WesWorld

That's kind of my guess: that he's trying to do something "tricky". But I'm definitely willing to be enlightened as to how, and the high freeboarrd is definitely cutting into the tonnage that can be used for armor.

loosing 4ft of freeboard aft would be no great loss to this design.
The belts are perplexing me though, why?

I'd be fairly sure that it involves 4" armour over the 8" magazines and 2" alongside the machienry spaces. Space underwater = machinery+magazines but main belt only cover machinery so it won't be 96.5% coverage. All together the belt is 400ft long and covers about 102% of the hull.

The height of the belt is a bit much at 12ft though, obviously more is better, but historically 8-9ft is used for cruisers.

I fail to see what is wrong with the armour. It really isn't that bad and is better than the historical County-class. The high freeboard gives better habitability, better seakeeping, more reserve buoyancy, can take more damage. I'd probably add a bit more misc. weight for some marines and general equipment.

I don't think a cruiser would be called "Howe", sticking with counties "HMS Cornwall" or something similar?

I'm comparing it to the contemporary USS Northampton, with 4" armor over the entirety of the magazines and machinery spaces. The lighter belt armor on this design means it's vulnerable to more opponents, not to sinking quickly (the high freeboard assures that), but to losing power to load its weapons and to power its props and pumps.

I'm just a bit puzzled by the radical change in the design: the machinery weight % went up to 23% from 21%, but the armor weight % fell from 17% to 10% between the latest iterations of the Howe design. And it's not just the belt armor that went down, the deck armor was cut in half as well. I was expecting, if a non-transom design was done, to see a version of Howe that had the minimum changes necessary to accommodate the increased shp needed to maintain speed, or a drop in speed to allow the rest of the design to stay as it was.

Northampton (assuming the WW ship) has a considerably more hydrodynamic hullform with Cb of 0,436 and 24.5ft draught compared to 0,525 and 19ft

The latest verison of Howe more like the historical County class, with a large and able hull. The turret armour is slightly better, there is now a 2" plate alongside the machinery instead of 1". And with duple 4" secondary guns.

The revised ship is basically an up-armoured (slightly!) County; I don't want to 'power-game' if avoidable now, and so I'm sticking largely to derivatives of historical designs for the near future.

Howe is the name that Roger suggested, based on Gravina's practice. I'll quote his PM:

Quoted

CA - Gravina had some 'Kents' underway. Following on from the Elizabethans I'd kept the 'hero/leader' theme and called them Drake, Albemarle, Boscawen, Blake. A follow on class (Surreys maybe (there is a year gap between classes so something may be learnt) start in 1927 called Howe, Hawke, Collingwood and Cochrane.

I might cut the belt down to 10' and lengthen or thicken the central portion. Opinions?

RLBH

Quoted

The revised ship is basically an up-armoured (slightly!) County; I don't want to 'power-game' if avoidable now, and so I'm sticking largely to derivatives of historical designs for the near future.

Something to keep in mind, IMO, is that WW is NOT the real world of 1925-1929. The existence of naval powers (major and minor) that did not exist in the real world are a fact of WW life, and modifications to plans/designs in recognition of this fact make perfect sense and should not be considered "power-gaming" or bad. For instance: how does a 1927 County-class compare to the Atlantean 1925 Menelaus class? To a South African 1926 Cap Infante or 1923 Cap Good Hope? It seems to me far more likely that commerce protection on distant station in WW may involve defending the sea lanes against hostile warships for Britain than it appeared in the historical 20s when there were relatively few nations that had modern warships.

Certainly, it's your country, and if you like the Counties by all means build them, but frankly the only questionable issue I saw on the previous design was the transom (and I personally was fine with it, I only mentioned the issue because I'd been beaten about the head and shoulders with it myself).

If I recall, Howe was going tobe used for one of the Admiral-class Battlecruisers, and then later for the KGV-class. Seems like an important name, and some might think a name that would deserve to be on a capital ship. But naming practices change....look at the United States since 1920 in naming Aircraft Carriers and Submarines.

Quoted

Certainly, it's your country, and if you like the Counties by all means build them, but frankly the only questionable issue I saw on the previous design was the transom (and I personally was fine with it, I only mentioned the issue because I'd been beaten about the head and shoulders with it myself).

I'd rather have had the type of ship that I'd got with the transom stern, but it seems unrealistic for the era, even with the precedent. I figure the Royal Navy will stress the trade protection role above that of a miniature capital ship for cruisers, hence the smaller = better argument, as long as I can keep it well armed and so a threat to larger ships.

