Chapter 207 Fast Cruiser

The Sovereign-class battleship has a hull length of 146.1 meters, a hull width of 26.8 meters, and a draft of 8.67 meters.

The battleship has a crew of 988, a conventional displacement of 18,490 tons, and a full load displacement of 20,910 tons.

Because it is expected to use the same design of four steam turbine propulsion units plus 18 drum coal-fired steam boilers as the Dreadnought, the speed of the Sovereign-class battleship is not much different from that of the Dreadnought, and the maximum speed is expected to reach 21 knots.

In terms of armor protection, the Monarch-class battleships follow the armor protection system of the Nassau-class battleships. The strongest protection is the armor belt in the middle of the string side, which is about 300 mm thick and provides protection for the engine room and boiler room.

The thickness of the protective armor on the front and sides of the main turret and the command tower is 280 mm, which is the same level of protection as the maximum protection level of the dreadnought.

In order to reduce weight, the side armor of the Nassau-class battleships was gradually reduced from the middle to both ends.

The Sovereign-class battleship did not weaken the side armor, which also resulted in the expected full-load water capacity of the Sovereign-class battleship being nearly 400 tons more than the fully-loaded Nassau-class battleship.

In summary, in addition to the current firepower system still using Germany's mainstream 280mm artillery, the power system and armor protection system can be balanced with the dreadnought, and the armor protection is even superior.

As long as all the artillery is modified to 305mm main guns with 45 times or even 50 times the caliber in the future, the Monarch-class battleship will become a true dreadnought and achieve all-round improvements.

After the design of the Monarch-class battleship was completed, Arthur was in a very happy mood and even gave each of the experts who participated in the drawing design a check for A$10,000.

Although it will take some time to put into production, and production will also face a period of exploration, it may not be until two or three years before the warship is actually launched.

But Australasia was about to have its own dreadnought, and that was enough for Arthur.

What's more, most of the powerful countries can only achieve this level at present. It would be good to have a design drawing of a dreadnought ship.

Australasia may be ahead of some major powers in terms of dreadnoughts.

Although Australasia's Monarch-class battleships were kept secret, William II still learned about Australasia's dreadnought design.

Although William II was surprised that Arthur did not rush to produce Nassau-class battleships, but instead used the technical data of Nassau-class battleships and the existing Dreadnought battleship to produce better Australasian own. Dreadnought.

But faced with the fact that Britain and Australasia also chose new technology steam turbines instead of the old three-cylinder reciprocating steam engines, William II still fell into deep thought.

The old three-cylinder reciprocating steam engines and coal-fired boilers used by the Nassau-class battleships have gone through many tests, so there is no need to worry about practical performance.

But could it really match the steam turbine technology adopted by Britain? I'm afraid not only William II, but even German experts are not sure.

The reason why they temporarily designated the power system used by the Nassau-class battleship as old-fashioned technology is because they want to see the real data after the Dreadnought battleship's sea trials to see if there will be any problems before making other plans.

But currently, judging from the designs of the three dreadnoughts that Germany knows about, the Nassau-class battleships that have been transformed with all the efforts of Germany are lagging behind in terms of power system.

To this end, William II made two decisions. One was to find ways to improve the power system of the Nassau-class battleship again and keep the expected maximum speed at 21, which is consistent with the Dreadnought and Monarch-class battleships.

The second is to order major German military factories to conduct large-scale research on 305mm artillery. Under the premise that new battleships will uniformly adopt 305mm artillery, Germany must not lag behind in this industry.

Arthur also had a brief phone call with William II, and the two sides reached an important trade. Australasia shared the design of the Monarch-class battleship with Germany in exchange for Germany sharing artillery technology and submarine technology in the next three years. .

This is still very important for Australasia. Although Germany has not yet mastered the artillery technology of 305 mm with 45 times the diameter, more than two years later, Germany caught up and successfully developed a 305 mm artillery with 50 times the diameter.

This will greatly enhance the firepower of warships and is definitely a technology not to be missed in the development of warships.

The second is German submarine technology. So far, Germany's submarine technology is actually lagging behind the great powers.

This is largely because Germany did not pay much attention to the development of this technology when submarines were just born.

Germany's first submarine was even the Trout submarine built in 1902 based on the design of a Spanish engineer.

It was not until 1904 that the German Navy established a submarine construction office to be responsible for the construction of German naval submarines.

