European Carrier

[kriegerfaust]

 

I recently found a really weird thing in the archives.

 

http://i.imgur.com/iezaZQal.jpg

(click for bigger)

 

A few drawings of an honest-to-god aircraft carrier (although a tiny one) dated in May 1946. I have no idea how serious this proposal was, and I currently don't know any background information that could explain the existence of this project either. It's very detailed but I really can't figure out what they were thinking they'd do with it - projecting power in the Baltic sea really isn't that big of a deal.

 

Data as given in the drawing

Length overall: 148.2 m

Designed waterline length: 140 m

Greatest beam: 28.4 m

Beam at design waterline: 20 m

Design draft: 5.5 m

Displacement, standard: 7800 tonnes

Displacement, full load: 8100 tonnes

Speed at 28000 shaft horsepower: 25 knots

Aircraft carried: 20 de Havilland Sea Vampire

Artillery:

- eight 12 cm guns in twin turrets

- 16 40mm Bofors autocannons in both single and twin mountings

- 17 single-mount 25mm autocannons

Armor:

- 75 mm waterline belt plus 25 mm in "torpedo compartments" (?)

- 25 + 50 mm deck

Crew: 535 men

 

Side and top view:

 

 http://i.imgur.com/HMdbkWT.jpg

 

http://i.imgur.com/jmWEigD.jpg

Front section

 

http://i.imgur.com/YSaAVa9.jpg

Center section

 

http://i.imgur.com/6kKrxTK.jpg

Rear section

 

 

 

 

Cross sections and deck plans

 

 http://i.imgur.com/JnR9Jgf.jpg

Cross sections

 

http://i.imgur.com/barO28v.jpg

Upper deck plans

 

http://i.imgur.com/NLLfiVR.jpg

Lower deck plans

 

 

 

 

 

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

https://fdra-naval.blogspot.com/2021/08/armada-svenka-marinen-durante-la-guerra.html

This project is only known from detailed sketches (but not plans). It was part of the ambitious naval plan of World War II, which saw a dramatic increase in shipbuilding, especially with the Tre Kronor cruisers, new destroyers and submarines. It was a fairly small aircraft carrier, displacing only 8,000 tons, well protected, armed and still carrying a supply of twenty fighter aircraft. It was perhaps too ambitious as a design due to the limited size and displacement, forced by the limited size of the Yards basins.

The overall appearance resembled a British aircraft carrier, with a large, rounded bridge island forward of an aft deck, two step lifts in the middle of a straight deck which, as shown in the view above, allowed only folding wing aircraft to be stacked alongside, little space available for aircraft to take off in a straight line from the rear of the deck - however, there was what could be a catapult forward ("even throttle"), otherwise these aircraft would have to take off in about 130 metres. The project was not very far from being a proposal to the Admiralty, there was no official name associated with it and it was never ordered. Conways is also silent on the matter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Havilland_Vampire

Of interest, the Vampire was not actually carrier capable for the Royal Navy until 1948. I wonder how realistic it was for Sweden to even attempt to envision having some for an aircraft carrier commissioned in 1946...

[Ensign Cthulhu]

9 hours ago, Daniel_Allan_Clark said:

Of interest, the Vampire was not actually carrier capable for the Royal Navy until 1948. I wonder how realistic it was for Sweden to even attempt to envision having some for an aircraft carrier commissioned in 1946...

The first landing of a Vampire on a carrier deck was in late 1945, and with the feasibility demonstrated, there's every reason for the Swedes to want to plan for the ship to carry them. Sweden had already bought 70 Vampires from Britain in 1946 for operation from land (and would buy over 300 more later), and the possibility of operating the same aircraft as a naval fighter would have been very attractive from a logistical viewpoint (commonality of spares, training, servicing etc). 

Also, I suspect that the date of 1946 relates to when the drawings were actually produced, not when the ship might have gone into service. Tack on three or four years from there for building, and a squadron of Sea Vampires doesn't seem so unrealistic, especially with the fighter already integrated into the land service and naval pilots likely posted to RSwAF squadrons to learn to fly them.

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

Looking more into the Sea Vampire...it could carry both rockets and bombs.

Looks like this paper project could be a potential WG premium candidate.

Interesting.

[Aethervox]

No!

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

54 minutes ago, Aethervox said:

No!

Too late...planes have been in the game for years.