Italian 61200 ton CRDA battleship (4-16-16-40)

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Hello all,
While browsing some old WoWS Reddit threads I found mention of a CRDA (assumedly Cantieri Riuniti dell'Adriatico, active 1930 to 1984) battleship design that was posted on the (now-defunct) WoWS forums. Apparently the known specifics are "61200 tons standard, 29 knots, 406mm belt, 4x4 406mm/56" (copies from one of Phoenix_jz's posts).
I was wondering if anyone knew anything more on this topic?
 
Unfortunately, there is very little known on this project.

4-16/16-40 was a design, or perhaps better to say concept*, found by an acquaintance of a user known as Deamon93 (on EU - on the NA forums he went by 'Demon93IT'), who was doing research to help him create a hypothetical Italian tech three for WoWs, very early in the game's history.

Unfortunately I don't have the specifics saved, and it doesn't appear either thread from the EU or NA forums was archived, so I'm not sure if there's a way to gain access to the information again.

But as a basic summary - yes, this was a CRDA concept, and thus after 1930. I've never seen any mention of this design from an RM perspective (not that there is an abundance of information RM never-weres), so I suspect that this was a private initiative by CRDA.

The concept had a 406mm internal inclined belt, and iirc also featured 50mm outer hull plating, though the specifics of how this was arranged I don't think was known. It featured four 406mm/56 in quadruple turrets. I don't recall if there were any details on the secondary armament. Top speed was, as you said, 29 knots.

*I'm not sure 4-16/16-40 ever existed in enough detail to be called a design, and probably more likely existed only as a general concept. If more information on its existence can be found, that would obviously shed light on things - but for now what we know is very little.
 
Excellent find, thank you @Kresta II !

So, stats are;

Standard Displacement: 61,200 tons
Full Load Displacement: 66,336 tons
Length (pp): 256 meters
Beam: 40 meters
Propulsive Power: 195,000 shp
Top Speed: 29 knots
Armament: 4x IV 406mm/56
Protection: Inclined interior belt, 406mm tapering to 203mm, with a 50mm outer belt
 
Yamato sized both in weight and dimensions but carry more turrets and faster, I presume thinner deck, around max 127mm. Likely 4x3 152mm secondary guns and 6x per side AA 90mm or 120mm guns single or twin
 
Last edited:
Tzoli said:
Yamato sized both in weight and dimensions but carry more turrets and fadter, I presume thinner deck, aroind max 127mm. Likely 4x3 152mm secondary guns and 6x per side AA 90mm or 120mm guns single or twin
Click to expand...
Maybe instead it would have the DP 135mm , possibly four twins, the 90mm in oscillating turrets and a host of 65mm?
 
It's really impossible to say. We have no information on the armament beyond the main battery.

The likely secondary battery would probably heavily depend on when the ship was built (within the span of the 1930s and 40s). And then it must be said that the design is also simply too large to be seriously considered by the RM. They did not want to go beyond 45,000 tons standard displacement on the grounds of affordability (if you have to have the minimum number of battleships deemed necessary) and infrastructure limitations.
 
Phoenix_jz said:
Excellent find, thank you @Kresta II !

So, stats are;

Standard Displacement: 61,200 tons
Full Load Displacement: 66,336 tons
Length (pp): 256 meters
Beam: 40 meters
Propulsive Power: 195,000 shp
Top Speed: 29 knots
Armament: 4x IV 406mm/56
Protection: Inclined interior belt, 406mm tapering to 203mm, with a 50mm outer belt
Click to expand...
I'm a bit skeptical of those tonnages. That's roughly the same as the Yamato or Montana classes. Compared to the Montana class it has four more 16" guns of a greater barrel length, more engine power, and the armor as described seems comparable. Had the Italians started to seriously design this thing I think the projected displacement would rapidly increase as the realities of building such a large warship set in.
 
Colonial-Marine said:
I'm a bit skeptical of those tonnages. That's roughly the same as the Yamato or Montana classes. Compared to the Montana class it has four more 16" guns of a greater barrel length, more engine power, and the armor as described seems comparable. Had the Italians started to seriously design this thing I think the projected displacement would rapidly increase as the realities of building such a large warship set in.
Click to expand...

I'm actually mostly in agreement with this, with the exception of the propulsion aspect.

I don't think the propulsion should be much of an issue - that's more than a Montana but still less than an Iowa and within the range of what the Italians could have achieved by the late 1930s. I'd also keep in mind that Italian propulsion systems were generally very power-efficient relative to their weight, even compared to their American counterparts (on the other hand, they did far worse of fuel efficiency).

But otherwise - yes, considering the inevitable gain in weight of armament, and weight of protection (even assuming lighter deck armor than on a Montana), it seems certain that the displacement would have risen beyond what CRDA had projected here - which itself was probably only a preliminary design at best.
 
User Demon 93 some later wrote that he received information about the CRDA battleship from colleagues from the United States. Possibly, more detailed information about this project can be found in one of the US archives among captured Italian documentation or reports on Italian shipbuilding of the WWII period.
 

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