Shipbucket

Very nice work, I think Ashley drew the M some time ago, but this version looks far more historically accurate.

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Never-Were British Aircraft

It's rather odd they went with a tripod, rather than the typical tube mast seen on most German cruisers. I imagine that it was for increased visibility?

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We can't stop here--this is Bat country!

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"That is a very graphic analogy which aids understanding wonderfully while being, strictly speaking, wrong in every possible way."

Hi,

I'd like to show to you a highly hypothetical drawing of the improved M-Class cruisers "Q-R":


Since my references on German never-were cruisers are fairly limited, I could not find plans of the ships. I don't even know if any official ones were made...

The only reference I could find was a drawing found on german-navy.de.
http://www.german-navy.de/kriegsmarine/ ... index.html
I have used said drawing as basis for mine, with a few logical additions here and there.

I don't know how "realistic" my drawing is and if it can be accepted as an uploadable "never-were".
Well, here it is anyway:


Thanks for looking!
-maomatic-

Good looking cruiser maomatic.

If these were to be improved M's, that would be 43/44? Would the twin 37's be replaced with the new 40mm.

Hi Krakatoa,

as planned, the M-Class cruisers were to be equipped with the awful semi-automatic 37mm Flak C/30 twins.
So the drawing is true to the design in that respect.

An improved AAA-outfit for ships commissioned around 1944 would be logical, though. ("Barbara"-refits f.e.)

As a side note, the 40mm Bofors were never more than an interim solution until the 37mm Flak M43 could become available.
It seems like the KM never received more than about 100 captured guns to mount on its surface ships.

So fitting them with M42's or M43's might be a more realisitc approach.


To keep in line with the references, I'll leave the drawing as it is, though.

Assuming the 55mm cannon's problems were worked out and the design went into production, what are the chances this would have replaced the truly wretched 37mm?

Also, was the quad 30mm (which was to have replaced the quad 20mm on the Wirbelwind AA tank) ever considered for naval use? I know the twin 30mm certainly was but never actually entered service.

Just as an aside - I once read somewhere that the fact the He-162 Volksjager was fitted with two 20mm cannons and not the intended two 30mm cannons was not that the airframe couldn't handle the recoil but was instead the fact that the main factory producing the 30mm fell into Soviet hands...

Hi eltf177,

it was recognized (even pre-war), that the older guns were no longer effective against the faster and better armoured emnemy airplanes.
So while the 55mm Flak Gerät 58 was intended to replace all of the 37mm-calibre guns, the 30mm guns were to replace the 20mm guns in service with the Kriegsmarine.

The destroyer Types 1944 & 1945 were to carry 55mm and 30mm guns.


According to my copy of "Marine Arsenal - Leichte und mittlere Artillerie auf deutschen Kriegsschiffen", a quadruple mount for the 30mm MK 303 was "envisioned".
If I recall correctly, only land-based prototypes were made. You can find a depiction of it on the Kriegsmarine-partsheet.

Very nice work, as always! I have to know: are the O-class battle cruiser or the other forms of the H-class BBs (H-41-44) possibly in the works? I know you'd do them all justice!

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Excellent addition!

Maomatic,
PS: your main forward-mast, with rangefinder atop look like a 1920s-early 1930 german ship..., not really good for a 1936/1938 designed ship