Shipbucket

This project has taken many months to get right and has been quite productive in that several new parts have come out of it.
This is a complete redrawing of an earlier attempt I made some twelve years ago that is now lamentably poor!
A note on the drawing, as many will know the 1952 Fleet Carrier was not worked out in detail and the basic outline sketches have been published in Friedman and D.K. Brown's books. I have brought one of these designs to life but beyond the basic deck layout, island shape, armament layout and funnel locations the details are mine. As ever, how much is never-were and how much is personal design is always a fine line in bringing never-weres to life. My interpretation is based on the sketch outline and the conversions done to HMS Ark Royal, Eagle, Victorious and Hermes during the late 1950s. I have depicted the ship as completed in 1959.


1952 Fleet Aircraft Carrier, Carrier 'D', depicted as completed 1959

In June 1952 the Admiralty shifted away from the policy of rebuilding the older armoured carriers due to the problems faced with the rebuilding of Victorious. A new carrier was desired by 1958. The design of a new carrier had been studied since April with a design with a 1,000ft long flightdeck with an airgroup of 80-90 aircraft. By July the design had evolved to one capable of operating English Electric Canberra bombers. However, dock infrastructure became an issue and only No.10 Dock at Devonport was suitable and the draught had to be restricted to 35ft. By September the design had shruken slightly. The tentative schedule estimated an order in January 1954, laying down in May and completing in December 1958, a rather ambitious schedule. But the design work slipped due to pressures of work and the building slips were taken up with other construction. By April 1953 two carriers were wanted but the Admiralty wondered whether the £26 million price was too high and if smaller carriers would be more suitable. In July 1953 the Radical Review cancelled the ship and all work stopped.

Four designs had been drawn up by September 1953; 'A' had two deck-edge lifts, 'B' had split islands, 'C' had the split islands but with a deck-edge lift between them, 'D' had one centreline and one deck-edge lift. The boiler/machinery and magazine layouts of 'B' and 'D' were preferred. Slightly later designs sacrificed some fuel capacity and two 3in mounts to reduce size, displacement and cost.
Rough estimates for the four designs were:
Displacement (deep): 52,000 tons
Length: 815ft
Beam (waterline): 115ft
Beam (flight deck): 160ft
Draught (deep): 33ft 6in
Machinery: 200,000hp for 30kts ('deep and dirty' in tropics)
750,000gal aviation fuel (including 250,000gal AVGAS)
Armament: 4x2 3in L/70
Armour: 2in plating to waterline, 2in NC on flightdeck
Radar: 2x Type 894 3-D

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Hood's Worklist
English Electric Canberra FD
Interwar RN Capital Ships
Super-Darings
Never-Were British Aircraft

Hmmm
Hood,
Re-check the book "British aircrafts carriers - designs, development and services histories, by David Hobbs, Seaforth publishing"

British 1952-1953 carrier design-history were a complex one

If you need refs, PM me (but I need time )

Absolutely fantastic one!!

Solid and true shipbucket quality as it should be

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Shipbucket mainsite, aka "The Archive"
New AU project "Aravala"

Fantastic work!
(and it would be certainly very interesting to see other design variants )

A very lovely drawing. I find the stern somewhat odd (at least, compared to the USN supercarriers I'm used to). Presumably the athwartships yellow line was intended as a touchdown target, or even a 'don't land aft of here' marking? The narrowing of the landing zone aft of this line is otherwise very peculiar to me -- I'd expect it to remain constant-width (projecting out to starboard) all the way to the fantail.

Very nice work! A KGV-esque superstructure arrangement on an elongated Ark Royal-style hull.

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MS State Guard - 08 March 2014 - 28 January 2023

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Beautiful!

Fantastic! I love it!
I am curious about a few small things, though, and a few small remarks.
- Why are the 2 funnels different in size, while they both have 2 tubes of the same size going trough them?
- is the aft 3D radar capable of rotating in that spot?
- The hangar opening seems higher then the deck level of the gallery deck, hell the portholes just next to it seem to be near floor level if the elevator opening is to be believed.
- are we gonna see these new parts on the wiki soon?

I believe the bow needs a slightly different shading though, the hull is at the waterline very narrow and at the flight deck level very wide, so should the shading not be more like on this drawing? http://shipbucket.com/drawings/639/file

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Drawings are credited with J.Scholtens
I ask of you to prove me wrong. Not say I am wrong, but prove it, because then I will have learned something new.
Shipbucket Wiki admin

Indeed it was, my potted history is just a bare-bones outline. Anyone wanting to know more would be better off consulting these texts directly.
Hmmm, maybe. Each design is quite different in detail so its not a simple case of rearranging things. I won't commit to this but it might happen.
The marking's I have used are based on those applied to the first 'proper' angled decks in RN service. The horizontal line was the warning line, aft of that point the landing decks often began to curve downwards towards the aft edge, in practice the pilots would be aiming to land quite a way ahead of that line. By the mid-60s the colour scheme was red but generally similar.
The narrow end of the landing deck is common to all four of the designs. But is has to be remembered that these are the first angled decks the DNC had designed for a new ship. By September 1952 the only 'angled decks' had been a painted line for trials on HMS Triumph and USS Antietam had just begun trials with her rudimentary sponson. HMS Centaur's modified flight deck would not be ready until 1954 and Ark Royal's purpose-built angled deck (the first one) was not completed until February 1955 and of course that year saw HMAS Melbourne and USS Forrestal complete too.
My guess is that had this design been built, its quite possible that experience with Centaur and Ark Royal might have seen some modifications to the aft end of the layout.
Plenty of questions there!
The funnels are a frustrating mystery to me! The plan sketch outline of 'D' shows the island outlines (a rectangle with rounded edges) and the uptakes represented by a crossed square but did not show the opposite curved faces of the two funnels but the size is as taken off the side-view. The plan clearly shows that both uptake tunnels were of the same dimensions despite the funnels being of different size! I had discussed with Erik_T if it was possible these were Macks but we discounted that possibility.

The aft radar is another frustrating mystery! The aft islands of all the split-island designs and the the aft sections of the singular islands of all four designs are too small! There is no way two 984s could be fitted or would have satisfactory arcs. On scaling the drawings the aft island worked out only 1.5 decks tall! I have kept the same length as shown on the drawing but I took artistic licence and raised the island to 2 full decks height. A Type 984 now just about fits but I agree its a tight squeeze and I might rearrange things slightly (I need to edit the 984 drawing slightly anyway too due to a source I found this morning!). Even so, the arcs are terrible and the funnel would blank out the forward arcs. This is why I pondered if Macks were planned but that would result in terrible topweight. Of course, in 1952 the planned Type 984 was still an unknown quantity in terms of final design, size and weight so its not surprising they were left off the sketch.

The deck scales are based on the plan. There seems to be a tiny gallery deck, mine is deeper but I agree the portholes need shifting upwards a little.

Yes, new parts will appear soon on the Wiki.

Hull shading is not my natural forte, I can look at that.

Based on the scaling issues and the oddities of the plan I would say that the sketch drawings were not complete by any means. They were intended to show the machinery and magazine layout and the deck layout and hangar but otherwise had little other detail.

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Hood's Worklist
English Electric Canberra FD
Interwar RN Capital Ships
Super-Darings
Never-Were British Aircraft

I think your comment on macks is a little over-strong, I believe our conclusion was "ehh, probably not, but who knows"

One other detail -- I think I'd indicate some deck-edge drainage for the 3"/70 platforms. Right now, it looks like they are excellent water collectors. Maybe something like a repeating series of (in pixel count) gray-gray-black-black-black along the deck?