Shipbucket

As the title says, this is the house of American horrors, that is to say the whacky, and sometimes monstrous designs produced by the US navy to either satisfy the whims of a US senator who was sick and tired of the ever increasing costs of battleship cough Tillman cough. Others are either fast battleships or battlecruisers. I am obliged to provide you with a governmental health warning. Also, I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY HEALTH ISSUES OR INSANITY! You have been warned!

First is the Maximum Battleship design study, unofficially called the Tillman battleships. The idea was to build few ships that were the maximum size that the Panama Canal could handle. That being a ship roughly 300m long and 33m wide.

First up is the 63.500t battleship armed with 12x16"/50 caliber guns. By far the reasonable and realistic of the 6 designs.


The two last are the 80.000t designs armed with 18"/50 caliber guns, with Scheme #4-1 armed with 13 guns in five twin turrets and one triple turret.


Scheme #4-2 has 15x18" guns in five triple turrets.


I won't be doing schemes 1-3 as they are visually identical to #3, with alternating designs having slimmer funnels and slower speed. Two of those designs have sixtuple turrets with 16" guns, and no, that is not a typo. 6 GUNS PER TURRET!

Tis one is wip as of now. One is for a 48.750t 25kt battleship that is basically a stratched South Dakota class.


This is a 30kts battleship armed with 12x16"/50 Mk2s on a long (270m) hull. The superstructure and seconday layout is even more wacky than that of the Tillman's. There are a version of this that is 280m long, but looks the same. There are also two versions of this design with British input, with a more sensible superstructure and secondary layout. The ammount of funnels is likewise reduced. This design also comes in a 270m, and a 280m flavour. Both are still very much wips.


Last, but not least (that's a pun, you may laugh) is a 1085ft (330m) 56.500t battlecruiser armed with 8x16"/45 cal guns with 13" of belt armor and a top speed of 29kts.
I would make another joke about the ship, but it's too long


Here's the second of three carrier designs that would eventually result in the Lexington class carrier. Top speed was 34kts, and armed with 16x6"/53 guns in four twin turrets and four twin casemates. AA guns were 12x5"/25 guns.


Here's the last of three carrier designs produced in 1922. This one is about 39000 tons, with a top speed of 34kts. She is armed with 12x6" guns, and 12x5" AA guns. With the signing of the treaty, this design was adopted to the Lexington class battlecruiser hull, and with some changes afterwards, would become the Lexington class carrier that we all know and worship.


After some quick edits, namely adding on the bow and stern guns I have turned my 10 gun AU Tennessee into one of the preliminaries for the Colorado class, most of which had 10 guns in various layouts, each one more crazy than the next:


I'm finally posting the 50.000t fast battleship design. She was armed with 8x16" guns, and armored like a proper battleship. Speed was 25kts.

tillmans are dope af

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Nice. I personally love the Tillman's.
aren't those 16 x 50's on the IV-1 & IV-2?

a question about the shading on the stacks, the barbettes and anything round, shouldn't the light color be at the most forward?
i am going to try and recolor my Alabama as you suggested but I noticed that and was wondering about it.

Designs 4-1 and 4-2 had 18" guns, not 16. There were two designs with sixtuple 16" turrets, and two with triples.

As for the shading, the light color is at the forward part. In SB style, light comes from the front, and up above. We usually don't shade it realistically with large sweeping shadows at significant overhangs. For simplicity, and traditon, I suppose. Curves should have a thin brighter color, followed by a thicker part behind it. The curve on the back of curved objects should be shaded with a single continious darker shade.

i was comparing your guns to these

I've finished the 54500t Scheme D 1919 Fast Battleship design. It's a full 270m long with a top speed of 30kts. She has a 12" armored belt, with a 10" armor strip over it to protect the boilers. She has 12x16"/50 Mk2s.

That's the same gun, but a much later turret design from 1938.

Here's the last of three carrier designs produced in 1922. This one is about 39000 tons, with a top speed of 34kts. She is armed with 12x6" guns, and 12x5" AA guns. With the signing of the treaty, this design was adopted to the Lexington class battlecruiser hull, and with some changes afterwards, would become the Lexington class carrier that we all know and worship.

Nice work!

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MS State Guard - 08 March 2014 - 28 January 2023

The Official IJN Ships & Planes List

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I´ve added one of the Colorado class preliminaries: