Royal Navy Alternate Cruiser designs post WW1

Deleted member 94680

An interesting idea would be to stick to the 7.5 inch gun. With only 10,000 tons to work with under the treaty it was impossible to properly armor a heavy cruiser. By sticking with a 7.5 inch gun weight is saved which could be put towards better armor.
The end result being the 7.5 inch gunned cruiser would be able to damage the 8 inch gunned cruiser before it could be damaged.

According to NavWeaps there’s about three thousand Kg difference between the 7.5” and 8” guns.

You’d have to bear in mind the 7.5” mounts on the Hawkins weren’t turrets but CP half shield mounts so more armour (and weight) would be needed there.
 
According to NavWeaps there’s about three thousand Kg difference between the 7.5” and 8” guns.

You’d have to bear in mind the 7.5” mounts on the Hawkins weren’t turrets but CP half shield mounts so more armour (and weight) would be needed there.
Turrets for the 7.5 inch would be smaller than turrets for the 8 in guns, that is where the real weight savings comes in.
 

Deleted member 94680

Turrets for the 7.5 inch would be smaller than turrets for the 8 in guns, that is where the real weight savings comes in.

The 7.5s weren’t in turrets on the Hawkins. The turret we’d be talking about would be theoretical. While there is a bit of a difference in size between a 7.5” gun and a 8” gun, the turrets wouldn’t be that much smaller (not like comparing a twin 4” to a twin 8” for instance) and it depends more on what the turrets are armoured against than the calibre of gun in it.
 
It would be a new gun design, not the same gun as on Hawkins. They want to incorporate war experience particularly safety measures. Given that the RN isn’t likely to select a smaller caliber than contemporaries, I can’t really see a 7.5” armed Kent. Armouring 10,000 ton ships is not really a practical idea and a waste of tonnage. They aren’t mini battleships.
 
Just checked the Washington treaty.
Capital ships were allowed to add up to 3000 tons as part of a refit, but not change calibre or number of main guns, or side armour.
So cruisers can't use that to add armour as a) they aren't capital ships and b) it's armour.
So you would need a different treaty to build cruisers that were designed for retro-fit of armour.

Butterflying the Hawkins class, or agreeing to scrap, and restricting to 6" guns and 8,000 tons in the treaty works better in the long run for the RN, and stands a good chance of being agreeable to most parties.
Except nobody on the naval side in the RN delegation saw that.
As Beatty was 1st sea lord, and according to his bio was "responsible for negotiating the washington naval treaty" that shouldn't be too surprising.

The French and Italians stopped building 10000 tons 8" cruisers, and went to 8000 ton 6" as soon as the London treaty was signed in 1930.
So probably not a problem for them.

The Japanese were building 5,500 ton (ish) 5.5" cruisers until they felt the need to counter the Hawkins.
The Furutaka and Aoba classes were 8,000 ton, not 10,000 (and laid down post Washington). So no 10,000 tonners until post Washington.
Agreeing to an 8000 ton limit, and doing a minor redesign to take 5.5s or 6" rather than 8" before even laying the ships down makes these ships as good as anything in the world.

The US were building the Omahas (8,000 ton, 6") at the time of the Washington treaty, which they presumably thought were satisfactory, or they would be building bigger and heavier armed. I don't think the problems with the Omahas were due mostly to size.
The US hadn't built any cruisers for a while, and they weren't particularly well designed, with an old-fashioned look to them.
Double banked casemate guns, in 1920?
With a restriction to 8000 tons and 6" guns I'm sure the next generation of cruisers would have been better.
Probably like the Pensacola class, only smaller, as the 6" guns allow for weight savings not only on the guns but also throughout the ship to maintain roughly the same performance, but with lighter guns and armament.
Agreeing to 8000 tons and 6" puts the Omahas at the top end of cruisers, rather than instantly obsolescent when everyone starts building 10000 tons with 8".

From the viewpoint of 1921/22, and absent the Hawkins class, the lower limit on tonnage and gun size makes sense for everybody, particularly in the context of an arms (and cost) limitation treaty.
 
