Royal Navy Alternate Cruiser designs post WW1

And when someone inevitably sends a real warship out as a raider, what then?

The advantage of the 8” gun is in shooting up other cruisers. Particularly on the 10,000-ton limit it was practically impossible to provide a ship that could withstand the gun. It also meshed well with director fire control, enabling 8” ships to practically as well as nominally outrange 6” ships. On the trade routes, Britain’s focus in the 1920s due to the mass of C and D-class cruisers for fleet work, the 8” cruiser makes sense, and in fact the Royal Navy spent a lot of energy to get more affordable 8” cruisers for a Navy people keep saying didn’t like it.
In a world limited to 6" at WNT the number of raiders with more than 6" will be very small (ie 3 PBs and any of the very few free capital ships 4 Kongos and they will not be that disposable as they are for the main force?) RN can simply fight with 6" ships, it doesn't have to kill other cruisers just damage them sufficiently to make them try to run home.
 

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In a world limited to 6" at WNT the number of raiders with more than 6" will be very small (ie 3 PBs and any of the very few free capital ships 4 Kongos and they will not be that disposable as they are for the main force?) RN can simply fight with 6" ships, it doesn't have to kill other cruisers just damage them sufficiently to make them try to run home.

I was wondering about this. Can a good (decent fire control, modern armour, good damage control) 6” cruiser fight off a 7.5” or 8” cruiser or will the bigger gun always win?
 
I was wondering about this. Can a good (decent fire control, modern armour, good damage control) 6” cruiser fight off a 7.5” or 8” cruiser or will the bigger gun always win?
What are the weather and light conditions? AND what do you mean by a 6" CL.....do we mean a equal or smaller?

I would say at night/bad weather the 6" might win but in daylight at long range the 8" should win assuming equal ships? 8" makes fire control easier at long range and does more damage and is harder to protect agaisnt, at night the faster firing might win as it might hit something vital first, ie no CA turret could really keep working after a 6" hit so you might only need a few hits to win the fight very quickly......

I will add that the advantage of 8" gets more as you cheat over 10,000t as you can fit a more balanced CA on 13-18kt....
 
In a world limited to 6" at WNT the number of raiders with more than 6" will be very small (ie 3 PBs and any of the very few free capital ships 4 Kongos and they will not be that disposable as they are for the main force?) RN can simply fight with 6" ships, it doesn't have to kill other cruisers just damage them sufficiently to make them try to run home.
I’m not talking just about cruisers with bigger than 6” guns, I’m also talking about 6” cruisers. 8” guns and a decent director system give a CA a very large advantage in the sort of conditions you get in trade protection duties, advantages a 6” cruiser is only going to have against AMCs. Against a proper warship, 6” on 6” is a recipe for damage on both sides, which is... less than ideal.

Besides, we’re not talking about that sort of situation so can you please stop mentioning it.

I was wondering about this. Can a good (decent fire control, modern armour, good damage control) 6” cruiser fight off a 7.5” or 8” cruiser or will the bigger gun always win?
Yes, it can. The British gave this considerable thought in designing the Southamptons and concluded the 6” ship could pull it off by means of high speed or heavy armor. And in close conditions, big 6” cruisers could indeed fight off heavy cruisers. See Barents Sea or Empress Augusta By for examples.
 
Against a proper warship, 6” on 6” is a recipe for damage on both sides, which is... less than ideal.
But fine if you have more 6" ships and the raider has longer to go to get home.... trying to win against a raider is gold plating to much all you need is to stop them getting home if you have to get towed home by a merchant ship you are protecting or a second CL that arrives later from a near by patrol area its not the end of the world.

I’m not talking just about cruisers with bigger than 6” guns, I’m also talking about 6” cruisers. 8” guns and a decent director system give a CA a very large advantage in the sort of conditions ...
Besides, we’re not talking about that sort of situation so can you please stop mentioning it.
That's the point, once you have lots of 8" ships they are more powerful and set the standard and therefore make (especially small) 6" ships less useful.
 
