US Battlecruisers

Rodger Herbst · Post by **Rodger Herbst** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 5:09 pm

Did the US build two battlecruisers in WW2,one if i recall was the USS Alaska, they had 12" rapid fire main batteries,anyone remember and what happened to them?

Patrick · Post by **Patrick** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 5:27 pm

Yes, there was the USS Alaska (CB-1) and USS Guam (CB-2). They entered service in the Pacific in early 1945 and were broken up in 1960/61. A third, USS Hawaii, was never finished and broken up. Three more were planned but never completed.

There is a .pdf file available at ussnewjersey.com with a little more information. Pictures can be found at bobhenneman.com.

Rodger Herbst · Post by **Rodger Herbst** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 5:37 pm

Thanks Patrick,can you give me some more info?Were the carriers,Saratoga and Lexington built on WW1 battlecruiser hulls,hence thier names?

Patrick · Post by **Patrick** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 3:22 am

Hello,

The design of the Lexington/Saratoga and Alaska Class battlecruisers were separated by 20 years.

The US originally ordered battlecruisers prior to WWI but the designs kept changing so their construction didn't begin until after the war in order to incorporate lessons learnt. Six ships were begun in 1920. However, there was a naval treaty later in 1920 that restricted capital ship construction. Aircraft carriers weren't covered by the treaty, so two of these ships were converted to aircraft carriers (Lexington and Saratoga) while the other four (Ranger, Constellation, United States, and Constitution) were broken up on the slipways in various stages of construction.

The Alaska Class battlecruisers were built after the London Treaty expired in the late 30s. They were specifically intended to escort Atlantic convoys and chase and hunt down German pocket battleships and had 12 inch guns. Interestingly, the US Navy didn't want them, but FDR used his political influence to have them built. The design was finalized in June 1941 and six ships were ordered, all of them named after US territories. The designs were poor, however; they were too big to be employed as cruisers and too lightly armored to be battleships. They only had a single rudder and their maneuverability was bad. The Alaska and Guam were completed far too late to hunt down Japanese cruisers, but did see some duty in the closing days of the war. The USS Hawaii was 85% complete, but never finished and broken up in 1958. Three others (USS Phillippines, USS Samoa, and USS Puerto Rico) were never laid down and cancelled.

(I summarized the above info from the sources mentioned in my previous post.)

Patrick · Post by **Patrick** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 3:44 am

Hello,

There's an error in my previous posting. The Washington Treaty was ratified in 1923, not 1920.

Rodger Herbst · Post by **Rodger Herbst** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 6:51 am

I think the battle cruisers got a bad name at the battle of Jutland,the HMS Hood finished it off,i could never see why the navy would want to get near one,politics as you say.
,

Enrico Cernuschi · Post by **Enrico Cernuschi** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 9:00 am

They were very charming ships and the idea to hit without being hit thanks to their speed was a seducing one for politics who were looking always for cheap solutions which could help their self esteem to be military big brains in front of the always one direction minded sailors who were able only to ask more ships and bigger ships.
III Reich and USSR too planned to build this kind of ships and the matter if the two French Dunquerque and the two Scharnhorst were really battleships or modern battle cruisers is still an open one.

Bye EC

Rodger Herbst · Post by **Rodger Herbst** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 7:23 pm

I think the Brits misused thier battlecruisers,they were meant to chase and destroy commerce raiders,which i believe one did in WW1.Ibelieve thier mistake was putting BB main batteries on them so the admirals thought they could fight BBs,They should have never been near BBs in a fight.As you say politics played a part in US building battlecruisers,the fast BBs were capable of doing both jobs,fight other BBs and run down raiders.My brother serve in the navy from 1938-62,he was a BB sailer,he thought the world of the Iowas.Having put my service in the army i didn't know if i should believe some of the things he told me.He said the California class BBs were electric drive,i know subs could be, but to move a battleship with electric motors is a little over my head,am i wrong?

Enrico Cernuschi · Post by **Enrico Cernuschi** » Tue Oct 14, 2003 7:18 am

You are. They had turbo-electric engines EC

Shadow · Post by **Shadow** » Tue Oct 14, 2003 8:33 am

Greetings Rodger & Patrick -

Thought you both might be interested in the following info:

1. RE: The Washington Naval Armys Limitation Treaty -

From: Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States: 1922, Vol. 1, pp. 247-266.
Page 247
Treaty Series NO. 671
CONFERENCE ON THE LIMITATION OF ARMAMENT,
WASHINGTON,
NOVEMBER 12 1921-FEBRUARY 6, 1922.
Treaty Between the United States of America, the British Empire, France, Italy, and Japan, Signed at Washington, February 6, 1922. [41]

2. RE: U.S.S. Alaska -

ALASKA CB-1

displacement. 27,000
length. 806'6"
beam. 91'1"
draft. 27'1" (mean)
speed. 31.4 k.
complement. 2,251
armament. 9 12", 12 5",
56 40 mm., 34 20 mm.
aircraft. 4
Armor: 9' belt, 12 4/5" turrets, 1 2/5" + 4" + 5/8" decks
Machinery: 150,000 SHP; G.E. geared turbines, 4 screws.
class. ALASKA

ALSO:

Found the following a very interesting site to visit -

http://nauticom.net/www/harts/navy.html

best regards to both of you -

Patrick · Post by **Patrick** » Tue Oct 14, 2003 10:58 am

Thank you for that very interesting web site. After reading it, I now realize that I need to correct something else I posted earlier.

