Modern IOWA battleship with helo hangar?

[seadude]

Been doing some thinking and researching the last few days on the following: Adding a small helo hangar to the IOWA class battleships, but without removing the aft 3rd 16" gun turret. Sound possible......or impossible? Probably. But I think it could be done. It may not look or work from a realistic "technical believeability" standpoint, but it's something I may want to try for another what if modern IOWA battleship project.
Most concepts I've heard or seen on website forums suggest removing the aft 3rd 16" gun turret to make room for a large hanger/flight deck for troop assault operations, large contingent of helos, etc.  That's not what I want to do. I want to keep all three 16" gun turrets, but add a small hangar for storage of at least 1-2 Seahawks plus 1-3 Fire Scout RPV's. I'm thinking of possibly modifying or scratchbuilding hangars from either a O.H. Perry frigate, Freedom LCS, or Independence LCS ships. The hangars don't necessary need to be large either. A Seahawk with it's tail rotor assembly when folded for hangar storage is about 41ft. long, so maybe make the hangar 50ft. long. A little extra room for crews to move around the helo for maintenance purposes. So if I scratchbuild a hangar, 50ft. long in 1/350 scale is approx. 1 3/4 inches long. As far as width going from port to starboard, I'm not sure yet.
I'm using this page for reference to plan my measurements and designs.
https://www.sinodefenceforum.com/us-flight-deck-hanger-comparisons.t6591/

Anybody else have any thoughts, ideas, concepts, designs, etc. for adding a helo hangar to iowa battleships? But remember, I want to keep the aft 16" gun turret.

[sandiego89]

It would quite easy to scratch one up with sheet styrene. 

I see two concerns with an hangar aft turret three: ruining the visual lines of the ship, and the blast effect from the aft turret on such a hangar, but as you stated you were not too concerned about "believability", it would work fine.

I might suggest a smaller hangar (or one on each side) farther forward along the rear superstructure, forward of turret three.  Still plenty of room up there, a bit of a tow from the aft landing pad, but may look better.     

-Dave   

[Gondor]

As the Iowa class of battle ship carried SH-60's during their last period of activation I am sure this is something that the US Navy have already looked into at some point in time so you may be able to find what the proposals were at the time.

However, as you plan to add a hanger regardless of what the US Navy decided your wanting reasons to go for what ever type of hanger you decide on.

I can see there being three options available, each with it pro's and con's

1) Fixed Hangar. Traditional helicopter hanger.
Pro's; Permanent structure that can be used not only for storage of helicopters, it can house the spares required to maintain the helicopters as well as being a nice potentially warm environment to work on the helicopters as required.
Con's; Reduces the arc of fire for the aft turret by creating a blind spot. Damage to the hanger likely to be caused when the armament in the rear turret is fired due to the resultant blast wave.

2) Fold-able Hanger - Flat plate. This is similar to a traditional helicopter hanger but in a flat pack form where the roof and sides fold and move.
Pro's; Collapse-able which allows the aft turret an uninterrupted field of fire.
Con's; Takes time to erect or lower this type of hanger. Complexity of design which increases cost in building and maintaining and risk of the folds whether manual, semi-automatic or fully automatic mechanism breaking down. No ability to use as storage for tools and equipment required to work on the helicopters.

3) Collapse-able Hanger. This would be a semi tent like item that could either have hooped poles with a semi-rigid material between the hoops and operating like a pair of clam shells that rise from the deck to cover the helicopter.
Pro's; Cost. This is the cheapest of the three most reasonable options. Ease of operation. Ease of repair.
Con's; Takes time to erect or lower this type of hanger. No ability to use as storage for tools and equipment required to work on the helicopters. Flimsy.

All other types of hanger that could be considered would require alteration to the structure of the ship which would entail high cost and time to complete such conversions. These would include altering the stern of the ship in one of at least two ways.

1} Creating a hanger inside the stern of the ship along with a deck lift to provide access to the hanger. This would not only involve cutting a hole into the armoured deck of the ship, it would include the removal of a large part of the internal structure of the stern to provide the hanger space and the moving of equipments that were stored or operated in that area.

2} Creating a step in the stern of the ship which would create a lower landing pad for the helicopters and then provide an end on access to the hanger area. This has a greater cost to the above selection 1} as more of the armoured deck and in fact a large area of the stern would require removal and it would as above require the moving of equipments that were stored or operated in that area, and less hangarage would probably be created than in option 1}

Hope this is of some help seadude

Gondor

[zenrat]

How about building on top of #3 turret?
A pop-up hanger.  Chopper lands, deck crew fold the rotors and tail in and then the sides of the hanger fold up and the roof rolls out from one side like a garage roller door.

I did find this awesome picture which illustrates why they wouldn't want to fire over the top of any choppers parked on the deck at the back.

http://www.navy.mil/navydata/ships/battleships/iowa/bb61-ia.html

[NARSES2]

It must have been an amazing sight to see any big gun ship fire a full broadside. Dad saw Warspite firing off Normandy and even though she'd lost X turret by then it must have been impressive.......as long as you weren't on the receiving end 

[jcf]

Build down with a lift?

[sandiego89]

Build down with a lift?

Yep, the below deck hangar is definitely an option, but a boring one visually- pretty much just a rectangle painted on the deck, unless you cut a hole in the deck and scratched up a hanger deck below and showed the roof or elevator in the down position.   

