Shipbucket

Inspired by Rowdy36 and others nice sea plane escorts and reading DK Brown's books (and his dislike of secondary guns/aircraft on battleships) I thought what about an escort CLAAV (CLAA and AV together ) It role would be to escort battleships so as to save them having to carry scout/spotting planes and to boast AA defences, thus saving weight/space on treaty limited capital ships.(post 36 LNT2 and no limit on CL numbers and pre escalator to 45,000t)



Based on an Arethusa hull with,
4 x 2 4.5' (separate loading) BD mounts
8 x 40mm AA
2 x 3 21' TT
6+ Aircraft (2 x cats and cranes, hanger for 6)

Updated with a few changes as sugested.

An interesting concept. Certainly nice to see more seaplane tenders/carriers around.
I would be tempted to ditch the torpedo tubes to save weight.
I would check the radar fit too, you seem to have two different air-search types, really for 1939 you should have two Type 79 rather than the one (mainmast) you currently have. I also wonder whether a DCT and 2 HACS might be a good idea for surface escort roles?

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Hood's Worklist
English Electric Canberra FD
Interwar RN Capital Ships
Super-Darings
Never-Were British Aircraft

I like the idea but I can't help thinking that the boat arrangements would be better amidships. I'd also tend to agree with Hood about the torpedoes, unless you're acting alone I don't really see the need for them and finally, why Walruses? Why not Swordfish or Sharks as it'd make handling and accommodating a good deal easier to manage, especially with a funnel bifurcating your hangar.

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AU Projects: | Banbha et al. | New England: The Divided States
Blood and Fire

Agree with Hood and Blackbuck. The torepdo tubes are realy redundant. A good destroyer type surface fire control on the bridge and behind it an AA director (much like the arrangement on a cruiser)will give the cruiser an added bonus of a support unit for destroyers. The aircraft I'd use would be the Fairey SeSeafox or a combination of Swordfish and Seafox.

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Thank you Kim for the crest

"Never fear to try on something new. Remember that the Titanic was built by professionals, and the Ark by an amateur"

Ok updated it,

- 2 times radar (hope its right Hood ?)
- lighter aircraft
- Director for surface fire
- kept the TT to swap for more light AA later and most RN CLs had them anyway (and 4.5') will not hurt anything bigger than a DD so might need something if I meet a CL (or worst case I'm defending HMS Glorious )

The idea is fine JSB.

But I agree with the others, the torpedoes where they are mean your hangar is impassable at that point. You have torpedoes - small blank space - funnel - small blank - torpedoes.

If you want to keep the torpedoes, move the boat under the fore funnel, to under the D turret. Put the torpedoes where the boat was.

While having BR/ER/BR is nice, you could just have BR/BR/ER and go for one funnel. That would get that funnel out of the hangar.

Keep up the good work!

- My plan was to have the torpedoes under the hangar ? assuming the floor of the hangar was level with the cat so aircraft can just be slid out onto it ?

- I was basing it off a Arethusa class light cruiser (without changing the ER/BR stuff to speed up design, might like to remove the wing spaces but that's not shown) with a beam of 51 ft (16 m) so didn't think hangar/funnel/hangar would be to bad ? say (6m/4m/6m)

I agree a clean sheet design would be better with BR/BR/ER to allow for a big hangar.
I've nothing against the Walrus for long-range spotting.

_________________
Hood's Worklist
English Electric Canberra FD
Interwar RN Capital Ships
Super-Darings
Never-Were British Aircraft

To be fair the Walrus only offers something like 40 miles over a Swordfish or Shark endurance wise, that and a canopy (which is easily fixed) the extra bulk IMO isn't justified.

_________________
AU Projects: | Banbha et al. | New England: The Divided States
Blood and Fire