My reference on the Washington Naval Treaty stated that "...the US now had a free hand to build aircraft carriers..." which I took to mean that aircraft carriers weren't included in the treaty. In fact, they were indeed covered by the treaty, but the US had no carriers at that time which is why they had a free hand to build. (The USS Langley was considered to be experimental and didn't count.) The treaty allowed the US to build a fleet of aircraft carriers whose combined displacement could not exceed 135,000 tons, with up to two of those carriers having a displacement of more than 27,000 tons each.

Ignoring budget considerations as well as the US Navy's pro-battlewagon/anti-aircraft carrier bias of the 1920s, I wonder how the Pacific war would have turned out if all six battlecruisers had been converted into aircraft carriers instead of just two?

Shadow · Post by **Shadow** » Tue Oct 14, 2003 11:20 am

Patrick -

Most interesting don't you think?
A possible 4 extra carriers!
As long as they were also at sea on December 7th

Boggles the mind!

regards -

Rodger Herbst · Post by **Rodger Herbst** » Tue Oct 14, 2003 7:34 pm

Greetings all,
I talked to an old navy guy who lives near me,Shadow he tells me that the turbine spun the generator that fed juice to the electric motors,man those must have been some motors.He said locomotives are diesel electric,a diesel spins a generator and feeds it to traction motors on the axel.Thanks for the specs on the Alaskas.

This maybe off the thread but i,m curious,did the QE2 have turbine problems and was changed over to a diesel electric drive,i think i saw a TV program and it showed some huge Burmiester-Wain diesels in the engine room.This goes back a few years{lol} do any of you guys know if the Normandie was turbo-electric?

Shadow · Post by **Shadow** » Tue Oct 14, 2003 9:33 pm

Greetings Rodger -

Hope the info below is useful -

RE: QE2 -

QE2'S POWER PLANT IS DIESEL ELECTRIC, a system chosen for its inherent reliability and flexibility. In 1986/87, in an operation costing £100m, nine medium speed MAN L58/64 nine cylinder turbo charged diesel engines were fitted, in place of the aging and fuel thirsty steam plant. The diesel engines drive C.E.C. generators, and each develop 10.5 MW of electrical power at 10,000 volts. Each engine weighs approximately 120 tons.

RE: Normanie -

The Normandie's planners adopted a different machinery design, a design seldom before, and rarely afterward, used in any passenger liner. In this system, the turbines are connected to electrical generators. The power produced by these generators is then fed to electric motors which drive the propeller shafts. There are several advantages to this system of propulsion. First, the system is much simpler to arrange within the ship, since the only components which must align are the electric motors and propeller shafts. The steam turbo-generators can be placed where most convenient. Although in practice this is near the motors, it does not have to be in line with them. Secondly, turbo-electric drive allows the full power of the machinery to be used in going astern, since all that is required is to reverse the polarity of the current flowing to the electric motors, which run equally well in either direction. Moreover, the changeover from going ahead to going astern is much simpler and faster to accomplish. Finally, the French had at that time less expertise than the British and the Germans in the casting and forging of large steel components, such as gear wheels, while they had a great deal of experience and know-how in electrical work. This may have encouraged them to try this new and relatively untried form of propulsion. There are also the inevitable disadvantages. Turbo-electric drive is less efficient than direct or geared-reduction turbine drive, but only by some two to three percent. It is also somewhat heavier. Although the huge gears used on a ship like the Queen Mary weighed many tons each, turbo-electric drive uses large and heavy generators and motors between the turbines and the shafts. In practice, the system worked very well indeed and its advantages were such that many large vessels in the United States Navy relied on this system of propulsion during WW2 and later.

best regards -

Rodger Herbst · Post by **Rodger Herbst** » Wed Oct 15, 2003 3:09 pm

Thanks for the dope on propulsion systems Shad,i think the diesel-electric would be the best.Easier to install cable than steam pipes,only boilers you need isfor hot water,no spending hours getting up steam,my friend told me you had to be carefull putting steam to the turbines when the were cold,said you could ruin the blades,and you didn't need those huge funnels and all thier piping.What type drive did the "pocket"BBs have?

The Alaskas' must have been nice looking ships according to the specs'.

Feldgrau.net