Shipbucket

The foremast should go right through to the deck, not dangle of the back of the superstructure. As far as I can see the only thing you gain from that is more weight for less strength. That huge radar you carry on the aft mast also needs way more support than it currently have. Also, I see no way or it to turn.

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Well, Thiel, while it may be recommendable, what you suggest, I'd not put it as an absolute. This AU-ship is so clearly influenced by various Kriegsmarine ships, and if you take a look at them, all classes, you'll see exactly the same mast construction, albeit as pole masts even, or supports placed higher up on the tower-levels. So, as far as I can judge the foremast is perfectly ok. It also has sufficient thickness (circumference) to support its load.

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My Avatar:Петр Алексеевич Безобразов (Petr Alekseevich Bezobrazov), Вице-адмирал , царская ВМФ России(1845-1906) - I sign my drawings as Ari Saarinen

But no Kriegsmarine ship ever had to deal with the sort of continuous vibrations those guns are going to create.

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Source Materiel is always welcome.

That's a valid point. You probably know more about those weird guns than I do, and I never said no, only not to make it an absolute. Now, however, you did present a good case why it should be done your way...

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OK, Hopefully de-noodled (un-noodled? Noodless? Why does this conversation sound like pastafarianism?) masts version, plus stretch to clear reverse of turrets - what do you think? I kept the support on the foremast, as Thiel's pointed out it'll need all the structural strength it can get, and placed a support directly under the Freya to form a triangle bearing the weight down into the hull ... Solid enough?



Also added training and elevating gear for the Freya (grey boxes are supposed to indicate an electric motor, gearbox, drive shaft and a hypoid gear pair to train, grey box behind would be elevating gear)

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Hey apdsmith. Why don't you take a look at the Little Rock as of 1960?. It'll give you an idea what you can do with that big aft radar. In other words, use a platform, not a mast structure if it's that heavy or bulky!
Unfortunately your solution for your mainmast really doesn't look good, and I doubt it'd be free of vibrations too. You simply have way too much, unrelated -and unnecessary stuff on it!
As for your foremast, looking at it, I'd probably go with either a quadripod or pentapod, for improved stability and load capacity.

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My Avatar:Петр Алексеевич Безобразов (Petr Alekseevich Bezobrazov), Вице-адмирал , царская ВМФ России(1845-1906) - I sign my drawings as Ari Saarinen

Hi apdsmith,

while I think the concept of "gatling turrets" is somewhat "imaginative" , I think you have done quite nice!

Just some small suggestions:

- I would advise to space out your turrets even more - a single unlucky hit might be enough to take out both.
- Like the others have already said, I would loose some of the weight on both of your masts. As it is, your radar outfit seems rather heavy.
- Your ship lacks medium AA(!) - I would advise loosing the 20cm turrets and install some medium-calibre DP guns instead.

All in all very nice work! Keep it up!

Hi Maomatic,

To be honest, I'm looking forward to finishing this ship - apart from the fact that the guns themselves don't work, can't work, they force all kinds of unpleasant compromises on the rest of the design (partly that's because these particular ones are designed poorly, even for an "it doesn't work" design, partly because of the redundancy requirement I inserted at the start and am now sincerely regretting).

Take your point about gun spacing, however, I'm already more than a little concerned about the length of the ship - to my eye, she's Bismarck length already, after that latest cut-and-shut and I'm dubious that it could take more length without entering into another round of H-class "increase the armour, increase the beam, increase the length, increase the armour" iterations...

After Thiel and bezobrazov's comments, already working on a lattice-type after structure, hope to have that ready soon.

Re medium AA - well, it's got 149.1mm, 55mm, 37mm and a couple of 20mm I stuck on there mostly to keep the forecastle from looking empty. Could add 105mm, I guess, but I worry it would start to look like a pre-dread with a Noah's Ark one-of-every calibre. Or remove one calibre and replace with another? What's your suggestion?

Regards,
Adam

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Hi,

there is certainly no need for changes, if you don´t want to! It`s your drawing afterall and I know it can be tiresome to update a drawing again and again...


I don´t think you`d need to lengthen the hull any further. Just move turrets A and D a little more towards the bow / stern, while keeping (or even reduceing) the lenght.

The 20,3cm turrets are a bit too much in my opinion. A turret weighs about 250tons and your main armament should be sufficient to deal with cruiser-size surface targets. The firing-arcs of the 20,3cm guns is also very limited at the moment.
Now I think they waste too much valuable weight and - above all - space! Maybe replace them with some 12,8cm SK/L45 DP guns (can be found on the KM Partsheet).
This way you could save some of the ships beam and length. Plus it would bolster her AA defences considerably.

Are the "149.1mm" guns the ones in the small mount (i.e. the four mounts on the first deck)? I am not familiar with those guns, yet if they are supposed to be your medium AA / DP-guns, they might be well enough!

Maybe limit your light AA to 1-2 calibres, i.e. 30mm and 55mm guns. I have redrawn the 30mm MK303 if you are interested.

Well, those are just my ideas. Like I said, you have done a good job already and you don´t have to change anything.
Excuse my English - I hope you get what I mean... If you need any help just send me a pm.

Happy Easter Holidays!
- maomatic -

Edit: Typos!

Hi Maomatic,

Interesting ideas - they certainly hadn't occurred to me! I didn't mean to sound like I was brushing off your ideas, apologies if I didn't communicate that very well, I was just detailing my concerns over the suggested changes (given the amount of helpful feedback I've received on this ludicrous design I feel it'd be quite rude to just not listen to somebody's comments)

I suppose the 203mm turrets have stayed through inertia, really - on the very first version, they were actually the main battery turrets in the usual superfiring positions along the centreline, but got displaced out to the wing mounts once I (finally) realised that the Stupid Gun, in addition to being stupid, is also a bit of a prima donna in terms of placement - it wants top billing or not at all. The current main battery turrets are 149.1mm rotaries, intended to engage air and surface targets (elevation up to ~70 degrees), so I wonder if shipping 128mm DP would be somewhat redundant? That said, redundant and small is probably better than redundant and big!

To be honest, the 37mm came about for a couple of reasons: 1) 37mm was already a calibre in use in the KM - while this is for an AU nation that's not a part of Germany (it's in the South Atlantic) they're trading partners with a lot of technology transfer (paid for by the AU nation's vast mineral wealth, of course), so I figure if the KM had settled on something, so would the AU nation
2) I found a couple of pictures of the T249 Vigilante and thought "You know, if you were insane enough and stubborn enough to make a 149.1mm rotary cannon work, wouldn't you also start looking at the other calibres?" So, with a rough-and-ready copy of the T249 and a coat of navy gray paint, the AU nation's 37mm weapon was born!

That said, are they close enough to the 55mm to make one (or other) somewhat redundant?

I do appreciate all of the help I've been offered, so please, if you feel this is worth spending the time to look at and notice something, it's certainly worth my time giving some decent thought to your suggestions.

Regards,
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