RN post war carrier conundrums

[Hood]

They would have been anachronistic quite quickly though had they been built. No coincidence that after these ships died in the 1957 cuts that the escort cruiser with Seaslug and helicopters came along two years later. In effect they took out the old 6in guns and added helicopters, one old weapons system for a new one.

 

[uk 75]

For anyone interested in the saga of the escort cruiser it is fun to look at the real ship of this kind built by the Italians
With her long range SAM fit, helo deck and Macks like the1966 Fleet Working party drawings Vitorio Veneto only needs a few tweaks to be the rear deck version

 

[uk 75]

Cant resist this one. An early impression of Fearless from 1962 looking much more like a US LSD. A similar bit of artwork shows HMS Tiger with a much smaller hangar than actually fitted. This supports the idea that like the proposal to fit a helo deck and landing craft to HMS Belfast it was to allow a small Royal Marine contingent for "Constabulary" duties

 

[uk 75]

I am always intrigued by the US ASW Essex ships with their mixture of S2 and Seaking ASW and anti-snooper Skyhawks. A developed short take off ASW plane rather than the S3 might have allowed these and Karel Doorman and Bonaventure to be replaced by an updated new build Essex size ship. The UK could easily have designed and built such a ship to replace Hermes and Bulwark in the ASW role more effectively than the Invincibles. Italy and even France might have joined such a NATO small carrier programme with Arromanches 2 and Trieste/Italia

 

[zen]

I am always intrigued by the US ASW Essex ships with their mixture of S2 and Seaking ASW and anti-snooper Skyhawks. A developed short take off ASW plane rather than the S3 might have allowed these and Karel Doorman and Bonaventure to be replaced by an updated new build Essex size ship. The UK could easily have designed and built such a ship to replace Hermes and Bulwark in the ASW role more effectively than the Invincibles. Italy and even France might have joined such a NATO small carrier programme with Arromanches 2 and Trieste/Italia

Well the AEW platform from Brough could well have been the basis of just such ASW, AShW, transport and other variations.

 

[bobtdwarf]

I am always intrigued by the US ASW Essex ships with their mixture of S2 and Seaking ASW and anti-snooper Skyhawks. A developed short take off ASW plane rather than the S3 might have allowed these and Karel Doorman and Bonaventure to be replaced by an updated new build Essex size ship. The UK could easily have designed and built such a ship to replace Hermes and Bulwark in the ASW role more effectively than the Invincibles. Italy and even France might have joined such a NATO small carrier programme with Arromanches 2 and Trieste/Italia

Well the AEW platform from Brough could well have been the basis of just such ASW, AShW, transport and other variations.

Or the Canadair CL-84.. yes that is a version armed with sparrow for some reason

 

[Pirate Pete]

Archibald.
FYI (and hopefully pleasure), here are pictures of the model of the GW.96A Missile Cruiser held at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, London, plus a line drawing from Groves 'Vanguard to Trident'.
N.B. Our Board Member Tizoli has done a series of drawings of the designs leading unto and including the final version elsewhere on these boards.

 

[CNH]

Lovely pics, but the missiles seem to be something of an afterthought on that design!

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

Lovely pics, but the missiles seem to be something of an afterthought on that design!

Looks are deceiving. The Missile magazine takes up a two-deck high volume stretching from the just forward of the launcher to just forward of the front funnel. Despite looking like a gun cruiser, GW96A was very much a volume-critical ship with not much more than splinter protection.

 

[Volkodav]

I've posted this before but just imagine a late 70s MLU on the GW96A with SeaSlug supressed and an aft helideck and hangar for SeaKings fitted, while the midriff 3" mounts are replaced with Mk 13 GMLS with Standard and Harpoon. You have your escort cruiser and your NGS.

