Proposal to Improve Historical Accuracy of Introduction Years and Types of Gun Construction - New Year's Special Feature

[BattleshipOfDestruction]

This topic is to discuss an improvement to the historical information on the topic of Gun Technology. This is not related directly to the guns in game, more of a general guideline that came from my research that doesn't fit anywhere else. More topics will be coming about other modules and discussions on their accuracy and possible improvements that can be made. 

From what I can gather about gun technology in terms of primary armament Battleships/Battlecruisers usually were equipped with a 10 inch gun or higher (some exceptions could be made in the case of American large cruisers with 8 inch guns, but they easily fit into the high end of the heavy cruiser designation so in this case the exception was omitted), 7-11 inches on heavy cruisers (including the earlier armored cruisers and earlier protected cruisers), 4-7 inches on light cruisers (including the semi-armored cruiser, scout cruiser, torpedo cruiser and some protected cruisers), 4-5 inches on destroyers (including torpedo boat destroyers, the intermediate predecessor to the destroyer in its modern form), and 2-4 inch weapons on dedicated torpedo boats. Secondary armament for battleships ranged from 2-9 inches, 2-6 inches on battlecruisers and heavy cruisers, 2-4 inches on light cruisers, 2-3 inches on destroyers and no secondaries on torpedo boats.

In general, I find the progression of guns in the game to be uneven and nonsensical in most cases. From a historical perspective every new gun of a new caliber was known as a Mark 1 in some form while using similar technology from a different caliber that may have a mark 5 designation for example. Also it makes no sense that each gun individually increases in mark level every innovation starting with the lowest caliber to the highest caliber split between two research trees. Historically speaking if an innovation was made in that department, it was applied universally to all guns in service. The unlock of 7-8 inch casemates and turrets also perplexes me as many nations in the 1890s had access to those calibers. Therefore a more realistic progression would be like this:

1890: 2-13 inch caliber available at MK 1 Tech Level

1900: 2-14 inch caliber available at MK 2 tech level with 14 inch designated Mark 1

1910: 2-16 inch caliber available at MK 2 tech level with 14 inch designated Mark 1, and 15/16 inch designated Mark 1

1920: 2-18 inch caliber available at MK 3 tech level with 14, 15 and 16 inch designated Mark 2 and 17/18 inch designated Mark 1

1925: 2-19 inch caliber available at MK 4 tech level with 14, 15 and 16 inch designated Mark 3, 17/18 inch designated Mark 2, 19 inch designated Mark 1

1930 2-20 inch caliber available at MK 5 tech level with 14, 15 and 16 inch designated Mark 4, 17/18 inch designated Mark 3,  19 inch designated Mark 2 and 20 inch designated Mark 1

From my research using the NavWeaps repository using hundreds of real warships for this data point, I have found that Single gun armament reloads on average 5% faster than dual gun armament. Triple armament, due to the more cramped turret layout on average, is another 5% slower. There are two types of quadruple armament. One is the British style seen on The King George V. These turrets are as similarly cramped as triple armament and thus carry the same 5% reload penalty, but due to the fact the guns are uniformly spaced are only 2.5% less accurate than triple armament. The other case is the French Style Split Quads. Split Quads are in effect two dual gun turrets sandwiched together on a single rotating mount and due to the higher space reload effectively the same as dual gun turrets. The Split Quads also have armored partitions in the turret to prevent the entire turret being knocked out if a shell were to damage that turret, allowing for most of the firepower contained within to continue firing at the enemy and are in general a bit heavier than the US/British Style. Because of this unique design, the split quads are less accurate than the UK/US equivalent due to the larger space in the middle between the two pairs of mounts. This results in about 5% less accuracy compared to triples. Originally in the mod, I would have given the Traditional Quads (US/UK style) to the United States, Britain, China, Austria-Hungary, Japan and Spain. For the Split Quads I would have given them to France, Italy, Russia and Germany.

