I object: Bring Back "The Ranger"!

[Occhidiangela]

And in your first post, which commented on Sea Scorpion, you did indeed present that it was "an exception." Your words exactly. As I pointed out above there, I suppose thought that you were referring to an older sub called Sea Scorpion, which you were not in fact doing, and so I checked to make sure I had not overlooked that in the lineage of USS Scorpion, the SSN edition.

Not sure why we went round about that, and you were exactly right in your initial comment: it represents an exception to the old habit, which of course has been superceded because . . .

Fish can't vote, and neither can Scorpions. :)

[Count Duckula]

I know this'll never make it, but there's a family up the street who owns a pretty sweet 20-footer (a river rat, as the local lingo goes) named Attitude Adjuster.

My push would have been for Challenger or Columbia, but maybe it's not such a good idea to name battle ships after exploded space shuttles.

[WarBlade]

Somehow you've just managed to conjure up an image in my head of a (thankfully fictious) motor gunboat with shark's teeth painted around the front called, "Bad Mutha ____er". :blink:

*internal debate rages over clicking or not clicking "add reply" * :unsure:

[Rhydderch Hael]

...Actually I'm surprised about having been interpreted as "very offensive". I certainly don't "get" that at all and as for nautical matters, just because I might be clueless about American warship names doesn't mean "I don't get nautical matters" ...

Well, let's see: you just told a Navy man that the most venerated warship in American history had a hilarious-sounding name...

[Bun-Bun]

Count,

Wasn't Attitude Adjuster a ship name in Iain Bank's Excession? Banks did some excellent ship names in his Culture series, none of which I can remember offhand ... and my copy of Excession has apparently gone walkies. <_<

If one is looking for small-craft names, I've always been partial to Apocalypse Now's litttle boat, PBR Street Gang.

[Medicine Man]

I just recently saw a little feature on the original USS Constitution and her role in the war of 1812. I was more than a little surprised at the arrogance of the British Empire -- press ganging the crews of American merchant vessels. My lord.

Still, it ended well enough... the skill of the American shipbuilders and sailors embarased the Admiralty. No mean feat considering that the British have always been damn fine mariners.

[WarBlade]

Well, let's see: you just told a Navy man that the most venerated warship in American history had a hilarious-sounding name...

Another bizarre interpretation I'm afraid. :huh:
"Hilarious-sounding name"?

FYI I don't find anything particularly funny or even mildly amusing about the sound of the word "constitution", even when applied as the name of a ship. :huh:

[Rhydderch Hael]

Another bizarre interpretation I'm afraid. :huh:
"Hilarious-sounding name"?

FYI I don't find anything particularly funny or even mildly amusing about the sound of the word "constitution", even when applied as the name of a ship. :huh:

Oh thanks for warning me to put my drink down. You mean there's an American ship called the Constitution???&nbsp; Holy crap dude! That's hysterical!

Sounds pretty much like the idea that a warship was named Constitution gave ya' a bit of a chuckle there, eh?

[Rhydderch Hael]

One may argue that it wasn't the skill of the ship-builders...it was their insanity. ;)

No one prior to Joshua Humphreys and Josiah Fox had contemplated the idea of building a frigate that was longer, faster, and carrying as heavy as the guns they intended for the ship. There's some technical limits to such specifications, and if Humphreys had submitted his designs to a competent Admiralty (something that the fledgling nation did not yet have), he would have been laughed out of the building. No one goes around building a ship with the length-to-beam ratio as what was proposed, nor would they laden the gun decks of a frigate exclusively with 24-pounder long guns...

...unless they had some new-fangled idea to prevent the ship from springing her back. The transverse hull runners in Humphreys' and Fox's collaborated design carried the weight of the gun decks directly to the keel, allowing the ships to be built longer (and hence faster) and with the heavier guns needed to compensate for the inferior quality (back then) of American gunpowder and gun manufacturing. Hence, an American frigate was in actuality a bit bigger and had a heavier throweight than a typical European frigate, a "super-frigate" as it were: tough and heavy-hitting as a razee, but as fast as a true frigate.