 

[uk 75]

It was bad enough the RN being lumbered with the 3 Tiger class dinosaurs because of the cancellation of the Escort Cruiser programme in 1962. If they had been saddled with these Seaslug cruisers in the 1960s as well, funds would have been even more stretched.
Much more sensible would have been a rationalisation of the carrier fleet by converting Albion, Bulwark, Centaur and Hermes.into Essex style ASW/Commando ships retaining one catapult for Gannet AEW/COD and possibly Skyhawk A4 anti-snoopers but mainly Sea King/Wessex ASW.
Victorious should have been scrapped sooner and Eagle chosen as the swing carrier with Ark Royal in reserve for spares.
After 1966 a proper updated Hermes style carrier class of ASW carriers should have been ordered instead of the Invincibles.

 

[Volkodav]

It was bad enough the RN being lumbered with the 3 Tiger class dinosaurs because of the cancellation of the Escort Cruiser programme in 1962. If they had been saddled with these Seaslug cruisers in the 1960s as well, funds would have been even more stretched.
Much more sensible would have been a rationalisation of the carrier fleet by converting Albion, Bulwark, Centaur and Hermes.into Essex style ASW/Commando ships retaining one catapult for Gannet AEW/COD and possibly Skyhawk A4 anti-snoopers but mainly Sea King/Wessex ASW.
Victorious should have been scrapped sooner and Eagle chosen as the swing carrier with Ark Royal in reserve for spares.
After 1966 a proper updated Hermes style carrier class of ASW carriers should have been ordered instead of the Invincibles.

I'm not talking about sensible, I'm talking about it would look cool and I want to eventually 3D print a model of one in this configuration.

In an ideal world the completion of the Tigers and Hermes, as well as the modernisation of Victorious would not have happened, the carriers Mount Batten wanted being ordered instead. Possibly the five ships could have been flogged off to a South American or Commonwealth nation during the mid 50s and then new carriers (and cruisers) ordered, interim upgrades on existing ships covering the gap to the mid to late 60s deliveries. Thinking Belfast and a couple of other cruisers with updated sensors, Seacat etc. while Albion and Bulwark are upgraded to the same standard as Centaur and a couple of Colossus class are retained as Commando Carriers.

 

[zen]

On a strictly technical sense the Centaurs could have been abandoned in '45. But they were seen as necessary for the future compared to the Colossus class that was in various stages of build and choking up build slips.

As I have pointed out, if they had an inkling of the time and cost of Illustrious rebuilds they would have abandoned this by '47 for new carriers.

 

[Volkodav]

On a strictly technical sense the Centaurs could have been abandoned in '45. But they were seen as necessary for the future compared to the Colossus class that was in various stages of build and choking up build slips.

As I have pointed out, if they had an inkling of the time and cost of Illustrious rebuilds they would have abandoned this by '47 for new carriers.

I been reading a fair bit of archival cabinet submissions on Australian carrier selection in the early 80s and have been surprised by the lack of technical content, or any real analysis, let alone any with actual technical merit. What was particularly surprising was reading the Assistant Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinets summary of the reports and his recommendations based on the material provided to him by defence, he basically made virtually no reference to the argument for the capability and highlighted the dissenting view of the Chief of Air Staff as if it was the majority view. I read the documents he was basing his recommendations on and it was nothing short of an completely unprofessional, agenda driven, cherry picked piece of biased fiction. What is really disappointing is this individual was a professional engineer who joined the Public Service after working in industry in his younger years, then again that may have been the issue, he did work on guided missiles, and maybe that is where his pro RAAF stance came from.

Sounds a little judgemental I know but less than two months after the recommendation was made that the Government not acquire HMS Invincible from the UK, because it was an unnecessary extravagance, because the Sea Harrier was nothing but a proof of concept interim design with no real operational capability, and the acquisition of an additional 10 P-3C instead would provide far greater capability and flexibility, Argentina invaded the Falklands. The rest is history, Invincible, proven, Sea Harrier, proven, long range MPA, useful but limited, long range strike supported by tankers, questionable at best. The best bit was the statement that the Sea Harrier would be outmatched by aircraft such as Skyhawks and F-5 Tigers, mmm.....

