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Author Topic: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer  (Read 78456 times)

Jimmy James

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #225 on: March 20, 2010, 09:03:43 pm »

That explanes the fender fitted to 90 % of them --- It's been a good chase but youv'e finally brought the Fox to heel...; The next thing is to find out what she handles like
   My bet is a turning circle like a super tanker with a hangover and steers better at slow speeds going astern than ahead.....  Quick acceleration going ahead and even faster going astern (Any takers???) %% %% {:-{ :-))
Jimmy
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Martin (Admin)

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #226 on: March 20, 2010, 10:03:29 pm »

That must be the only class of ship to leave a slipway with a 10' bow fender built in!
 

"Arquebuse class destroyer - Owners Manual."

1. She steers like a pig.
2. Stopping...... You need to think ahead... real far.
3. Don't even think or trying to steer when going astern.
4. Have you made out your will before embarking?



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tonyH

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #227 on: March 20, 2010, 10:11:48 pm »

Aye JJ,

It's just that the ending seems so feeble, but I suppose many expeditions have the same experience of flatness at the end.

As far as the model is concerned, I've almost completed the planking and am just waiting for the running gear before sealing up, so should be on schedule for our April meet. Basic upperworks will be in place and, of course, a working version of the 'point' of the exercise (Ugh - Sorry :embarrassed:)

As to your idea Colin, I may just save that for the Mayhem Weekend!!!!!!!!! (OK Martin - You can have a play as well!!!!)

Tony


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tobyker

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #228 on: March 20, 2010, 11:55:27 pm »

Well, hasn't it been fun while it lasted!
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Colin Bishop

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #229 on: March 21, 2010, 10:53:15 am »

Be interesting to know what they expected to hit...

Colin
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tonyH

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #230 on: March 21, 2010, 07:58:43 pm »

Don't worry Tobyker, I'm sure another 'anomaly' will turn up as I trawl through the Victorian period - for example - disappearing gun mounts on ships, what was the point if the 'fuzzy-wuzzies' couldn't see the power of Empire?

I'm sure the answer to your comment comes from the fact that 99.9% of the photos of the ships show them 'bottom'-on to the dock!

Tony
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Colin Bishop

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #231 on: March 21, 2010, 08:08:40 pm »

Disappearing gun mounts were provided so that the gun could be reloaded out of sight behind armour. Ranges were so close in those days that shot trajectory was virtually horizontal. Of course when Gatling type guns caught on and were mounted in fighting tops the benefit become somewhat less. As disappearing mountings were heavy and expensive they soon died out in favour of the protected gunhouse. I think they were still used in land based situations such as forts where the drawbacks were not so apparent.

Colin
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Jimmy James

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #232 on: March 21, 2010, 09:35:11 pm »

Colin,
The Yanks were very fond of their disappearing gun mounts , Mainly the much vaunted Dinamite gun used in sea defence forts but as you mentioned the mounts were deemed impractically for marine use mainly due to the fact that the vessels of the time had a fairly low freeboard and the danger of flooding the deep Barbette needed to lower the gun out of sight was much too likely,.. making the gun useless... and it was also found that these guns were not as powerfull as the same bore gun using traditional powder and were also a lot heaver :-)) %) {:-{ so they went the way of many other insteresting but impractical inventions.
Jimmy
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tonyH

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #233 on: March 21, 2010, 10:31:42 pm »

Sorry, I wasn't really trying with that one but it's an interesting subject all the same.

Also Colin, for not saying that it was your comment that I was referring to in the second sentence of my last post.

Tony
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Martin (Admin)

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #234 on: March 22, 2010, 12:09:34 am »

( Never heard of one of those, but a search for 'Dynamite Gun' came back with an interesting page... can you read Chinese? - http://note100.egloos.com/5134369 )
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RickF

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #235 on: March 22, 2010, 10:32:48 am »

The only RN battleship to be fitted with "disappearing guns" guns was HMS Temeraire (1876), which also had the distinction of being the largets two-masted warship capable of being propelled by sail alone. She took aprt in the bombardment of Alexandria in 1882 and was not scrapped until 1921.



Rick
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Jimmy James

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #236 on: March 22, 2010, 08:49:22 pm »

I'd Forgotten about her. Carried 4 x 11" MLR's in two pear shaped barbette's (The RN's first barbette ship) The largest Brig evet built "8,540 tons Displacement" Built in Chatham Dockyard 1873 - 76
 Became a Depot & work shop Ship in 1902 and was renamed Indus II later Akbar sold out of service in 1921---- She was said to be a slow sailor but handy.
Sorry got carried away .. I started on a model of her 30 odd years ago... {:-{ Last I saw of it the young son of an old shipmate was carrying
it along the Quay in Cape Town with a huge grin on his face ok2
Freebooter
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Jimmy James

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #237 on: March 23, 2010, 10:28:38 am »

Rick F
 Could you tell me where you got the Picture of her I wouldn't mind getting a copy for my collection
  Jimmy
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RickF

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #238 on: March 24, 2010, 12:16:20 am »

It's from an excellent collection of Fred Mitchell paintings in a book called "Ships of the Victorian Navy" by Conrad Dixon (1987). It contains about 50 prints, each with a full page description of the ship.

