ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Historical what if discussions, hypothetical operations, battleship vs. battleship engagements, design your own warship, etc.
jonsidneyb
Member
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon Oct 13, 2008 6:28 am

ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by jonsidneyb »

At its time of construction the ETS Loudenboomer was the baddest ship in one on one surface engagements.

This class was the pride of the fleet. It sported 12 15.89 inch guns on three triple turrets for the main armament with 24 5.2 inch dual purpose secondaries arranged in twin turrets with an impressive array of lighter AA armament. This ship is 50,000 tons and can make 33 knots with a clean bottom.

The Loudenboomer Class required special drydocks to be produced just for them and many other costs went into these ships in order to build, service, and maintain them as they were the largest ships of the ETS republic and the pride of the fleet.

The EMS SmallWimp Class does not compare well one on one to the Loudenboomer Class for good reason. These ships while sporting electronic gear that is easily the equal of the Loudenboomers the weapons come up short.

The EMS class is 25,000 tons, sports 6 15.82 inch guns in two triple turrets. While it sounds like an enlarged German pocket battleship the thinking behind it was way different. The EMS had 12 5.1 inch dual secondaries arranged like a USN Cleveland Class cruiser and had a two classes of smaller AA weapons on board. The armor protection of the ship was a little bit shy of the Loudenboomers but not enough to speak of.

The SmallWimp Class while equally advanced in fire control and other areas was built for economy of construction sacrificing only fire power to other ships. This was done not by making them easier to build but by making the class large with only enhancements to the design being made as they are thought of without a major redesign. The other savings is that no special dry docks or harbor facilities are needed for these ships. The fact that the SmallWimp does not have superfiring main batteries makes these ships lighter not due to just fewer turrets but the high turret is gone. The ship is less top heavy. The ship having less area to protect makes it easier to provide good armored protection. The savings from special facilities not being built go into more quantity being built and for some refinements in the design to bring older models up to date when practical to do so.

The question comes up "Can an EMS SmallWimp defeat and ETS Loudenboomer???" No the SmallWimp just does not have the firepower. The debate rages on other factors. Sea Keeping..... Speed.... Protection.... Firecontrol.... the SmallWimp does not look so bad until you get to the guns. The 15.89 inch guns of the Loudenboomer and the 15.82 inch guns of the SmallWimp are compared but the difference is determined to be so slight to not matter... But then the turret/gun count comes into play. Oh my how can 6 guns in twin triples compare to 12 guns in 4 triples. Advantage the ETS Loudenboomer.

But wait..... Does having the biggest baddest ship rule the day. One on one is not everything. The Loudenboomer might less cost in materials than two of the SmallWimps but the added resources of the special docks and harbor facilities makes the SmallWimps an equal drain on war resources. By making lots of SmallWimps there are twice as many of them as Loudenboomers.

Two SmallWimps can seperate from each other fire is needed in different places but the Loudenboomer cannot. The SmallWimps can come together to fight other nations BB's if needed. The SmallWimps can run with the carriers to provide them protection at night and bad weather from surface units when air operations are not possible or practical.

I made this all up just to ask a question..... Do you need the biggest and baddest or a ship that can win one on one to have an effective navy?
jazsa80
Member
Posts: 59
Joined: Sat Aug 30, 2008 8:51 pm

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by jazsa80 »

Interesting question.

Is 2 Hippers worth 1 Bismarck. I think? I dont even know where to start with this. I think in Germany's case maybe 2 25000 ship with 6-15" would be worth more than 1 Bismarck even if it was virtually un-armoured. This only because Germany had more of a 'fleet in being' thing going on.

Would operation Rheinburg have fared better with 2 25000 6-15"gun ships? Soooo many variables.

Yuk.
jonsidneyb
Member
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon Oct 13, 2008 6:28 am

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by jonsidneyb »

I can't count. It would take 4 triple turrets to make it a 12 main gun ship :D
User avatar
RF
Senior Member
Posts: 7760
Joined: Wed Sep 20, 2006 1:15 pm
Location: Wolverhampton, ENGLAND

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by RF »

jazsa80 wrote:Interesting question.

Would operation Rheinburg have fared better with 2 25000 6-15"gun ships? Soooo many variables.
Not least in having to hit two separate ships on the rudders at the same time.

