#Victoria 3 warfare full
Victoria and Howe were both very fast ships for their time on trials Victoria made 11.79 knots and Howe achieved 13.56 knots though neither was carrying anything like a full load.
#Victoria 3 warfare how to
But captains had to learn how to trim their ships as the coal bunkers gradually emptied. The early engines were bulky, and the weight of machinery, low down in the hull, enabled builders to greatly reduce the amount of ballast carried, or even dispense with it altogether, as in the 101-gun HMS Conqueror (1855). Victoria was the largest wooden-hulled battleship ever built, and was briefly absolutely the largest, until the arrival of HMS Warrior. Quite apart from the superior shell-resistance of iron, the problems arising from powerful machinery and heavyweight guns in a wooden hull encouraged the use of iron in construction. Even so, the seams tended to separate and it was a leaky ship.
The hull was heavily strapped on the inner side with diagonal iron riders, 127mm (5in) wide and 25mm (1in) thick, to hold the planking together against the vibrations from machinery and screw. Eight boilers were arranged laterally in four pairs with the engine between, and it was the Royal Navy’s first two-funnelled warship. It was a hybrid, a traditional wooden-hulled three-decker of 121 guns with steam engines, and cost £150,578. Victoria was laid down at Portsmouth on 1 April 1856 and launched on 12 November 1859. In the British Admiralty’s typical knee-jerk response to French developments, it was intended to rival the 130-gun French three-decker Bretagne, which had been laid down as a sailing ship but was converted to steam propulsion while building, and launched in February 1855. Victoria however was planned from the start as a steamship. But the Royal Navy still had relatively few steam-powered warships and a hurried programme of conversion began. Steam propulsion, with its speed and independence of the wind, really came into its own. The Crimean War of 1854–56 was a long-distance war for France and even more so for Britain, requiring transport through the Mediterranean and into the Black Sea. Lord Auckland, First Lord of the Admiralty 1846–49, had defined the new requirement for design: ‘…the manner in which the screw auxiliary may be best combined with good sailing qualities.’ The last sail-driven ships of the line were ordered for the Royal Navy as late as 1848 (the 80-gun Orion class). Already obsolescent despite its steam propulsion, it had an active life of less than 10 years. With its sister ship Howe, Victoria was the last wooden-hulled three-decker to be built for the British Navy. Despite powerful engines it carried a full spread of sail. The two-funnelled Victoria combined up-to-date and traditional features. HMS Victoria, painting by William Frederick Mitchell, 1898
0 kommentar(er)
