WesWorld

With 48,000 tonnes of destroyer tonnage, and 10% of my light cruiser tonnage (8,400 tonnes), India has 56,400 tonnes with which to build destroyers.

This will build

56 - 1,000 t destroyers, or

47 - 1,200 t destroyers, or

37 - 1,500 t destroyers, or

28 - 2,000 t destroyers

Twenty-eight cans is not going to be sufficient in the long run. Thirty-seven might be.

Undoubtedly some of you have the same problem. So, what's your take? Go for the big cans and let sloops pick up the slack? Go for intermediate cans? Go for lots of small destroyers?

Do you plan to use destroyers to escort the battle fleet? Will these be for ASW or for torpedo attacks on the enemy fleet?

Do you intend them for independent patrol missions? Anti-ship or ASW or both?

Will they be escorting merchant shipping? Will they meet surface raiders or subs? Or need they handle both?

The ships that are built in response to these questions will differ in size, and have a different mix of speed/armament/range.

Given that I'll be eventually operating 20+ capital ships and cruisers - I already have 13 operational, so it's not long in coming - I'll need most or all of the destroyers attending to them. A few left overs may be tasked with independent patrols.

Sloops will be tasked with merchant escort work; if a surface raider threat exists, escort cruisers and gunboats (from the coastal defence category) will be attached.

My inclination is to find a "standard type" I'm happy with and incrementally improve on it every few years - much like the Brits did for a while. I don't think I have the tonnage to spare for too many specialized types.

J

The requirement to escort 20+ capital ships and cruisers really rules out the bigger designs. You need numbers.

So what you're going to want is enough range and cruising speed to keep up with the fleet, high top speed for the torpedo run, enough guns to fight off enemy destroyers on their torpedo run, and some depth charges.

I think you start getting all this on around 1,100 - 1,200 tons.

You might relax the range requirement if you build some tankers for them.

I'm hoping I can get the package on to 1300 tons or so. I'm finding the design process rather difficult - small, fast hulls are not very forgiving.

Tankers are in the works. I'll have one on the slip before the end of '21, with more to come.

Thanks for your comments...

Well, I'll likely move to small cruisers as well as 1600 t destroyers. I'll move my DL tonnage to cruisers for that purpose mefinks.

cheers

B

PS: aren't tankers a rather modern concept? UNREP has not been invented yet, you know.....

I suspect UNREP is a WW2 thing, but I wasn't reading the Admiral's comment that way. I was thinking more along the lines of forward operating locations, for which a steady supply of oil would be needed.

J