Ballistic missile cruisers

[Weaver]

Thought long and hard about a crane, but went with Thorvic's theory in the end. You could turn one of those Sacramentos into a keen tender. Alternately, a small passenger liner might do, if you could find/build the neccessary cranes for it. Sounds daft, but go look at some tenders.....

[Thorvic]

Well you can get the US Dixie class WW2 Destroyer Tender and the Vulcan Class Submarine Tender that served the USN well into the 80's so either could be modernised as Cruiser Tender.

http://home.earthlink.net/~loosecannonproductions/index-aux.html

http://home.earthlink.net/~loosecannonproductions/Kit10.html

G

[Weaver]

I suspect the Vulcan is a little small for a Polaris tender, though the shape and lines havn't changed much. Looking at the lines of tenders, it also occues to me that a kit of a cargo ship, WWII amphibious ship, or WWII escort carrier would do the job as well: they all have the right slab-sided, high-volume look.

The USN has destroyer/cruiser tenders which look very similar to the SSN and SSBN tenders, the only difference being that the latter have bays amidships for stowage of SLBMs and appropriate cranes to handle them. There are some excellent pictures on the the following site of the SSBN tender USS Simon Lake laid up in reserve at Norfolk, next to the USS McKee, an SSN tender. You can clearly see the adaptions needed for SLBM handling:

http://www.lastrosehomeport.com/navy_as33.html



(The photos on the site are MUCH bigger and highly detailed  )



Here's a pic of the Simon lake transferring a Trident to an SSBN:


From here: http://www.navsource.org/archives/09/36/3633.htm

I suspect that for cruiser work, the cranes would need more lift and longer reach, and possibly a "cranked" boom so that they could rotate the missile outboard while keeping it close to the rotation axis in order to avoid hitting the cruiser's superstructure (can't swing it right over a ship like you can with a sub).

[Jschmus]

I remember seeing those two ships sitting tied up.  I passed them every time I crossed the Jordan Bridge from Portsmouth to South Norfolk (Chesapeake, really).  Alas, the Jordan Bridge was condemned and scheduled for demolition in 2008, and the replacement span won't be ready until 2012.  Every time that bridge lifted was a nifty photo op, either because of the ships tied up alongside or whatever was sailing on the river that caused the bridge to lift in the first place.

[Thorvic]

Back to the Modelling aspect of this concept, Dragon under their Cyberhobby wing are due to relaease the USS Albany as a guided missile conversion of a WW2 USN cruiser, that could be modified with Polaris in place of the aft Talos battery or some of the features of Albanys conversion could be applied to a WW2 cruiser kit so as to create a hybrid conversion - Just an alternative to the use of the Cyberhobby USS Long Beach kit or the Matchbox Tiger.

Unfortunately there are not many post war Cruisers kits available in 1/700, most tend to be WW2 thats available and the more expensive resin kits just cover the WW2 cruisers, conversions of those and later guided missile cruisers of the US & Soviet navies.

Battleships are a possibility, they were considered for conversion in the Post War period before their disposal, The RN KGV class survived till about 1958, the French Jean bart wasn't completed till the mid 50's so could be an ideal candidate and the USN were looking to make use of not only the Iowa class but also the earlier North Carolina class too ! Trumpeter have just released the Roma, although she was sunk her sisterships were scrapped post war but as being fairly modern ships in their era it would be a nice Whiff to have them survive longer and form the basis for a ballastic missile conversion.

G

[royabulgaf]

"USN were looking to make use of not only the Iowa class but also the earlier North Carolina class too ! "

Really, this could be a good use of mid-50s thinking.  Although the NC class was slower than the Iowas, they were still heavily armored.  You really want to do it right?  Pull the turret structures and you have room for three launchers for the big liquid fueled missiles.  Plenty of room for fuel storage, and strong enough to survive a nuclear near-miss.  Remember, this was before the days of real-time satellite and SIGINT.  Send the NCs into the Pacific under radio silence on a cruise to nowhere, carrying three real ICBMs, and you have another nuclear deterrent.

[Thorvic]

Had a look at the Iowa class conversions booklet and it does cover the proposals for a hybrid Iowa with fwd guns and bridge retained with the midships and stern modernised with MACKS, Polaris, Talos and Terrier systems. Together with a full conversion with the new bridge and fwd turrets replaced by Talos as per a very large version of the Albany conversions. Both of these have 16 Polaris silos mounted in the revised superstructure aft of the rear funnel MACK.

G

[PR19_Kit]

Really, this could be a good use of mid-50s thinking.  Although the NC class was slower than the Iowas, they were still heavily armored.  You really want to do it right?  Pull the turret structures and you have room for three launchers for the big liquid fueled missiles.  Plenty of room for fuel storage, and strong enough to survive a nuclear near-miss.  Remember, this was before the days of real-time satellite and SIGINT.  Send the NCs into the Pacific under radio silence on a cruise to nowhere, carrying three real ICBMs, and you have another nuclear deterrent.

This idea would rely on the ship knowing EXACTLY where it was at all times as the targetting parameters would be changing as it sailed around the oceans. Had inertial navigation systems been developed enough by then for that to work? GPS hadn't been invented of course.

[Hobbes]

There's always celestial navigation; that gets you within 800 m of the correct position. With nuclear weapons, that's usually close enough.

[rickshaw]

Really, this could be a good use of mid-50s thinking.  Although the NC class was slower than the Iowas, they were still heavily armored.  You really want to do it right?  Pull the turret structures and you have room for three launchers for the big liquid fueled missiles.  Plenty of room for fuel storage, and strong enough to survive a nuclear near-miss.  Remember, this was before the days of real-time satellite and SIGINT.  Send the NCs into the Pacific under radio silence on a cruise to nowhere, carrying three real ICBMs, and you have another nuclear deterrent.

This idea would rely on the ship knowing EXACTLY where it was at all times as the targetting parameters would be changing as it sailed around the oceans. Had inertial navigation systems been developed enough by then for that to work? GPS hadn't been invented of course.

Inertial Nav still isn't good enough today.  Its why GPS was invented of course and why its predecessers LORAN-C, OMEGA and Decca were as well (the fUSSR developed their own CHAYKA system which was similar).   All allowed radio silence for the receiver but of course the transmitters must blast out their signals and why they were always considered amongst the first targets in pre-emptive strike scenarios.

I can still remember the political ructions downunder when the USA wanted to build an OMEGA system in Australia for use by its SLBM carrying submarines in the early 1970s.  It was the last OMEGA station built as a consequence.  It was at Woodside, in Victoria and was used until 2004.  It had a 434 metre high tower(!)  

[rickshaw]

There's always celestial navigation; that gets you within 800 m of the correct position. With nuclear weapons, that's usually close enough.

Not when you're attempting a counter-force strike.  Its OK for city busting, as Nagasaki showed but if you want to destroy a missile in its silo, you need better than 100 m accuracy (or REALLY BIG BOMBS!).

[RLBH]

Not when you're attempting a counter-force strike.  Its OK for city busting, as Nagasaki showed but if you want to destroy a missile in its silo, you need better than 100 m accuracy (or REALLY BIG BOMBS!).

In the 1950s, and into the early 60s, half-mile accuracy with a four megaton device would be par for the course for attacking hard targets. For a deterrent ship with three big liquid-fuelled missiles, it's likely that non-time-critical targets would be allocated anyway, and most of those aren't particularly hardened.