If I really need to deal with big cruisers, I've a plan.

Concerning names, I'd need to check, but I might use the names of the Cavendish class: Cavendish, Effingham, Frobisher, Hawkins and Raleigh. Of course, I'll only use 4.

RLBH

Leaders for cruisers fits the theme. The only one that may not fit would be Nelson as being head and shoulders above the others. The Elizabethans are still in service but due for replacement in the 1930s. I think it helps to get away from Historic naming as it helps getting away from the mental image of a 'County'.

Cheers,

I've designed the H Class ships, now. The AA fit in the picture is slightly different from the sim, but isn't a major thing.

I've done a picture, but the board seems not to like Photobucket. Here's the link:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y93/HayneR16/HClass.png

H Class, United Kingdom Light Cruiser laid down 1928

Displacement:
7,505 t light; 7,877 t standard; 9,632 t normal; 11,036 t full load

Dimensions: Length overall / water x beam x draught
609.28 ft / 598.00 ft x 59.00 ft x 19.50 ft (normal load)
185.71 m / 182.27 m x 17.98 m x 5.94 m

Armament:
8 - 6.00" / 152 mm guns (4x2 guns), 112.00lbs / 50.80kg shells, 1928 Model
Breech loading guns in turrets (on barbettes)
on centreline ends, evenly spread, 2 raised mounts - superfiring
8 - 4.00" / 102 mm guns (4x2 guns), 35.00lbs / 15.88kg shells, 1928 Model
Dual purpose guns in deck mounts
on side, evenly spread
8 - 1.59" / 40.5 mm guns in single mounts, 2.00lbs / 0.91kg shells, 1928 Model
Anti-aircraft guns in deck mounts
on side, evenly spread, all raised mounts
4 - 1.59" / 40.5 mm guns in single mounts, 2.00lbs / 0.91kg shells, 1928 Model
Anti-aircraft guns in deck mounts
on side, evenly spread, all raised mounts
12 - 0.79" / 20.0 mm guns (8 mounts), 0.24lbs / 0.11kg shells, 1928 Model
Anti-aircraft guns in deck mounts
on side, evenly spread, all raised mounts
Weight of broadside 1,203 lbs / 546 kg
Shells per gun, main battery: 250
8 - 24.5" / 622.3 mm above water torpedoes

Armour:
- Belts: Width (max) Length (avg) Height (avg)
Main: 2.00" / 51 mm 415.00 ft / 126.49 m 10.00 ft / 3.05 m
Ends: Unarmoured
Main Belt covers 107 % of normal length

- Gun armour: Face (max) Other gunhouse (avg) Barbette/hoist (max)
Main: 3.00" / 76 mm 2.00" / 51 mm 1.00" / 25 mm
2nd: 1.00" / 25 mm - -
3rd: 0.50" / 13 mm - -
4th: 0.50" / 13 mm - -

- Armour deck: 1.00" / 25 mm

Machinery:
Oil fired boilers, steam turbines,
Geared drive, 4 shafts, 82,168 shp / 61,297 Kw = 32.06 kts
Range 12,000nm at 16.00 kts
Bunker at max displacement = 3,159 tons

Complement:
485 - 631

Cost:
£2.830 million / $11.321 million

Distribution of weights at normal displacement:
Armament: 143 tons, 1.5 %
Armour: 918 tons, 9.5 %
- Belts: 341 tons, 3.5 %
- Torpedo bulkhead: 0 tons, 0.0 %
- Armament: 145 tons, 1.5 %
- Armour Deck: 431 tons, 4.5 %
- Conning Tower: 0 tons, 0.0 %
Machinery: 2,558 tons, 26.6 %
Hull, fittings & equipment: 3,761 tons, 39.0 %
Fuel, ammunition & stores: 2,127 tons, 22.1 %
Miscellaneous weights: 125 tons, 1.3 %

Overall survivability and seakeeping ability:
Survivability (Non-critical penetrating hits needed to sink ship):
13,231 lbs / 6,001 Kg = 122.5 x 6.0 " / 152 mm shells or 1.6 torpedoes
Stability (Unstable if below 1.00): 1.30
Metacentric height 3.6 ft / 1.1 m
Roll period: 13.0 seconds
Steadiness - As gun platform (Average = 50 %): 70 %
- Recoil effect (Restricted arc if above 1.00): 0.33
Seaboat quality (Average = 1.00): 1.36