Good precedence in history with the US Navy Baltimore>Albany class, and Cleveland class which had below deck seaplane storage (later for helicopters) and the later 4 ship CGN Virginia class (as fitted for the LAMPS (Sea Sprite), hanger later welded shut when the Tomahawk boxes were fitted).  Also several USSR and other naval uses for below deck hangars.  Some had the elevator acting as the roof, some had a retractable hatch covering.

-Dave

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland-class_cruiser#/media/File:Cleveland-class_cruiser_technical_drawing.png

[seadude]

I might suggest a smaller hangar (or one on each side) farther forward along the rear superstructure, forward of turret three.  Still plenty of room up there, a bit of a tow from the aft landing pad, but may look better.     

Not really liking that idea.

1) Fixed Hangar. Traditional helicopter hanger.
Pro's; Permanent structure that can be used not only for storage of helicopters, it can house the spares required to maintain the helicopters as well as being a nice potentially warm environment to work on the helicopters as required.
Con's; Reduces the arc of fire for the aft turret by creating a blind spot. Damage to the hanger likely to be caused when the armament in the rear turret is fired due to the resultant blast wave.

I'm not concerned about a 16" gun turret firing aft. Why would a 16" turret need to anyway? I've never heard of or seen stories/pics of any 16" or other major size gun turrets firing completely aft. Besides, wouldn't the aircraft crane be in the way?

2) Fold-able Hanger - Flat plate. This is similar to a traditional helicopter hanger but in a flat pack form where the roof and sides fold and move.
Pro's; Collapse-able which allows the aft turret an uninterrupted field of fire.
Con's; Takes time to erect or lower this type of hanger. Complexity of design which increases cost in building and maintaining and risk of the folds whether manual, semi-automatic or fully automatic mechanism breaking down. No ability to use as storage for tools and equipment required to work on the helicopters.

3) Collapse-able Hanger. This would be a semi tent like item that could either have hooped poles with a semi-rigid material between the hoops and operating like a pair of clam shells that rise from the deck to cover the helicopter.
Pro's; Cost. This is the cheapest of the three most reasonable options. Ease of operation. Ease of repair.
Con's; Takes time to erect or lower this type of hanger. No ability to use as storage for tools and equipment required to work on the helicopters. Flimsy.

Nope. Don't like these ideas either. I prefer something more "permanent".

Build down with a lift?

Yep, the below deck hangar is definitely an option, but a boring one visually- pretty much just a rectangle painted on the deck, unless you cut a hole in the deck and scratched up a hanger deck below and showed the roof or elevator in the down position.   

-Dave

I tried that before with this crude model I built over a decade ago. I wasn't too happy with the results afterward.
http://www.modelshipgallery.com/gallery/bb/bb-62/350-em/bb-62-index.html

So, I want to build a permanent structure on the main deck. But I need to build it in such a way as to show that the structure has been strengthened against concussive blasts from the 16" guns.
Here's an example of what one modeler did for a deckhouse for RPV drone storage.
http://s300.photobucket.com/user/johndon1968/media/DSCF0001-121.jpg.html
http://s300.photobucket.com/user/johndon1968/media/DSCF0012-3.jpg.html
I like what that guy did. But whatever structure I make will have to be a little bit taller, and it won't be "underneath" the 16" gun barrels.

[DarrenP2]

what if they had dug out the plans or some non completed ships and fitted with a Nuclear reactor steam plant?

[kerick]

I always wonder what a modern designed nuke powered BB would look like. Keep the guns and armor and go from there

[wuzak]

1) Fixed Hangar. Traditional helicopter hanger.
Pro's; Permanent structure that can be used not only for storage of helicopters, it can house the spares required to maintain the helicopters as well as being a nice potentially warm environment to work on the helicopters as required.
Con's; Reduces the arc of fire for the aft turret by creating a blind spot. Damage to the hanger likely to be caused when the armament in the rear turret is fired due to the resultant blast wave.

What if the #3 turret is raised, and the structure for the hangar extends from the structure under the turret, which could be connected to the main superstructure?

And if you are putting on helicopters, could you change the deck to suit F-35Bs?

[rickshaw]

There were proposals to rebuild US battleships to carry Harriers in the heady days of the 1980s.  They came to nought because of the costs.







They also tried in the 1970s:





Nichimo even made a kit of it:



Seems a bit like putting new wine in an old bottle to me.

I'd go, if I wanted a helicopter hangar, with a semi-submerged deckhouse, which penetrated the deck.  It would have sloping, armoured sides to deflect blast.  It would be placed behind X turret (Turret No.3 in USN terminology).  I'd build a slightly larger landing deck, on top of the existing fantail. 

[Thorvic]

The only viable option is to build the hangers either side of the aft superstructure where it tapers to a point. Instead of being pointed the rear super structure becomes flat and gives you room either side of the gun director. The taper was to allow the aft gun to fire on a forwards angle when steaming in to engage with enemy battleships, but as their are no other battlewagons, that style of combat is dead and the guns are used for shore bombardment (note the launches which now restrict the forward rotation of the aft turret). The Hangers should allow for maybe additional systems (NATO Sea Sparrow or possibly VL Sea Sparrow as used on the Dutch M Frigates)

[sandiego89]

The only viable option is to build the hangers either side of the aft superstructure where it tapers to a point.....

I agree (as posted in #2), plenty of room up there.

[Mossie]

Seems a bit like putting new wine in an old bottle to me. 

I've had an idea before about the Iowas being refitted for VLS as a response to the Kirov class.  I've just read that this was actually considered.