What is your Favorite type of ship?

Lwd wrote:

The Iowa's and Montanas were developed in parallel. They were both the product of a number of design studies undertaken at the same time, and were expansions upon the South Dakota class. The fast battleship option was selected and the first two Iowa's were authorized in 1938. The next two Iowas and two Montana's were authorized in 1940. The Navy's need for fast battleships was more pressing so the Navy requested that two more Iowas be substituted for the two Montanas and the pennant numbers (BB-65 and 66) were reassigned.
CA 45 Wichita was laid down in 1935 and launched 16 November 1937, so she pre-dates the SoDak's and would probably be closer to being a contemporary of the North Carolinas, the first of which was laid down on 27 October 1937. The first of the South Dakotas were laid down in July of 1939 around the time the planning was started on the Baltimores the first of which was authorized in 1940. The first Alaskas were ordered in September 1940. Interest once again was revived in the Montana class and she was again approved for construction in April 1942, to include revisions because of lessons learned in the preceeding classes. This should show that the Baltimores, Alaskas, Iowas and Montanas were all contemporary to one another. If you go with the modified Montana design of 1942, the contemporary cruiser, as I initially said would be the Oregon City class or possibly the Des Moines class, both of which were improved Baltimores.
I do not think the chronology supports your pairing of BB and CA types to prove a natural evolution in displacement of CA's as a ratio in relation to BB's.

 

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Indeed. I hadn't been aware of the exact defintion of standard load either so I just learned a couple of things. My thanks.

That was to some extent anyway my point. There's also the factor that they were treaty battleships so there was another constraint on them.

Well the Lexingtons fit between the Colorado's and the canceled SoDak's. According to South Dakota class battleship (1920) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia the latter were to weigh in at around 43,200 tons. Which is still just shy of the Constellations ( Lexington class battlecruiser - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ) at 43,600.

 

Thanks for the run down on the develpment history of the battleships. I tend to lup the SoDak's and the North Carlinas as they are so similar especially in displacement and besides it's faster to type SoDak, but you do make a valid point there. The point I was tring to make though is I think still a valid one. Most navies tended to have cruisers that were between half and 1/3 the displacement of their contemporary battleships. Alaska fits neatly in here. But displacements and terminology for cruisers is not exactly obvious. For instance the big US light cruisers were heavier than many heavy cruisers and and both the US and Britain built some very light cruisers that were still catagorized as CLs. Battlecruisers as we have seen seem to very from a few percent lighter than contemporary battleships to some what heavier. Obviously Alaska doesn't fit into that catagory.

Just what is a battlecruiser is a debate I've seen on a number of boards and it is not an easy call as there are IMO several equally valid defintions and several more that are close. For the ones I think are best the Alaska doesn't qualify but for others it does and since no one made me the overall czar of warship classification my opinion on the matter is worth whatever weight people are willing to give it.

 

This is a very good point, one I hadn't addressed. The Washington and London Naval Treaties forced many compromises in the development of battleships, cruisers and carriers. The reason the CV Wasp was so small was to use the limited tonnage left for carriers under the treaty. The BB North Carolinas were initially designed to fit within the 35,000. ton and 14" gun limits on displacement and gun size for battleships. She was initially designed to mount a main battery of 12 14" guns mounted in three quadruple turrets. As I stated in an earlier post:
"One of the design criteria for battleships was that it be armored to provide an immune zone against it's own main battery."
This is the point that some people use to argue that the Noth Carolinas and Iowas are actually battlecruisers. The North Carolina was designed with armor protection against her original 14"/50 Mark B guns. When Japan and Italy didn't sign on to the Second London Naval Treaty, the US invoked the escalator clause to allow guns up to 16". The Navy had hedged their bets in this area and had designed the barbettes to accept either the 14" quad turret or the new 16"/45 Mark VI triple turret. So the North Carolinas were not technically armored against their own main battery. To further muddy the waters, the North Carolinas 16"/45 guns were designed to fire either the 2,240-pound Mark 5 armor-piercing shell or the new "super-heavy" 2,700-pound APC Mark 8. This gave the North Carolinas (plus the South Dakotas and Iowas) a heavier broadside than any other battleships except the Yamatos. So while the North Carolinas were sufficiently armored against their designed 14" battery and most older 16" batteries, she was not armored against her own main battery.
Even the Iowas design was constrained by the treaties, they were limited to a maximum displacement of 45,000 tons specified in the escalator clause. They were designed to use the 16"/50 MkII's from the cancelled Lexington class and armored against the 16"/45 guns mounted on the North Carolinas and SoDaks. The guns the Iowas mounted were the new 16/50 Mk VII's and they were nearly as powerful as the Yamatos 18" guns (actually 18.1"). At 20,000 yards the Mk. 8 shell fired from the 16" MkVII could penetrate 20 inches of steel armor plate or 21 feet of reinforced concrete! So like the North Carolinas she was not armored against her main battery even though she was armored against anything afloat except the Yamatos or another Iowa. If you look at any battlecruiser, except the Hood, they are not armored against anything heavier than the 8" main battery of a heavy cruiser.