I think its safe to assume there were people in the know who could have told the government that the carrier modernisations were a waste of money, brains and treasure (WOMBAT), but they would never be listened to when there were so many layers of people with agendas and a lack of technical knowledge, between them and the decision makers. The scary thing is, I have seen enough strange things to be fairly sure similar still happens today.

 

[CNH]

The more interesting thing is: why does Australia want to have a Navy and what is its function?

 

[Archibald]

Maybe - maybe ? - because Australia is the world largest island ? A continent-size island ? (thank you, Captain Obvious !)

 

[Volkodav]

The more interesting thing is: why does Australia want to have a Navy and what is its function?

Well lets see, ummmm, its surrounded by oceans, pretty much totally reliant on maritime trade, responsible for 60000km of coast line and the third largest maritime exclusive economic zone in the world.

My post was an example of the disconnect between reality as seen by subject matter experts, and reality as seen by the public service / civil service, after factoring in personal biases. Political bias is one thing and expected, what I was surprised about was the filtering of information by a public servant, only presenting what he thought would get the response he desired. The question is why did the UK rebuild Vic and complete the Tigers and Hermes to modernised designs instead of building new carriers, the answer is because Churchill ignored Mountbatten, but why? Did Churchill have some helpful summaries and recommendations from senior Civil Servants that guided his decision, or did he do it all on his own?

 

[zen]

Or did Churchill have his own set of prejudices?

Or should we say Attly....?

 

[EwenS]

The more interesting thing is: why does Australia want to have a Navy and what is its function?

Well lets see, ummmm, its surrounded by oceans, pretty much totally reliant on maritime trade, responsible for 60000km of coast line and the third largest maritime exclusive economic zone in the world.

My post was an example of the disconnect between reality as seen by subject matter experts, and reality as seen by the public service / civil service, after factoring in personal biases. Political bias is one thing and expected, what I was surprised about was the filtering of information by a public servant, only presenting what he thought would get the response he desired. The question is why did the UK rebuild Vic and complete the Tigers and Hermes to modernised designs instead of building new carriers, the answer is because Churchill ignored Mountbatten, but why? Did Churchill have some helpful summaries and recommendations from senior Civil Servants that guided his decision, or did he do it all on his own?

Well maybe we will get a few answers to the Vic question later this week when Warship 2020 is published. There is to be an article by David Hobbs on the subject.

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[bobtdwarf]

On a strictly technical sense the Centaurs could have been abandoned in '45. But they were seen as necessary for the future compared to the Colossus class that was in various stages of build and choking up build slips.

As I have pointed out, if they had an inkling of the time and cost of Illustrious rebuilds they would have abandoned this by '47 for new carriers.

in fairness the cost of Victorious's rebuild is so high since they affectively did it twice, and then they layered in new stuff on top of it that complicated what could have been a really strait forward and fast job.

I mean.. if you leave her at a deck capable of operating 30k pound aircraft you don't have to go with taller beams.. you can replace the 7 footers with 6.5's as they did in the Audsacious builds and thin out the flight deck armor to get you to a 17.5 foot hangar height.. fit her out the rest of the way as Albion/Bulwark and BLAMMO you are done.

But NOoOoOo they have to go with a 45k pound deck and steam cats... and then only check to see if the boilers they knew in '47 were good until '67.. were strong enough to handle the load... after they have refitted the more complicated and costly deck and are about to refit the island...

 

[zen]

Whereas an all new CV, potentially starting concept from '47-'49, would aim to cope with Jet Bomber of 60,000lb and undergo revision of flight deck after angled deck trials in '53-'54.
Y300 plant would result anyway.
But unless drydock facilities expanded, constraints remain.

 

[Volkodav]

On a strictly technical sense the Centaurs could have been abandoned in '45. But they were seen as necessary for the future compared to the Colossus class that was in various stages of build and choking up build slips.

