CVE Class Aircraft Carriers

TsrJoe · May 09, 2007, 05:13:09 AM

im thinking Sea King and RN. Harrier??? any thoughts ...

RLBH · May 09, 2007, 05:21:05 AM

That baby? Sea Kings all the way, but I suppose it might sprout some Harriers if CVA-01 and P.1154 are axed - which in all likelihood they would be.

Mind you, some of the later versions were supposed to carry ASW Chinooks, IIRC...

TsrJoe · May 09, 2007, 05:40:39 AM

ASW Chinook...ooohh, now thatd look sweet in RN. colours...any references for that one???

i guess another type in similar role would be the French Sud Super Frelon or even the CH.53 Stallion both looked at to fulfil a joint services helicopter requirement??

cheers, Joe

RLBH · May 09, 2007, 07:53:03 AM

QuoteASW Chinook...ooohh, now thatd look sweet in RN. colours...any references for that one???

i guess another type in similar role would be the French Sud Super Frelon or even the CH.53 Stallion both looked at to fulfil a joint services helicopter requirement??

cheers, Joe

Just going on memory here, so I may be wrong, but I'm pretty sure it's mentioned in DK Brown's "Rebuilding the Royal Navy".

Mossie · May 09, 2007, 08:11:29 AM

Fairey Rotodyne.

Take your pick, COD, ASW, AEW, CSAR, troop bus.....

Joe C-P · May 09, 2007, 10:37:10 AM

COD already in progress.

JoeP

GTX · May 09, 2007, 12:57:53 PM

How large (or small) was this baby? I'm thinking it wouldn't have too large a capacity for aircraft and especially larger aircraft.

Regards,

Greg

RLBH · May 09, 2007, 02:22:05 PM

About 10,000 tons, if my memory serves me; air wing was seen as being six Sea Kings, though I imagine that is only aircraft in the hangar. Of course, I doubt a deck park is terribly bright on something that size.

Incidentally, it's not a carrier, it's a helicopter cruiser. If you look carefully, you can see that there's a Sea Slug launcher aft, and a twin 4.5" gun at the forward end of the superstructure. Not convinced of the value of the Sea Slug, myself - I'd rather have a bit more flight deck and maybe two more helicopters, but then Parliament might think it's an aircraft carrier.

EDIT:

And, by care of Shipbucket, we have a nice big picture:

http://i90.photobucket.com/albums/k279/shi...ies211961AU.gif

For interest, this is an earlier version:

http://i90.photobucket.com/albums/k279/shi...ries91960AU.gif

dy031101 · May 09, 2007, 04:07:15 PM

QuoteIncidentally, it's not a carrier, it's a helicopter cruiser. If you look carefully, you can see that there's a Sea Slug launcher aft, and a twin 4.5" gun at the forward end of the superstructure. Not convinced of the value of the Sea Slug, myself - I'd rather have a bit more flight deck and maybe two more helicopters, but then Parliament might think it's an aircraft carrier.

Weren't the Escort Cruisers to accompany CVA-01 class carriers (and therefore were to carry no fixed-wing aircraft) to begin with?

What kind of SAM can be carried in place of the Sea Slug?

Maybe, say, the escort cruisers were built and later to undergo upgrade and refit...... and more modern SAM were available by the time of the upgrade.

Joe C-P · May 10, 2007, 11:59:56 AM

QuoteIncidentally, it's not a carrier, it's a helicopter cruiser. If you look carefully, you can see that there's a Sea Slug launcher aft, and a twin 4.5" gun at the forward end of the superstructure. Not convinced of the value of the Sea Slug, myself - I'd rather have a bit more flight deck and maybe two more helicopters, but then Parliament might think it's an aircraft carrier.

Wow, Sea Slug?

That would have taken up considerable space that should have been part of the hangar. Sea Slug was loaded horizontally, so the after end under the flight deck would have been the magazine and missile assembly space.

Perhaps they would have quickly seen the error of this design, dumped the missiles and launcher, and extended the flight deck and hangar. Or maybe that was the intent all along - start building, can Sea Slug, and "discover" that they can extend the flight deck aft.

JoeP

RLBH · May 10, 2007, 12:52:36 PM

Sea Slug needn't actually have been in that monstrosity of a hangar; given the scale of the ruddy thing, I suspect any new installation would have had to be designed to the ship anyway; the 1957 guided-weapons cruiser was seen as having a missile hangar that was only two missiles long, but (IIRC) five deep and four across.

I like the "Oops, we seem to have a bit much hangar space" theory more. Or at least some persuasion of Sea Dart if we must have big SAMs. It should be smaller and more capable.

GeorgeC · May 10, 2007, 01:40:01 PM

The Sea Slug looks a bit strange today, but at the time it and the planned follow-on missiles were seen as a direct replacement for the SR177 deck-launched interceptor against high/fast aircraft. Hence the ship already has its 'fighter'. The theory persisted through the CVA01 to the Invincibles.

uk 75 · May 19, 2007, 05:25:13 AM

I went back to the source books on this one and must admit to being confused.

The version shown for 1961 was never finalised in the Seaslug form, the planned service version was a ship with Seadart (or CF299 as then known), and possibly Ikara, and certainly no gun. The ships were planned up until 1962 for production in the 60s. The costs of Polaris led to their postponement and interim replacement by the Tiger class conversions.

However, as the 1961 version looks so neat lets assume that it came into service in about the same time frame as the last County class and the first cruiser conversion (Blake). Up until 1970 these were equipped with the Wessex ASW helo (Humphrey of Falklands fame). They then received the Seaking. However, it had originally been planned to replace the Wessex either with a development of the Belvedere or a UK version of the CH 47 Chinook. Hope this is giving you some inspiration.

VSTOL aircraft in the initial phase would have been limited to the P1127 and early version RAF Harriers (1154s would be stretching things, though the RAF suggested this). The early tripartite Kestrels look quite smart and might make a useful adjunct.

Hope this helps

UK 75

Tornado · May 19, 2007, 07:29:35 AM

I wish I could find something more out about the ASW Chinook, I keep hearing references to it alot in various books but I've found no trace of any Vertol study or USN requirement for such a type. Who would build a British licence copy? Westland might but they mainly produced Sikorsky types and maybe Vertol might have put off by this.

roughneck06 · June 06, 2007, 07:42:41 AM

A few thoughts to Wif this escort cruiser-

5 are built per original plans for the RN and demonstrations show that Kestrels/Harriers can operate off them successfully, leading to the RN deploying small detachments of VSTOL along with Sea King Asw helos. Several nations take notice and place orders for Escort Cruisers from the UK in the mid to late 1960s-

Canada: 2
( frees up Bonaventure for refit to a strike carrier A-4 Skyhawks, later purchase purchases HMS Centaur for same purpose- A-7 Corsair capable. )
Once Centaur is on line- Bonnie becomes a Vstol/ Commando/Asw carrier

Australia: 2
New Zealand:1
Netherlands: 2 ( replaces Karel Doorman if sold to Argentina per OTL )

Additional possibilities-
Germany?
Italy?
Portugaul?

Perhaps some Latin American Navies might be interested in aquirring them as well.

All users purchase Harriers for their Escort Cruisers in addition to Sea Kings.

Refit/ upgrades to include:

Sea Dart or USN Sm-1,SM-2
Harpoon
CIWS

UK shipyards will be kept busy for 10 yrs for so filling these orders.

Brings alot of additional ASW, Sea Control capabilities on to the scence acroos the board.
Looking forward to feedback ! More thoughts later.