Merchant Seaplane Carrier

I was reading up about CAM ships and I thought why does it have to be fighter plane why couldn't it have been an ASW plane . Then I thought their must have been a good reason they didn't . Maybe the aircraft would be too heavy . According to Wikipedia Hurricane's maximum take off weight is 3950 kg however a Supermarine Walrus is suprisingly lighter at 3650 kg maximum take off weight plus if the seas were calm enough if you have a handling crane fitted you could just lower the aircraft over the side and she could take off anyway .

My next thought was as a proto MAC ship in the MSC and presumably quicker to convert was giving tankers a handling crane and a flat spot to park a couple of Supermarine Walrus or Float Swordfish

I'm assuming there's a good reason why this wasn't done . something I've overlooked
 
The British' most important sea was the Atlantic, which is not calm enough to routinely operate seaplanes, unlike f.ex the Baltic or the Pacific.

In addition the Walrus was designed as a spotter plane. Where is the artillery to spot for on a merchant hull?

In addition it's one thing to carry some. 303 rounds on a merchant, but how would you handle the depth charges, torpedoes on a merchant?
 
The British' most important sea was the Atlantic, which is not calm enough to routinely operate seaplanes, unlike f.ex the Baltic or the Pacific.

In addition the Walrus was designed as a spotter plane. Where is the artillery to spot for on a merchant hull?

In addition it's one thing to carry some. 303 rounds on a merchant, but how would you handle the depth charges, torpedoes on a merchant?

Walrus can carry Depth charges though and I'm sure they could work round the ammunition storage issue which presumably they did for the full blown MAC ships
 
As some have suggested before might be better to plank over a tanker or bulk carrier and fly off Swordfishes. )
 
Shagbats and Stringbags can't shoot down Condors, so that's why ratty old Hurricanes were chosen to rocket off merchies on a one-way trip, using the simplest installation possible. Real life catapults and cranes are a much more complex installation requiring a bit more ship, such as HMAS Albatross, which did as you wish. Jeeps and MACs did it better, easier.
 
I was reading up about CAM ships and I thought why does it have to be fighter plane why couldn't it have been an ASW plane.

Then I thought their must have been a good reason they didn't. Maybe the aircraft would be too heavy. According to Wikipedia Hurricane's maximum take off weight is 3950 kg however a Supermarine Walrus is suprisingly lighter at 3650 kg maximum take off weight plus if the seas were calm enough if you have a handling crane fitted you could just lower the aircraft over the side and she could take off anyway.

My next thought was as a proto MAC ship in the MSC and presumably quicker to convert was giving tankers a handling crane and a flat spot to park a couple of Supermarine Walrus or Float Swordfish.

I'm assuming there's a good reason why this wasn't done. something I've overlooked
The good reason why they didn't was that the Condors were a greater threat. The CAM ship conversions were done to meet that specific threat. However, the Walrus because it was amphibious was reusable while the Hurricane was a one-shot weapon and therefore it wasn't used that often. Having said that (AFAIK) the threat of being attacked was enough to make the Condors stand off. Furthermore the CAM ships were a stop-gap while the escort carriers and MACs were acquired.

Having said that there was the Athene class. These were 2 merchant ships (against a requirement for 4) that were converted to seaplane carriers. However, in service they were used as aircraft transports.
 
Shagbats and Stringbags can't shoot down Condors, so that's why ratty old Hurricanes were chosen to rocket off merchies on a one-way trip, using the simplest installation possible. Real life catapults and cranes are a much more complex installation requiring a bit more ship, such as HMAS Albatross, which did as you wish. Jeeps and MACs did it better, easier.
Ninjad again!
 
Walrus can carry Depth charges though and I'm sure they could work round the ammunition storage issue which presumably they did for the full blown MAC ships
Also a full blown MAC can operate Swordifsh which is easier to launch and recover than an amphibian. Plus a Swordfish can carry three 500lb depth charges.
 