As I have pointed out, if they had an inkling of the time and cost of Illustrious rebuilds they would have abandoned this by '47 for new carriers.

in fairness the cost of Victorious's rebuild is so high since they affectively did it twice, and then they layered in new stuff on top of it that complicated what could have been a really strait forward and fast job.

I mean.. if you leave her at a deck capable of operating 30k pound aircraft you don't have to go with taller beams.. you can replace the 7 footers with 6.5's as they did in the Audsacious builds and thin out the flight deck armor to get you to a 17.5 foot hangar height.. fit her out the rest of the way as Albion/Bulwark and BLAMMO you are done.

But NOoOoOo they have to go with a 45k pound deck and steam cats... and then only check to see if the boilers they knew in '47 were good until '67.. were strong enough to handle the load... after they have refitted the more complicated and costly deck and are about to refit the island...

It will be an interesting read, whether it details the reasons for the scheduling mistakes during reconstruction or not. I don't know about contracts back then, but a common cause of schedule and cost blow out is targeting key milestones that it would have been better delaying, and descoping work critical in penny pinching exercises.

Those responsible for meeting the milestones, push to achieve them no matter what, even if it means complete work has to be redone later to complete work that was left out so the milestone was achieved. Then there is the customer deleting scoped work to save money, even if that scoped work is necessary to prevent a major engineering casualty that it is known will happen without the work. Both cases usually involve decision makers who either do not understand the consequences, or occasionally, opportunistic, even malicious individuals who know full well what is likely to happen but also know they will be in the clear when it does go wrong. These are a sign of systematic issues rather than individual poor performance when the system is more likely to reward bad behaviour and sanction doing the right or professional thing.

Way too young to have been on the Vic rebuild but cases I have seen include a situation where the customer deleted a system that would safeguard the main generator on a platform from a known event that always caused severe damage, several months after the platform returned to service it suffered a main generator failure due to that event occurring. The customers response, an expensive enquiry (scoped to look only at the contractor)

 

[bobtdwarf]

I am always intrigued by the US ASW Essex ships with their mixture of S2 and Seaking ASW and anti-snooper Skyhawks. A developed short take off ASW plane rather than the S3 might have allowed these and Karel Doorman and Bonaventure to be replaced by an updated new build Essex size ship. The UK could easily have designed and built such a ship to replace Hermes and Bulwark in the ASW role more effectively than the Invincibles. Italy and even France might have joined such a NATO small carrier programme with Arromanches 2 and Trieste/Italia

I had a thought on another board that might be interesting..

A rebuild of Franklin and Bunker Hill the freshest of the old batch.. using as air group the aircraft of the former Dutch, Canadian and British carriers. All of those flew from land bases and all those countries had support crew.. just as easy to take them to sea and not lose that skill set and have the US pay for the carrier and the crew that operates it

 

[Archibald]

13 years ago when I started posting on Internet forums I was all excited by the prospects of 22 Essex carriers - imagine, such a large fleet, plus all the older and smaller carriers sold before to many countries (Dixmude, Lafayette).

Nowadays I think the real missed opportunity was (were ?) Bunker Hill and Franklin. Shame they were never rebuild to a balanced, state of the art 1962 standard - and sold in pair, to either Australia or GB.

Incidentally this trigger another question. had these two been rebuild this way - could older Essex have followed ? I'm thinking of the last group that hanged on after 1970, decommissioning in 1974-75-76 and... 1992 for Lexington.

Would it be possible to create a "SBC update" to rebuild Franklin and Bunker Hill and to be applied to the "fresher" in-service Essex ?
(Hancock, Oriskany, Lexington, Intrepid, can't remember the others)

 

[bobtdwarf]

13 years ago when I started posting on Internet forums I was all excited by the prospects of 22 Essex carriers - imagine, such a large fleet, plus all the older and smaller carriers sold before to many countries (Dixmude, Lafayette).

Nowadays I think the real missed opportunity was (were ?) Bunker Hill and Franklin. Shame they were never rebuild to a balanced, state of the art 1962 standard - and sold in pair, to either Australia or GB.