So far, the submarine technology possessed by Germany is not advanced, but Germany has sufficient potential in the development of submarines.

And now Australasia's most likely source of submarine technology is Germany, and Arthur will naturally not give up this opportunity.

William II was very satisfied with using the artillery technology and submarine technology within three years in exchange for the complete design information of the Sovereign-class battleship.

After all, this can be regarded as the most advanced warship independently designed by Australasia, and its advanced level is definitely the best in the world.

Even if such technology was placed in Germany, William II believed that it would be impossible to share it with other countries without bloodletting, let alone Australasia, which was already relatively backward in technology.

Because the complete design information of the Monarch-class battleship was obtained, Germany's construction plan in 1907 was also different from history.

Historically, Germany built four Nassau-class battleships in 1904, namely Nassau, Westphalen, Rheinland and Posen.

After having the seemingly more advanced Sovereign-class battleships, the German Navy made a temporary decision to change the Rhineland and Posen into Sovereign-class battleships, and like the other two Nassau-class battleships, they both started construction in 1907. Mid-year.

As soon as he finished negotiating the business with Germany, Arthur gave the naval experts another difficult problem, which was to develop a fast battleship, or battleship, with very powerful firepower, better power, and the ability to appropriately reduce armor protection capabilities. cruiser.

In order to allow these experts to have a full understanding of the so-called fast battleships, Arthur also explained them very carefully.

The so-called fast battleship is actually a battlecruiser in the true sense.

Each country has a different view on battlecruisers. The first country to build battlecruisers was the United Kingdom. Their concept of battlecruisers is to emphasize firepower and speed and despise armor protection capabilities.

Germany will also build its own battlecruisers in the future. Their view of battlecruisers is that they value armor and speed and relatively despise firepower.

But no matter what view you have, battlecruisers are warships with extremely high tactical value that have slightly weakened armor and firepower in exchange for higher speeds.

Because of their extremely fast speed and the firepower that matches battleships, battlecruisers can fight battleships when entering, and suppress them with speed and firepower when retreating, absolutely crushing other small and medium-sized warships that are not battleships.

It is precisely because of the high speed of the battlecruiser that it can also surround and intercept the enemy's fleet during naval battles.

And compared to battleships, as long as the high speed advantage of battlecruisers is still there, they will not fall behind the times as quickly as battleships.

Compared with the newly born dreadnoughts, battlecruisers are more suitable as main battleships to expand the scale of Australasia's warships.

Of course, this does not mean that dreadnoughts are not important to Australasia. It’s just that the update rate of dreadnoughts is too fast and is not suitable for large-scale construction in a short period of time.

After receiving Arthur's order, the design team at the Naval Shipyard became busy again.

Arthur has the most basic requirements for this kind of warship, which is called a fast battleship. It must have a speed of at least 25 knots and be equipped with at least ten 280 mm main guns, leaving room for improvement for the subsequent replacement of 305 mm main guns.

What does this mean? This means that this kind of warship is comparable to battleships in terms of firepower, and even comparable to the newly born dreadnoughts.

Looking at the speed, the maximum speed of the battleship Dreadnought, which currently breaks the record for the highest speed of a battleship, is only 21 knots, while Arthur's maximum speed requirement for a fast battleship has reached 25 knots. This is not a small change.

Although in order to ensure strong firepower and speed, Arthur agreed to reduce the armor in some unimportant areas to balance it.

But which piece of armor should be reduced and to what extent is a matter worth debating.

Arthur's request gave the Australasian experts a headache, and even some questions could only be asked in a roundabout way by the German experts.

But that’s actually not their fault. The earliest battlecruisers in the world were the British HMS Indomitable, HMS Invincible and HMS Steadfast, also known as the Invincible-class battlecruisers.

Although the construction of these three battlecruisers has begun, they will not be actually launched until a year later, in 1907.

Before they were launched, these three battlecruisers were kept secret. Like the previous Dreadnought battleship, they were one of the top secrets of the British Navy.

This also leads to the fact that apart from the current British experts, there are not many shipbuilding experts who are exposed to the theory of battlecruisers.

This also has to be praised for Britain's advanced and powerful shipbuilding. Dreadnoughts, battlecruisers and other warships that changed the naval system and pattern were all born in the shipyards of the British Empire.

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