Naval Pictures X: Underway on Nuclear Power

[Wrangler]

They were better off trying to use an navalized version of the regular artillery guns. They had extend ranged shells.  We won't know until 2025 how the launchers will be like, since that's when Zumwalt is due be completed.

[Sabelkatten]

The longest range I can find for a "standard" 155 seems to be 70 km. Latest version of Excalibur round supposedly.

[marauder648]

Gun ammo gets real expensive real fast when you start strapping rocket propulsion and guidance packages to the shells...

Aye but lethality goes up, you'd probably only need one shell to hit say a specific building or radar facility etc. Experience recently has shown how accurate the https://www.militarytoday.com/artillery/vulcano.htm shell is, able to hit very specific targets at extreme range in a modern battlefield environment.

[Wrangler]

Technically speaking, the Iowas supposedly had such shells, rock propelled ones. They were sub-caliber, like 11 inches.  I've never found much about them in use.

I'd image they wreck havoc in the barrels though.

[Colt Ward]

USS Sable (IX-81) moored in the icy waters of Lake Michigan at the Chicago Navy Pier in 1945.
USS Sable and USS Wolverine (IX-64) were Great Lakes sidewheel steamers converted into training carriers. They trained scores of naval aviators in carrier takeoffs and landings operating in the Great Lakes.

[Wrangler]

Lordy, I wish one of those ships had been preserved. I really do.  I know it was not to be, they'd would end up going poof once they went back to their original owners once the war was over.

[I am Belch II]

The Sable and the Wolverine were pretty old to start. But yes would have been nice to be saved.

[Colt Ward]

USS Arizona, then one of the largest and newest of Uncle Sam's sea fighters passing out to sea under the Brooklyn Bridge on her first voyage since being put in commission.

[Colt Ward]

USS Tennessee (BB-43) and the bow section of USS California (BB-44) at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, summer 1946

[Elmoth]

Sexy ship

[Colt Ward]

Radio controlled Coastal Battleship Number 4 (formerly USS Iowa BB-4) bracketed by a salvo from USS Mississippi (BB-41) during Fleet Problem I, off the Panama Canal Zone, 1923

[Wrangler]

I find it amazing they could remote control something like that, that far back. Especially the level tech that went into that.

[Cannonshop]

I find it amazing they could remote control something like that, that far back. Especially the level tech that went into that.

thinking about the technology of the time it's probably easier to control something that BIG, than something small and light, if you don't think so, consider that this was long, long, long before Transistors and microelectronics.  Ships had Radio rooms, not radio sets or chassis, but actual ROOMS to run basic communications and direction finding, there was no such thing as integrated circuits, and vacuum tubes were used to control the direction of electrons. thus, macro-voltages, not micro-voltages, which weould be easier to power on a ship, than, for instance, a tracked vehicle.

[Sabelkatten]

I'm mostly wondering how the boilers were managed. They couldn't have stokers on board after all!

[Gorgon]

According to the wikipedia article (which the picture sent me to last night), they fitted the ship with oil burners for this.

[Sabelkatten]

Of course. Should have realized that.

[Wrangler]

According to the wikipedia article (which the picture sent me to last night), they fitted the ship with oil burners for this.

The oil burners make sense, it was the remote control in 1924 which I thought was unique.

[Wrangler]

Here another one from book of Makeshift Marine Vessels.



This picture from 1951 of a Mk 6 LCM landing ships converted into a river monitor for patrol on the Mekong River. 

Essentially a turrets taken off of WWII British Coventry armored cars and modified,coaxial gun was changed to a MG 151 from BESA.  It was recently posted on Reddit.

[Gorgon]

The oil burners make sense, it was the remote control in 1924 which I thought was unique.

Absolutely. It must have been quite the engineering feat to rebuild it for radio control 100 years ago.

By the way, Coastal Battleship Number 4's radio control ship has a pretty interesting story, too. USS Shawmut (later USS Oglala) started life as a civilian steamer, got rebuilt as a mine layer prior to WW1, participated in both Word Wars (got sunk at Pearl Harbor and refloated, as well). And between the wars she participated as an observer on the US bombing of U-117 and served as radio control ship.

Here she is in glorious WW1 dazzle camo, serving in the North Sea:

[Euphonium]

Radio controlled Coastal Battleship Number 4 (formerly USS Iowa BB-4) bracketed by a salvo from USS Mississippi (BB-41) during Fleet Problem I, off the Panama Canal Zone, 1923

Colt,

Where are you hosting your pictures at please? They never show up for me and I can't figure out which of my security settings is blocking them!

[Daryk]

My mouseover seems to indicate Facebook...

[Wrangler]

That's why I attach the pictures (reduce them to 600KB ) and link them to the post after attaching.

[Euphonium]

My mouseover seems to indicate Facebook...

I don't even see links unless I try to quote the post, but hosting on Facebook would explain it - I can't avoid FB altogether so I've got it locked down to its own containerised tab on the odd occasion I need to go there.

I'll play with settings a bit, but I might need to start reading this thread in a more disposable browser.

[Giovanni Blasini]

Had a story on the USS New Orleans pop up in my MSN feed today, about the aftermath of the Battle of Tassafaronga, where they lost the ship's bow, patched it with coconut trees, then sailed home in reverse to get a new bow put on.



Which, of course, might remind you all of the classic Clarke and Dawe skit.

[Colt Ward]

"It's been a long road, getting from there to here. It's been a long time, but my time is finally near." USS Enterprise from when after she was just launched in October 3, 1936 to her last voyage and being tugged to the scrapper in August 21, 1958

Yeah, FB . . . "some how" they know I like warship pictures.

[Ruger]

"It's been a long road, getting from there to here. It's been a long time, but my time is finally near." USS Enterprise from when after she was just launched in October 3, 1936 to her last voyage and being tugged to the scrapper in August 21, 1958

Yeah, FB . . . "some how" they know I like warship pictures.

Just think, what I consider the MVP of the War in the Pacific, and if she had been a day or so earlier in coming to port (when she was supposed to have arrived; she was delayed by the weather), or if the attack on Pearl Harbor had been a day or so later, and she likely would have been sunk during the attack.

And she did lose some planes (several dive bombers, and a few fighters later after the attack; some to the attackers, some to friendly fire) during the attack anyways.

Ruger

[I am Belch II]

It is too bad that the Enterprise couldn't be saved as a Museum Ship.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

So in Godzilla Minus One, there's a scene where a Japanese cruiser is firing its guns at Godzilla while Godzilla is grabbing the ship.  That got me wondering- did naval guns in WW2 have a minimum range before the shell would arm, or were they live the moment they left the barrel?

[Euphonium]

I'm not aware of minimum arming distance for large calibre naval shells, but if AP shells hit anything less solid/hard than several inches of hardened armour it was not uncommon for them to simply punch through and out the other side without the bursting charge detonating. It actually made smaller/unarmoured ships like DDs and AMCs surprisingly hard to sink with larger shells.

[Colt Ward]