Precision strikes on targets like AA and send in the planes with precisions munitions. Contested beach landings are a thing of the past and the sheer cost of keeping one battleship up would be better served on 5 missile boats.
when the navy figures out how to make decent railguns I think we will see larger battleships again. But until then cruise missiles are just more practical and versatile than big naval guns
Artillery even railguns is obsolete due to missile. We will not see battleships, we will see something like this. Missiles will dominate surface warfare but you can just dive.
>It can be done better on smaller ships (missiles) with a fraction of the logistical footprint.
If you are willing to accept the non existent armor of modern warships, a gun ship should come out lower on the logistical side due to vastly cheaper ammo.
Nope, they fixed that up. Its now scheduled sometime in August. They have got a dry dock being set up now:
https://battleshiptexas.org/battleship-updates/
when the navy figures out how to make decent railguns I think we will see larger battleships again. But until then cruise missiles are just more practical and versatile than big naval guns
conventional guns shoot out their barrels too...
eventually they will figure out the problems and electromagnetic weapons will be a thing, it's inevitable
yes, because unlike a conventional gun the projectile velocity is not limited by the velocity of the gases from an explosion. The only limiting factor is power. You could have a ship based railgun than can hit any target anywhere on earth
2 years ago
Anonymous
yes, because unlike a conventional gun the projectile velocity is not limited by the velocity of the gases from an explosion. The only limiting factor is power. You could have a ship based railgun than can hit any target anywhere on earth
It can't hit "anywhere on Earth" assuming you mean from a single starting point. Moving around it could get closer, but still not total coverage. The fact that it can get close to that at all, with very cheap munitions and very deep magazines, is a huge advantage for the weapon.
You can’t shoot down an artillery shell
You can, and it has been done operationally under combat conditions for like 15 years now. A 16" AP shell maybe not, but even current CRAM could probably decap it, which might make a big difference. Not that anyone has a 16" battery operational to fire against a notional BB, as far as I know.
2 years ago
Anonymous
putting a small rocket motor in the projectile that fires at apogee could give it global range, like some of the HARP rounds they were designing
2 years ago
Anonymous
The HARP round were hitting 180km of altitude that's like 100km out of the atmosphere. That's already going to reach out past 500km if you angle it rather than go for altitude.
Railguns are trash. They fire a fraction of the payload a fraction of the distance of an optimal gun system. They also use more space for propellant because of the lower energy density of liquid fuels vs chemical explosives.
>railguns have no propellant not sure what you are describing
Oh they run on unicorn farts and the dreams of little girls?
The propellant used by a railgun is the liquid fuel burned to power the generators on the ship.
Do you think it's likely to field a brand new nuclear powered cruiser or larger for railguns when objectively superior conventional guns are around?
2 years ago
Anonymous
it's not likely to happen soon, but yes it is very likely going to happen
there is a reason the military is currently researching railguns and scrapped HARP 50 years ago anon
2 years ago
Anonymous
Not him but the light gas guns, while very interesting, have AFAIK, much slower rate of fire, much much longer form factor, and all the drawbacks of conventional chemical ammo compared to what a successful mature rail gun (if that is even possible) would offer.
And it's highly likely that all major surface combatants DDG and above will get SMRs to replace their current LM2500 and generators in the not so distant future, regardless of what happens with railguns
2 years ago
Anonymous
I doubt they will put SMR into any naval ships because they would lead to civilian SRM and the Democrats will do anything they can to ensure the death of cheap energy.
2 years ago
Anonymous
I get what you mean but it's getting to be a tactical necessity. No way you could run spy full power and some kind of laser CIWS during a missile duel, and a very large chunk of the Navy has been nuclear powered for a very long time. I don't see them chimping out over Virginia or Columbia's or Ohios or Nimitzes or Fords, but I get what you mean. Not like we build civilian ships here anymore anyway so our law makers wouldn't really get a vote
2 years ago
Anonymous
>and a very large chunk of the Navy has been nuclear powered for a very long time.
A small fraction of the USN has been nuclear. Subs and carriers.
The nuke cruisers I think proved that the navy doesn't want it if they can get away without it.
2 years ago
Anonymous
I wouldn't call it a small fraction. There are what, 70 SSN/SSGN/SSBN? And like 70 DDGs and 15-20 cruisers. Of major blue water combat ships it's almost 50/50 nuke vs conventional.
Problem then and now is going to be manning, unless they can automate the hell out of the reactor. Those are tough billets to fill, and back then the Navy didn't expect surface ships to be putting in the city miles and total service life we are expecting of them now, changing the economic calculus a lot.
