Tech stuff for armour, you may, or may not find this intresting.
http://www.warships1.com/W-Nathan/Metalprp.htm
Hannibal
http://www.warships1.com/W-Nathan/Metalprp.htm
Hannibal
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Yep, the Brits went for armored flight decks, accepting the vastly reduced aircraft capacity that this entailed (since this great weight had to be compensated for by getting it much lower to the water, which cut the aircraft handling, fuel, magize and spares to the bone). As I said, it was the right move for the British, just as the unarmored flight deck proved to be the right move for the Americans. They were facing much different threats.
The Lex's loss was due to poor understanding of the need for redundent inert gas fill systems in the avgas lines, not due to any fault in the ships. The real weakness of the Lexington class was that they lacked maneuverability, having been built as ships that didn't need to be avoiding air-dropped bombs and torpedoes. The tactic of having Lex and Yorktown operate together proved unsound, as the Yorktown's greater maneuverability kept the two ships apart during most air attacks. Saratoga was used mostly in single-CV task groups (like the specialized one for night operations) largely as a result of this.
BTW, the way the Lex was lost proved to be a real boon to the USN in many ways, as the lessons learned from her loss saved other carriers later in the war. The Japanese lost several carriers due to leaking inert gas (replaced in the lines, of course, by actual avgas) because they didn't lose the carriers in a way that let them identify the cause of loss.
Also BTW, USN carrier HAD an armored deck, it was just down in the ship, over the engines, magazines, etc. The USN theory was that the damage cause above the armored deck could be repaired relatively quickly. this proved true to some extent, but the flamability of these areas was greater than the designers realized. I read in a naval architecture course that the paperwork stowed in the ship was more than 100 times what the designers had counted on when designing the firefighting systems! One of the driving forces behind the current "paperless Navy" concept of the USN is the damage control issue.
The Lex's loss was due to poor understanding of the need for redundent inert gas fill systems in the avgas lines, not due to any fault in the ships. The real weakness of the Lexington class was that they lacked maneuverability, having been built as ships that didn't need to be avoiding air-dropped bombs and torpedoes. The tactic of having Lex and Yorktown operate together proved unsound, as the Yorktown's greater maneuverability kept the two ships apart during most air attacks. Saratoga was used mostly in single-CV task groups (like the specialized one for night operations) largely as a result of this.
BTW, the way the Lex was lost proved to be a real boon to the USN in many ways, as the lessons learned from her loss saved other carriers later in the war. The Japanese lost several carriers due to leaking inert gas (replaced in the lines, of course, by actual avgas) because they didn't lose the carriers in a way that let them identify the cause of loss.
Also BTW, USN carrier HAD an armored deck, it was just down in the ship, over the engines, magazines, etc. The USN theory was that the damage cause above the armored deck could be repaired relatively quickly. this proved true to some extent, but the flamability of these areas was greater than the designers realized. I read in a naval architecture course that the paperwork stowed in the ship was more than 100 times what the designers had counted on when designing the firefighting systems! One of the driving forces behind the current "paperless Navy" concept of the USN is the damage control issue.
True, the words "abandon ship" come to mind. The design of the protection of the Lex and Sar. was geared with the torpedo in mind rather than the dive bomber. The Val took almost as big a toll on our flattops as the Dauntless took on the Japanese.
The protection system on the Lexington class was designed for a Battlecruiser. The underwater protection scheme was designed to defeat surface ship torpedoes, not air-dropped ones. However, by the time of WWII the air-dropped torpedo carried the same punch as the surface-launched torpedo of the 1920s, so you are in effect correct.
I don't have my copy of Friedman's USN Carriers at hand, but if my memory is correct the Japanese were much more successful with their torpedo bombers than their dive bombers when it came to sinking USN CVs (at least in the pre-Kamikaze days). Lexington was lost to torpedo damage, as was Yorktown (Yorkton's damage at Coral Sea WAS, however, entirely due to a single DB hit and 2 near-misses, and the final blow on her at Midway was from a submarine, rather than an air-launched torpedo).
Paul S. Dull's The Imperial Japanese Navy gives extensive detail on all the USN CV losses in the war.
At the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, Enterprise was hit by a single DB bomb and no torpedoes, and retired from the action with only moderate damage.(Dull, p. 202)
At the Battle of Santa Cruz, Hornet was sunk by the USN after IJN torpedo bombers had left her DIW with hits in each engine room. Although dive bombers (and a kamikaze) did considerable damage, she probably would have survived if she had not been hit by the TBs. At the same battle, DBs hit Enterprise twice but she was never in danger (Dull, p. 230).
Wasp, of course, was sunk by torpedoes from a submarine, and Princeton by Kamikaze. No USN CV losses were thus due to japanese dive bombers as the primary cause of loss.
This is not, I guess, unexpected. It is always better to try to sink a ship by letting water in the bottom rather than by letting air out of the top. The USn success with Dive Bomber is due, IMO, primarily to the fact that the japanese were so belated in developing effective firefighting measures. The loss of the Lexington forced the US to recognize the vital need to have effective firefighting crew, equipment, and procedures. the japanese lost CVs so quickly and under such unknown circumstances that they saw the need only after 5 of their six big carriers were already gone.
Thus, I don't agree with the assertion that Japanese dive-bombers had the same impact as US ones.
Can i intrest anyone in an after action ship report for the loss of the Yorktown?
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ships/logs/CV/cv5-Midway.html
Hannibal
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ships/logs/CV/cv5-Midway.html
Hannibal
Perhaps, I should have said shipping rather than flattops. I know that the Japanese had a marked advantage in terms of topedo bombers. The Kate was death.
I think the fact that weapons and fully fueled planes were all over the place may have effected the Kaga, Akaga, Soryu, and Hiryu(I'm not looking at the spelling so forgive me). Of course excellent firefighting equipment may have saved one or two. We forget that the folks fighting WW2 had to learn many of the lessons the hard way. One look at the Nimitzs' one will realize that we've learned an awfull lot. The firefighting capabilities are enormous as is the protective features.
http://www.theunderdogs.org/
Grumbler, and anyone else,
Try this for free games, ive just found it and grabbed Ardennes and a pacific War, will let you know what their like. Free, my fav price!!
Hannibal
Grumbler, and anyone else,
Try this for free games, ive just found it and grabbed Ardennes and a pacific War, will let you know what their like. Free, my fav price!!
Hannibal
Hi all, ive played around with Ardennes and its a good game, ai is very good on both attack and defence. The P T O II is also very good grand strategic pacific game, its got a big learning curve, but after watching the ai play out a year or so i think itl be worth the effort to learn the system. Oh it plays the whole pacific war, a day at a time. Ardennes on the other hand is easy to get into and reminds me of panzerbltz/squad leader type games.
Hannibal
Hannibal