Just checked the Washington treaty.
Capital ships were allowed to add up to 3000 tons as part of a refit, but not change calibre or number of main guns, or side armour.
So cruisers can't use that to add armour as a) they aren't capital ships and b) it's armour.
So you would need a different treaty to build cruisers that were designed for retro-fit of armour.
But that's just scrap metal sitting in that warehouse couldn't possibly be armour......;)

The problem with WNT/LNT from a perspective of hindsight is there are no previsions for enforcement or what can be done to ships later so the best way to deal with that is simply to build around the rules as far as your nation will allow and will not look to bad later.....

As to the rest agree, but the limit could be even smaller 7500t/6" would fit everything but Hawkins,
Omaha are 7,050t normal displacement and 6" what would its standard weight be? (-10%?)
E 7,580 tons standard 6"

I could add that VT Article 190 limited cruisers to 6,000 long tons (6,100 t)....... could we get a 6000t/6" that would make all the old CLs far more competitive even if the Omahas got grandfathered in....
 
I could add that VT Article 190 limited cruisers to 6,000 long tons (6,100 t)....... could we get a 6000t/6" that would make all the old CLs far more competitive even if the Omahas got grandfathered in....

Why would anyone want to be limited to what the Germans can build?
 
Just checked the Washington treaty.
Capital ships were allowed to add up to 3000 tons as part of a refit, but not change calibre or number of main guns, or side armour.
So cruisers can't use that to add armour as a) they aren't capital ships and b) it's armour.
So you would need a different treaty to build cruisers that were designed for retro-fit of armour.

Butterflying the Hawkins class, or agreeing to scrap, and restricting to 6" guns and 8,000 tons in the treaty works better in the long run for the RN, and stands a good chance of being agreeable to most parties.
Except nobody on the naval side in the RN delegation saw that.
As Beatty was 1st sea lord, and according to his bio was "responsible for negotiating the washington naval treaty" that shouldn't be too surprising.

The French and Italians stopped building 10000 tons 8" cruisers, and went to 8000 ton 6" as soon as the London treaty was signed in 1930.
So probably not a problem for them.

The Japanese were building 5,500 ton (ish) 5.5" cruisers until they felt the need to counter the Hawkins.
The Furutaka and Aoba classes were 8,000 ton, not 10,000 (and laid down post Washington). So no 10,000 tonners until post Washington.
Agreeing to an 8000 ton limit, and doing a minor redesign to take 5.5s or 6" rather than 8" before even laying the ships down makes these ships as good as anything in the world.

The US were building the Omahas (8,000 ton, 6") at the time of the Washington treaty, which they presumably thought were satisfactory, or they would be building bigger and heavier armed. I don't think the problems with the Omahas were due mostly to size.
The US hadn't built any cruisers for a while, and they weren't particularly well designed, with an old-fashioned look to them.
Double banked casemate guns, in 1920?
With a restriction to 8000 tons and 6" guns I'm sure the next generation of cruisers would have been better.
Probably like the Pensacola class, only smaller, as the 6" guns allow for weight savings not only on the guns but also throughout the ship to maintain roughly the same performance, but with lighter guns and armament.
Agreeing to 8000 tons and 6" puts the Omahas at the top end of cruisers, rather than instantly obsolescent when everyone starts building 10000 tons with 8".

From the viewpoint of 1921/22, and absent the Hawkins class, the lower limit on tonnage and gun size makes sense for everybody, particularly in the context of an arms (and cost) limitation treaty.
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The US would have never agreed to an 8000-ton, 6” limit on cruisers. You can’t just look at what they were building at the time, you also have to examine the designs they were considering for a follow-up, and of the dozen designs under consideration every single one of them mounted 8” guns and only one came in under 10,000 tons.

And if you think the US Navy was satisfied with just the Omaha’s since they were building them at the time, well, you really don’t know the design history of those ships and the 1916 program they were a part of. WWI heavily delayed the Omaha’s, as it did the South Dakota’s and Lexington’s, as construction and money were diverted towards more destroyers and getting the AEF up and running. Those heavy cruisers I mentioned? They were part of the follow-on 1919 program. So no, given a choice the US Navy would liked to have been done with building Omaha’s and instead working on the aforementioned 8” cruisers.

And if the US Navy doesn’t agree to this, good luck getting Japan to.
 
