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linseed — HMS Vanguard
Published: 2010-02-26 21:35:46 +0000 UTC; Views: 44365; Favourites: 180; Downloads: 5643
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Description
HMS Vanguard. South Atlantic, 1982Motto: ‘We lead’.
A speculative (fictional) plan drawing of HMS Vanguard, the Royal Navy’s biggest, fastest and last battleship, had she survived in service into the 1980’s.
Laid down in 1941, launched in 1944 but not commissioned until 1946, HMS Vanguard was built quickly under wartime conditions by John Brown and Company, on Clydebank. The ship was intended for wartime service, and to speed up construction the Vanguard’s main guns and mountings were taken out of storage (they had originally been mounted on HMS Courageous and HMS Glorious).
The Vanguard carried out various roles during her career, acting as flagship, training ship and even as a Royal Yacht (carrying the Royal family to South Africa in 1947). She was refitted in 1954-55 and then entered the Royal Navy Reserve Fleet. After efforts to have her turned into a museum ship failed, Britain’s last battleship was finally scrapped in 1960.
During her naval career HMS Vanguard never fired her guns in anger…
…but what if?
My speculative design is based on the idea that the Vanguard remained in the naval reserve post-1960, and had been refitted and recalled into the fleet (much like the US Navy’s Iowa class battleships were in reality).
The Vanguard retains her original primary and secondary armaments, eight massive 15-inch guns in four twin mountings, and sixteen 5.25-inch guns in eight twin mountings. I have added four MM 38 Exocet anti-ship missile launchers, one twin Seaslug AA launcher and four quadruple Seacat AA missile launchers. She also retains eight of her original 40mm Bofors AA guns in single MK VII mountings (genuinely still in use in the 1980s).
I have also completely revamped her communications and radar package and made changes to her upper works and deck (including adding a helicopter landing pad).
[I took the original plan drawing of HMS Vanguard from R.O. Dulin & W.H. Garzke’s. ‘Battleships: Allied Battleships of World War II’. (1980)]
Wikipedia article.
[link]
HMS Vanguard website.
[link]
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Comments: 30
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Yes currently you have a 3 shot Sea Slug SAM system with a long reload my hand around maybe a hour. I have the original plans of HMS Vanguard both as ordered in 1941 with Pom-poms and KGV-Lion style bridge and as finished
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Not Sure if any of you have actually seen the below decks arrangement of Sea Slug handling on the County Class DD's but it was pretty long and extensive (it took up nearly 1/4 to 1/3 the length of the ship), so I'm not sure you'd have the space where it's fitted, also if I'm not mistaken didn't Sea Slug reload horizontally on the County Class DD's? Sea Dart on the other hand was comparatively compact and loaded vertically from a missile magazine below the launcher so if you assume that Vanguard could have been chosen for a trial installation of Sea Dart then...
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Quite a nice redesign. She's quite the lovely ship, though I think the positioning of the Exocets essentially right next to the primary batteries will expose them to severe shock damage (as large-caliber naval guns tend to produce- it's why the Iowas couldn't mount additional weapons closer to their own guns). The missile weaponry, save the exocets, is fairly obsolete, BUT if she was refit earlier in the century to this configuration then I see no reason why she couldn't still have them. Overall, great job, and she still looks beautiful!
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I like this idea of modernising HMS Vanguard. I think you have caught her just right. She should have been kept on like the Iowas in the USN.
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Why would they have kept the 5.25 in guns in there current state? Would it not have been more likely that they would instead place the 4.5 inch Mk 5 on or an automatic 5.25 inch gun instead? Hell even replaced them some of them with some sea dart systems?
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A pretty cool idea. But, as others have stated, I think the Seaslug is a poor choice, specially in that location; the missile had to be assembled before launch, and then railed up to the launcher; can't do that there. I would suggest removing it and instaling a Sea Dart launcher by removing the X turret. Also, only 4 Exocet, on a ship this size? Go for 8.
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I'd take out the two rear turrets and put a whole barrage of exocet missiles.
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Good idea. Would also open enough space bellow for more Seaslug SAMs, which I understand were huge and required a lot of handling space.
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Now this would have spooked the Argies. Would have provided a nice big target for Exocets though.
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Awesome! The HMS Vanguard in alternate history! I would like to see her in action if she was saved from scrap. 
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The Sea Slug did took more space than the Sea DArt; in fact, some half of the lenght of the COUNTY class destroyers was devoted to the Sea Slug missile. A number of the missiles were stowed unassembled and there were assembly, finning, warming up and loading facilities. There's no way a launcher that aft could be serviced.
The Sea Dart was a vertical affair, with an storage area, a finning/warming up middle stage and the laucher itself. It could have replaced one of the main gun turrets and "recycle" the barbette for protection. Also, the Type 909 illuminators are muchs smaller that the gigantic 901 used by Sea Slug
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Nice work! I can't believe the Brits scrapped such a good ship! They should've followed our example with the Iowa's instead of just scrapping it after just 14 years! She was still so young!
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This is great work, but if I may be so bold as to make a few points:
The Sea Slug is obsolete by 1982, and while it was still in service it was only on ships ready for the scrapyard, and I doubt the Sea Dart would fit. Considering nobody is going to send a battleship out without escorts, the Sea Cat would be sufficient, but if this update is being done in the late 70s or early 80s, it probably would be better to fit it with the Sea Wolf, which is considerably more effective. Losing Sea Slug gives you a bigger helicopter deck, which is safer and allows you to use bigger choppers - The Sea King instead of Wessex, maybe.
The Exocets would have to move, too. Where they are positioned will make them highly vulnerable to the overpressure from the big guns' blast, which testing on the Iowas found was too much to allow the Sea Sparrow to be fitted. Might be better to lose the Bofors AA guns (obsolete by 1982) and mount the Exocets ahead of the rear turrets. It's also worth noting that Vanguard would be the only ship in the Royal Navy with the 5.25" guns, all RN vessels had switched to using 4.5" guns by the 1960s.
Overall, this is a very nice upgrade to a fine ship. If we're assuming she was taken care of before being reactivated, the Vanguard would have lots of life left in its mechanicals.
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Would be interesting to see a 2010 refit of this... delete the sea slug, replace the sea cats with 21-missile RAM launchers, the Exocet with Harpoon, a couple of the Bofors mountings with Gatekeeper or Phalanx CIWS. Be tempting to stick a SAMPSON radar on there and see if you could work in some ASTER cells too!
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