But fine if you have more 6" ships and the raider has longer to go to get home.... trying to win against a raider is gold plating to much all you need is to stop them getting home if you have to get towed home by a merchant ship you are protecting or a second CL that arrives later from a near by patrol area its not the end of the world.


That's the point, once you have lots of 8" ships they are more powerful and set the standard and therefore make (especially small) 6" ships less useful.
Or, you could be like Sydney and get yourself sunk. An 8” cruiser is simply going to have a much easier time driving off raiders of all types, with less risk to the ship. It’s why the Royal Navy built and planned to build so many.

And again: this is not a situation where we’re banning 8” cruisers. If you really want to discuss that, make your own thread.
 
On 10,000 tons the 8 inch cruiser is simply a battlecruiser analogy . Not armoured against their own guns and full of compromises . A 10,000 ton 6 inch cruiser is more balanced and able to have advantages on rate of fire and secondary's for example . Also for the British the Leander class are perfect in many ways . The Southampton's are ideal as a fleet cruiser with Leander perfect as a trade protection cruiser . I often wonder if the Graf Spee would have been worse of with the rate of fire from 28 6 inch guns firing on her as opposed to 16 6 inch and 6 8 inch .
 
That’s four ships, a number which at the time was expected to become woefully inadequate in a hurry. The Royal Navy had intelligence on US Navy cruiser-building plans in 1920-1921, and the thought of the US ordering thirty 8” cruisers was quite alarming. And yes, the US Navy tried to get that authorized. Even the reduced plans had eighteen 8” cruisers over three years.
All the more reason to kill off the 8" cruiser at the treaty. Remember if Britain doesn't sign it's dead and the US Government wants the treaty, they're not going to kill it over the size of a cruisers guns.
 
Or, you could be like Sydney and get yourself sunk. An 8” cruiser is simply going to have a much easier time driving off raiders of all types, with less risk to the ship. It’s why the Royal Navy built and planned to build so many.
I don't think you should look at the outliers for what the average CL/CA will manage to archive..... and I agree with you 8" are better individually thats why they got built in OTL they are just more expensive in cash and treaty tonnage so RN especially questioned if it would be better to split and build more smaller ships but this was very hard with the likley opposition on 8"/10,000+t dominating the world....
 
The Southampton's are ideal as a fleet cruiser with Leander perfect as a trade protection cruiser . I often wonder if the Graf Spee would have been worse of with the rate of fire from 28 6 inch guns firing on her as opposed to 16 6 inch and 6 8 inch .
I doubt it, and it would be 25 6" guns IMO, the OTL force included a "B class" CA sub 10,000t ship designed to save weight and cost (a bad option IMO) so we should swap it with a 9x6" ships not a 12x6" to be fair? I think in the good weather of OTL engagement with early war systems 9x6" is worse than 6x8" and the extra protection if any will not help against 11" fire.
 
The original question was about alternative RN cruiser designs post WW1.

I think the discussion has gone circular.

The best design gives the maximum number of ships that are competitive against credible opposition.
That opposition is dependent on the Washington Naval Treaty.

So for the OTL Treaty those ships need to be competitive against 10000 ton, 8" gun cruisers.
In a timeline where the Treaty can be changed, one where smaller ships are competitive is much better for the RN, as they can build a larger number.
 
Is there any evidence to show a heavy cruiser won a fight just because it had 8" guns and coming from the other side is there any evidence a light cruiser ever lost out because it's shells were too small.
 
What do you mean by “political choice”?

Didn’t the 8” come into service because it was “better” than the 7” or 7.5”? I mean, once the British built the Hawkins-class with their 7.5”s all it took was one class of 8”-armed cruisers built by a Peer, and technically the Hawkins are outclassed. It was always going to happen, given the nature of naval arms race building patterns. Your 7.5” cruisers may well hoover up all the 6” cruisers and destroyers they can find, but an 8” cruiser will have them on the ropes.

