Shipbucket

I have a question about possibility to mount such gun caliber in turret of SMS "Seydlitz", replacing 28 cm SK L/50 gun?

Or if it is not possible do the space restrictions then can base of turret can support/fit the SMS "Derfflinger" type of turret?

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Nobody expects the Imperial Inquisition!

I would tend to be skeptical of substantial up-gunning in any turret, since turrets were very nearly wrapped around their guns. Recall that the Iowa program faced a near-crisis just from the barbette diameter change associated with going from the 16"/45 to the 16"/50!

Of course you can sometimes play games like trading 6" triples for 8" twins, as on the Mogamis.

The navweaps discussion boards would probably be able to answer your question more authoritatively.

I did drop the question there, but nothing so far.

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Nobody expects the Imperial Inquisition!

I would think that unless the ship has had an allowance made right from when the ship was first designed to allow an upgrade from one gun size, turret size, to another then the problems would be quite large. To upgun your ship requires virtually everything from turret down to magazines to be changed to accept the new shell size.

Those countries that made an allowance to allow a new gun size to be fitted later, Japanese, as erik-t said (6" to 8"), Germans with the Scharnhorst type (11" to 15"), uhmmm there aren't that many examples, still found problems to surmount.

Well, that's true for large calibers. The Standards went through three different sizes of 5" gun, and some 3" as well, and this aspect of the the reconstructions did not represented (AFAIK) a substantial challenge.

wasn't North Carolina-class original designed as a quad 14" turret design, that could be changed to 16" triple turret version, if Japan didn't play nice.

The class was programmed that way, but I don't recall if the 14" version was still intended as steel was laid down.

Hi Rhade

Although I can't know for sure, I think it would not have been possible. The 305mm guns weigh 20% more than the 280mm ones and need much stronger cradles to handle recoil; I doubt they could be crammed into a 280mm turret. The complete 305mm turrets had larger barbettes than the 280mm, so the whole ship would have to be gutted to fit them (either the guns need to be moved closer to the ship's ends or the machinery and Boiler spaces need to be shortened to retain the length of the citadel, or a mix of both measures); although this seems abstractly feasible given that all German WWI era ships were underarmed for their size and had ample weight reserves, it would certainly be prohibitively expensive and not worth the effort.

The examples for up-gunning battleships included a reduction in the number of guns per turret, so the new turret would fit on the diameter of the old barbette (which of course would have to be totally refitted internally with all new elevators and gear to work the larger shells). The only people who ever increased gun caliber while retaining the turret were the Italians in the Conte di Cavour and Andrea Doria classes, which was possible because they used essentially the same guns with new liners and thinner barrels (the thick barrels of the WWI-era wire wound British guns allowed for that). German gun barrels were much thinner to begin with, so that would not have been possible either.

There however was a pre-design for Seydlitz mounting eight 305mm guns arranged as the 280mm guns on Von der Tann; beats me why this was not followed through, given that German battleships had switched to 305mm ordnance even before Seydlitz was laid down. Such a ship would have looked something like the AU Graf Schwerin to be found here:
viewtopic.php?f=14&t=5720&start=320

Greetings
GD

Thank's lad.

I dig for this on couple of sites and most give the same info like you. 280mm mount is too weak to receive 305mm gun, turret is too small and such replacement would be probably impossible from technical point of view. Drh LC/1912 turret was bigger in diameter and need larger turret foundation, weight is also bigger so replacing all 5 Drh LC/1910 turrets would give at least 500 tons of extra weight (not to mention additional weight beyond turrets alone) and mess up the ship stability. The sensible thing would be lowering number of turrets from 5 to 4. But such modernization would be very costly.

If you don't mind I will ask you about "one" more thing. How sensible would be rebuild "Seydlitz" by replacing of coal-fired boilers with fuel/mazut ones, rebuilding coal bunkers for fuel/mazut tanks. Moving turret B in to middle from staggered position with moving aft funnel structure back. Removing turret E completely. I know it would be a costly rebuild that actually lower the firepower but from technical point of view, is this possible?

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Nobody expects the Imperial Inquisition!