To be honest we did have a demonsration of something approaching this proposition. It was called Operation Berlin, and I don't think this sort of operation would be much different.
''Give me a Ping and one Ping only'' - Sean Connery.
User avatar
RF
Senior Member
Posts: 7760
Joined: Wed Sep 20, 2006 1:15 pm
Location: Wolverhampton, ENGLAND

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by RF »

jonsidneyb wrote:I can't count. It would take 4 triple turrets to make it a 12 main gun ship :D

Loudenboomer - woulldn't H-44 be better?
''Give me a Ping and one Ping only'' - Sean Connery.
jonsidneyb
Member
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon Oct 13, 2008 6:28 am

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by jonsidneyb »

I came up with fake names and non-existant ships to avoid nationalism.

What I was trying to get at was all of these one on one comparisons. I am sure that sometimes building a better ship is the right answer for a navy but I wonder if it is not always the best thing to do.

Lets say you have ship ABC in inventory, it has good speed, good armor and good firepower. Next thing you know an possible future enemy builds something bigger and meaner. Is it always needed to build something bigger and more powerful to match it. Perhaps sometime the best solution is to respond with something smaller. Perhaps build something you have built before. While it might not be as powerful alone it can team up with what you already have.

Perhaps the road to a better navy is not always one upping the other... Maybe sometimes it is the right solution and and sometimes it isn't.
lwd
Senior Member
Posts: 3822
Joined: Sat Jun 17, 2006 2:15 am
Location: Southfield, USA

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by lwd »

That's why a British cruisers in general weren't as good as those of a lot of other countries in WWII. They needed a lot of them spread around the globe. In most cases a decent ship was good enough. The same with DDs US and Japanese DDs tended to be bigger and "better" in some senses. But given the physical and political constraints Britain built what was probably best for her.
jonsidneyb
Member
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon Oct 13, 2008 6:28 am

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by jonsidneyb »

I actually think the York Class Cruisers were excellent ships.

If you compare them one on one to other heavy cruisers of the period it might not look that way but I think that is the wrong way to look at it.

York Class Cruiser:

It's speed was what you would expect I think of a cruiser of that era at 32.5 knots.

It was actually better protected than the previous heavy cruiser though it was smaller and lighter.
The protection was good.

The main weapons were 8 inch guns but there was only 6 of them compared to 8 of the ship before it.
In an age where other heavy cruisers had 8-10 guns it may seem that this is a disadvantage. I am thinking it wasn't a disadvantage in some ways.

It was 50 feet shorter and 9 feet narrower. It was better protected than the Colony Class Cruiser. Only two were built of this class and the cost didn't come down as low as was the hope, they were £250,000 cheaper. If these were produced in larger numbers the costs per unit would have gone down more. The previous class had several subclasses that spread some of the costs.

Building a larger cruiser means less of something else you can build. Even if it does not equal a larger cruiser does not mean it would be the wrong thing to build. I would guess that three of these would be equal to two nine gun heavy cruisers all else being equal that three of these would be more effective than 2 colony class cruisers.

You don't have to fight one on one. I think as long as you have the other qualities good enough you don't need to be the biggest because you don't have to fight one on one. One thing 2 larger heavy cruisers cannot do that 3 smaller cruiser can. That is be in three different places at one time if needed.

Since these ships are not lacking in armor protection compared to some other heavy cruisers. You would have to sink them at a 1/3 greater rate if these were built in mass. That might be harder as it might take just as much gunfire and as many torps to put one under as a contemporary ship. It it takes the same to put this smaller cruiser down I start to think three of them is better than 2 of the larger ship.
User avatar
RF
Senior Member
Posts: 7760
Joined: Wed Sep 20, 2006 1:15 pm
Location: Wolverhampton, ENGLAND

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by RF »

lwd wrote:That's why a British cruisers in general weren't as good as those of a lot of other countries in WWII. They needed a lot of them spread around the globe. In most cases a decent ship was good enough. The same with DDs US and Japanese DDs tended to be bigger and "better" in some senses. But given the physical and political constraints Britain built what was probably best for her.
I don't find the first sentence here very convincing.

They did indeed need a lot of cruisers spread around the globe - Britain had worldwide commitments, whereas the enemy countries had only local commitments - Germany in the Baltic/North Sea, Italy in the Med, Japan in the western Pacific.

Most of the British cruisers, especially the heavy cruisers (the London and County class) were of 1920's design and construction, whereas the Axis cruisers were products of the 1930's.

