Shipbucket

I think there is plenty of room for this large hangar to store 6-8 helos and all the maintenance stuff needed to operate them. The hangar sides go to the edge of the hull as drawn in the original drawing and one pixel is six inches which is a lot thicker than the walls would be. There is no need for a hallway or anything along the sides of the hangars as there is plenty of room under the hangar for people to get up and down the ship.
Yes there is space for two Sea Hawks to be side by side without the rotors touching. But I doubt they would land and takeoff at the same time because that would be pretty dangerous!

Space and volume is the one thing this 40,000 ton ship does not have a problem with!

I wouldn't be too concerned with reactor access for refuelling. The most recent designs (Virginia & Ford class reactors) are 30-50 year cores. The USN doesn't intend to ever refuel them; there's just so much involved even with access.

SoCar37
"Prepared In Mind & Resources"

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SoCar37

"Prepared In Mind & Resources"

Be that as it may, but you'll still need access to the turbines, those won't last fifty years

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“Close” only counts with horseshoes, hand grenades, and tactical nuclear weapons.
That which does not kill me has made a grave tactical error

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Yes and this ship is concieved as a 1980s product as it doesn't have any later weapons and anti terrorist features. Very much a new build USS New Jersey surface action group leader type or Persian Gulf dominator.

They just might. Enterprise (CVN-65) still has her original main engines, and there is no plans to swap out mains on the other CVN's. The only reason for large access to the main spaces is for reactor refuelling. Which is a once-in-a-lifetime occurance on Nimitz class and never on CVN-78.

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SoCar37

"Prepared In Mind & Resources"

No, they most certainly wont. Casigns and housings, sure. Turbine blades and wheels, no way. Especially not with nuclear power. Then thereøs all the other stuff down there that'll need replacement either in part or in whole during the ships service life. Alternators, Freshwater Generators, Coolers, auxiliary power units, the list goes on. Heck, the main breaker on that thing is likely to be the size of a large desk. Definitely not something you want to wrestle up a narrow ladder.

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“Close” only counts with horseshoes, hand grenades, and tactical nuclear weapons.
That which does not kill me has made a grave tactical error

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I wonder what would be the feasibility of an A1B backfit to some Nimitzes when it comes time to refuel them.

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I doubt if they have enough hull life left to make it economical.

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“Close” only counts with horseshoes, hand grenades, and tactical nuclear weapons.
That which does not kill me has made a grave tactical error

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Source Materiel is always welcome.

IIRC, even the Nimitzes, or at least the later ones, were pretty much thought of as a "never-refuel" ship.

OK, full disclosure time. I have 18 years of nuclear navy experience; 6 of them on Nimitz class carriers. By all means, the turbine blading can handle full power for the entire design lifetime. These are not wimpy LM2500 gas turbines that have to be replaced wholesale after so many hours. Alternators last a long time too. The ladders can be removed and chainfalls used to get the main breakers out. Been there, done that. Yes it's a pain in the butt, but it's doable.

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SoCar37

"Prepared In Mind & Resources"