Thanks Martin!
It's fun trying to prove that design flaws can occur in the real world!
To the Lords Commissioners of Mayhem, I respectfully submit the following for their considerationOn the 7th inst. Vice Adml James and the undersigned attended at Eaton Park, Norwich for the purpose of further trying and assessing the characteristics of the French ship Arquebuse.
The first thing was to ballast her down to the line. She was VERY light at Wickstead as can be seen in your photos, and even when Andy provided a spare lead-acid battery as ballast she was uncontrollable. We also set the end points on the rudder servo so that the rudder was just about touching the shafts giving a MAXIMUM travel of about 15 degrees each side.
1. Leaving the Dock.
If moored alongside, it was almost impossible to get her unstuck. The nearest we came was reversing away and even this was marginal. The fact that the shafts are angled towards each other going towards the stern meant that the rudder effect was partially neutralised in either direction.
Once she was a couple of inches clear, she would move smoothly away but needed a lot of space.
We then tried dropping an anchor well off the seaward side of the bow and on going ahead the bow was pulled away from the dockide to give clear water. This may be the
onlyreliable way.
2. Docking.
She would come alongside cleanly but again needed a long approach. We then tried docking stern on (since almost all of the photos show this to be common practice). Again, lack of control was very obvious, as was coming in bow first, so we then tried dropping the anchor well away from the dock and letting the ship go astern and drag (trawl) the anchor back to a decent mooring. This was a lot better and the only way to do it, as far as we could see.
3. Handling at sea.
With the right ballast, generally handling was as could be expected. I.e. she needed a lot of space. Optimum turning seemed to be at about 3/4 throttle and she seemed to prefer going to starboard (but this may be down to inaccuracies in the build).
There was a definite problem with cavitation at higher speeds. The propellors were made (by George Sitek) to the size and pitch from the builders' drawings and so there is definitely an inherent limit which may have been there in full size. The shape of the stern is not helpful being very rounded. The location of the screws is not quite right, by the thickness of the locking nut, so removing these would bring them slightly further under the stern and closer to the hull. This could reduce the cavitation.
4. The Pointy Thing.
After the collision with Stavros' lighthouse, it was felt that a further test was required and I'm happy to report that, as evidenced below, a high speed approach to the pond wall led to a 1" movement on the 'prong' and no damage to the forward plates or stempiece!!!!!!!!!
5. Piracy.
At various stages during the proceedings we were approached by the pirate ship Freebooter which, beiing commisioned by Adml James, tried to cause havoc but which was doomed to a slow time due to the lack of winds. We have appended a picture for identification.
We commend the above to Your Lordships and remain,
Yrs Etc.
TH
Jimmy, I'b be obliged if you could add your specialised overview 
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Topic: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer (Read 84897 times)