Invincible class - notes

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Found a couple of notes on Invincible class from my Aviation & Marine International magazine collection

September 1979:
Provision was originally made for the armament to consist of a number of container/launchers for MM38 Exocet. However these missiles have not been installed for economical reasons
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April 1976:
Iranian Navy would not be ordering an Invicible class cruiser. The abandoned plans called for the construction of three vessels. The renouncement was prompted by Iran's inability to provide sufficient trained personnel to form the crew for ships of the size and sophistication of the ASC, negotiations are continuin, however, about the order for a batch of 25 Sea Harrier. Acording to some sources Iran is going to replace the abandoned Invincible with a group of at least 4 Harrier vessels. But in this case too, the Shah seems to be very reluctant to give the go-ahead in the absence of any show of concrete interest by the Royal Navy
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D K Browne mentions the exocet launchers as well. Obviously the need for them vanished when the Cold War ended (and this space was rightly used for an extended flight deck) but had the Cold War continued it would have been nice to have seen, perhaps 8 Harpoons in that space to add to the overall ASuW firepower of the RN at the time.
 
pometablava said:
Found a couple of notes on Invincible class from my Aviation & Marine International magazine collection

April 1976:
Iranian Navy would not be ordering an Invicible class cruiser. The abandoned plans called for the construction of three vessels. The renouncement was prompted by Iran's inability to provide sufficient trained personnel to form the crew for ships of the size and sophistication of the ASC, negotiations are continuin, however, about the order for a batch of 25 Sea Harrier. Acording to some sources Iran is going to replace the abandoned Invincible with a group of at least 4 Harrier vessels. But in this case too, the Shah seems to be very reluctant to give the go-ahead in the absence of any show of concrete interest by the Royal Navy
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Thank you pometablava. Interesting to speculate what the Islamic Republic of Iran might have done with three Invincible-class aircraft carriers and 25 Sea Harrier.
 
Don't forget about their probable escorts:

The Kidd class guided missile destroyers (DDGs) were a series of four warships based upon the hull of the Spruance class destroyers. These ships were originally ordered by the Shah of Iran for service in the Persian Gulf in an air defense role. The Shah of Iran was overthrown prior to Iran accepting delivery of the ships, causing the United States Navy to integrate the vessels into its own fleet
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(from wikipedia)

...a mighty fleet for the Shah
 
This seems to be an appropriate place to put this old 2003 obiturary which I came across while trying to find info on the Royal Corps of Naval Constructors: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1438568/Norman-Hancock.html

As Director of Warship Design from 1969 to 1976, he had to persuade a reluctant Admiralty and an unenthusiastic Treasury to involve the shipbuilder in the sketch designs for Invincible and to supervise some 3,500 man-years of effort which produced over 50,000 drawings. Late in the design, Lt-Cdr D R Taylor produced the idea of a ski-jump, again to a scornful naval staff, but Hancock and his project manager, Arthur Honnor, were easily able to accommodate this new feature and produce the world's first jumpjet carrier. As a result Invincible had the highest freeboard of any ship in the Navy and a modest displacement, yet was still the biggest ship to be propelled by gas turbines.
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This picture, found here, is apparently the first MOD model of the Invincible class and originated from 1972. Key differences with the final design are:

1) No ski-jump
2) No blast deflector for the Sea Dart launcher
3) The Type 965 radar is mounted on a mast right aft of the island superstructure rather than above the bridge
4) Four Exocet box launchers are present on the starboard side next to the Sea Dart launcher

1972_Invincible_Model.jpg
 
JFC Fuller said:
This picture, found here, is apparently the first MOD model of the Invincible class and originated from 1972. Key differences with the final design are:

1) No ski-jump
2) No blast deflector for the Sea Dart launcher
3) The Type 965 radar is mounted on a mast right aft of the island superstructure rather than above the bridge
4) Four Exocet box launchers are present on the starboard side next to the Sea Dart launcher

View attachment 624946
Click to expand...

Nice find JFC Fuller, the Invincible design in the picture looks rather strange without the ski jump being there, I had to take a second look to be sure I was not imagining things.
 
