Matrix Games

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ORIGINAL: wdolson

This should take about 30 seconds to solve, but it was a new one to me when I came across it the other day...

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ORIGINAL: castor troy

wonder why there weren't any tripple 5 inch turrets when they built CLAA. Has there never been thinking about that? There are the modern CL with tripple 6 inch turrets, so why wouldn't a CLAA be equipped with tripple 5 inch for more AA? Imagine an Atlanta CLAA with an additional 6 x 5 inch guns, worth another destroyer's heavy flak in DP guns. Mounts too big, too heavy? The Atlantas even had a double 5 inch mount on their sides, so wouldn't a tripple mount in the six center positions be possible? Well knowing that a CLAA was far lighter than a modern CL.

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wonder why there weren't any tripple 5 inch turrets when they built CLAA. Has there never been thinking about that? There are the modern CL with tripple 6 inch turrets, so why wouldn't a CLAA be equipped with tripple 5 inch for more AA? Imagine an Atlanta CLAA with an additional 6 x 5 inch guns, worth another destroyer's heavy flak in DP guns. Mounts too big, too heavy? The Atlantas even had a double 5 inch mount on their sides, so wouldn't a tripple mount in the six center positions be possible? Well knowing that a CLAA was far lighter than a modern CL.

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ORIGINAL: Panther Bait

It seems like triple turrets for AA would allow you to throw more firepower at a single target, but not allow you to engage more targets, since all the guns in the turret face in the same direction. Half-again as many rounds at the same number of targets might not be worth the extra weight that the larger turret and shell conveyance equipment would require.

If I was trying to defend against swarms of kamikaze, I think I'd rather have 10x2 5-inch guns rather than 7x3 5-inch guns, even if the second configuration gives me an extra 5-inch.

Against surface ships, that's probably a whole different story.

Mike

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ORIGINAL: crsutton

quote:

ORIGINAL: castor troy

wonder why there weren't any tripple 5 inch turrets when they built CLAA. Has there never been thinking about that? There are the modern CL with tripple 6 inch turrets, so why wouldn't a CLAA be equipped with tripple 5 inch for more AA? Imagine an Atlanta CLAA with an additional 6 x 5 inch guns, worth another destroyer's heavy flak in DP guns. Mounts too big, too heavy? The Atlantas even had a double 5 inch mount on their sides, so wouldn't a tripple mount in the six center positions be possible? Well knowing that a CLAA was far lighter than a modern CL.

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wonder why there weren't any tripple 5 inch turrets when they built CLAA. Has there never been thinking about that? There are the modern CL with tripple 6 inch turrets, so why wouldn't a CLAA be equipped with tripple 5 inch for more AA? Imagine an Atlanta CLAA with an additional 6 x 5 inch guns, worth another destroyer's heavy flak in DP guns. Mounts too big, too heavy? The Atlantas even had a double 5 inch mount on their sides, so wouldn't a tripple mount in the six center positions be possible? Well knowing that a CLAA was far lighter than a modern CL.

I am guessing weight, size and distribution of firepower. Not to mention the economy of manufacturing one platform for all types of ships. The dual turrets probably offered the best balance for these purposes.

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ORIGINAL: wdolson

I came across the info about the Wyoming in the Squadron in Action book. She looks very weird with 5 inch guns in place of her main turrets, but considering how the fast BBs were used for AA and only once were the big guns needed, it would have been better bang for the buck to replace the 16 inch guns on the fast BBs with extra 5 inch mounts. They may have brought down more kamikazes before reaching their targets.

Bill

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ORIGINAL: wdolson

This should take about 30 seconds to solve, but it was a new one to me when I came across it the other day...

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ORIGINAL: Nikademus
The reason for the modern 5in mounts was because late-war the ship's final role was to be an Anti-kamikaze/AA research ship. As such her 3 remaining heavy gun turrets were superfluous, meant to aid in her former role as a generalized gunnery training ship.

Stefan Terzibaschitsch's old book on US Battleships in WWII had very good line drawings in it and it showed the heterogeneous arrangement of her AA suite by 1945. Everything from the heavy AA guns replacing the last of her heavy gun turrets all the way down to 20mm pop guns. One side's "Broadside" didn't match the other.

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ORIGINAL: wdolson

I think the most likely reason there were no triple 5 inch turrets was due to mass production and the least common denominator was DDs which didn't have the beam for a wider turret.

However, another possibility might have been the logistics of space. 5 inch guns were, I believe loaded by hand and you had to have a loading crew standing around the gun. In a twin turret the crews could be somewhat to the side of the gun and not interfere with each other. In a triple turret, the middle gun crew would end up in the way of the other two guns.

Larger caliber guns were loaded with ammunition lifts since the shells were too heavy for a human being to manhandle. Though there did have to be people there to run the mechanism and such. The actual distance between the gun breaches on a triple turret of larger caliber would also be larger just because of the gun size, which would give the crew for the center gun more room to maneuver.

Just a thought. I'm far from an expert on naval gunnery.

Bill