[--Pete]

Hi,

if Humphreys had submitted his designs to a competent Admiralty . . . , he would have been laughed out of the building.

Say rather "British Admiralty" than "competent". As an institution, the Admiralty has been extremely conservative over most of its history. Thus, during the Napoleonic wars (the period when the first US frigates were developed and built), the British designs had not changed much in two to three generations. The French (and to some extent the Spanish and Dutch) experimented with a number of changes, in rigging, hull, and armament. When the British captured ships with those innovations, they typically removed the innovations.

Comparing the technology of an early nineteenth century ship of the line with a John Company ship shows that many of the innovations developed in England were also not incorporated into the fighting fleet.

allowing the ships to be built longer (and hence faster) and with the heavier guns

Very much so. It has been said that the Constitution could outrun anything she couldn't outfight. Then again, the European navies were built around the principle (even after Nelson) of the line of battle. Speed was just not enough of an advantage in that type of encounter to be a major design consideration. Considering the rather short distances involved in most European conflicts, that made sense. Even a long chase (Nelson chasing Villeneuve all around the Atlantic) eventually resulted in a pitched battle. Had that ever been the case between the British and American navies of the time, I fear that the American frigates would have stood small chance against the British first and second raters. Fortunately for the Americans, the British were primarily occupied elsewhere.

--Pete

PS Nice intro to Trafalgar is at http://militaryhistory.about.combrary/w...y/aa101600a.htm

[Bun-Bun]

A bit more in-depth is Tom Pocock's "The Terror Before Trafalgar". I just finished it - it's not bad at all and fills in a lot of background on what was happening in the British fleet in the pre-Trafagar days.

It's at Amazon at The Terror Before Trafalgar

[Occhidiangela]

That no offense was intended. :)

[Occhidiangela]

Was about one half that of the typical frigate of the day. (18 or 30 inches, memory fuzzy)The frames thus provided considerable "thickness" to the sides of the ship, making the freeboard exposed to cannon fire essentially its own thickness plus the thickness of the framing for the length of the ship. It was small wonder the shot tended to bounce off.

As to the design limits, at the speeds involved in sailing, the ship's length and bow wave can be significant factors in speed, or at least the potential top speed available.

The debate between speed and armament tradeoffs never ended.

"Give me a fast ship, for I intend to sail in harm's way." --attributed to John Paul Jones--

The problems for the Dreadnaught era ships, and for that matter the Iowa class battleships, was a design decision that had to adress speed, above water line armor, below waterline armor, and firepower/displacement tradeoffs. Even higher power density steam turbines, however, still ran into the "length to bow wave" relationships (influenced by beam as well, IIRC) as they achieved higher speed. Fastest ship of the line that I have ever heard of? The USS Enterprise, CV -65. Rumor has it that Soviet Alpha class, all titanium SSN's, could run faster. I wonder at the truth of the matter.

As recently as the Cold War, the US tended to go for speed, the Soviets a bit more for armor and armament, though the Gorshkov era cruisers and destroyers were plenty fast. Some of the heavier armed Soviet Cruisers were a bit more sea worthy in heavy seas, though I must caveat that comment by noting that class by class comparisons always suffer somewhat due to a variety of design decisions that influence ship's displacement.

It is instructive that the US went away from aluminum and back to steel in the recent Arleigh Burke class guided missile destroyers. I'd say the US Navy adopted an idea or two from the folks who worked for Gorshkov all those years, or were perhaps given pause at HMS Sheffield's aluminum superstructure having caught fire after the exocet attack.

[--Pete]

Hi,

A fairly accurate value for the hull speed of a vessel in terms of waterline length is

hull speed (knots) = square root (2 X length of the waterline) (feet)

This works pretty well over an amazing range of lengths.

