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Gun layout
A few historic designs, and a few here, incorporate three turrets, two of which are mounted aft. Historical German cruisers and some of Admiral Kuznetsov's newer designs are examples of this.
Why would one opt for such a layout? Is it structural, or tactical, or aesthetic?
J
Structural reasons. The middle turret is nearer to the middle of the ship where it is strongest. However a lack of guns firing ahead maybe a problem, especially for cruisers.
Its structural
Its even more marked if you go with no superfiring turrets, as I've done with a couple of my recent designs. This requires a good deal of clear deck space to allow the guns to traverse, and your firing arcs for turrets amidships have limits. So when running or chasing, you have less firepower. But you get a combination of armament, armor, speed, and seakeeping that are otherwise not available.
I've noticed the difference in performance that comes from having no superfiring turrets. It's crossed my mind more than once that it may be worth pursuing.
Will Springstyle generate different numbers for a ship depending on where that superfiring turret is?
Yes, there are differences when the superfiring turret is fore or aft. The structural and seakeeping no.s vary a little.
Yes I agree its Structural
And hull space related, plus it also saves weight, improves sea keeping and last but not least helps maintain stability.
Most of the early Japanese destroyers for example had the one turret forward and two on the stern arrangement due to their fine hull forms and large power plants. Their just wasn’t the space for the machinery and magazines required to feed two twin gun turrets forward of the bridge.
Also a secondary reason is sea keeping. Having all that weight forward would force the ships bow to dig into the wave as apposed to riding other it. The option of solving that problem by introducing a high freeboard and knuckle adds dead weight to the ships structure and brings with it the problem of decreased stability.
So in other words. If you have a ship who’s length to beam ratio is close to 11 to 1, has a Block coefficient below 0.5 and its capable of surpassing 32 Knots but you are also concerned about its sea keeping, structural integrity and stability you have very little choice.
I have found that most of the above problems are also taken into account with spring style. The smaller the ship the more apparent they are.
Harry