I am trying to be sensible with the title and not hurt peoples sensibilities too much, but there is no escaping what this is. A What If for another half-baked idea to make the unmentionable mammal work - in another world.
Here goes: Imagine a somewhat different 1930's were the following four conditions are met.
1) The Germans are better off total resource wise so the can afford the proposal below without to many knock-on effects (through any number of means, earlier power grab, better economic management, not losing as much of Silesia post war, whatever!)
2) They feel confident they can defeat France! Otherwise they would never prioritize the stuff below. Again, this could be for better internal strength or realization of French weaknesses, most likely a combination.
3) They really want to defeat Britain! Anything goes, maybe Hitler becomes fascinated with Wilhelm the conqueror, anything goes, but the Germans want to invade Britain early on.
4) The German realize that a conventional naval buildup towards superiority is impossible as the British will outbuild. Temporal asymmetry is the best possible and they go for trying to defeat the British army in France and build sea lift and a protection force for the channel crossing.
Todays what if is how the proposed trinket would fare as part of such a protection force. The inspiration comes from the last voyage of the mighty Yamato. Coulda design be made, purpose build to be a beached gun platform? A design that would be constructed to be beached at high tide and then function as an invunerabile gunplatforn around the narrow parts of the British channel. Maybe on the shallows a few km off the british coast. Coupled with a pre-planned gun installation on the french side, no ship in the channel would be more than 20 km from heavy German artillery.
Now the design below I assume for a while would not obviously look like a warship until the guns are installed, which could be ordered way in advance and it has very low engine power.
I imagine this design as having 3-4 inch outer armor plates for decapping. Then a 5-6 meter space followed by a 16-17 inch armor plate and that followed by a 2 inch splinter protection plate/torpedo bulwark from top to bottom of the hull.
When it is beached, a large portion of the hull and space between the armor plates would be filled with water (maybe sand, but I dont know hos fast that could be done). When looking at the specs from shipsharp, please consider that the deck armor in the simulation is spread over the entire width of the ship, but it only needs to cover half so the deck armor thickness could be 12-13 inches.
As far as I can see, the vessels would be quite immune to anything until the tallboys comes along?
If we imagine 4 of these build, two on either side of the invasion site, maybe another version with rapid firing 8 or 6 inch guns, and connected with wires to provide ease of communication and joined firecontrol and redundancy in the same. How would it work? The cost would be similar to 2-3 battleships (a lot saved on engines though)
Another note. If you wonder why such an invincible ship was never build in real life, one reason could be that it is not invincible. The armored citadel is about a quarter of the ships volume so it couldnt keep it afloat. That doesnt matter if you intentionally fill the ship with water anyways.
Germany Monitor laid down 1938
Displacement:
23.698 t light; 25.866 t standard; 26.135 t normal; 26.351 t full load
Dimensions: Length (overall / waterline) x beam x draught (normal/deep)
(421,44 ft / 410,11 ft) x 85,30 ft x (32,81 / 33,05 ft)
(128,46 m / 125,00 m) x 26,00 m x (10,00 / 10,07 m)
Armament:
4 - 15,98" / 406 mm 55,0 cal guns - 2.204,08lbs / 999,76kg shells, 300 per gun
Breech loading guns in turret on barbette mounts, 1938 Model
2 x 2-gun mounts on centreline ends, evenly spread
8 - 5,04" / 128 mm 55,0 cal guns - 69,07lbs / 31,33kg shells, 450 per gun
Dual purpose guns in turret on barbette mounts, 1938 Model
2 x Twin mounts on centreline ends, evenly spread
2 raised mounts
2 x Twin mounts on centreline ends, evenly spread
