be able to carry as many aircraft
as the existing designs, and secondly, to meet the requirements of the "Layered Defence "doctrine, the layers being
the aircraft themselves, the heavy AAA for detering air attacks (and light surface attacks as a never realised last resort),
the light AA armament against attacking aircraft, and the armour and damage control system in the event of a sucessful
attack.

In order to meet the first requirement, there was a degree of compromise with regards to the thickness of the "armoured box"
so as to accomodate an extra half hanger deck bringing total aircraft compliment up to the required 48 planes.

All three ships in the class served with distinction during the Second World War. The Illustrious herself is most famous
for her role in the the attack on Taranto,although most of the credit does to her Swordfish Torpedo Bombers and Skirmish divebombers.
The Battleships Conte de Cavour and Caio Duillo, while not definitively sunk,
never saw action again, and a Heavy cruiser and two destroyers were sunk by dive bombers.

The Formidable also served with distinction in the Mediterranean, having if not the most spectabular, but perhaps the most important impact at the battle of Cape Matapan.
While contemporary coverage made much of the capture of the heavy cruiser Pola (whose name is still used in the Royal Australian Navy to this day),
the Fairey Hammerhead torpedo bombers suceeded on inflicting severe damage on the battleship Vittorio Veneto.
It wasn't until a week after the battle that British intelligence learned that the fourth and final strike had broken her back.
The repairs Mussolini had insisted upon despite her being a total constructive loss
were not completed before the Italian Armastice.

The Victorious is perhaps the best known of the three Illustrious Class.
Her aircraft and those of HMS Glorious were responsible for sinking the German Battleship Bismarck in the first recorded "Hammer and Anvil" strike.
This tactic was repeated in March 1942 against the Battleship Tirpitz, this time with Victorious's Hammerheads acting in concert with those of her sister ship, the Illustrious.

Note: The Fairey Hammerhead is a high wing monoplane developed in place of OTL's Albacore.
 
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Why would the added 4,000t be used for an armoured deck? I was under the impression that the armoured deck (and sides) was only decided on later when the focus was a Mediterranean war (implying attack from land that would have the numbers to get through anyway so hits where inevitable) prior to that was Ark not designed more like USN/IJN to fight in pacific CV v CV fights?
Ark Royal did have an armoured flight deck, though it was much thinner than on the later Illustrious class (and derivatives) class carriers with their fully armoured box hangers. Wikipedea (yes I know not the best source) lists it at .75 inches. It's main armour protection was a lower protective deck with 3.5 inches. In my opinion an extra 4000 tons would have been used to simplify the stern and increase the thickness of the flightdeck, mainly to allow for heavier aircraft. A deck sufficient to trigger any bombs so they explode contained within the hanger rather than penetrating the main body of the ship would greatly improve the ships chances of survival.
 
Ark Royal did have an armoured flight deck, though it was much thinner than on the later Illustrious class (and derivatives) class carriers with their fully armoured box hangers. Wikipedea (yes I know not the best source) lists it at .75 inches. It's main armour protection was a lower protective deck with 3.5 inches. In my opinion an extra 4000 tons would have been used to simplify the stern and increase the thickness of the flightdeck, mainly to allow for heavier aircraft. A deck sufficient to trigger any bombs so they explode contained within the hanger rather than penetrating the main body of the ship would greatly improve the ships chances of survival.
Is that really a protective deck or is it not just the strength deck for the hull and the necessary thickness for the tensile strength required resulting from that?

I don't get why the 4,000t would be (rather than could be with hindsight) used to,
- alter the bow stern round downs as that's just a result of obsession with airflow from light old aircraft that was rendered obsolescent by heavier faster WWII aircraft?
- add such heavy protection to the flight deck in alternative to just making the ship carry more aircraft?
 
It's listed as the protective deck in all my sources.
As for the stern of the ship, you simplify it not to alter the round down so much as to make it easier to build and increase the internal space available in the ship.
Allowing for heavier aircraft requires no real foresight as the weight of aircraft was already rising when the design work on the Ark Royal was done.

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