As you say what the British had were the best for that situation and I don't see that they failed in their tasks. What we didn't get in WW2 was a straight one on one heavy cruiser action between a County class and Axis heavy cruiser, I believe the closest was the action in which Berwick briefly engaged Hipper. I did propose in this section quite some time ago a prospective hypothetical all-out action between Devonshire and Prinz Eugen; the consensus seemed to be one of uncertainty as to which ship would emerge the winner.
''Give me a Ping and one Ping only'' - Sean Connery.
User avatar
RF
Senior Member
Posts: 7760
Joined: Wed Sep 20, 2006 1:15 pm
Location: Wolverhampton, ENGLAND

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by RF »

With respect to the York class cruiser, one question: was the Exeter at the River Plate action a better ship to have than Cumberland?
''Give me a Ping and one Ping only'' - Sean Connery.
jonsidneyb
Member
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon Oct 13, 2008 6:28 am

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by jonsidneyb »

I understand that the York Class cruisers were better protected than the Cumberland Class. Perhaps that could make a difference. The Cumberland does have more fire power but my thinking is this. If the building of heavy cruisers were of the 6 gun variety using less material resources, allowing more facilities to be involved in the building of the smaller ship, and perfecting efficient building of these slightly smaller ships perhaps there would be a higher number of these slightly smaller heavy cruisers in the ocean. This could translate into finding Graff Spee faster and also increasing the possibility of there being 4 ships against the pocket battleship rather than 3. Another York Class cruiser I think would have made things much more difficult for the German ship to deal with.
lwd
Senior Member
Posts: 3822
Joined: Sat Jun 17, 2006 2:15 am
Location: Southfield, USA

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by lwd »

RF wrote: ...As you say what the British had were the best for that situation and I don't see that they failed in their tasks...
As a group I think they did very well.
What we didn't get in WW2 was a straight one on one heavy cruiser action between a County class and Axis heavy cruiser, ....
Well ther eis the obvious case of an axis CA vs a British CA and 2 CLs result tactical victroy for the Axis strategic for the British. Btitain could afford that.
User avatar
RF
Senior Member
Posts: 7760
Joined: Wed Sep 20, 2006 1:15 pm
Location: Wolverhampton, ENGLAND

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by RF »

River Plate, yes. But as I feel that the panzerschiffe were ''pocket battleships'' rather than the later German description of ''heavy cruiser'' I didn't think 11 inch calibre are cruiser guns as such - I would rather go on the Washington Treaty definition, where 8 inch was maximum calibre for cruisers, which the Japanese and the Germans (Panzerschiffe possibly excepted) adhered to.
''Give me a Ping and one Ping only'' - Sean Connery.
lwd
Senior Member
Posts: 3822
Joined: Sat Jun 17, 2006 2:15 am
Location: Southfield, USA

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by lwd »

However the weren't the British working on some CA designs with 9.4" guns at the time of the naval agreement? Spee and her sisters had armor roughly corresponding to CA armor and while the guns packed a real punch there were only 6 of them. Indeed it's been argued that in a cruiser vs cruiser action the US large light cruisers may have had the better armament. Also consider that from what I've read of that engamement Spee was shooting very well and the British had some problems (spotter plane correcting based on fire from the wrong ship doesn't help at all). Indeed in a way this was the type of action that the British should have exepcted and while they took more damage than I'm sure they wanted to they won. The implication is the cruisers did what they were designed to do. Now if they had only had one superior CA there even if it inflicts the same damage on Spee it's going to have recieved enough that it has to head to port leaving Spee a possible escape. This may truly be a case of a couple of Soviet sayings proving true.
User avatar
RF
Senior Member
Posts: 7760
Joined: Wed Sep 20, 2006 1:15 pm
Location: Wolverhampton, ENGLAND

Re: ETS Loudenboomer VS EMS SmallWimp Class.

Post by RF »

Again there is no real test here, as US warships did not fight any surface actions with their German counterparts. I suspect you are right, but beyond that no hard evidence. The closest that ever came to happening (that I am aware of) was when hilfskreuzer Michel sighted USS Trenton in the South Pacific, in which nothing happened.

Now if Hitler had used an alternative proposition to the Channel Dash of 1942, by Ciliax going to the Atlantic coast of Morrocco or to Dakar, if Tirpitz had broken out to join them, then we might have had a real test.
''Give me a Ping and one Ping only'' - Sean Connery.
Post Reply