After WWI, the frantic pace of gun development that had seen caliber rise from 12" to a planned 18" in barely a decade plateaued, although work continued on mounts and mountings. One of the more interesting schemes of gun layout was that used on the British Nelson class, built under the Washington Naval Treaty. In an attempt to save weight by reducing the armored length of the ship, all three turrets were grouped together forward of the bridge. The second turret superfired over the other two, and the bridge was set very far back.

HMS Nelson displaying her unique armament arrangement¹

Nelson and Rodney also deserve mention for their guns. For some reason, the British decided that it would be a good idea to build guns with light shells fired at high velocity. In practice, this didn't work, and the 16"/45 Mk I was only marginally better at piercing armor than the 15" that proceeded it. Worse, the muzzle velocity had to be reduced to increase barrel life, and the triple turret mountings were poorly designed, causing slow and inconsistent fire. There's an excellent writeup on this turret on NavWeps.

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Scott Alexander: Thank you all for coming. Ever since we accidentally created a friendly AI, and it built this new country for us to run, we’ve all been rather busy. Since we’ve got a handle on the immediate problems, Bean is going to lay out his vision for our Navy.²

Bean: Thank you. Ultimately, the plans for our Navy have to start with our basic strategy and situation, and flow out of that. As David Friedman's economic policies have attracted a great deal of trade, and because the AI was kind enough to leave us with a medium-sized island, I believe the policies pursued by the British over the last few decades should serve well as a general model.

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By 1907, the 12" gun had reached the limits of its development. Trying to improve range and penetration by throwing projectiles faster was clearly a losing game, so calibers began to creep up again. The British lead the way with a return to the 13.5" gun, to replace the 12"/50 used on some of their later first-generation dreadnoughts.

13.5" gun on HMS Ajax³

Besides the accuracy issues already discussed, the 12"/50 suffered from an absurdly short barrel life. As a gun is fired, the hot gasses melt and erode the bore. This is more of a problem for high-velocity guns, and on the British 12"/50, the liner was worn out and had to be replaced every 130-160 rounds.⁴ The 13.5"/45 that replaced it saw a significant reduction in muzzle velocity, from 2850 ft/s to 2580 ft/s, but an increase in barrel life to a full 450 rounds.⁵ Thanks to the improved ballistics of the heavier shell, the two projectiles were traveling at the same velocity by the time they reached 15,000 yards.

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Today marks 6 months of Naval Gazing here at Obormot. (This blog, like the Queen, has two birthdays.) A couple of things that have come up:

• First, I'm interested in suggestions on future topics. Unlike last time, I'm not going to give you a list of options. Just suggest things you want to hear more about, and I'll decide what to do with them.
• Second, I'm conducting an experiment to examine the factors which shape a modern navy. The framing story is that a friendly AI created a country and handed it over to a group of people, who now have to work out naval policy. It's not a simulation because I don't have the time to do that properly, but more of a general discussion on the policy of a generic medium country. I do have a few slots open for inclusion on the discussion list. Email me at battleshipbean at gmail if you're interested. The first part will post Monday, although I'm not sure if it will stay there or move to Friday. (It's already written, but the discussion will continue in later parts.)
• Third, a month from today kicks off Jutland Week. I'm reposting a lightly-edited version of last year's Jutland series over 7 straight days to celebrate the greatest clash of the dreadnoughts.
• Fourth, I expect to be in both Boston and LA over the summer/early fall, although I don't have dates yet. When I'm in LA, I definitely want to run a reader tour of Iowa. Boston might see a similar get-together on Salem. (I'm going to Massachusetts with the people I'm visiting.)

I think that's all for now. Thanks again to Said Achmiz for hosting me, and dndnrsn for proofreading my posts.

One thing that I don't often talk about is what life was like aboard a battleship. This is because I prefer the technical side of naval history, but doesn't mean I should totally ignore the human aspect of these ships. So let's take a look at what life aboard Iowa looked like, mostly during WWII but also during the 80s commission.