For USS Constitution, we have 175 ft on waterline giving about 18 knots hull speed. Her actual top speed was more like 13 knots, about 72% of max. HMS Victory gives 186 ft (lower gundeck) which gives a potential 19 knots hull speed. She was actually capable of 11 knots which was only 57% of max. Both ships were copper clad below the waterline and both ships were capable of flying more sail than conditions usually merited, so their inability to achieve hull speed was a result of compromises to speed made for stability as a gun platform.

To compare this to a similarly sized ship where speed was the prime consideration, consider the Cutty Sark. With 213 ft on waterline she had a hull speed of 20 knots. Her recorded top speed was 17 knots, or 85% of max.

Of course, some modern racing yachts with displacement hulls achieve speeds in excess of 100% of hull speed calculated by the above formula, but not much. And, again of course, hull speed is meaningless when speaking of anything not using a displacement hull (i.e., hydrofoils, planing, etc.)

--Pete

[Rhydderch Hael]

In a wooden sailing ship, the length also created another factor of consideration: hogging on the keel. A metal ship, be it of steel or aluminum, isn't going to have a bow in her keel due to the buoyancy pressing up from above. The elastic nature of wooden ships presented that problem, of course.

It gets worse with a wooden warship, since the heaviest loads borne upon the vessel (the gun decks) are as far away from the keel (the fulcrum of this hogging movement) as one can get: high above the waterline and on the periphery of the ship's hull, which only makes the buoyant force pressing up on the keel all the worse. The reason the European frigates were not built along the lines of the Americans was because the Americans (Humphreys and Fox) had the idea of building transverse ribs into the hull. These ribs, like the buttresses of a cathedral, conspired to transmit the greatest weight of the ship, the gun decks, directly onto the keel— thus eliminating keel hogging and the risk of springing the ship's back. Seemingly simple to figure out today, but it was revolutionary at the turn of the 19th century.

[channel1]

...the arrogance of the British Empire -- press ganging the crews of American merchant vessels

That made good PR from the War Hawks to get support for the invasion of Canada, but it was hardly the reason for the war.

Probably the most significant single factor that led to the events that brought about the war was the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. What American history views as simply a real estate deal, was in fact a major contribution to Bonaparte's ability to wage war in Europe. Bonaparte was rather sly, knowing that it was easier to acquire new world territories by conquering the empires that controlled them. Between Spain and Portugal, he could have gotten far more DEVELOPED territory than he sold off.

Much of the $15 million paid to France was in the form of notes of credit, which were turned in to pay for materials used to wage war. The American merchant vessels were supplying France with the means to wage war on the British. That alone would make them a fair target, I would think. Nobody argues the right today of stopping the North Korean shipments of missiles to Saddam's Iraq.

Furthermore, there really WERE British deserters serving aboard American merchant vessels. The British may not have been very particular about verifying the details of those that they picked off of the American vessels, but it was pretty hard to verify such things at a time when many people weren't even sure when they were born, or carried documentation. they couldn't very well check the Social Security cards or driver's license.

The point is, the Americans were supposedly neutral in the European conflict, but were supplying the enemies of the Allies. The British had every right to intercept American shipping going to France.

The invasion of Canada was mostly just an opportunistic land grab, done at a time when the British lion was occupied in Europe. It wasn't the first time that the Americans picked their time that way, the war of American independence also coincided with a hot period in Britain's seemingly interminable wars with France. I doubt that the Americans would have been crazy enough to confront the British empire during those brief periods when their full resources were unoccupied.

Even distracted as they were, the British were formidable in British North America. They knew the value of rapid lines of communication, which enabled them to take the American fort at Michilimackinac bloodlessly, simply because the Americans there had no idea that their government had declared war.
Britain had some superb commanders, Brock was a strategic genius, Tecumseh the same tactically. If Brock had not foolishly sought fame in a glorious, suicidal charge at Queenston Heights the war would have ended much earlier. As it was, his replacements were incompetent fools and cowards. The British had some of those, too.

