I wonder if an all aft superstructure as with Astronomer / Reliant would be more acceptable?

Argus primary purpose when converted was to provide a training platform for helicopter pilots at sea, so they would be able to land on any moving ship (the space behind the aft superstructure is used to simulate a Frigate’s landing pad, whilst the port side simulates a carrier’s deck). For this reason, having the superstructure block forward was more important at the time. Sea Harriers could practice Ski Jump launches on land at Yeovilton just as easily as at sea but landing on a moving ship (approached from astern) needed a real moving ship approximately the same size as an Invincible. Experience had already been gained with Atlantic Conveyer (landing pad forward / hangar aft), Atlantic Causewayand MV Astronomer (hangar forward/ landing pad aft in front of bridge) during the Falklands War, and indeed Contender Bezant had also been converted with an (above deck) hangar and landing pad aft in 1982. Astronomer’s conversion to RFA Reliant was a stopgap experiment pending the completion of Contender Bezant’s conversion to RFA Argus, so the variations possible were fairly thoroughly explored at the time.

If the Kuznetsovs lifts are such a bottleneck why where they not moved like the Varyag?

Obviously not clued in on Navy stuff but are the lifts the single biggest reasons the kuznetsov can deploy less aircraft than the varyag?

Wont the Royal Navy have to sail its carrier without any aircraft for a few years due to budget constraints?

Kuznetzov and Varyag are twin sisters. The lifts are in the same position. Did you mean Kiev? Ulyanovsk?

The CVFs will have aircraft. They will have rotor blades on top 95% of the time but if the press are around one or two jets will visit for the day…:eek:

There was a 3rd tiger decommissioned in 1972. The last of the Darings, Battles and the converted World War 2 destroyers were decommissioning around this time as well. Albion Also decommissioned 1973.

The Manpower was there.

Personally I’m curious about whether the Sea Vixen could have been fitted with the radar of a Phantom and given Sparrow/Skyflash. Still subsonic, but unlike the sea harriers they would have at least had a Radar guided missile (and they look good too). (The Centaurs could operate both these and the Buccaneer’s).

Lion was decommissioned an the mid 60s and held in reserve for a while. Her conversion was cancelled in 1969 or thereabouts and afterwards she was used as a source of spare parts for her sisters, so much so that Tiger was soon nicknamed Liger! After paying off her crew was dispersed throughout the fleet so cannot be added to this equation. Thanks for trying to help though. I have always believed the RNs manpower crisis of the late 70s was in part as a result of the perception that there wasn’t much of a Navy to join amongst the general public (at least those who would have been interested in joining); “Join the Navy, see the world! Well see the North Atlantic in Winter, maybe the odd trip to the Med, a lot of bobbing around off Norway, and hope the Russians don’t attack because we won’t have any air cover beyond UK coastal waters! Oh and the pay and accomodation isn’t much better than when your dad served…”

The RN had the infrastructure to support five CVs in the 60s, it seems odd to suggest they could not support two in the 70s. They had been planning to do so right up until 1969 when Eagle’s Phantomisation was cancelled. Two helicopter cruisers over one CV? No cruiser of the 70s could hope to match the firepower of a strike carrier or come close to the flexibility. No contest.

Speaking of conversions, looking at a picture of Contender Bezant as she originally was…

http://www.royal-navy.mod.uk/server/show/ConMediaFile.30945

…does suggest quite a bit of reconstruction around the original superstructure – any particular reason why it couldn’t have been done around the funnel?

IIRC, one of the options before Ocean was ordered from new was such a conversion with an island towards the stern of the ship.

Argus conversion involved adding new accomodation blocks to the existing superstructure, hence it’s enlargement. To remove the forward structure and build a starboard island would have been a lot more expensive, plus the accomodation would have had to go below decks soaking up hangar space. Also with the forward superstructure retained, the politicians would be less likely to view the ship as an aircraft carrier, still a politically sensitive issue at the time.

Perhaps, not too sure though the money still wasn’t there (lets face it bean counters wouldn’t spare the money to Phantomise Eagle so 1 or 2 new carriers of that size was a nonstarter).

maybe the funds would have slipped through If the RN had bitten the bullet in the mid 50’s and accepted the fleet was going to shrink drastically instead of building cheap crap frigates based on WW2 destroyers (T14,15,16 also a reduction of Bay and Loch class that survived WW2) and worked on new designs with far smaller numbers (small number of T11, slow diesel ASW frigate based on the Leopards this would have served as a cheap to mass produce combatant in the event of a war instead of the WW2 compromises) in which case by the late 60’s there would have been manpower and a little more money to spare to keep the carriers in service longer and the next generation escorts such as T82 and T19(effectively a 40knotter ASW frigate based on T12 weapons [IIRC she was binned and the cheaper tin can T21’s were ordered]).

that could have free’d up enough funds and resources to keep Vicky serving into the early 70’s(perhaps later if she could’ve been Phantomised) Ark Royal and Eagle serving until the early 80’s at least (on the likelihood of Ark Royal spending most of the 70’s in refit), leading to a replacement class in the 80’s in a high-low mix of 4 with 2 upper end carriers replacing Ark Royal and Eagle, and alot cheaper slightly smaller derivative without cats and arrestors running on diesels to replace Bulwark and Hermes in the commando carrier role

all of this said though chances are Labour would’ve still attacked the navy left, right and centre in the 60’s

urgh, what could have been if the eyes were open for it.