But again, all that is kind of immaterial. The way naval warfare is developing nuclear power is going to be the only viable option quite soon. Even flight 2s are very tron hungry in GQ and they are going to need to add a huge amount of DEW and other energy hungry systems to hope to remain relevant in air defense. To say nothing of how important nuclear range is going to be in a Taiwan situation
2 years ago
Anonymous
490 Ships in the navy.
76 Are nuclear powered.
11 Are Surface ships that could burn oxygen.
65 Are Subs that are vastly better served without. >Problem then and now is going to be manning, unless they can automate the hell out of the reactor.
I guess you are not a power engineer or a nuclear power engineer. The nuclear reactors are effectively totally automatic, much like most other power generation systems.
2 years ago
Anonymous
No, I'm not a nuclear engineer, but I am an EOOW qualified SWO, so maybe you don't understand how staffing and running a Navy engineering plant goes as well as I do. Suffice to say, the actual plant operation isn't the problem, both the MP and prime mover gas turbines are already totally automated, it's all the auxiliary equipment supporting them that's the problem for upkeep, operational checks, and scheduled and emergency repairs. Lose your firemain pressure while running a regular LM2500? You're going to get yelled at, but will probably be fine if you can get it worked out in an hour or so. Lose it when you have 2 reactors? I'm guessing that's not quite as happy of an ending. When you dramatically raise the consequences of any components failure, all your training and staffing requirements increase proportionally. That is going to be where your manning problem comes from, regardless of automation.
The "490 ships" claim is a canard and a strawman. I was comparing major blue water assets, so DDGs, CGs, CVNs, and all subs. That's how the CSGs and DESRONS etc are organized and filled out. And for those major combatants, it's nearly 50/50. Trying to count patrol boats and MPS ships in that comparison is a dishonest and ineffective ploy.
2 years ago
Anonymous
Interesting insight. I wonder how much of a pita it is to take care of these turbine-piston engine setups with combining gears.
>Gerald Bull never got his guns working
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20160317-the-man-who-tried-to-make-a-supergun-for-saddam-hussein >1000mm cannon dug into a hill >156m barrel
bros what could have been, if only the israelites didn't murder him
it was a sequential charge artillery. basically used to launch satellites into orbit. he used to work for DARPA to make a gun to send satellites to orbit.
Accuracy is really rough at operational ranges compared to regular artillery. In the past this was made up for by frick huge weight of iron broadsides but the little 1x5" mount is not going to get you there. Iowa could loft something like 40,000 pounds of ordnance per minute, sustained, until her magazines were dry.
Physics gets a vote though, and dropping something off an airplane from 40k' is much more efficient than projecting the same mass ballistically through a partially contained explosion.
The main problem was forward fire control. Aircraft tend to overfly the target and can visually spot and control their fire. Lucky for the US Musk has put enough sats into orbit to provide real time targeting over the whole world.
Nope. Artillery is getting a lot better and smart rounds are solving the accuracy problems. ERCA for the Army's 155mm artillery can reach out past 40 miles and development is still ongoing. A cruiser sporting several 155s could easily outdistance a WW2 battleship. It could do it cheaply and shoot all day if the barrel is water cooled.
sure but a cannon assist rocket is still better. we can split hairs on this im sure but rockets really are just that much better now. a rocket can do 200 miles change targets 5 times and do your math homework for you.
guidance aside it is more about fuel use and getting ordinance to distant targets. rockets are better at long range, arty at shot. but rockets are simply more flexible because they can just take the short path.
I'm a firm believer we should commission a class of heavy cruisers (CB style, maybe call it the South Carolina class in honor of the battleships) with 4x 8" gun turrets and plenty of missiles. Something to allow naval gunfire capability. Would probably be useful for invading China or defending Taiwan. We have no real naval gunfire capability now.
I don't think making special caliber would be wise. Development of gun and ammo for them would cost much and it would be very special snowflake gun with great chance to be cancelled see fate Zumwalt and it's woundergun.
I think best would be using 155mm land army guns and MRLS (GMRLS). They already exist and have bazillion stocks of ammo and mass production.
Something like land attack frigate with 2x155mm with 1000 rds, and GMRLS launcher with 60 rds. No need for extensive air defense, there are Air Defense destroyers already, they would be providing area AD.
Make it small, cheap and humble so it has better chance to happen. Uber cruiser with Uber guns would go right down Zumwalt road.
is there any theoretical boon to constructing a frickhuge Ace Combat timeline style Stonehenge cannon to shoot at enemy aircraft and arty ground targets?