Hull form characteristics:
Hull has rise forward of midbreak
Block coefficient: 0.490
Length to Beam Ratio: 10.14 : 1
'Natural speed' for length: 24.45 kts
Power going to wave formation at top speed: 55 %
Trim (Max stability = 0, Max steadiness = 100): 51
Bow angle (Positive = bow angles forward): 20.00 degrees
Stern overhang: 0.00 ft / 0.00 m
Freeboard (% = measuring location as a percentage of overall length):
- Stem: 31.00 ft / 9.45 m
- Forecastle (20 %): 24.00 ft / 7.32 m
- Mid (58 %): 24.00 ft / 7.32 m (16.00 ft / 4.88 m aft of break)
- Quarterdeck (15 %): 16.00 ft / 4.88 m
- Stern: 16.00 ft / 4.88 m
- Average freeboard: 21.20 ft / 6.46 m

Ship space, strength and comments:
Space - Hull below water (magazines/engines, low = better): 100.4 %
- Above water (accommodation/working, high = better): 148.9 %
Waterplane Area: 23,296 Square feet or 2,164 Square metres
Displacement factor (Displacement / loading): 132 %
Structure weight / hull surface area: 96 lbs/sq ft or 469 Kg/sq metre
Hull strength (Relative):
- Cross-sectional: 0.95
- Longitudinal: 1.56
- Overall: 1.00
Hull space for machinery, storage, compartmentation is adequate
Room for accommodation and workspaces is excellent
Ship has slow, easy roll, a good, steady gun platform
Good seaboat, rides out heavy weather easily

Misc. Weight includes:

Provision for 2 aircraft (only one usually carried)
8 reload torpedoes and handling gear

Not bad at all. Quite long and lean for a British design, with the length to beam ratio right up there. I'd say her magazines might be a little oversized, cutting back to the 200 rounds per gun historically carried by the Towns might give a little more tonnage for armor.

The board likes Photobucket, but it doesn't like .png files, unfortunately.

She'll make an effective escort, with her range, speed, and armament. I'd prefer to have a bit more protection, but one can't have everything.

RLBH, the board doesn't like png files as has been pointed out. However, seeing as your picture has no colour why not saveit as a gif instead? I'm fairly sure that the originals were saved in gif format as well.

I'm kinda confused about the ship. Its sort of like Leander, but isn't somehow...

L:B isn't ideal, but is within limits and doesn't seem like a problem, so I'll leave it. Future designs won't be so slim, though.

No PNG? Eh well, I can live with that, I suppose. I just prefer it as the compression doesn't do so much damage to the image quality when I come to redraw.

I'm doing 2 drawings, anyway (one large-scale then reducing to that), so there's no real loss.]

Oh, and what's this meant to mean?

Quoted

I'm kinda confused about the ship. Its sort of like Leander, but isn't somehow...

RLBH

Oh, here's a question: on this ship you're using the 23.5" torps, on the previous CA you left those and went back to the 21" fish. Either is fine by me, I'm just curious what the reasoning is behind carrying one or the other on the different designs, and whether His Majesty's quartermasters might suggest settling on one or the other.

I've found ways to fool they systems into not altering the colors when converting from .bmp to .gif in MSPaint. It involved saving it twice or undoing the save and resaving, but I can get ships like the ones I use here and at Navalism on as .gifs without the program readjusting my colors on me.

Quoted

I've found ways to fool they systems into not altering the colors when converting from .bmp to .gif in MSPaint. It involved saving it twice or undoing the save and resaving, but I can get ships like the ones I use here and at Navalism on as .gifs without the program readjusting my colors on me.

ctrl-a to select everything

ctrl-c to copy everything

save as .gif and colour goes funny

ctrl-v to paste old image

save again and coulours are correct

Why not try the oxy-enriched air 21" torpedoes. I forget which Mk exactly but I'm fairly sure that the 24.5" was rejected for use on cruisers and DDs due to the sheer size and weight.

The Mk. VII was the 21" oxy-enriched torp. Can't have been much of a success, the torps were converted to natural air early in WWII. Certainly the speed and range listed on navweaps aren't very impressive.

Neither trick works for me but that may be because I use an older version of Windows... so I will keep on using the old way which is converting it to 256 colors using Paint Shop Pro and then save it to gif because I have a feeling that the conversion to 256 colors is the main problem MS Paint has, not saving it as a gif file.