In all, it was an interesting stage of history. It is also interesting how history gets rewritten to suit whoever happens to write about it. An example is the Monroe Doctrine of 1823, which states:
"With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere."
They seemed to have a rather short memory. :)

-rcv-

[Occhidiangela]

The point is, the Americans were supposedly neutral in the European conflict, but were supplying the enemies of the Allies. The British had every right to intercept American shipping going to France

Neutral countries, under the agreements of the time, were indeed allowed to trade with belligerents. That bit of international law has not remained static, however, the "freedom of the seas" folks point out that neutral ships of many nations traded with belligerents for centuries.

The key complaint a Brit would make in 1803, or in 1807, was whether or not war materiel was in the trade, versus "non war material" like cotton or wheat.

Once 1807 and the Continental system were put in place, and the significant economic mess of 1809 in England, it is very understandable that the Brits chose to test out whether or not anyone could hold them to previous agreements. The Law of the Sea is, and has always been, Might makes Right.

Their boarding of American flagged vessels was legally dubious at best, and given the American protestations being basically ignored "shut up, we are at war with Boney, and you're being a pain in the arse" the decision to act was not all that hard a decision to reach.

Had Britain not been in such a dire war, two things are probably certain:

The need for sailors would have been less, and the frequency of impressments likely would have been well below any pain threshold.

The young US would have had to look at the risk/reward of fighting a war against ALL of the Empire's might. A far different calculus indeed, both politically and materially.

[Skandranon]

Fastest ship of the line that I have ever heard of?&nbsp; The USS Enterprise, CV -65.&nbsp; Rumor has it that Soviet Alpha class, all titanium SSN's, could run faster.&nbsp; I wonder at the truth of the matter.

ENTERPRISE is about as fast as they go, 33.6 knots at full power after refit. Close behind come the Iowa class battleships, though none of them are in service any more. They could usually reliably get 32.5, maybe 33.

It was rumoured that the Alfa class could hit 45 knots due to a sodium-cooled reactor design, among other things, but recent information reveals that NATO intelligence was way off on the Alfa's capabilities. Aside from being noisy (and therefore near-blind, not even counting the fogging of the instruments due to insufficient radiation shielding), they could never get 45. The most reasonable number seems to be an estimate in the 38-41 range, though some places still carry a "43-45 knot" estimate since disproven.

[Occhidiangela]

Exceeded 33 now and again. :)

Unlike the Nimitz class, its unique power plant and prop arrangement could produce a bit more speed than the Nimitz class.

However, I know what is listed in Jane's, and will accept that for practical puposes, your numbers are pretty solid.

The Alpha? I suppose fast is relative, and yes, the numbers cited by Western sources that are available for public consumption were likely clouded by the inevitable "plus or minus" limitation of estimates based on non calibrated or instrumented speed measurement. Those Soviets, they just would not make their runs on a calibrated range we had access to, imagine that.

I wonder if they ever declassified their own numbers on the Alpha?

EDIT:

Excerpts from a site covering Submarines:

ALPHA

Endurance 1,175 full power hours
50 days stores endurance
Max Speed 14 knts surfaced 43 knts submerged
Maximum Safe Depth 1,150'
Never-Exceed Depth 1,400'
Crush Depth 1,700'
Safety Factor 1.20

[Rhydderch Hael]

... See also USS Enterprise, the first nuclear powered carrier.&nbsp; It is no mistake that Star Trek's creators resurrected that name in their future as Star Fleet's most advanced ship . . . the theme of giving famous ships new hulls is a consistent one in American Naval Heritage. ...

And the Enterprise of Star Trek lore is a Constitution-class starship. Which implies that there is also a Federation starship named the USS Constitution. Which is a bit troubling, implying that Old Ironsides would not survive to the 23rd century. Then again, that's a given, if Earth was to be devastated by the Eugenics Wars, WWIII, and the Romulan Wars.