Yes, if you have AC supertech that allows you to build such things at a reasonable timeframe and cost and it has alternative uses (in the case of Stonehenge, shooting down giant fricking meteor fragments) that make it worthwhile. Or you could be like Belka and build a 1km tall laser rave tower that bankrupts your entire country.
For Artillery, for battleship now. BB is for fighting other BB there is no need for them.
For shooting against shore there is need for artillery, but such type of ship is called monitor not battleship.
The only thing they can do, that can't be done infinitely better by other ships, is to hold much bigger guns than can reasonably be used by ground forces. Which is useful for exactly one thing - fire support for forces within a few dozen kilometres of the coastline. Unless you're intentionally building your entire military around dedicated marine landing forces they're just not worth the cost of building them; and the only countries who could persuade themselves that that's a good idea (Britain, Italy, Japan) can't afford them.
>seems like China could use a battleship.
Considering that the PLA are effectively a glorified occupational force for China at this point (and growing to be increasingly independent of the communist party) I don't see how a battleship would help them.
most cities are within 50km of a navigational water ways. they just need it for Taiwan and then keep the Chinese in check by droping a shell on a boat every so often. I see massive piracy in the event of taiwans fall.
My understanding is that once in a while an Iowa gets recommissioned to go shell a village in some sandy country. They have big frickoff guns and have such huge fuel tanks that you basically get a 2-in-1 artillery and fuel transport. Not really a ship guy though so don't take this too seriously
It can be done better on smaller ships (missiles) with a fraction of the logistical footprint.
what about missiles can match artillery for effect on target?
Precision strikes on targets like AA and send in the planes with precisions munitions. Contested beach landings are a thing of the past and the sheer cost of keeping one battleship up would be better served on 5 missile boats.
Artillery even railguns is obsolete due to missile. We will not see battleships, we will see something like this. Missiles will dominate surface warfare but you can just dive.
nice
looks pretty comfy
You can’t shoot down an artillery shell
>It can be done better on smaller ships (missiles) with a fraction of the logistical footprint.
If you are willing to accept the non existent armor of modern warships, a gun ship should come out lower on the logistical side due to vastly cheaper ammo.
so sad about this ship.
Why?
She is about to get dry docked for repairs. Late but still happening.
I heard that she couldn't even go into drydock. because keel is rusted out.
Nope, they fixed that up. Its now scheduled sometime in August. They have got a dry dock being set up now:
https://battleshiptexas.org/battleship-updates/
nice
I hope they can keep that around for a century more for kids to gawk at
I've actually seen the engine room many many years ago. Before it was blocked off due to flooding.
"the Iowa class were a order of 4 heavily armored and gunned, also known a Battle cruisers, or fast battleship"
>popular war ships great war to moderm conflicts ships issue 8 1955
when the navy figures out how to make decent railguns I think we will see larger battleships again. But until then cruise missiles are just more practical and versatile than big naval guns
impossible. railguns literally shoot out their barrels.
conventional guns shoot out their barrels too...
eventually they will figure out the problems and electromagnetic weapons will be a thing, it's inevitable
the longevity of artillery is a problem. but the contacts of a railgun become a plasma and wear out.
only because we can't make a material to withstand the temperatures and forces involved
but materials science is advancing pretty rapidly
but is it really worth it to have a railgun?
yes, because unlike a conventional gun the projectile velocity is not limited by the velocity of the gases from an explosion. The only limiting factor is power. You could have a ship based railgun than can hit any target anywhere on earth
It can't hit "anywhere on Earth" assuming you mean from a single starting point. Moving around it could get closer, but still not total coverage. The fact that it can get close to that at all, with very cheap munitions and very deep magazines, is a huge advantage for the weapon.
You can, and it has been done operationally under combat conditions for like 15 years now. A 16" AP shell maybe not, but even current CRAM could probably decap it, which might make a big difference. Not that anyone has a 16" battery operational to fire against a notional BB, as far as I know.
putting a small rocket motor in the projectile that fires at apogee could give it global range, like some of the HARP rounds they were designing
The HARP round were hitting 180km of altitude that's like 100km out of the atmosphere. That's already going to reach out past 500km if you angle it rather than go for altitude.
No. Railguns are trash, and a technological dead end. Deal with it.
Railguns are trash. They fire a fraction of the payload a fraction of the distance of an optimal gun system. They also use more space for propellant because of the lower energy density of liquid fuels vs chemical explosives.
railguns have no propellant not sure what you are describing
>railguns have no propellant not sure what you are describing
Oh they run on unicorn farts and the dreams of little girls?
