Potential Battlewagons of Bavaria

[mentat]

   I vote for Wotan - not too big/expensive, good capability - impressive firepower - if the Main armament isn't enough - at medium range the heavy Secs will do the job - smother the opponent with hits

    - also the name - yesssss  ;D

[Borys]

Ahoj!
One of the designs with 8-10 13" guns, and 4,7-5,9" guns. 26 knots is enough.
I don't like the 7,1" secondaries.
Borys

[Sachmle]

I think the 18cm secondaries would be one of those things that looks good on paper, works in trials/training, and would be found to be mostly useless in actual combat. But, since the Bavarians have no ACTUAL COMBAT experience, I can see Kirk's IC reasoning behind them. Longer range, heavier shell, minimal RoF loss.

[miketr]

A 40KT ship with 33cm mains and 18cm I think would discovered to be a white elephant.

One though is that Bavaria had access to the Builders Plans for the Iberian Portugal class BB's as Bavaria provided armor.  Didn't Italy have a similar arrangement with Bavaria?  If so I would think that as a starting point a design based on either one of those two designs might make the most sense for Brazil. 

Another thought is that does Bavaria need a ship with more than 8,000 nm range?

Michael   

[Jefgte]

Original Wotan
35,490t
12x33cm, 24x18cm, 12x9cm
35cm MB, 12cm UP, 100cm D, 4cm TDS (+)
26kts, 66%, 9990nm


modified Wotan
35,000t
4T3x33cm, 24x15cm, 12x9cm
35cm MB, 12cm UP, 100cm D, 4cm TDS
26kts, oil, 8000nm:@12kts

or ...built BB Tennessee class


Jef  ;)

[Guinness]

I think the 18cm secondaries would be one of those things that looks good on paper, works in trials/training, and would be found to be mostly useless in actual combat. But, since the Bavarians have no ACTUAL COMBAT experience, I can see Kirk's IC reasoning behind them. Longer range, heavier shell, minimal RoF loss.

Pretty much the USN's reasoning on the 7"L45. In theory it had nearly the same RoF as a 6" gun, but fired a shell twice as heavy, and so having much more killing power.

In the latest Warship International there is a table, comparing the Weight of shell delivered per minute for the 6, 7 and 8 inch shell. I'll reproduce it here:

Caliber	Rounds/Minute	Weight of Shell/Minute	Energy/Minute
8"	1.2	300lbs	16,322 ft-tons
7"	2.5	412.5lbs	23,062 ft-tons
6"	3.5	350lbs	20,433 ft-tons

So in theory, just on these metrics, the 7" gun would be superior, at least if you want to deliver HE rounds on a single target. If we look at each gun's weight: the US 6"L50 of the period weighed 8.3 tons, the 7"L45 12.8 tons, and the 8"L45 18.8 tons. So we get 15.95 lbs/ton for the 8", 32.22 lbs/ton for the 7", and 42.16 lbs/ton for the 6". So the 6" looks like a good deal.

What ultimately disproved the 7" gun though, I believe, was the shift of secondary batteries from use against the "main" target to torpedo boat defense. When defending against mass torpedo attack, more guns firing faster matters, so long as the gun is big enough to hit and kill the attacker outside torpedo range. For this job, the 7" was probably overkill. It was also heavy enough to make laying it on smaller targets difficult.

For a coast defense gun though, I believe that 7" was a very good caliber, being "hand" loadable (by two men with a tray at least), and thus having relatively high RoF. 7" from a shore installation still delivers plenty of punch. Indeed the US 7"L45's found significant use in this role in WW2.

[mentat]

Interesting discussion on the heavy secondaries

I have to admit they are a pet liking on my part

I think they have real value firing HE against Major targets at Medium range - fires can be very incapacitating to any size of Ship - and no Ship can protect completely against HE

Against TBDs - something lighter (5-6") with higher Rate of fire is definitely preferable - giving higher probability of hits

But a 17/18cm has longer range and bigger punch - so there is some compensation

Although such guns are criticised vs TBDs on a BB - I have never seen a Cruiser with 17/18 cm Main armament - ship a separate Secry Battery vs TBDs - the Main guns are relied on

Also - re. laying guns on target - why the problem?? - any difference in training rate ? - I assume 17/18cm are power operated ...

[Guinness]

The 7" used on the Connecticut class (for example) was not power trained or elevated. This would be typical for most single gun mountings in casemates.

[mentat]

  Thanks - interesting - how about the 7.5"s on the Hawke's - power operated?

[Guinness]

Navweaps says:

This mounting was essentially a hand-worked center pivot type with additional power training and elevation provided by a 10 HP electric motor and hydraulic pump.  Run-out was spring-powered.

So sort of hydraulically boosted manual, I guess. The given RoF figures in Navweaps are probably fanciful I suspect. At least, that's what American naval ordnance officers believed, given their own experience with the 7" gun. Sustained RoF over 2 rounds/minute for this gun would likely have been exceptional.

[mentat]

Also interesting thanks - my interest in heavy secs is strictly on the basis they are power operated to be practical weapons - I think manual operation is only really effective up to 14/15cm - anyone else have views on that?

For the heavy Secs on Wotan - I guess 24 x 18cm will be very heavy if they are power operated - but 16 would still be plenty ...

[ctwaterman]

My feeling has always been for sustained rate of fire anything over 25kg/55 lbs for shell and powder is heavy and maintaining ROF is extremely hard back breaking labor.  So 12.7cm/5" guns in L50/54 are about the upper end.   Anything 15cm is going to start with a good ROF and watch it wrappedly fall off as the crew quickly gets exhauseted.

[Valles]

My intention regarding Maori practice is that rates of fire are designed to be both as high and as sustainable as possible; I know that my design spec for the next heavy gun design they produce - 400mm/L50 - and associated turrets is going to include all-angle loading and a desired cycle time of fifteen seconds. Obviously, even trying for that (and no, I don't really expect the mods to let me get past twenty seconds) will involve power everything.

For smaller gun mounts... I'd honestly never considered it. Now that I am, I suspect that the 75mm mounts seen on destroyers and as BB tertiaries are the only non-powered, human-loaded guns the Maori field. The 100mm mounts are probably electrically trained and elevated but hand-loaded, and the 35mm AA mount should be belt-fed and motor-driven for tracking speed.

The Maori have a perfectly adequate supply of Large Scary Tattooed Men, but using them to tote shells would be felt a waste.

[maddox]

France uses the heavy 140 L45 and L50 with the 42 kg shell, and uses the scary big slabs of meat formerly part of the Black gangs.

With a large population, those few 1000 ammo carriers can be found, and are well payed (should reflect that somewere in my HY reports).

In any case , everything has pro and cons.

[P3D]

Actually, for 12"+ calibers, I have the strong suspicion that the main bottleneck for higher ROF would be the shell room arrangements. Serving two guns is OK, but when there are teams maneuvering 4 half-ton+ shells every 30s from the ship into a constantly revolving turret, you can't avoid interference. The obvious solution for quad turrets is this two-level shell loading facilities, propellant bags that can be moved by hand are not that problematic.