battleship conversion

tinlail · May 25, 2011, 01:09:18 PM

I haven't decide if it was because of lost over seas islands and a french admiral want to take them over with out to much allied help. Or if a US marine general was able to convince the navy to modify an oddball battleship for pacific landing.

This is the Richelieu with the aft six inch guns remove and the space dedicated launching landing craft.

Jschmus · May 25, 2011, 06:43:34 PM

There was a similar proposal in 1962 to convert an Iowa class battleship into a hybrid assault ship. It would have carried six 16" guns, plus 1800 Marines and 18 LCM-6, or six LCM-6 and six LCM-8, plus up to 32 CH-46 helicopters.

dragon · May 25, 2011, 07:30:24 PM

Maybe a forward looking French Admiral who is in charge of the French Navy's future doctrine, decides to read some Dumas before going to bed while trying to figure out what to do with the RICHELIEU. During the night he dreams of the "Three Musketeers" sagas and his unconscious recognizes that Cardinal Richelieu had his own guards- soldiers that answered only to Cardinal Richelieu....Boots on the ground. French Boots on the ground....At the same time, the French Admiral realizes he could even use Foreign Legion members, since at that time the French had their issues with La Legion Etrangere.

Captain Canada · May 25, 2011, 08:13:55 PM

Nice ! Now that would be awesome to see built.....

Cliffy B · May 25, 2011, 08:20:52 PM

If you need to source some 1/700 LCM-6 landing craft for you build, check with Loose Cannon models. They sell them 10 to a pack for a few dollars each. This would certainly be a cool build!

ChernayaAkula · May 26, 2011, 08:19:55 AM

Wow! What an awesome project!

ysi_maniac · May 26, 2011, 08:34:46 AM

I love hybrids!

Jschmus · May 26, 2011, 12:54:32 PM

Just out of curiosity, which kit are you using for this?

tinlail · May 26, 2011, 01:33:53 PM

[Cliffly B] thanks for the pointer to the landing craft, I was thinking that I was going to have to cast some from a LHA Tarawa model, I got. So I'll have to work on a idea for that other model.

My general notions on this design has been that going to shore underneath the firing of the main guns of the battleship that brought you would be about as good as a beach assault could be.

[Jschmus] Actually the model with be the trumpeter 1/700 Jean Bart. haven't decide on the ramification what sort of AA weapons it should have fitted.

Jschmus · May 26, 2011, 02:22:05 PM

During the war, Richelieu was refitted with 40mm and 20mm AA, so neither will look out of place on your model.

Cliffy B · May 26, 2011, 04:28:13 PM

I can't recall specifics, but if accuracy is something you want, the Trumpy Richelieu kits have some bugs. Check over on the modelwarships.com forum and the review section for specifics if you're interested. I know you're whiffing the kit but its still something to consider. I remember when it came out the guys were finding flaws all over the place. Again that's only if its a concern. Just thought I'd give you a heads up.

Thorvic · June 03, 2011, 05:16:49 AM

If your using the Jean Bart kit then the existing AA guns in the kit should suffice as they were new in 1955 when it commisioned, lathough you will probably want to reduce the number around the super structure.

It might help once you start working on the build but you might want to look at adding a helo deck aft on the stern and possibly use the deck area between that and the funnel to put additional Landing craft and only use single level davits fwd where the hull is higher, that should also give you a better arc of fire for the AA guns on the superstructure.

Looking forward to seeing how this build develops

G

tinlail · June 04, 2011, 02:24:09 PM

My extensive marine engineering has come to a design of landing craft on the edge, barracks in the middle, with AA guns on the top (but I was thinking light weight Bofor). The exact layout of the landing craft will be decided when they arrive and I see how many can fit on the deck. I want this to be a design that was reasonable to have used in WWII so if I built this as a 1950 version of the ship it would be clear that the helo deck was yet another retrofit. But building a 1950's version would mean that I don't have to buy Bofor so that would be good.

The issues I see to face currently are,
Do I need extend the deck edge to launch the craft parallel to the ship?
If I am stacking landing craft how does the top one launch?
Did amphibious assault ship launch tanks and if so how do you put the tank in the LCM?

and most important, the Jean Bart bridge is ugly compared to the Richelieu, what can I do to fix it?

Cliffy B · June 04, 2011, 04:49:02 PM

As I understood it, the top LCM had to be lowered into the water and the troops had to scale the cargo nets. After all of those were away, the second wave could be lowered to the deck edge and the troops boarded from the main deck. But don't quote me on that. By the way, I THINK the landing craft that were used in those davits were LCVPs not LCMs due to size restrictions, I'm not sure though. I mentioned LCMs because that's what I say in the drawing, sorry $:-\$ I'm pretty sure caring LCM-6s in davits wasn't dreamed of until after WWII and even then I'm not aware of them ever actually being carried that way.

Upon further inspection of photographs of WWII era transports, they are LCVPs (Higgins Boats). The LCMs were carried on the main deck of LSTs and were actually "rolled off" by ballasting one side of the ship heavily, causing a large list. The LCVPs were carried inside of them and launched first. If they were on transports they were usually carried as deck cargo and craned over the side. I think LSDs carried them as well in their well decks. Argh....sorry for making you buy the wrong landing craft man

As to the first question, from looking at all of the photos and drawings i have of transports, they were all mounted flush with the deck edge.

Tanks usually were launched from LSTs but I would tend to think that only LSD would be able to launch tank laden LCMs due to their well decks. I'm not sure though.

As for the bridge, doesn't the Jean Bart kit depict her postwar? She was incomplete during the war and was modified when they did finish her. That's probably the reason for the differing bridge layouts. I'd say scratch build new one or try to get a hold of some Richelieu parts.

I apologize once more

tinlail · June 04, 2011, 08:08:04 PM

I haven't actually bought the landing craft yet, so don't hit your head. But the difference between a LCM-6 and a LCM-3 is only 6 feet, so maybe it is LCM-3 slightly out of scale. Here is a picture of the USS Electra (AKA-4) launching a LCM during it's Korean war activation.

I see no signs that the ships cranes were changed in the reactivation, but they might of been.

I think the notion of buying both classes of landing craft have some merit if you can stack a LVCP inside a LCM, that would be your you really want to put a lot of troops ashore during war time configuration.