Incidentally this trigger another question. had these two been rebuild this way - could older Essex have followed ? I'm thinking of the last group that hanged on after 1970, decommissioning in 1974-75-76 and... 1992 for Lexington.

Would it be possible to create a "SBC update" to rebuild Franklin and Bunker Hill and to be applied to the "fresher" in-service Essex ?
(Hancock, Oriskany, Lexington, Intrepid, can't remember the others)

The general idea I had would be a more extensive rebuild along the lines of their sisters in form.. to the best of my knowledge no advanced metallurgy was used in the SCB125 conversions, just normal construction steel and STS.

Going from some reading on CVA-01, from links on this site.. at one point they were looking at a way to make her cheaper and it involved changing the steel parts of her were being constructed with, shaved some cash out of the price but it increased displacement by about 5000 tons. Applying that same principal I think it might be possible to shave 3000 tons from Franklin and Bunker Hill restoring a couple feet of freeboard. It would also be wise to replace the existing WW2 era boilers with a doubled up DLG style plant so you can use the old boilers for spare parts of sisters and have a ready spare supply of new parts going forward... it doesn't hurt that the DLG plants took fewer men to operate and over time were progressively automated more and more. Maybe even look into installing active stabilizers, though that should reduce fuel by 500 tons...

Point being you now a modernized pair that should be operable as a North Atlantic NATO carrier and as a replacement for Lexington in the training role probably into the early 2000s or beyond. You could do a similar rebuild to Oriskany or any of the others as you wish.. and want to spend money on.

Been doing some rereading of the Australian Essex proposal.. there is some serious gold data in that, at least to me. USN qualified F-4 for the Essex, they absolutely confirm that you can without major issues operate them from an Essex, though it would be better if you used something like a J model if you want to bomb her up.. or you could install a C-7 cat which might be possible. They also qualified A-6 for them. Sure you could not operate them at a high op tempo for very long but you could and with modern aircraft in smallish numbers.. say 48-60 AC depending.

 

[zen]

RN isn't buying refurbished Essexs. The cost of rebuilding to RN standards isn't worth it and scrapping everything to become a mirror mini-USN isn't on the cards.

The answers to the RN were either go for new, or abandon the CV Fleet once the hulls were time expired.
The latter was the decision.

The only way otherwise is to find a compromise.
And it's partly the compromise on top of compromise on top of compromise that meant relief all around on cancellation of CVA-01.
And that in turn is down to the aircraft it was to operate.
And that is down to the F4 on the one hand and the next generation expected on the other.

So change expectations, change the AW.406 winner and ideally have the carrier(s) built by 1965.

 

[uk 75]

The problem for the RN is that the aircraft carrier is not seen as a NATO asset until it is too late.
The RN justify its big carriers as assets to reinforce commitments East of Suez: Kuwait, Confrontation with Indonesia, Aden. After 1966 and economic collapse at home, this justification ends.
To preserve CVA01 the RN made its ASW carriers into cruisers. The old 50s idea of Gannets and Seamews protecting trade routes against Sov subs had become the Seaking via Belvederes, Chinooks and Wessex.
Political dogma and penny pinching prevented the UK ditching Ark and turning Bulwark, Albion, Centaur and Hermes into viable Sea Control/Commando carriers and ordering new build analogues.
The harsh truth then as now was that only the US could afford Forrestal size attack carriers. But equally the UK did not need them, it needed ASW and Commando carriers.
It eventually by 1982 gets two and then three such vessels.
The F35B has allowed their replacements some of the capacity of an attack carrier. But a nuclear Nimitz/Ford carrier is only within the budget (barely) of the US. I doubt whether China will be able to build one post Covid.
So, the RN is pretty much boxed in.
Of course in the UK 75 "fantasy" world the UK economy did not tank and Macmillan and then Home presided over a prosperous 1960s and 70s where we got all the goodstuff. But (before my usual Trolls weigh in) that is purely "fantasy".