2 double raised mounts
12 - 1,46" / 37,0 mm 65,0 cal guns - 1,71lbs / 0,78kg shells, 1.200 per gun
Anti-air guns in deck mounts, 1938 Model
4 x Twin mounts on sides, evenly spread
2 x Twin mounts on centreline, forward deck aft
2 raised mounts
64 - 0,79" / 20,0 mm 65,0 cal guns - 0,27lbs / 0,12kg shells, 2.500 per gun
Breech loading guns in deck mounts, 1938 Model
12 x Twin mounts on sides, evenly spread
4 x Twin mounts on centreline, aft deck forward
4 raised mounts
Weight of broadside 9.407 lbs / 4.267 kg
Armour:
- Belts: Width (max) Length (avg) Height (avg)
Main: 19,7" / 500 mm 246,06 ft / 75,00 m 32,81 ft / 10,00 m
Ends: 1,97" / 50 mm 164,04 ft / 50,00 m 26,25 ft / 8,00 m
Upper: 3,94" / 100 mm 246,06 ft / 75,00 m 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
Main Belt covers 92 % of normal length
- Torpedo Bulkhead - Additional damage containing bulkheads:
1,77" / 45 mm 246,06 ft / 75,00 m 45,93 ft / 14,00 m
Beam between torpedo bulkheads 42,65 ft / 13,00 m
- Gun armour: Face (max) Other gunhouse (avg) Barbette/hoist (max)
Main: 21,7" / 550 mm 13,0" / 330 mm 15,7" / 400 mm
2nd: 5,91" / 150 mm 3,94" / 100 mm 3,94" / 100 mm
3rd: 0,79" / 20 mm 0,79" / 20 mm -
4th: 0,39" / 10 mm 0,39" / 10 mm -
- Armoured deck - multiple decks:
For and Aft decks: 6,30" / 160 mm
Forecastle: 0,79" / 20 mm Quarter deck: 0,79" / 20 mm
- Conning towers: Forward 21,65" / 550 mm, Aft 21,65" / 550 mm
Machinery:
Diesel Internal combustion motors,
Direct drive, 2 shafts, 3.033 shp / 2.263 Kw = 10,14 kts
Range 2.000nm at 9,00 kts
Bunker at max displacement = 485 tons
Complement:
1.027 - 1.336
Cost:
£10,793 million / $43,171 million
Distribution of weights at normal displacement:
Armament: 2.311 tons, 8,8 %
- Guns: 2.311 tons, 8,8 %
Armour: 15.116 tons, 57,8 %
- Belts: 8.694 tons, 33,3 %
- Torpedo bulkhead: 741 tons, 2,8 %
- Armament: 1.894 tons, 7,2 %
- Armour Deck: 2.966 tons, 11,3 %
- Conning Towers: 822 tons, 3,1 %
Machinery: 83 tons, 0,3 %
Hull, fittings & equipment: 5.588 tons, 21,4 %
Fuel, ammunition & stores: 2.438 tons, 9,3 %
Miscellaneous weights: 600 tons, 2,3 %
- On freeboard deck: 200 tons
- Above deck: 400 tons
Overall survivability and seakeeping ability:
Survivability (Non-critical penetrating hits needed to sink ship):
46.312 lbs / 21.007 Kg = 22,7 x 16,0 " / 406 mm shells or 10,2 torpedoes
Stability (Unstable if below 1.00): 1,10
Metacentric height 4,7 ft / 1,4 m
Roll period: 16,5 seconds
Steadiness - As gun platform (Average = 50 %): 68 %
- Recoil effect (Restricted arc if above 1.00): 0,47
Seaboat quality (Average = 1.00): 1,35
Hull form characteristics:
Hull has a flush deck,
a normal bow and large transom stern
Block coefficient (normal/deep): 0,797 / 0,798
Length to Beam Ratio: 4,81 : 1
'Natural speed' for length: 23,88 kts
Power going to wave formation at top speed: 26 %
Trim (Max stability = 0, Max steadiness = 100): 50
Bow angle (Positive = bow angles forward): 20,00 degrees
Stern overhang: 6,56 ft / 2,00 m
Freeboard (% = length of deck as a percentage of waterline length):
Fore end, Aft end
- Forecastle: 20,00 %, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
- Forward deck: 30,00 %, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
- Aft deck: 30,00 %, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
- Quarter deck: 20,00 %, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
- Average freeboard: 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
Ship tends to be wet forward
Ship space, strength and comments:
Space - Hull below water (magazines/engines, low = better): 86,3 %
- Above water (accommodation/working, high = better): 77,6 %
Waterplane Area: 31.898 Square feet or 2.963 Square metres
Displacement factor (Displacement / loading): 100 %
Structure weight / hull surface area: 159 lbs/sq ft or 775 Kg/sq metre
Hull strength (Relative):
- Cross-sectional: 0,92
- Longitudinal: 2,11
- Overall: 1,00
Adequate machinery, storage, compartmentation space
Cramped accommodation and workspace room
Good seaboat, rides out heavy weather easily
Here goes: Imagine a somewhat different 1930's were the following four conditions are met.