Why would anyone want to be limited to what the Germans can build?
Some fullfy world disarmament thinking.....add that GB only cares about numbers anyway so why worry as Germany is limited to far to few by VT and thins only makes that more solid?

...The US would have never agreed to an 8000-ton, 6” limit on cruisers. .....
But you really don't need to get USN to agree, only Congress, President Woodrow Wilson and even then really its just Charles Evans Hughes as once its verbally agree with GB in the back room its to late to back out without risking everything.... USN would be at grave risk if they then risked challenging it later for fear of what would be given in compensation or the damage of failing the treaty?
 
I think CV12Hornet is probably right in asserting that the US would never have agreed to the 6" gun and 8,000 ton limits on cruisers for the WNT.

However, assuming that somehow the USN had to swallow these restrictions, then my expectation is that the UK design process would go something like the following.

1) A ' Leander ' class with 8-6" guns (4x2) plus 4" AA and TT

2) A ' Colony ' class with triple 6" turrets. Might have 4x3 or later 3x3 to fit in extra AA. A design with 2x3 and 2x2 turrets might be resorted to if the 12 gun ship is overweight.

3) Possibly built with the ' Colonies ' and definitely at some point an ' Arethusa ' design on 6,000 tons or less and 3 twin 6' gun turrets.

The ' Colonies ' and ' Arethusas ' also with 4" AA and TT.

4) An AA version of the Arethusa, similar to the Dido class.

The above WAGs are based mainly on Friedman's discussion of the design process for the RN cruiser force in OTL. Clearly if at any point this alternative WNT breaks down or is modified to allow larger tonnage and heavier armament the RN would respond accordingly.
 
Some fullfy world disarmament thinking.....add that GB only cares about numbers anyway so why worry as Germany is limited to far to few by VT and thins only makes that more solid?


But you really don't need to get USN to agree, only Congress, President Woodrow Wilson and even then really its just Charles Evans Hughes as once its verbally agree with GB in the back room its to late to back out without risking everything.... USN would be at grave risk if they then risked challenging it later for fear of what would be given in compensation or the damage of failing the treaty?
Okay, but why would Charles Evans Hughes agree to this? What are the Brits giving up here? Because they have to give up something more than just ditching the Hawkins class. It is a very common thread in OTL Treaty negotiations that the US wanted bigger cruisers than Britain. It’s going to take some doing to get the US to agree to give that up.
 
Okay, but why would Charles Evans Hughes agree to this? What are the Brits giving up here? Because they have to give up something more than just ditching the Hawkins class. It is a very common thread in OTL Treaty negotiations that the US wanted bigger cruisers than Britain. It’s going to take some doing to get the US to agree to give that up.
Agreed

The only thing I can think of is that the alt-WNT distinguished between 8" and 6" gun cruisers. With the US allowed a certain number of the former and the UK a larger number of the latter.

Allowing both to build the fleets they thought they needed.

Japan? Perhaps could choose a ' Mix and Match ' set with a limit on total tonnage?
 
Okay, but why would Charles Evans Hughes agree to this? What are the Brits giving up here? Because they have to give up something more than just ditching the Hawkins class. It is a very common thread in OTL Treaty negotiations that the US wanted bigger cruisers than Britain. It’s going to take some doing to get the US to agree to give that up.
I don't think its really works with the Hawkins class existing, they are to new and numerous to scrap and to large & numerous to let pass.....

Without them I think GB simply saying "you want to save money, so do we why do you want people to build large expensive cruisers" might well work. The OTL treaty has plenty of bits that are simply easy political agreements that are none optimal for USN or RN and or leave room for doubt & exploitation later that simply agreeing to a lower number might easily happen?

I think if GB really sits on demanding 7500t/6" without Hawkins class its dismissed as an acceptable relatively small secondary compromise (that still saves US even more cash) to get the BB limit and holiday?

At WNT I don't think anybody really thought that much about cruisers, they just used the size and gun from the largest in service ie Hawkins and didn't think about them becoming a race to build lots of them at that limit that's only LNT hindsight.....
 
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I don't think its really works with the Hawkins class existing, they are to new and numerous to scrap and to large & numerous to let pass.....

Without them I think GB simply saying "you want to save money, so do we why do you want people to build large expensive cruisers" might well work. The OTL treaty has plenty of bits that are simply easy political agreements that are none optimal for USN or RN and or leave room for doubt & exploitation later that simply agreeing to a lower number might easily happen?