 

[Archibald]

rereading of the Australian Essex proposal

Do you have any document to share about this one ?

 

[Archibald]

The problem for the RN is that the aircraft carrier is not seen as a NATO asset until it is too late.
The RN justify its big carriers as assets to reinforce commitments East of Suez: Kuwait, Confrontation with Indonesia, Aden. After 1966 and economic collapse at home, this justification ends.

Interesting, even more when compared to France.

- Carriers were heavily used in Indochina (including old cranky Béarn at the very beginning, in 1946-47 - later Lafayette, Bois Belleau, Dixmude and even Arromanches). Algeria by contrast absolutely don't need them for obvious reasons. So they were free for Suez.

- Situation in the DOM-TOM scattered across the globe (Caribbean + French Guyana + luvly La Réunion) never got serious enough to justify sending carriers. Caribbean is safe - Uncle Sam big stick backyard. La Réunion is remote even from poor Madagascar. Only French Guyana is vaguely sensitive, in the case Brazil goes completely bonkers - there were vague threats in 1961 by a nutjob that was promptly sacked. Plus Kourou of course.

- NATO, then. For all the hatred De Gaulle got after 1966, in case of WWIII, Tom clancy got it perfectly right in RSR - Foch and Clemenceau would join US CBG, trading AEGIS and Tomcat umbrella for adding their attack squadrons to USN. That was clear all the way from 1967 to 1992.

- ASW was for Jeanne d'Arc and frigates, plus Arromanches until 1974. Same for commandoes.

 

[Dilandu]

Nowadays I think the real missed opportunity was (were ?) Bunker Hill and Franklin. Shame they were never rebuild to a balanced, state of the art 1962 standard - and sold in pair, to either Australia or GB.

Yep, the irony was, that since they were so "fresh" after repair, they were considered "too valuable" to just refit, and USN wanted to gave them "the best refit possible", to make most use out of their service life. Essentially, they managed to became obsolete without actually being refitted...

 

[uk 75]

Archibald
France's "real" relationship with NATO from 1966 to the 90s deserves a book or thread of its own. In General Hackett's two World War Three books he includes French forces and a moving account of a NATO convoy being unloaded at a French Port.
A joint UK/French carrier programme in the 70s could have produced at least two possibly three carriers for each country.

 

[Archibald]

France merely walked away from a NATO command to get control over its nukes. The rest of NATO we stayed on. Plus in 2009 silly Sarkozy restablished what de Gaulle had canned in 66.

 

[zen]

There are two obvious CV programs that could be joint between the UK and the French Republic.
Yes a Meduim Fleet CV is one, and this ought to have proceeded from 50's. Frankly if the UK had pursued this from the early 50's then France would likely have copied the design as it would have opted in on components purchases such as catapults and arrestor gear.

The second is the ASW-CV that could have been a mini-CVN.
Of the two the second could have been built in larger numbers. Possibly around a joint reactor program.
This could have been the basis for a Euro-CVN Fleet.....

 

[Archibald]

Just wondering - the Internet is full of the *1952 carrier* and the far smaller *1954 medium fleet* - bad luck, the closest from the French designs is the *1956* evolution. Is there some kind of name for this one, or is it considered a mere extension of the 1954 "medium fleet carrier" ?

"1956 medium fleet carrier", way to go indeed. I said it before in different threads, but there was a "sweept spot" at 42 000 tons for, altogether - a better Foch, a better Clemenceau, a smaller and least expensive Verdun, plus a trio of British ones, total six carriers.
All this plus the BS-5A catapults, Sea Venom / Aquilons, Colossus / Arromanches, plus a different outcome to the Suez crisis, just scream "joint carriers".

I recently learned that the "Verdun" (just like the "Medium Fleet Carrier", the irony...) also come in two different sizes and two different years.
Basically 1958 PA58 Verdun was 45000 tons, was rejected as too expensive.

The Navy tried again closer from Clem' at 35000 tons the next year (PA59 thus) and this time it was screwed by La Force de Frappe.