1) The Germans are better off total resource wise so the can afford the proposal below without to many knock-on effects (through any number of means, earlier power grab, better economic management, not losing as much of Silesia post war, whatever!)
2) They feel confident they can defeat France! Otherwise they would never prioritize the stuff below. Again, this could be for better internal strength or realization of French weaknesses, most likely a combination.
3) They really want to defeat Britain! Anything goes, maybe Hitler becomes fascinated with Wilhelm the conqueror, anything goes, but the Germans want to invade Britain early on.
4) The German realize that a conventional naval buildup towards superiority is impossible as the British will outbuild. Temporal asymmetry is the best possible and they go for trying to defeat the British army in France and build sea lift and a protection force for the channel crossing.
Todays what if is how the proposed trinket would fare as part of such a protection force. The inspiration comes from the last voyage of the mighty Yamato. Coulda design be made, purpose build to be a beached gun platform? A design that would be constructed to be beached at high tide and then function as an invunerabile gunplatforn around the narrow parts of the British channel. Maybe on the shallows a few km off the british coast. Coupled with a pre-planned gun installation on the french side, no ship in the channel would be more than 20 km from heavy German artillery.
Now the design below I assume for a while would not obviously look like a warship until the guns are installed, which could be ordered way in advance and it has very low engine power.
I imagine this design as having 3-4 inch outer armor plates for decapping. Then a 5-6 meter space followed by a 16-17 inch armor plate and that followed by a 2 inch splinter protection plate/torpedo bulwark from top to bottom of the hull.
When it is beached, a large portion of the hull and space between the armor plates would be filled with water (maybe sand, but I dont know hos fast that could be done). When looking at the specs from shipsharp, please consider that the deck armor in the simulation is spread over the entire width of the ship, but it only needs to cover half so the deck armor thickness could be 12-13 inches.
As far as I can see, the vessels would be quite immune to anything until the tallboys comes along?
If we imagine 4 of these build, two on either side of the invasion site, maybe another version with rapid firing 8 or 6 inch guns, and connected with wires to provide ease of communication and joined firecontrol and redundancy in the same. How would it work? The cost would be similar to 2-3 battleships (a lot saved on engines though)
Another note. If you wonder why such an invincible ship was never build in real life, one reason could be that it is not invincible. The armored citadel is about a quarter of the ships volume so it couldnt keep it afloat. That doesnt matter if you intentionally fill the ship with water anyways.
Germany Monitor laid down 1938
Displacement:
23.698 t light; 25.866 t standard; 26.135 t normal; 26.351 t full load
Dimensions: Length (overall / waterline) x beam x draught (normal/deep)
(421,44 ft / 410,11 ft) x 85,30 ft x (32,81 / 33,05 ft)
(128,46 m / 125,00 m) x 26,00 m x (10,00 / 10,07 m)
Armament:
4 - 15,98" / 406 mm 55,0 cal guns - 2.204,08lbs / 999,76kg shells, 300 per gun
Breech loading guns in turret on barbette mounts, 1938 Model
2 x 2-gun mounts on centreline ends, evenly spread
8 - 5,04" / 128 mm 55,0 cal guns - 69,07lbs / 31,33kg shells, 450 per gun
Dual purpose guns in turret on barbette mounts, 1938 Model
2 x Twin mounts on centreline ends, evenly spread
2 raised mounts
2 x Twin mounts on centreline ends, evenly spread
2 double raised mounts
12 - 1,46" / 37,0 mm 65,0 cal guns - 1,71lbs / 0,78kg shells, 1.200 per gun
Anti-air guns in deck mounts, 1938 Model
