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This is something I once decided to do, or more like a general essay of soviet carrier projects. I did actually manage to the "part I" where I covered some of the pre-and WWII era designs but since then I've come up with alot of new information and undestandment over these projects. And this was years ago. Before Shipbucket didn't even exist. I always knew I will return to the matter with my new hobby and here it is: attempt to visualise these facinating projects. This time I decided to focus mainly on the images and leave the in-depth analyses to those with more knowlidge and writing skills.

NOTE: These drawings are based on the existing images, inturperations and scethes of soviet carrier projects. I've made some artistical adjustments and standarlised some equipment and weaponry fits. All together as these projects were "never-wheres" one shouldn't get too exited on their authentity.

So here is Part I.



Project 71 emerged soon after soviets introduced carriers into their naval building program in 1938. The orginal plan didn't specify any dedicated carrier projects but soon after a TTZ was issued for light carrier with about 13 000ton displacement and 40 aircrafts. Orginal armament fit was 3 dual 130mm guns, 8 dual 100mm guns and 4 quad 37mm AA guns. Eventually the armament was reduced to 8 single 100mm guns and 4 quad 37mm guns. The hull and machinery was based on the pr. 68 Chapaev class light cruisers being build at the moment. The design was abbandoned at the outbreak of WWII.



Project 72 was studied in 1944-45 and in most sources it is mentioned at least two variants of this project, one showed here with displacement and size of roughly the same as UK Illusrious class and another one considerably larger with approx. 62 aircrafts and diplacement of over 30 000 tons. The variant showed here features 8 dual 130mm guns, 8 dual 85mm guns and 8 dual 37mm AA guns.



Project Kostromitinov is one of the most interesting, yet least known of all the carrier projects. It's a study of Leutenant Kostromitinov, who studied the concept of German carrier Graf Zeppelin. The design bears similarities to the german projectalbeit it's much larger, 300m full lenght and over 50 000 tons full load displacement. Armament was 8 twin 152mm casemant mounts, 4 tripple and 6 twin 100mm guns and 8 quad 37mm guns. 66 fighters and 40 bombers were to be carried.



Project 69AV dates imidiate post-war era, 1945-46 when it was studied wheter the incomplete heavy cruiser pr.69 Kronstad could be able to modified as a aircraft carrier. 76 aircrafts were intended and armament consisted 8 dual 130mm guns and 16 dual 37mm AA guns.

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Shipbucket mainsite, aka "The Archive"
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very nice! but could you tell me which aircraft are carried? some seem to be familliar, and I am really interested in them...

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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.
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I used I-16, Yak-9, Kop-1 and the sole existing carrier plane project from those days, Chetverikov PTI torbedo-bombers. There isen't much information about any aircraft types being carried by which designs, thus I'm mainly using common soviet aircraft of that era for illustrative purposes.

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Great concepts, I really was looking foward when you told you were doing these ones!! Byzantine use too?

Wow! Amazing stuff! Been reading up on all the Soviet never-built carriers lately (including Gollevainen's own article on it), so it's great to see these appear on Shipbucket. Well done Sir!

A most unusuall project, very nice done. Sir I salute your skills

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Thank you Kim for the crest

"Never fear to try on something new. Remember that the Titanic was built by professionals, and the Ark by an amateur"

Amazing work on the ships and great research. The Soviet never-built projects themselves are very interesting.

Thank you for illustrating them.

Fantastic job!

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Lazer_One


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Agreed,
A very interesting set of drawings, and two of them new to my knowledge. One wonders what else Golly has up his sleeve ready for us to see?
All the aircraft complements can only be speculative, there just wasn't the kind of naval aircraft development as elsewhere during this period. It's not hard to suggest that the mainstream OKBs would have developed variants of their land-based types if these carriers ever had reached launching stage.

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Very Nice!!

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Salide - Denton - The Interrealms

I am not very active on the forums anymore, but work is still being done on my AUs. Visit the Salidan Altiverse Page on the SB Wiki for more information. All current work is being done on Google Docs.
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