The propellant used by a railgun is the liquid fuel burned to power the generators on the ship.
yeah factoring in continuous operation nuclear reactors are going to beat an equivalent weight of TNT all day in energy output
Do you think it's likely to field a brand new nuclear powered cruiser or larger for railguns when objectively superior conventional guns are around?
it's not likely to happen soon, but yes it is very likely going to happen
there is a reason the military is currently researching railguns and scrapped HARP 50 years ago anon
Not him but the light gas guns, while very interesting, have AFAIK, much slower rate of fire, much much longer form factor, and all the drawbacks of conventional chemical ammo compared to what a successful mature rail gun (if that is even possible) would offer.
And it's highly likely that all major surface combatants DDG and above will get SMRs to replace their current LM2500 and generators in the not so distant future, regardless of what happens with railguns
I doubt they will put SMR into any naval ships because they would lead to civilian SRM and the Democrats will do anything they can to ensure the death of cheap energy.
I get what you mean but it's getting to be a tactical necessity. No way you could run spy full power and some kind of laser CIWS during a missile duel, and a very large chunk of the Navy has been nuclear powered for a very long time. I don't see them chimping out over Virginia or Columbia's or Ohios or Nimitzes or Fords, but I get what you mean. Not like we build civilian ships here anymore anyway so our law makers wouldn't really get a vote
>and a very large chunk of the Navy has been nuclear powered for a very long time.
A small fraction of the USN has been nuclear. Subs and carriers.
The nuke cruisers I think proved that the navy doesn't want it if they can get away without it.
I wouldn't call it a small fraction. There are what, 70 SSN/SSGN/SSBN? And like 70 DDGs and 15-20 cruisers. Of major blue water combat ships it's almost 50/50 nuke vs conventional.
Problem then and now is going to be manning, unless they can automate the hell out of the reactor. Those are tough billets to fill, and back then the Navy didn't expect surface ships to be putting in the city miles and total service life we are expecting of them now, changing the economic calculus a lot.
But again, all that is kind of immaterial. The way naval warfare is developing nuclear power is going to be the only viable option quite soon. Even flight 2s are very tron hungry in GQ and they are going to need to add a huge amount of DEW and other energy hungry systems to hope to remain relevant in air defense. To say nothing of how important nuclear range is going to be in a Taiwan situation
490 Ships in the navy.
76 Are nuclear powered.
11 Are Surface ships that could burn oxygen.
65 Are Subs that are vastly better served without.
>Problem then and now is going to be manning, unless they can automate the hell out of the reactor.
I guess you are not a power engineer or a nuclear power engineer. The nuclear reactors are effectively totally automatic, much like most other power generation systems.
No, I'm not a nuclear engineer, but I am an EOOW qualified SWO, so maybe you don't understand how staffing and running a Navy engineering plant goes as well as I do. Suffice to say, the actual plant operation isn't the problem, both the MP and prime mover gas turbines are already totally automated, it's all the auxiliary equipment supporting them that's the problem for upkeep, operational checks, and scheduled and emergency repairs. Lose your firemain pressure while running a regular LM2500? You're going to get yelled at, but will probably be fine if you can get it worked out in an hour or so. Lose it when you have 2 reactors? I'm guessing that's not quite as happy of an ending. When you dramatically raise the consequences of any components failure, all your training and staffing requirements increase proportionally. That is going to be where your manning problem comes from, regardless of automation.
The "490 ships" claim is a canard and a strawman. I was comparing major blue water assets, so DDGs, CGs, CVNs, and all subs. That's how the CSGs and DESRONS etc are organized and filled out. And for those major combatants, it's nearly 50/50. Trying to count patrol boats and MPS ships in that comparison is a dishonest and ineffective ploy.
Interesting insight. I wonder how much of a pita it is to take care of these turbine-piston engine setups with combining gears.
>Gerald Bull never got his guns working
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20160317-the-man-who-tried-to-make-a-supergun-for-saddam-hussein
>1000mm cannon dug into a hill
>156m barrel
bros what could have been, if only the israelites didn't murder him
it was a sequential charge artillery. basically used to launch satellites into orbit. he used to work for DARPA to make a gun to send satellites to orbit.
ya'll know what happened to the HARP guy right?
Not really, shore bombardment is the only cost effective use, but given you have to get within 15 miles of the coast it's a dangerous proposition.
>is there still any use for naval artillery?
Uh, yeah. I remember a docudrama from 2012 where the Mighty Mo fought some alien bullshit.