 

Before I get into replying to your points, I'm really into cruisers also and after we finish discussing the battlecruiser, and since this is a favorite ships thread, I hope we can discuss cruisers in general. I'd really like to get your take on certain things!

I'm still not convinced that the 1/3 displacement isn't just an unintended consequense of the Naval Treaties. The US was limited to 18 heavy cruisers with a combined tonnage of 180000t or 10,000 tons each. We really have to concentrate on the US cruisers because they were the only country with the industrial capacity to build a significant number of cruisers freed from the pre-war treaty restrictions. The first US cruisers to be freed from the limits were the Baltimores at 13,600 std displacement. Based upon wartime experience and incorporating all desired features and unrestricted by treaty you have the Des Moines class at 21,000 std tons. This class was designed and built as what the epitome of a cruiser should be. They were designed and built after the Iowas and Montanas. Why were they only 21,000 tons standard? This is only 3/4's of the Alaskas 27,500 tons standard displacement?
You brought up the heavy cruiser/light cruiser question. (A very good and interesting point I might add). Many US light cruisers had heavier armor and a heavier broadside than the treaty designed US heavy cruisers. This is because the treaties specified 8" as the maximum caliber for heavy cruisers (CA)and 6.1" for light cruisers (CL), displacement and armor were not used as a delineator. The Baltimores were in fact an improved version of the Cleveland class CL mounting 9 x 8" guns instead of 12 x 6" guns. If the Alaskas were the natural evolution of the heavy cruiser, why did the later designed and built Baltimores and Des Moines classes revert to 8" guns from the Alaskas 12" guns? It is interesting that the 12"/50 MkVIII gun mounted on the Alaskas had superior performance to the 14"/50 mounted on older American battleships. It was decided to mount 16/50 MkVIIs on the Montanas as opposed to an 18" gun that was considered, because their performance was so similar to the 18" for much lighter weight. Could there have been similar reasoning behind the Alaskas? Why put a gun with the performance of a battleship on a heavy cruiser?

You are correct about the debate, it's been going on since the Alaska was designed. In her early design stage she was actually designated a CC, battlecruiser, but this was later changed. You and I won't be able to lay the question to rest but it is an interesting topic. Later my friend.

 

View attachment 13385 USS Oklahoma City, CG 5

The USS Oklahoma City was the twentieth of twenty seven Cleveland class light cruisers built during World War II. Finished in Feb. 1944 the ship participated in the final actions against Japan. She conducted local operations, around Pearl Harbor, until 22 May when she sailed for Ulithi, thence to rendezvous 6 June with Carrier Task Group 38.1 for operations in support of the Okinawa campaign. For the rest of June and into July, she screened 3rd Fleet carriers during their intensified air operations against Japanese forces. The Okie Boat was one of six light cruisers selected for conversion to guided missile cruisers in the 1950s. These first generation missile ships provided long range anti-aircraft defense for the fleet. The OK City served as a Flagship until decommissioning in 1979 including throughout most of the Vietnam War. She accepted refugees from at least 8 Huey helicopters during Operation Frequent Wind at the conclusion of the Vietnam War. Hueys that landed on a flight deck that was designed for a SH 3 Sea King helicopter (no small feat) by retired BMC David Campbell. BMC Campbell is a veteran of the "Brown Water Navy".

P.S. You never call a Naval Vessel a "boat", so how she got this nickname is a mystery to me but we all loved her (especially when we made it through a typhoon in the Taiwan Straits in 76, thought we were a goner). It is like a Marine calling trousers.....you know. Guess "Okie Ship" doesn't sound right.

Class and type: Galveston class guided missile cruiser
Displacement: 10,000 long tons (10,160 t)
Length: 610 ft 1 in (185.95 m) Beam: 66 ft 2 in (20.17 m) Draft: 24 ft 10 in (7.57 m)
Propulsion: Geared turbines, 100,000 hp (74,570 kW), 4 shafts
Speed: 31.6 knots (58.5 km/h; 36.4 mph)
Complement: 1,426 officers and enlisted Armament: • 3 × 6 in (152 mm) guns in Mark 16 turret
• 2 × 5 in (127 mm) guns
• 1 × twin-rail Talos SAM launcher
Aircraft carried: Kaman SH-2B (1968-1972) Sea King (1975-?) helicopter (Call Sign: Blackbeard 1)

View attachment 13386

 

It must be the destroyer, the jack-of-all-trades - and in particular its use of the torpedo, a real equalizer, especially in close-in night fighting. The sinking of Scharnhorst is a good example on that. The Germans used a technique in the Channel where they preferred not to use the guns not to reveal their position in the dark, instead using the torpedoes.