Actually the Hawkins class was seen as an answer to a never build class of WW1 type f German commerce raiding type of cruiser, nothing more, nothing less. 8 inch was a US wish to do, never a British one as they already knew the 6 inch was the weapon of choice, clearly superior of larger, slower guns for cruiser duties. The British never considered the Cruiser to be a fighting ship intended for fleet battles in line with battleships, but as a seperate warships for all other tasks, except fighting in line with a battlefleet. The Washington Naval Treaty threw up the 8 unch weapon as the USN would otherwise have canceled it from start and the British simply started building the 8 inch gun type cruiser from scratch, since the compeditors did as well, not because it wanted the type, as it restricted the numbers in the fleet. Luckily the British armamments industry came out with the very good 8"/50 (20.3 cm) Mark VIII, which outclased the USN, Japanese and other guns of this calliber in this timeperiod.

One of the reasons the British cancled the 8 unch gun cruisers after the commissioning of the HMS Exeter was their doubts in the value of the bigger gun as an effective weapon on a cruiser, besides the fact the aging existing 6 inch cruisers badly needed more modern consorts to increase numbers again, prefered to be with more medium sized ships, which resulted in the Leander and Arethusa classes, before going larger again 6 inch gunners after Mogami was put to sea.
 
The Washington Naval Treaty threw up the 8 unch weapon as the USN would otherwise have canceled it from start and the British simply started building the 8 inch gun type cruiser from scratch, since the compeditors did as well, not because it wanted the type,
Agree with most of your post but not sure that USN could really cancel it over 8" v 6" (if the RN/others have not already built them) without paying a huge political price with its own government?
 
The USN was the only country in a position to actually build the 1920s fleet it had intended to. Congress was fully prepared to fund the Lexingtons, South Dakotas, and new scout cruisers. Because the US would have had the easiest time walking away, the treaty had to cater to the US.
 
The USN was the only country in a position to actually build the 1920s fleet it had intended to. Congress was fully prepared to fund the Lexingtons, South Dakotas, and new scout cruisers. Because the US would have had the easiest time walking away, the treaty had to cater to the US.
Nobody disagrees that US could fund them easier than anybody else, its if they actually would that's in serious doubt? What makes you so sure of the bold part?

If US congress/gov was so willing to fund them why would they be so keen to actually call the conference and propose the holiday rather than do it after they have gained a dominate position due to completing the Col/SD/Lex classes?
 
Nobody disagrees that US could fund them easier than anybody else, its if they actually would that's in serious doubt? What makes you so sure of the bold part?

If US congress/gov was so willing to fund them why would they be so keen to actually call the conference and propose the holiday rather than do it after they have gained a dominate position due to completing the Col/SD/Lex classes?
Money had be allocated and construction had begun. What Congress didn't want to do was to pay for the second generation of 1920s capital ships to counter the British G3s and N3s and the Japanese fast battleships. Congress sacrificed shipyard jobs in a booming economy to force rival powers' battleships to be canceled.
 
Money had be allocated and construction had begun.
Did US do it by the entire program or just that years appropriations for the work planned in the next 12 months?

If so just how what % had actually been allocated compared to what completing them would actually cost and how many years would they take to build at the rate funded?
 
Did US do it by the entire program or just that years appropriations for the work planned in the next 12 months?

If so just how what % had actually been allocated compared to what completing them would actually cost and how many years would they take to build at the rate funded?
All 12 of the ships had been laid down by the end of 1921. They would have been completed by the end of 1924, or 1925 at the latest. The SoDaks were between 10% and 40% complete when they were canceled in 1922. Because the US was significantly behind the technology curve with regard to the British and Japanese until the Colorados, the Lexingtons and SoDaks were being built at both government and private yards basically in parallel.
 
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