Currently available from Amazon.

Rick
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Jimmy James

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #239 on: March 24, 2010, 09:01:08 pm »

Thank's Rick I'll put that on the wish list :-))
Jimmy
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Jimmy James

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #240 on: June 07, 2010, 10:00:41 pm »

Tony H
 Awaiting Trial's results O0
Jimmy
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tonyH

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #241 on: June 07, 2010, 10:26:39 pm »

Don't worry Cap'n, it's in for typing!

Tony :-))
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Martin (Admin)

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #242 on: June 08, 2010, 06:26:10 am »


I saw trials of Tony's  Arquebuse on the Sunday of Wicksteed....

She's a bit like trying to navigate a telegraph pole around a paddling pool!
 It needed all the lake (actually, a few feet more) to make a full rudder turn. Tony was on the helm and his mate Andy(?) was on
 the engine room telegraph [she has twin motors with overlapping propellers... and the rudder in the FRONT of the props!].

 She's quite fast in a straight line but anything more than a 5o turn is asking rather a lot of her. Tony and Andy had quite
 a realistic command banter between then and just for a moment or two, it was like listening to an old Sunday afternoon
 black & white British WWII film on BB2!....

 "Coming to port"
  "Coming to port, slowing port motor"
 "Helm hard over"
  "Port motor stopped"
 "Port FULL!"
  "Port motor reversed, Starboard motor full."
 "We're going to hit!"
  "Full reverse!"
  "..... to late."

    "........that front buffer beam is a good idea isn't it?"
 
 At one stage the wing took full control of the vessel and parked he neatly in the wooden dock... that's when they found out
 that a French Arquebuse class destroyer steers MUCH better backwards than forwards, I guess because the props and rudder are
 in a more conventional configuration.....

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tonyH

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #243 on: June 08, 2010, 03:33:56 pm »

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 consideration

On 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 O0
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Jimmy James

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #244 on: June 09, 2010, 05:11:18 pm »

As requested by Commander T. H.  I Dully presented my self at the lake side (Eaton Park .Norwich) to assist with the trials of TBD "A" at 10:07 Hrs BST  07.06.2010
 After inspecting said V/l and voicing previously stated opinion that she would Manoeuvre like a super tanker with a hangover hands were sent to quarters for getting underway.... Vessel laid stb'd side too along side the wall....First attempts to un-dock using engines alone proved that unless the wind was off the quay it was virtually imposable to clear the quay {:-{.... attempts to spring off using a head spring and then a stern spring also came to nought :(( .... An Anchor was then set to seaward of the port bow and it was found that by going slow ahead she would lift slowly off the quay O0.... Trials were then tried going slow astern on the anchor to spring the head off were also successful.  %).. once clear of the berth engine / Steering  trials were commenced (J.James in command on the Bridge & Commander T.H. in charge of the E/R)
 It was soon found that at speeds below Half she would only very sluggishly answer the helm when going ahead....at speeds above half to 3/4 speed she had as predicted the turning circle of a Super Tanker with a very bad hangover( taking 5/6Th's of the lake to turn (But this was her best Manoeuvring speed at Full speed she turned like an arrow loosed from a 100 Lb War Bow.... Going astern her maneuverability unimproved by 10-15% ....Berthing trials as expected underlined the extremely poor handling of this class of V/L at slow speeds and showed that Berthing and unberthing with out the aid of a tug or extremely skilled use of the v/l's anchors is most unwise
Trials were also made using a purpose made Stay Sail (Rigged RN fashion) as a passage sail  ---wile inconclusive were promising--- O0 Some light humour was injected into the proceedings by the appearance of the Freetrader Brigantine Freebooter which proceded to out maneuver the much vaunted French TBD in very light winds even with Commander T.H. at the Helm  %) Freebooters proper Master was at the time living up to his Flag and reputation :o  by conducting a raid on the French vessel's Grog Locker
Jimmy James  Master
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Jimmy James

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #245 on: June 09, 2010, 08:55:47 pm »

Tony
 How did the rest of the photos turn out?   Any chance of some copies
Jimmy :-))
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victorian

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #246 on: June 09, 2010, 09:59:10 pm »

I think these two pictures, 100 years apart, go together rather well:



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Jimmy James

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #247 on: June 10, 2010, 12:44:22 pm »

Tony... I told you we needed to ajust the ballast ,tweek up the engines and rig a smoke genny ... The Frogs are burning cheap coal again
 Nice match Victorian
Jimmy
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tonyH

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Re: Fat pointy thing! - Arquebuse class French destroyer
« Reply #248 on: June 10, 2010, 10:28:34 pm »

Don't worry Jimmy, I almost got a perfect match today when I left a lit blowlamp too near the hull. Not a good idea!

Tony :embarrassed:
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