What is the most interesting US Warship class in WW2?

Wyoming class.

Whats not to like about a battleship with six main turrets?

Wyoming was demilitarized under the London Naval treaty but Arkansas retained her armament right through Bikini


http://forum.worldofwarships.eu/index.php?/topic/873-uss-wyoming-bb-32/

 

The Brooklyn/St. Louis light cruisers; They had the largest number of heavy-caliber guns of any USN cruisers, and the layout of the turrets, while it wasn't new as the Japanese Myokos and Takaos had the same layout, was cool nonetheless.

 

Only about four years late, but are you sure it was it a cruiser? Could it have been something like Wyoming when she was a gunnery training ship?

 

This is a bit of a stretch, but is it remotely possible you were thinking of this fair lady, USS Wyoming?




While she is not, in fact, a cruiser, I can certainly see where she could be mistaken for one from some perspectives. And many of her distinguishing features have changed by these two late-war shots. In this slightly earlier shot her battleship heritage is more apparent, but so too is the full scale of her AA armament in her training ship guise.



And there you have a very slow anti-aircraft cruiser on three times the displacement, more or less. There's a brief discussion including quite a few pictures and some line drawings on World of Warships. Always thought she was an interesting old bird. Her close cousin Mississippi took on a similarly odd demeanor late in life.

 

Perhaps the USS Worcester CL-144 as seen here:
http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_6-47DP_mk16.htm

 

^^^^
close gentlemen. but those 5-inch guns stick out. i remember open AA mounts, probably 40mm quad and 20mm twins. it might have come during the waning months of the war or even after.

i'm glad people are as curious as i am, coming four years after i first mentioned it.

 

Here's another shot of Juneau, still the closest thing I can think of:

 

Probably was a Cleavland class as he added in his addendum

 

hmmm... this is the closest i can find gents. a WWI-vintage US battleship! USS Texas: 40 40mm guns, 44 20mm guns.

 

The unfortunate drawback to the Mk.16DP guns was that the auto loading system increased the weight of the turret mountings by 50%, the same with the Mk.16s on the Des Moines, plus they suffered from reliability issues(though the Des Moines guns had no issues and gave good service in Vietnam), which is unfortunate as mounting them on some of the Cleveland's as you suggested would of been very useful in AA defense.

http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_6-47DP_mk16.htm

http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_8-55_mk16.htm

 

I am going to Echo Kevin's having mentioned the Liberty ships because of the work horses they proved to be at moving people and supplies around.......built sometimes by the ladies in shipyards to the "19th century designs" of ships modernized only by having a steam turbine installed for an engine and often put to sea without the stabilizers that made stability and comfort lacking in their performance. One ship the "Marine Perch" continued as a post war transport for holocaust victims and some of them commented on how seasick they became on the unstabilized ship when rough seas were encountered.

 

IDK, the only thing interesting about the Liberty ships, is that some "snapped in half" when least expected. Low grade steel that would fracture under the right circumstances.

http://m-5.eng.uml.edu/22.311/s2011/powerpoint/22311--chapter15-v2011-v1.pdf

 

True they did snap apart....sometimes they would be sent off in pairs so that one ship could provide rescue for the sinking broken ones. What does one expect in performance from a 19th century design being rapidly manufactured to provide numbers for the needed shipping of the kinds of production that would win this war. Crews were often made up of former merchant marine sailors to provide enough crews to man them. How many of us today would have patience for 9-12 knot speeds. Some troops slept on deck in hammocks on some voyages, where conditions were somewhat primitive. Below deck was not always well aerated. I find these conditions and equipment interesting as compared to other more modern ships.

 

Glad to see your post Victor, missed seeing you here.

 

Thank you sir.....good to see your posts as well!

 

What were the benefits/advantages to having alternating boiler and engine rooms?

 

Makes it harder for a single hit to immoblize the ship by knocking out all engines or all boilers. If all the boiler are forward of all the engines, a hit at the midpoint could cut off steam to all engines even though some of both boilers and engines may remain intact. Although they are in separate watertight compartments, it is also possible for several adjacent compartments to be flooded if there's a hit near the watertight bulkhead, or just a sufficiently massive hit. In "split plant" operation, the forward boilers power the forward engines and aft aft, each plant completely independent. This also prevents a mechanical casualty like a steam leak or low boiler water from knocking out all propulsion. A four-shaft ship with four, eight, twelve, etc. boilers can run all four plants independently.

The disadvantage is that the propellor shafts from the forward engine rooms are longer, therefore heavier, and run through the aft boiler rooms, taking up space and forcing those to be a bit larger/longer than they would otherwise need to be. It increases the size of the ship and the volume of the armored citadel, not a lot, but enough to be a problem for the New Orleans class which were trying to maximize protection while staying within the 10,000-ton treaty limit.

Steam lines can be cross-connected, so that any combination of boilers can power any/all engines, generators, and auxiliary machinery. The forwardmost boiler could power the after engines if needed. For economical steaming, one or two boilers might power the whole engineering plant. Split plant operation just means that the appropriate valves are closed to let each operate indepently.

p.s. on a two-shaft ship with alternating e/b, the forward engine will power one shaft, usually the starboard in the USN, and the aft engine the other/port. This means the starboard shaft is longer/heavier than the port. The rotating mass of a propellor shaft actually imparts a small but noticeable sideways motion on the ship (torque?). To compensate for this, the shafts are counter-rotating, and some additional weight is added to the shorter shaft to equalize the force.

 

I had thought that the "Split plant" arrangement was for safety measures such as preventing a ship from being immobilized by a single well placed shell, but I wasn't sure at first, thanks for the response Carronade.

 

You're very welcome; you know I enjoy a chance to ratttle on about this stuff. I had a bit of a brain fart the other day, couldn't recall the term "unit machinery" which is commonly used for the arrangement.

 

I for one always enjoy when you "rattle on". Always excellent, interesting information!