A corridor aboard Iowa⁶

The first impression most people get when they come aboard is one of an endless maze of twisting passageways, all alike. The walls, known as bulkheads aboard a ship, are gray, the doors mostly have really high sills called knee-knockers,⁷ and the stairs are as close to being ladders as they can be and not actually be ladders. They're called ladders anyway, maybe because it's traditional, maybe just because the Navy prefers to confuse outsiders. The overheads are filled with pipes and cables, and the bulkheads are thin and made of metal. There's all sorts of equipment hanging on them, fire-fighting gear, breathing apparatus, water fountains, electrical distribution equipment, and so on. Things are exposed so they can be gotten to if they break.

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Last time we saw the evolution from the muzzle-loading smoothbores of Nelson's day to the turret-mounted breechloaders of the 1870s. But the best way to carry heavy guns to sea remained controversial, and the 1880s saw considerable strife between advocates of the turret and advocates of the barbette. The turret was considerably better-protected, but couldn't be carried high in the ship due to topweight concerns. The barbette left the gun exposed, but was significantly more effective in bad weather, as it kept the guns away from the spray and surf.

HMS Hood, the last British low-freeboard turret ship

In the early part of the decade, the open loading position of the barbette worked reasonably well. The only weapon of note was the heavy gun, which fired slowly and was likely as not to be aimed at the waterline. However, the development of the quick-firing gun soon made the open barbette untenable. Some nations, notably France and Russia, had installed thin (1-3") hoods on their barbettes from quite early on. The British had not, apparently under the impression that it would hinder their men's combat effectiveness somehow.⁸ However, the development of 6" QF (Quick-Firing) guns, capable of 5-10 rounds per minute, meant that exposed positions rapidly became vulnerable.

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The ultimate purpose of a battleship is to carry guns. Everything else - armor, engines, living quarters - ultimately exists to support the delivery of high-velocity steel to the enemy. As such, it's a topic which deserves a close look.

The gun deck of HMS Warrior

As you probably expect by now, we'll start with HMS Warrior. She carried a total of 40 guns: 26 68-pounder smoothbore muzzle-loaders, 10 110-pounder rifled breech-loaders,⁹ and 4 40-pounder rifled breech-loaders.

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Here are two more sea stories from Iowa tour lead Jim Pobog's time on the oiler Mispillion. Thanks again to Jim for giving me permission to post them here.

Mispillion in the Western Pacific

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The British battleships that served during WWII were less homogeneous than those of the US. While the USN had emphasized standardization during the pre-treaty era, the RN had not, and was left with a bizarre mix of ships, made more confusing by refits. 10 battleships¹⁰ and 3 battlecruisers¹¹ dating back to WWI made up the bulk of the fleet at the start of the war, accompanied by the two units of the Nelson class built in the 20s under the Washington Naval Treaty. During the war, the 5 units of the King George V class joined the fleet. They were fast battleships of the same type as those built worldwide after 1937.¹²

HMS King George V

The British battleships fulfilled largely the same roles as their American counterparts, although with less emphasis on carrier screening and more on surface superiority. There were several reasons for this. First, the carrier was less important in the narrow seas around Europe, and the threat of surface forces significantly greater. Second, the British entered the war two years before the US, and that time interval was critical to the development of airplanes that were serious threats to battleships at sea. Third, the lack of an equivalent to Pearl Harbor meant that the British never were forced to radically change their doctrine away from the battleship. All that said, by the end of the war, when the British were operating with the US Pacific Fleet, their ships, battleship and carrier alike, were used very much like their American counterparts.

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Last time, we discussed detecting submarines, but that was only the start of a process. Once a submarine had been detected, it still needed to be destroyed. At the start of the war, the only weapon was the venerable depth charge, essentially an explosive thrown over the side and fuzed to go off at a specific depth. However, as the war went on, the traditional depth charge, unchanged over the previous 20 years, became increasingly inadequate, and new and improved weapons were developed.

K-Gun with traditional "ashcan" depth charge

One of the biggest problems, even during WWI, with the traditional depth charge rack was that it only produced a narrow pattern. Submarines could estimate when a ship would lose contact, and then maneuver violently, hoping to dodge the pattern. During WWI, the USN developed the Y-gun, a device mounted on the centerline which threw two depth charges between 50 and 80 yards on either side of the ship. The biggest problem was that it consumed valuable centerline space, which was also in demand for guns and torpedo tubes. To solve this problem, the USN introduced the K-gun, which was essentially half a Y-gun, mounted on the railings. These were mounted in great numbers on destroyers and destroyer escorts during WWII.

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