The British' most important sea was the Atlantic, which is not calm enough to routinely operate seaplanes, unlike f.ex the Baltic or the Pacific.

In addition the Walrus was designed as a spotter plane. Where is the artillery to spot for on a merchant hull?

In addition it's one thing to carry some. 303 rounds on a merchant, but how would you handle the depth charges, torpedoes on a merchant?
It's a flawed idea, but the Walrus was a multi-purpose aircraft.

It was also designed to be a search aircraft extending the horizon of the cruisers searching for merchant raiders as well as to direct their gunfire once the enemy was brought into action. It can search for U-boats just as well as it can search for a surface raider. One found it can stay in the vicinity of the U-boat to spot the fall of the gunfire or depth charges. However, a Swordfish on a MAC can do that better because it is easier to launch and recover.
 
Thank you . Interestingly it turns out the Walrus was specifically developed for the Australians to serve on HMAS Albatross which I didn't know.
 
Another problem with floatplane operations is that the mother ship has to go dead in the water to recover its plane. That can obviously be problematic at times.

There is a good account online written by a SOC-3 pilot off USS PORTLAND during Midway. He said they carried extra gear onboard their planes and were up to speed on all of the alternate recovery sites in the general vicinity like French Frigate Shoals and Gardner Reef just in case they could not recover with the cruiser for whatever reason.
 
CAM ship captains grumbled about catapults interfering with loading and unloading grain. Slower turn-arounds reduced their profitability.

WI they used lighter spotter planes and recovered them with a cable slung outboard, alongside the ship at bridge height? The US experimented with a similar system during WW2.

As for effectiveness ..... you needed at least a Hurricane to scare off Condors.
OTOH U-boats soon learned to fear ANY aircraft flying over a convoy because it could call in gun fire or direct depth charge attacks from the military ships that escorted convoys through troubled waters. The USN even used blimps to scare U-boats away from coastal convoys
 
OTOH U-boats soon learned to fear ANY aircraft flying over a convoy because it could call in gun fire or direct depth charge attacks from the military ships that escorted convoys through troubled waters.

OTOH, 120 aircraft and many crew members were lost in attacks on U-boats, and 3 VCs were awarded, only one of whom was alive with 72 wounds. Not all losses were due to counter fire. eg. Two Skuas were lost to their own bomb explosions. But most were.
 
The ship would have to stop or slow down to recover the seaplane.Potentaly slowing down the entire convoy,not smart with all those U-boats about .
 
The ship would have to stop or slow down to recover the seaplane.Potentaly slowing down the entire convoy,not smart with all those U-boats about .
Indeed. Better option is a depth charge armed Swordfish, essentially a VTOL aircraft. Within the normal wind conditions of the Atlantic, with a 44 knot stall speed a 10 knot MAC ship could launch and recover Swordfish with the shortest of deck space without any arrestor gear.

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Then there's always the option of inflight recovery.

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All very enterprising but I wish you luck driving a Fw200 off with a Swordfish and latching on to a light aeroplane from a freighter heaving in the North Atlantic. Escort carriers needed Swordfish but they also needed Martlets to drive off bombers and torpedo carriers. Hurricanes were the right answer at that time. Fulmars were in shorter supply. MACS and FCS were not the solution. That was the escort carrier, but they were a solution and timely. I wonder if it would have been worthwhile to have rocket launch simulator flare to frighten off shadows when the Hurricat had been and gone?
 
All very enterprising but I wish you luck driving a Fw200 off with a Swordfish and latching on to a light aeroplane from a freighter heaving in the North Atlantic. Escort carriers needed Swordfish but they also needed Martlets to drive off bombers and torpedo carriers. Hurricanes were the right answer at that time. Fulmars were in shorter supply. MACS and FCS were not the solution. That was the escort carrier, but they were a solution and timely. I wonder if it would have been worthwhile to have rocket launch simulator flare to frighten off shadows when the Hurricat had been and gone?

Now that strikes me as a worthwhile idea that I hadn't heard before.
 
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