That boxy thing just forward of the bridge on the flight deck, representing the aircraft / equipment / boat crane?
 
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The appearance and armament of the model were in line with the designation of Invincible as a cruiser not a carrier after the 1966 structure for the RN without aircraft carriers.
MM38 Exocet ssms were planned originally fora much wider range of RN surface ships but numbers fell victim to defence cuts after 1974.
Opposition to carriers gradually reduced in Whitehall especially after 1979. This allowed the Invincibles to become carriers.
 
A copy of this sketch was in a book by RVB Blackman called (I think) Ships of the Royal Navy from the mid 1970's. He was editor of Janes' Fighting Ships from the late 1950's to the 1970's. The copy I had had a soft cover and one thing I always remember was that the photograph of the aircraft carrier HMS Eagle had been printed reversed so the angled flight-deck was to starboard and the island was to port (lol).
I remember an illustration of the "Through Deck Cruiser" as it was then being called in an early 1970's Janes' Fighting Ships. The view was an aerial image from the front port quarter which clearly showed the Exocet and Seadart launchers, and if I recall correctly at least one escort vessel in the background which I think was a Type 42 DDG.
 

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pf
I had the same book which I think also had the first drawing of the Type 22 unless you count BAC's drawing of where Seawolf would be fiited on a ship which looked more like a Type 42.
As a bored teenager doing exams many pieces of scrap paper were filled with lean mean thru deck cruisers escorting CVA01 lookalikes and double ended Type 82s. Sad but true.
 
The earliest image of the through deck cruiser appears in the Air Pictorial article from 1970 covering the Heath Government's first defence white paper. It shows an oddly made paper or cardboard model. Cannot find it online. But did find this which I think came from an early 70s Janes
 

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Its in the December edition in the article Conservative Defence Policy
 
It is curious that the evolution of the Invincible class has not received more detailed coverage.
The earliest images of the ship that becomes the Invincible class are the Future Fleet Working Party drawings from 1966 featured in Brown/Moore Rebuilding the Royal Navy.
Nothing has emerged to show how and when this evolved into the drawings shown here.
 
It is interesting how similar the early Invincible cruiser style design looks to the County class destroyers.
The masts and bedstead radar and twin funnels can be seen here

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The later drawings are much less sleek and more carrier like. The big bedstead radar is now on top of the bridge.
 

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Volkodav said:
Wasn't this derived from the Bristol, or was that a different design?
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I believe the Bristol-derived design was a seperate lineage. Saying that, other than brief descriptions in Friedman we've never seen it in pictorial form. It could well have been mistaken for the Study 21.
 
Hood said:
Volkodav said:
Wasn't this derived from the Bristol, or was that a different design?
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I believe the Bristol-derived design was a seperate lineage. Saying that, other than brief descriptions in Friedman we've never seen it in pictorial form. It could well have been mistaken for the Study 21.
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There was also something in Brown but I don't believe there was an illustration. I really need to unpack my library or buy more of it again on Kindle.

The sketch does seem too beamy to be derived from the Bristol.
 
In 1992, HMS Ark Royal was considered for conversion into an LPH instead of ordering a purpose-built ship.
Changes saw the Sea Dart removed, the magazine replaced with armament stores, a vehicle ramp to the hangar deck, four LCVPs (two in davits on the starboard side, two in davits on new sponsons on the port side), the ski jump may have been removed or retained - subject to whether the Merlin could land on a sloped surface.

Stability was a big issue and ultimately the decision was made not to convert her.
 

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Thread cleaned up - a reminder that project sections of the forums are for discussing real projects. Discussions of alternative designs, weapons etc. belong in the speculative sections of the forum.
Likewise pretty pictures of real ships don't belong here - post them in the military section.
 
Hood said:
In 1992, HMS Ark Royal was considered for conversion into an LPH instead of ordering a purpose-built ship.
Changes saw the Sea Dart removed, the magazine replaced with armament stores, a vehicle ramp to the hangar deck, four LCVPs (two in davits on the starboard side, two in davits on new sponsons on the port side), the ski jump may have been removed or retained - subject to whether the Merlin could land on a sloped surface.