4 x Twin mounts on sides, evenly spread
2 x Twin mounts on centreline, forward deck aft
2 raised mounts
64 - 0,79" / 20,0 mm 65,0 cal guns - 0,27lbs / 0,12kg shells, 2.500 per gun
Breech loading guns in deck mounts, 1938 Model
12 x Twin mounts on sides, evenly spread
4 x Twin mounts on centreline, aft deck forward
4 raised mounts
Weight of broadside 9.407 lbs / 4.267 kg
Armour:
- Belts: Width (max) Length (avg) Height (avg)
Main: 19,7" / 500 mm 246,06 ft / 75,00 m 32,81 ft / 10,00 m
Ends: 1,97" / 50 mm 164,04 ft / 50,00 m 26,25 ft / 8,00 m
Upper: 3,94" / 100 mm 246,06 ft / 75,00 m 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
Main Belt covers 92 % of normal length
- Torpedo Bulkhead - Additional damage containing bulkheads:
1,77" / 45 mm 246,06 ft / 75,00 m 45,93 ft / 14,00 m
Beam between torpedo bulkheads 42,65 ft / 13,00 m
- Gun armour: Face (max) Other gunhouse (avg) Barbette/hoist (max)
Main: 21,7" / 550 mm 13,0" / 330 mm 15,7" / 400 mm
2nd: 5,91" / 150 mm 3,94" / 100 mm 3,94" / 100 mm
3rd: 0,79" / 20 mm 0,79" / 20 mm -
4th: 0,39" / 10 mm 0,39" / 10 mm -
- Armoured deck - multiple decks:
For and Aft decks: 6,30" / 160 mm
Forecastle: 0,79" / 20 mm Quarter deck: 0,79" / 20 mm
- Conning towers: Forward 21,65" / 550 mm, Aft 21,65" / 550 mm
Machinery:
Diesel Internal combustion motors,
Direct drive, 2 shafts, 3.033 shp / 2.263 Kw = 10,14 kts
Range 2.000nm at 9,00 kts
Bunker at max displacement = 485 tons
Complement:
1.027 - 1.336
Cost:
£10,793 million / $43,171 million
Distribution of weights at normal displacement:
Armament: 2.311 tons, 8,8 %
- Guns: 2.311 tons, 8,8 %
Armour: 15.116 tons, 57,8 %
- Belts: 8.694 tons, 33,3 %
- Torpedo bulkhead: 741 tons, 2,8 %
- Armament: 1.894 tons, 7,2 %
- Armour Deck: 2.966 tons, 11,3 %
- Conning Towers: 822 tons, 3,1 %
Machinery: 83 tons, 0,3 %
Hull, fittings & equipment: 5.588 tons, 21,4 %
Fuel, ammunition & stores: 2.438 tons, 9,3 %
Miscellaneous weights: 600 tons, 2,3 %
- On freeboard deck: 200 tons
- Above deck: 400 tons
Overall survivability and seakeeping ability:
Survivability (Non-critical penetrating hits needed to sink ship):
46.312 lbs / 21.007 Kg = 22,7 x 16,0 " / 406 mm shells or 10,2 torpedoes
Stability (Unstable if below 1.00): 1,10
Metacentric height 4,7 ft / 1,4 m
Roll period: 16,5 seconds
Steadiness - As gun platform (Average = 50 %): 68 %
- Recoil effect (Restricted arc if above 1.00): 0,47
Seaboat quality (Average = 1.00): 1,35
Hull form characteristics:
Hull has a flush deck,
a normal bow and large transom stern
Block coefficient (normal/deep): 0,797 / 0,798
Length to Beam Ratio: 4,81 : 1
'Natural speed' for length: 23,88 kts
Power going to wave formation at top speed: 26 %
Trim (Max stability = 0, Max steadiness = 100): 50
Bow angle (Positive = bow angles forward): 20,00 degrees
Stern overhang: 6,56 ft / 2,00 m
Freeboard (% = length of deck as a percentage of waterline length):
Fore end, Aft end
- Forecastle: 20,00 %, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
- Forward deck: 30,00 %, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
- Aft deck: 30,00 %, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
- Quarter deck: 20,00 %, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m, 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
- Average freeboard: 13,12 ft / 4,00 m
Ship tends to be wet forward
Ship space, strength and comments:
Space - Hull below water (magazines/engines, low = better): 86,3 %
- Above water (accommodation/working, high = better): 77,6 %
Waterplane Area: 31.898 Square feet or 2.963 Square metres
Displacement factor (Displacement / loading): 100 %
Structure weight / hull surface area: 159 lbs/sq ft or 775 Kg/sq metre
Hull strength (Relative):
- Cross-sectional: 0,92
- Longitudinal: 2,11
- Overall: 1,00
Adequate machinery, storage, compartmentation space
Cramped accommodation and workspace room
Good seaboat, rides out heavy weather easily