modern naval design princples

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sineatimorar
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modern naval design princples

Post by sineatimorar »

I have completed many years of studying the defunct battleship design principles and during this time I have been distracted from time to time by the question of what principle is used in modern naval ships? Usually because it was clear that in the advent of a shooting war there would be significant loses of smaller combatants due to overall lack of suriving a single hit due to size and lack of significant armour I lost interest and went back to my original interest. It was not until I got the chance to visit some of Australia's Anzac class frigates and found to my relative surprise that in fact some added protection was used in places.

Now I did have a chance to talk to people involved in some research into 'blow out sections or panels' in a limited dicussion with usually infered conclusion due to the lack of in-depth technical knowledge been discussed (security I suppose).

Now I left thoses dicussion thinking along the lines similar to the blow out panels on the M1 abrhams in my mind.
Except that in viewing countless sink-exs that I may have got the 'size' abit out of kilter as it were.

Could have 'sections' ment complete 'hull sections' ? As destroyed section of hull seems to have cleanly been sheered of to 'direct' as much explosive force straight up thru the destoryed section of hull, thus maintaining enough buoyancy of the more intact sections to give surviving crew a chance to safely escape.

The question for discussion is " Am I reading more into this than any actual design principles been employed or not"?
fredleander
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Re: modern naval design princples

Post by fredleander »

sineatimorar wrote:Could have 'sections' ment complete 'hull sections' ? As destroyed section of hull seems to have cleanly been sheered of to 'direct' as much explosive force straight up thru the destoryed section of hull, thus maintaining enough buoyancy of the more intact sections to give surviving crew a chance to safely escape.

The question for discussion is " Am I reading more into this than any actual design principles been employed or not"?
You are onto something here. There are dozens of examples from WW2 where whole sections were blown off ships and they still were able to get safely back either under their own power, going backward or forward, or being towed. Most naval vessels were (are) purpose-built to some degree. The small RN Hunt destroyers seem to have been particularly well constructed in this respect considering their size. The German Type 35 minesweepers were constructed with 12 water-tight sections.

Fred
www.fredleander.com - River wide, Ocean Deep - a book on Operation Sea Lion
sineatimorar
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Re: modern naval design princples

Post by sineatimorar »

Yes you are right on that just because there is no armour does not mean there is no sub division of the hull to control flooding, and the natural need for internal compartments for human habitatation.

In someways modern designs could be considered the extreme expression of the all or nothing principal. By that in the realization that what armour installed on modern designs is there more to 'direct' the force of any explosion 'away' from sensitive areas of a ship, rather than to stop damage from occcuring. A land based analogy is the 'V' shaped hull of modern afv like the bushmaster.

By reinforcing the the transverse bulkheads to resist damage serves a two fold function of reinforcing the overall structure of the hull and stopping damage from entering other sections, thus limiting the damage to that section of the ship that is going to be destroyed anyway by the attacking weapon system.
fredleander
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Re: modern naval design princples

Post by fredleander »

sineatimorar wrote:Yes you are right on that just because there is no armour does not mean there is no sub division of the hull to control flooding, and the natural need for internal compartments for human habitatation.

In someways modern designs could be considered the extreme expression of the all or nothing principal. By that in the realization that what armour installed on modern designs is there more to 'direct' the force of any explosion 'away' from sensitive areas of a ship, rather than to stop damage from occcuring. A land based analogy is the 'V' shaped hull of modern afv like the bushmaster.

By reinforcing the the transverse bulkheads to resist damage serves a two fold function of reinforcing the overall structure of the hull and stopping damage from entering other sections, thus limiting the damage to that section of the ship that is going to be destroyed anyway by the attacking weapon system.
Not to forget stopping the water moving from one compartment to another.... :wink: ...

Fred
www.fredleander.com - River wide, Ocean Deep - a book on Operation Sea Lion
sineatimorar
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Re: modern naval design princples

Post by sineatimorar »

The USS Cole was what sparked my interest again ,added to that is the description of the hull design and how it differs from preceding classes. The damage report makes for very interesting reading, I have a downloaded copy of it and I will try and find the orginal web link if anyone is interested.

Not only do they seem to be incorporating the standard basic internal hull layout for basic damage control, they have specifically strengthened parts of that layout to limit damage. By using high-quality HY type steel usually reserved for submarine pressure hulls that are similar in metallurgy to humongous armour plate of the earlier periods they seem to be using it not only for it superior fatigue qualities, they are utilizing the extra resistance to penetrating damage that is part of this quality.

Similar quality steel was used in the later models of super carriers for it superior fatigue characteristics to reduce maintenance cycles on the hull structure.

A another interesting point is the slight construction differences between the earlier US built Australian FFG's and the later Aussy built units. The earlier units are built with thinner steel plate.

When I went to the Open day of the HMAS Adelaide some 15 odd years ago I noted with some interest that the hull had what I initially thought looked like a external armour plate extending for about half the overall length of the ship centred either side of the midship point.

After studying it for short period of time I came to the conclusion that it was additional hull bracing. I wish now I had had the time to bring a camera to record it. Not having any previous close up of other earlier FFG's of this class I made the assumption that it was standard on all hulls and forgot about it.

It was not until a couple of year ago when I had the chance to take my family to the open day of the HMAS Newcastle that I found that the Australian built units having been built of thicker steel did not require the bracing for I could not see the same external brace on her hull.

This is an assumption on my behalf as I find no mention of the older hull units requiring additional bracing recorded anywhere, except for some reason the Aussy built units were constructed of thicker steel. There has to be a reason for the accepting the extra weight penalty. l just not seen a record of the official reason for this change
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