Stability was a big issue and ultimately the decision was made not to convert her.
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How many Helicopters were envisioned?
 
Tzoli said:
How many Helicopters were envisioned?
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The air group would have been 12 Medium Support Helicopters (which were assumed to be Merlins in the study) of which 7 could be stowed in the hangar plus six Westland Lynx AH.1/AH.7 on deck.
 
Thanks! Though that adds up to 13 but I presume the Lynx is smaller then the Merlin.
Only Armament would be the Goalkeepers?
 
Tzoli said:
Thanks! Though that adds up to 13 but I presume the Lynx is smaller then the Merlin.
Only Armament would be the Goalkeepers?
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It's actually 18 helicopters — 12 Merlin plus 6 Lynx. The permanent deck park would be 5 Merlin and all 6 Lynx, with 7 Merlin in the hangar (though in practice, this would obviously vary when Lynx need to be hangared for maintenance). All of these aircraft are shown in the deck diagram in Post #23.
 
Stumbled on a very curious concept of - so it is claimed - a preliminary Invincible configuration.

The problem it's from a Russian magazine from 2006, and there are literally no notes of any sources for this plan. Never saw anything close in Brown or elsewhere.

1743824056916.png

It shows a low cut forecastle (!), long and very Soviet sonar attached forward, 2 Sea Dart launchers, Exocet and Harriers (not helicopters) in the hangar.

Is it pure author's attempt at reconstruction or is based on something real?
 
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Looks highly dubious to me - at best I'd say it was based on a Soviet interpretation of an early Invincible artwork gleaned from the Western defence press and somewhat tarted up with Invincible features for the speculative internals and layouts.
Also, by 1972 the design was finalised so there would be no preliminary like this and there were no twin Sea Dart options, only one launcher was planned.
 
Hood said:
Looks highly dubious to me - at best I'd say it was based on a Soviet interpretation of an early Invincible artwork gleaned from the Western defence press and somewhat tarted up with Invincible features for the speculative internals and layouts.
Also, by 1972 the design was finalised so there would be no preliminary like this and there were no twin Sea Dart options, only one launcher was planned.
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Likely true. I suppose, the author got some old Soviet guesswork, and mixed them with more modern knowledge to create "interpretative-esque" image.
 
Invincible deck plans, from a booklet published by FOI request.

www.whatdotheyknow.com

HMS Invincible Booklet - a Freedom of Information request to Royal Navy

I am wondering if you either have A booklet titled “HMS Invincible Information booklet” or any *deck by deck* plans of HMS Invincible (RO6) Yours faithfully, Charlie Haimes
www.whatdotheyknow.com www.whatdotheyknow.com

The closest to real hull lines I have seen yet.
 

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The same Russian edition also contains a correct drawing of the longitudinal section of the ship for 2004.
Martes said:
Stumbled on a very curious concept of - so it is claimed - a preliminary Invincible configuration.

The problem it's from a Russian magazine from 2006, and there are literally no notes of any sources for this plan. Never saw anything close in Brown or elsewhere.

View attachment 765640

It shows a low cut forecastle (!), long and very Soviet sonar attached forward, 2 Sea Dart launchers, Exocet and Harriers (not helicopters) in the hangar.

Is it pure author's attempt at reconstruction or is based on something real?
Click to expand...
 

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Dilandu said:
Likely true. I suppose, the author got some old Soviet guesswork, and mixed them with more modern knowledge to create "interpretative-esque" image.
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Alternatively it could have been a bit of British misinformation 'leaked' to the Soviets for one reason or another, for example during a mole hunt.
 
Hood said:
Official artist's impression of Invincible from 1973.
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Another art with Exocets:

1744244476025.jpeg

from Jane's 1973.

Source:

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Hood said:
Official artist's impression of Invincible from 1973.
Click to expand...
It is very similar to this one, but there are subtle differences - Exocet launchers forward, and aft radars portrayed differently, but both seem to be a work of the same author.
 
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