During the research on my book on Operation Sea Lion - River Wide, Ocean Deep, I came across a vessel type which is not listed here - the German Type M35 minesweeper which I found quite fascinating. Originally built as a minsweeper its main missions during the war changed more and more into that of an escort vessel and it achieved a healthy respect from its adversaries. The British gave it the nickname The Channel destroyer. More than 60 served in the Kriegsmarine. Even if it was in the forefront from the start none were sunk by the Allies untill the summer of 1942, then by anti-ship aircrafts. It took another year before one was sunk by an enemy surface vessel.

M1's escapades during the Weserübung operation, captained by Hans Bartels, are epic. His Norwegian adversaries nicknamed him The Red Pimpernel, after Alexander Dumas' hero figure.
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I decided looking at pretreaty designs might be the way to go with this. I'm not all that familiar with these ships and the resutls are rathe interesting. If we go back to compare say the Charleston (C-22/CA-23) it's almost 10,000 tons and the contemporary Conneticut class BB is 16,000 tons (the somewha later Mississippis are only 13,000 tons!). Let's go to the Dreadnaught period though. And another surprise CA-24 isn't built until the 1920s almsot 20 years after CA-23! and the same seems to hold for the CL's. So much for that idea for US designs.
Let's look at British:
Dreadnought is 16,000 tons and the contemporary armored curisers are 13,500 to 14,600! The next two classes of battleships go up to almost 19,000 and 20,000 tons respectivly and are still more or less contemporary with the armroed cruisers. Scout cruisers from this period seem to way in at around 3,000 tons plus or minus 500 or so. The first real heavy cruisers show up around 1918 and weigh in at ~10,000 tons where the contemporary battleships are 28,000 tons but is this a trend or just a data point? Perhaps there's room for a class ever few thousand tons with gap increasing with displacement. Or ????
Data from: List of cruiser classes of the Royal Navy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia and List of dreadnought battleships of the Royal Navy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
and List of dreadnought battleships of the Royal Navy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

One consideration is that the treaties obviously forsaw growth in both the guns and displacments in cruisers (as well as battelships) thus the clauses limiting such growth. Of course some of the limits were to prevent nations from sidestepping the treaties. All in all not as neat as I thought it would be.

Oh another thing about the North Carolina's, SoDak's, Iowa, and even the Montana's was that they were designed to be fast battleships with a corresponding increase in the propulsion displacement. Another thing to watch when comparing them with older designs.

 

You guys might be interested to know tba Richard Worth (tiornu) has recently put out a new publication titled Thunder in it's Courses: Essays on the Battlecruiser available now on kindle. Should be in print soon.

 

Thanks for the info Mike, my younger son got me a Kindle for Christmas. I need some new books for it Tioru's will top my list.

 

Read the epic story of the Emden. I know it was WW1, but didn't the Emden set the mark for what cruisers were designed for? Disrupting distant shipping, scouting, running away when outgunned? A fast, efficient, stable ocean faring war machine with long legs.

 

Cruisers. Despite not being as versatile as their smaller destroyer counterparts, they filled in the roles as capital ships when larger, more resource-consuming and powerful ships were not there... for example, HMS Suffolk and Norfolk helped the Royal Navy to track down the Bismarck and eventually lead to her destruction.

Also, if I had a second choice, it would be aircraft carriers

 

Ditto. Especially, heavy cruisers.

Regards,

 

I do not really have any favorite ships, as I like all types, but if I had to choose, I will go with cruisers, particularly the heavies, and for a specific class of cruiser, the New Orlean-class; they were the best class of American CAs prior to the Baltimores, were some of the most hard fought and decorated USN ships of WWII, and they're just good looking vessels in my book.

 

The USS Wisconsin.

 

Among my favorite class of CVs is the Yorktown-class, these were probably the best CVs the USN had at the start of the war, as they were a excellent middle ground between the Lexingtons and the Wasp; They had a comparable aircraft capacity to the Lexingtons, which were the largest carriers in the world at the time, and were faster and better protected than Wasp, as they proved their ability to absorb punishment before going down, with Yorktown being heavily damaged at Midway, taking 3 bombs and 2 torpedoes, and only sank after the battle following a run-in with a Japanese sub, and at Santa Cruz, Hornet, bearing the brunt of the Japanese air attack, took 6 bombs and 3 torpedos, along with 9 more torps as well as a unconfirmed number of 5" rounds in an effort by the USN to scuttle her, she was still afloat until finally finished off by Japanese destroyers, while the sole surviving member of the class, USS Enterprise, fought on to the end of the war and became the most decorated warship in US naval history, this was a truly outstanding class of CVs, made even more so by the brave men who served aboard these ships.

 

Just noticed that this thread is in the "other weapons" section rather than the naval one????

 

USS New Jersey Iowa Class Battleship. The Iowa class battleships were BEAST. They were my favourite and the Tamiya model of it made me love it.

 

Cruisers. From 1914 to present. Designed to operate alone, or way out front. If you can't outgun something, outrun it.