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[Martin (Admin)]

I was just watching a couple of videos  of HMS Invincible (1907)

How do the centre / middle guns train, fully Port or Starboard with crashing into each other?

https://youtu.be/i2HACbJ8u84

https://youtu.be/PeufgxPlaFE

[raflaunches]

Hi Martin


In reality they rarely used the centre turrets like this as they found that they suffered from blast damage and potentially the ship wasn’t strong enough to maintain a constant fire from this position.
On the real Invincible’s the barrels were elevated to reduce the chance of them contacting the other turret but they could traverse the turrets if they were careful without doing so. On the next class, the Indefatigable’s, the turrets were further apart but unfortunately increased the twisting stress when fired in this position.

[Geoff]

On my model A turret is linked to Q turret with Q pointing forwards. P is linked to Y turret with both pointing aft. They are linked with bowden cables so I only get a maximum traverse of 180 degrees. Its actually quite complex and the sequence goes as follows


A & Q turn to port these have to be done first as otherwise Q guns will foul P turret
P & Y turn to port


This gets all four on the port broadside.


Next step is


P & Y to amidships
A & Q to amidships
P & Y to starboard this makes sure they don't foul Q
A & Q to starboard


This gets all four pointing to starboard.


Next step


A & Q to midships
P & Y to midships




Yes, it is complicated and I have to do this close too so I don't get it wrong! In reality the ships were really only designed to fire three turrets on any one side because of blast effects. At the Falklands they did fire all four per side and the blast effects were very unpleasant. The ships were originally designed to have the disengaged turret available if the engaged turret was out of action. The next class Indefatigable had a slightly different arrangement which gave wider arcs for P & Q.


Most picture show P & Q pointing in the opposite direction to my model as this gives more deck space for the crew but some photos show it they way I have built it and this makes it possible to get a four gun broadside without turning any turret more than 180 degrees. On the real ship I suspect they would just elevate the gun barrels to clear the opposite turret which is something I can't do.


I will be modifying Invincible so that only three guns can fire a side as firing across the deck is developing some staining which I wish to avoid.


Good question!


Cheers


Geoff

[ballastanksian]

The Indefatigables also increased their acreage of deck planking as well just to add to the damage potential!