I think if GB really sits on demanding 7500t/6" without Hawkins class its dismissed as an acceptable relatively small secondary compromise (that still saves US even more cash) to get the BB limit and holiday?

At WNT I don't think anybody really thought that much about cruisers, they just used the size and gun from the largest in service ie Hawkins and didn't think about them becoming a race to build lots of them at that limit that's only LNT hindsight.....
If this is for a no-Hawkins situation, why are we even considering this? Form the OP this is OTL up to about 1921.
 
Form the OP this is OTL up to about 1921.
Agreed but I just think post WNT they are not many good (well ok great OTL isn't to bad in RN CA/CL) options?

From the OP,
What I am proposing is that a universal cruiser design in introduced with the intention of maximizing the numbers of cruisers and the versatility of the design . If instead of the County class they instead go with a three twin 8 inch turret(one forward and two aft) design on 9,000 tons (York class plus armour ) . If designed for three single 4 inch AA guns per side and a pair of quad pom poms on centreline mounts (one in front of the bridge and the other in a super firing position forward of the two aft turrets. You could end up with a very good ship . I personally hate the amidships Royal Navy floatplane hangars and mount however for the time they are very good so I feel they should be retained . Allow for two Walrus size aircraft . Also the good old quad Vickers 50 cal could be mounted on top of these hangars .

Design the triple 6 inch to fit into the same barbette as the 8 inch .

With 450,000 tons the Royal Navy could conceivably build 50 cruisers . This would have required the Hawkins for example to be converted into a sub 10,000 ton carrier . Expect a 14 to 20 aircraft air group.
. By WW2 this would directly translate into 50 cruisers compared to 29 modern ships . With construction beginning in 1927 you would need to be building 4 per year . This would also improve strategic construction .
This is far to late to change much, its even post the "counties" starting laid down/ordering 27... is after all but the last 4 of 13 laid down/committed?

By then they are looking for cheaper as they cant get the funds for the ships they need ie far more than 50.....

Going to more expensive Yorks that still only have 6 guns is a mistake IMO, you should repeat the counties as the 1000t saving isn't worth it in loss of fighting power.

No way will they get a sustained 4 a year in the great depression just coming up....... and unless you spread up OTL rearmament they will then hit a building jam like OTL in late 30s...
 
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Okay, but why would Charles Evans Hughes agree to this? What are the Brits giving up here? Because they have to give up something more than just ditching the Hawkins class. It is a very common thread in OTL Treaty negotiations that the US wanted bigger cruisers than Britain. It’s going to take some doing to get the US to agree to give that up.
Part of the treaty was always going to be, and had to be, a maximum size and calibre limit.
Whatever the limit was, all nations would build to it, so nobody was going to wind up with bigger cruisers than anybody else.
So the USN weren't going to be able to get bigger cruisers than the RN, unless there wasn't a treaty.

I believe the Omahas were the US response to the C class, so they make sense as part of the 1916 plan.
Could the 10,000 ton 8" designs in the 1918 plan be the USN response to the Hawkins, which out-matched the Omahas?
If so, then without the Hawkins, a follow-on to the Omahas is more logical.

The Hawkins were themselves a response to an (erroneous) report that the Germans were planning large, fast, cruisers with 7" guns.
 
The Omahas are a response to the 4 stacker destroyers.

The USN found themselves very top heavy with no scouting elements. So the cheap solution was to use destroyers. Unfortunately WWI destroyers (And American destroyers in particular) were awful at the role. So the obvious solution is to build a bigger destroyer. The Omahas.

Unfortunately a big destroyer a cruiser does not make. In simple terms it is the wrong hull shape, and the Americans were still learning that you don't have to stick guns on every flat surface. So they wanted another go. Which was leading towards something like the Pensacolas but the WNT intervened.

The basic problem with a small USN cruiser is that it does not match their requirements. They want a cruiser to supplement the Lexington battle cruisers in a scout role. Preferably on some epic sweep across the Pacific. And the Omahas had just proven small 7000 ton cruisers don't work.
The USN never built a small cruiser. Not even the Atlantas. I have trouble seeing how you are going to convince them to.
 
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