Reds to grays she'll be there to guide us on
Yes, there is. Just not a use for very large naval artillery.
Accuracy is really rough at operational ranges compared to regular artillery. In the past this was made up for by frick huge weight of iron broadsides but the little 1x5" mount is not going to get you there. Iowa could loft something like 40,000 pounds of ordnance per minute, sustained, until her magazines were dry.
Physics gets a vote though, and dropping something off an airplane from 40k' is much more efficient than projecting the same mass ballistically through a partially contained explosion.
The main problem was forward fire control. Aircraft tend to overfly the target and can visually spot and control their fire. Lucky for the US Musk has put enough sats into orbit to provide real time targeting over the whole world.
what are the political implications of an Iowa class battleship parked in the Black Sea
well, it would require a great deal of magic fairy dust unfortunately
yes and no.
Yes the class of ship is still reason able but they will be outfitted with rocket batteries instead.
No cannon at sea are pointless now.
the Mecha guys got it right. it will be missile swarms and counter measures with that ever energy weapons we come up with.
>No cannon at sea are pointless now.
Nope. Artillery is getting a lot better and smart rounds are solving the accuracy problems. ERCA for the Army's 155mm artillery can reach out past 40 miles and development is still ongoing. A cruiser sporting several 155s could easily outdistance a WW2 battleship. It could do it cheaply and shoot all day if the barrel is water cooled.
sure but a cannon assist rocket is still better. we can split hairs on this im sure but rockets really are just that much better now. a rocket can do 200 miles change targets 5 times and do your math homework for you.
guidance aside it is more about fuel use and getting ordinance to distant targets. rockets are better at long range, arty at shot. but rockets are simply more flexible because they can just take the short path.
naval gunfire was very effective during vietnam, doesn't get a lot of press coverage though
I'm a firm believer we should commission a class of heavy cruisers (CB style, maybe call it the South Carolina class in honor of the battleships) with 4x 8" gun turrets and plenty of missiles. Something to allow naval gunfire capability. Would probably be useful for invading China or defending Taiwan. We have no real naval gunfire capability now.
These would get sunk immediately. NGS in a Taiwan situation? This has to be bait you cannot be serious.
I don't think making special caliber would be wise. Development of gun and ammo for them would cost much and it would be very special snowflake gun with great chance to be cancelled see fate Zumwalt and it's woundergun.
I think best would be using 155mm land army guns and MRLS (GMRLS). They already exist and have bazillion stocks of ammo and mass production.
Something like land attack frigate with 2x155mm with 1000 rds, and GMRLS launcher with 60 rds. No need for extensive air defense, there are Air Defense destroyers already, they would be providing area AD.
Make it small, cheap and humble so it has better chance to happen. Uber cruiser with Uber guns would go right down Zumwalt road.
Italy thinks there is
man that looks like a tank round. I was tinking about the 8 inch to 16 inch range. nice 5 inch
is there any theoretical boon to constructing a frickhuge Ace Combat timeline style Stonehenge cannon to shoot at enemy aircraft and arty ground targets?
Yes, if you have AC supertech that allows you to build such things at a reasonable timeframe and cost and it has alternative uses (in the case of Stonehenge, shooting down giant fricking meteor fragments) that make it worthwhile. Or you could be like Belka and build a 1km tall laser rave tower that bankrupts your entire country.
For Artillery, for battleship now. BB is for fighting other BB there is no need for them.
For shooting against shore there is need for artillery, but such type of ship is called monitor not battleship.
The only thing they can do, that can't be done infinitely better by other ships, is to hold much bigger guns than can reasonably be used by ground forces. Which is useful for exactly one thing - fire support for forces within a few dozen kilometres of the coastline. Unless you're intentionally building your entire military around dedicated marine landing forces they're just not worth the cost of building them; and the only countries who could persuade themselves that that's a good idea (Britain, Italy, Japan) can't afford them.
well coast landings are very important for invasions. but large guns are not good for coastal defense. seems like China could use a battleship.
>seems like China could use a battleship.
Considering that the PLA are effectively a glorified occupational force for China at this point (and growing to be increasingly independent of the communist party) I don't see how a battleship would help them.
most cities are within 50km of a navigational water ways. they just need it for Taiwan and then keep the Chinese in check by droping a shell on a boat every so often. I see massive piracy in the event of taiwans fall.
My understanding is that once in a while an Iowa gets recommissioned to go shell a village in some sandy country. They have big frickoff guns and have such huge fuel tanks that you basically get a 2-in-1 artillery and fuel transport. Not really a ship guy though so don't take this too seriously