What is really interesting is that the Navy (clever boys !) tried to make that third carrier part of the Force de Frappe with a scaled-down naval Mirage IV (the IV-M - here's to you, A-5 Vigilante ) - and failed miserably.

Now with Buccaneers on larger carriers, things might be different. Even more since Etendard IV finally got nukes, except in a tactical role rather than strategic.

Buccaneers even subsonic would do far better - although a lot of teeths would cringe, considering how close it was from the SO-4050 Vautour... rejected in favor of the Mirage IV (those things happens outside the TSR-2 world, too).

 

[Archibald]

I know my idea of a second Béarn has been shot down in flammes (fair enough) just saying for the fun of it, there might be a parellel universe somewhere where
- Béarn and Languedoc fled with Jean Bart to the Clyde estuary in June 1940
- the two old Normandie hulls were uprated by the British
- " l'appétit vient en mangeant" and so the Jean Bart was finished as a carrier, too
- later on, in the 50's, that past experience led to joint "Medium Fleet Carrier" / "PA 54 / 55 / 58 / 59"

While not very realistic, that TL would be fun to write, if only because the first three French carriers - Béarn, Languedoc and Jean Bart - would all be unfinished Superdreadnought hulls - two 1921 Normandie(s)-class and one 1939 Richelieu-class. Plus all three uprated by the British during WWII.

 

[zen]

Just wondering - the Internet is full of the *1952 carrier* and the far smaller *1954 medium fleet* - bad luck, the closest from the French designs is the *1956* evolution. Is there some kind of name for this one, or is it considered a mere extension of the 1954 "medium fleet carrier" ?

"1956 medium fleet carrier", way to go indeed. I said it before in different threads, but there was a "sweept spot" at 42 000 tons for, altogether - a better Foch, a better Clemenceau, a smaller and least expensive Verdun, plus a trio of British ones, total six carriers.
All this plus the BS-5A catapults, Sea Venom / Aquilons, Colossus / Arromanches, plus a different outcome to the Suez crisis, just scream "joint carriers".

I recently learned that the "Verdun" (just like the "Medium Fleet Carrier", the irony...) also come in two different sizes and two different years.
Basically 1958 PA58 Verdun was 45000 tons, was rejected as too expensive.

The Navy tried again closer from Clem' at 35000 tons the next year (PA59 thus) and this time it was screwed by La Force de Frappe.

What is really interesting is that the Navy (clever boys !) tried to make that third carrier part of the Force de Frappe with a scaled-down naval Mirage IV (the IV-M - here's to you, A-5 Vigilante ) - and failed miserably.

Now with Buccaneers on larger carriers, things might be different. Even more since Etendard IV finally got nukes, except in a tactical role rather than strategic.

Buccaneers even subsonic would do far better - although a lot of teeths would cringe, considering how close it was from the SO-4050 Vautour... rejected in favor of the Mirage IV (those things happens outside the TSR-2 world, too).

So this could be a scenario.
But Buccaneers?
Then again using ATAR is not that big a problem....
Or variants of the Scimitar as we've discussed before.
There was I think the Etendard V, which needed better engines........ a pair of Orpheus perhaps?
A earlier Bristol Transmanche alliance could produce interesting results.

 

[bobtdwarf]

rereading of the Australian Essex proposal

Do you have any document to share about this one ?

View Digital Image

recordsearch.naa.gov.au

there is soooooo much gold in this

 

[Archibald]

Just wondering - the Internet is full of the *1952 carrier* and the far smaller *1954 medium fleet* - bad luck, the closest from the French designs is the *1956* evolution. Is there some kind of name for this one, or is it considered a mere extension of the 1954 "medium fleet carrier" ?

"1956 medium fleet carrier", way to go indeed. I said it before in different threads, but there was a "sweept spot" at 42 000 tons for, altogether - a better Foch, a better Clemenceau, a smaller and least expensive Verdun, plus a trio of British ones, total six carriers.
All this plus the BS-5A catapults, Sea Venom / Aquilons, Colossus / Arromanches, plus a different outcome to the Suez crisis, just scream "joint carriers".