The economics argument against retaining the carriers doesn’t hold up to scrutiny, simply because the money we allegedly didn’t have was spent anyway, to much less useful effect. Phantomising Eagle was estimated to cost £5million in 1970 prices (compared to £32million for Ark Royal), and yet at the same time around £15million was spent converting the two Tiger class cruisers to operate just four Sea Kings each. Eagle carried six Sea Kings in addition to her jets and so was arguably a more useful ASW asset than either Tiger. Each cruiser soaked up over 900 men each so ditch them and you are well on the way to providing the manpower for a carrier. Also between 1971 and 1973 £25million was spent converting Hermes from a ctol carrier to a comando carrier to replace Albion, which was in good material condition and not in urgent need of replacement by any means. Albion was actually sold to a private company for further service as an oilfield support ship but the scheme fell through and she was scrapped. So far I’ve managed to save about £40million without trying too hard. More savings could be found without looking too hard I believe. On the same budget that was spent historically I am convinced the carrier force could be maintained through the 70s and beyond. The Invincibles were not cheap by any means either, and it has to be remembered that the size of a warship has very little efect on the final cost of buying. Keep the missile systems to the minimum necessary for self defence (as the US does) and the price alters a lot more than reducing size by 20% for example. This goes a long way towards bridging the gap between what can be afforded and what can’t.

Cost of escorts has been mentioned, as in we couldn’t afford eight type 82 (about £30million each at the time), and instead we bought 14 type 42s (estimated at about £20million). Looks like the money was spent anyway to me…

cheers for the info.

Re the “small carriers”. Can anyone tell me the length and beam of the Atlantic Conveyor? And has anyone got any photos of the Atlantic Causeway with its ski-jump? or the Ro-ro Agostino Neto?

… you can see where I’m going..

FYI Atlantic Causeway never recieved a ski jump during the Falklands operation. Her conversion only differed from her sister ship in having the landing pad fitted just in front of the Bridge structure instead of near the fo’c’sle. I recall reading about it in the mid 80s and the conversion was a forerunner of the Arapaho conversion of the MV Astronomer into RFA Reliant. The Containers lining the deck to provide a wind break in ‘Conveyer were given a rudimentary roof on ‘Causeway by means of Flat rack containers bridging across the stacks to provide a rudimentary hangar forward.

The location of the forward lift was wrong. Too far back, requiring two 180 degree rotations of the aircraft, one when landing and taxing back, the other on the aft lift when coming up again. That taxing back in itself would have been a problem, since otherwise deckspace could have been used as parking space. And an internal lift only works if located at the end of the hangar deck, not somewhere in between, as here (as far as one can tell from the artist’s impression). Generally speaking for a carrier ~50.000 tons deck edge lifts are already the better solution.

If one would like to have kept the basic layout, the aft lift would better have been moved to the stern, as it would have enabled a clean tail-first flow of aircraft (only in connection with a more forward located internal lift). Such a layout could have given a nice parking space/taxi space seperation in the hangar.

The problem with the “Alaskan Taxiway” is, that it cuts into hangar space below. (In this design here somwhat mitigated by a very narrow design.) But the idea itself is sound, as it provides a clear separation of landing and launching operations. The bow cat would have been the standard cat, while the angled deck cat the surge cat.

(Those bridle catchers look indecent! :D)

The Alaskan Taxiway was positioned over a large sponson to starboard, which increased internal volume and allowed a LARGER hangar than otherwise. The reason for the forward lift being centre line rather than deck edge was because the designers thought a deck edge unit would be vulnerable to rough weather in the North Atlantic. The aft unit being further back was considered less vulnerable. Remember at the time the RN only had experience with two deck edge lifts (Hermes and Ark Royal), one of which had already been removed (from Ark 1959-60). The thinking was that aircraft could be brought up from the hangar on the aft lift and taxied outboard of the island to the forward cat without interrupting the deck park between the island and the landing area or landing operations. Recovering aircraft would be able to taxi straight onto the forward lift if necessary (assuming fly one was either full or in use for launching operations), though 180 degree turns would not be necessary, aircraft either in or going to or from the hangar on British CVs tend to be kept facing forward as much as possible. Deck towing tractors are normally used during these manouvers as the aircraft’s engines cannot normally be run in the hangar. CVA-01 did feature and engine running bay at the aft end of the hangar where aircraft could be positioned with their tails over the stern, next to the Sea Dart launcher.

In 1967 her angle-deck catapult was replaced with a longer one to “provisionally” equip her for Phantoms.

No it wasn’t. Her waist catapult was installed during her 59-64 refit and remained unaltered until her disposal. The modifications which were carried out in 1967 were to replace one of her DAX I arrestor wires with a DAX II unit for trials with the Phantoms, and in place of upgrading her JBDs a moveable steel plate was lashed to the deck behind the CALE positioning gear to absorb the heat of the Phantoms’ afterburners. After each launch the plate had to be cooled down by the fire crew with water hoses, before the next aircraft could taxi over it. During the trials her JBDs were not used.

Victorious’ withdrawal date was more to do with when it would be possible/ desirable to provide a replacement rather then when she would cease to be materially viable. Her 50-58 refit was said at the time to have given her twenty years more service life. That takes her to 1978, but obviously providing a replacement before that date is desirable due to her inability to operate Phantoms. She could have been retained as a training carrier for DLPs and as an ASW helicopter carrier, much like the French Arromanches was.