I recently learned that the "Verdun" (just like the "Medium Fleet Carrier", the irony...) also come in two different sizes and two different years.
Basically 1958 PA58 Verdun was 45000 tons, was rejected as too expensive.

The Navy tried again closer from Clem' at 35000 tons the next year (PA59 thus) and this time it was screwed by La Force de Frappe.

What is really interesting is that the Navy (clever boys !) tried to make that third carrier part of the Force de Frappe with a scaled-down naval Mirage IV (the IV-M - here's to you, A-5 Vigilante ) - and failed miserably.

Now with Buccaneers on larger carriers, things might be different. Even more since Etendard IV finally got nukes, except in a tactical role rather than strategic.

Buccaneers even subsonic would do far better - although a lot of teeths would cringe, considering how close it was from the SO-4050 Vautour... rejected in favor of the Mirage IV (those things happens outside the TSR-2 world, too).

So this could be a scenario.
But Buccaneers?
Then again using ATAR is not that big a problem....
Or variants of the Scimitar as we've discussed before.
There was I think the Etendard V, which needed better engines........ a pair of Orpheus perhaps?
A earlier Bristol Transmanche alliance could produce interesting results.

Best way to make it happen: think Bucc S.2 with the Spey.

Let me explain...

The Mirage IV was not always a "twin engine Mirage III" (that is, a French Phantom, the III being the F-104). At the very beginning it was rather like a F-105 - only one big and very powerful engine.
Basically the Mirage IV
- started as a French F-105 (one big engine)
- then morphed into a French Phantom (Mirage IV-C / IV-M)
- then into an A-5 Vigilante (Mirage IV-A as build, except not a naval aircraft)
- And finally, the Mirage IV-B tried to grow into a French B-58 Hustler. that is, a 60 tons medium-range bomber.

What happened was that SNECMA proved unable to build something more powerful than plain old Atar 9. "Super Atar, Vulcain" all went by the window.

At some point the jury split between
- a Vigilante-size 30 mt bomber, too small, but with Atar 9
- a B-58 size 60 mt larger bomber... with foreign engines.

Among the engines considered were
- The Olympus (1959, concorde was 4 years in the future)
- The Iroquois (the Arrow engine)
- the J75 (F-105, F-106) by Pratt&Whitney
And...
- the RB.141 Medway - which bring us to its son - the SPEY

OTL, SNECMA sold their souls and 15% of their shares to Pratt and while we never needed the J75 (since the IV-B was canned) later in 1963 they took a licence on the JTF10 / TF30, the crappy F-111 / Tomcat engine. And they managed to solve the compressor stall plague far better than the Americans: the TF-306 series.

Now, reel back all this to 1959, pick the Medway in place of the J75, and have SNECMA sell themselves to Rolls rather than Pratt.
doesn't change the Medway outcome very much since the Mirage IVB remain too big with foreign engines, not de Gaulle taste.
Still, that 1959 "Medway connection" is far more interesting than the OTL Pratt if only because
- it prepares Concorde Olympus deal by 4 years
- and obviously the Spey is far, far better than that TF30 piece of junk.
- Mirage IV* included, down the road after the TSR-2 die.

Now, if France gets common carriers with the British long before 1959, pushing the Clem's above 40 000 tons, there might be Buccaneers on french carriers, provided that at 42 000 tons they can handle them.

Another area of collaboration (very unexpected) might be Breguet... just like the Buccaneer, the Breguet 941 used BLC. Breguet will love them.

 

[Archibald]

Dang, licence-build Buccaneers S.2 by Breguet, with advanced BLC and SNECMA licence-build Speys... who needs Jaguar and Adour, really ?

 

[uk 75]

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/an-alternate-f-11-tiger.33038/page-3

Some overlap with this thread, so worth a look.