Another point I would like to add to this is that for weapons 7 inches or less, I would have liked the ability to do what many shipbuilders did and have a choice between turrets with gun shields (freestanding casemates in other words) and fully enclosed turrets. This would have made the game a lot more historically accurate. This also is considering that a lot of gun shields would have taken up a lot less space and weighed less than fully enclosed turrets which would have allowed many historical ships built with the editor to have their full historical compliment of armament without being overweight or having turrets that it didn't historically have due to the historical option being either too heavy or bulky for the hull selected.

Finally, I would like to give a full explanation of what each era of gun construction was like from the perspective of the adjusted mark levels. This detailed information comes directly from my historical research:

Mark 1 (1890): By 1890, Metal Mills at the time could produce steel at such a quality that it was superior to Wrought Iron as a material for naval artillery. However, the lack of supply meant that navies couldn't fully adopt it due to cost and supply issues. Therefore a hybrid construction of Steel tube and Liner with Wrought Iron Hoops between them was devised, using the built-up construction method as a stop-gap until more reliable amounts of steel could be manufactured. The Built-Up manufacturing process utilized a single piece tube and liner that was then heated with hoops of material in-between which bonded them together. This allowed for easy liner changes to extend the lifetime of the gun tube, allowed for better accuracy and was less expensive to manufacture. This was the first naval cannon that was designed to use Smokeless powder. The fairly new de Bange Breech System solved the loose seal problem of the earlier Armstrong Cup Breechloading Mechanisms by using an Asbestos Pad covered in grease which expanded and sealed the breech when firing. The de Bange system was the template upon which future screw breech systems would be iterated upon to the present day. Still, the sytem was very slow to reload due to the three step system and the 90 degree rotation required to unlock the breech. The breech was slightly heavier than later guns because of only having a 50% threaded breech which then required 50% longer breeches to ensure the backpressure from the blast wouldn't compromise the breech of the gun. This was normally applied to guns greater than 6 inch, but to smaller guns, the QF system of vertical rolling block breeches were normally used with a brass case for the propellant which improved reloading speed. The de Bange and QF systems were used for low and high caliber naval guns, however for medium caliber guns of between 4-8 inch the new Bofors Ogival or Elswick Conical Screw Breech was used. It was a bit lighter than they had been if they used the De Bange system, but slightly heavier than more traditional QF rolling block breeches in exchange for higher safety and ease of reloading with a two step unlock and swing away design. This was made possible by the conical threads; decreasing in diameter towards the muzzle. Although not useful for large caliber guns due to not being able to handle higher pressures, it did have superior use in medium caliber armament compared to De Bange and the QF System.

Mark 2 (1900): By 1900, Steel Mills could produce sufficient Steel in enough quantities for both armor and guns. This was true for most countries, but for the British it wasn't. For a period of about 20 years, the British used a new construction method called wire wound which used steel wire that is tightly wound around the liner and then the whole gun is heated and allowed to cool in order to bond the liner and outer jacket together. It was more expensive to construct, but used less material. Also at the cost of accuracy, the guns had better longevity. The problem with earlier breech systems, especially the de Bange system, was that it was a three step process to open and close the breech because of its design. Also the de Bange system was very heavy because the lack of stepping in the thread pitch required the breech block be long enough to accomodate enough threads to create a reliable gas seal. While working as a weapons designer for Thorsten Nordenfelt in London, Axel Welin solved this problem in 1889–1890 by using stepped threads so that instead of half of the breech being threaded, depending on the number of threads (2 being the bare minimum for an improvement, 4 being ideal and both common and realistic for the time) between 60-80% of the screw was threaded allowing for a shorter breech and screw mechanism which saved on weight. Also, unlike previous designs that required a full 90 degree thread rotation to unlock the breech, this design only required 30 degrees at least of rotation to unlock which greatly sped up reloading. Initially this was a two motion breech block system where one motion unlocked the breech and another opened the breech. This was often mounted vertically with the breech screw dropping down instead of swinging out to the side. It was widely adopted by almost every navy in the 20th century, in particular the US and British Navies for all guns starting at 6 inch and above. 5 and 4 inch guns returned to using the QF system with two piece brass cased propellant with seperate shell.

Mark 3 (1920): At this point the Built-Up Gun construction was more feasable due to better supply of mild steel. This improved the accuracy, allowed for easier liner changes for the rifling and the cost was much better compared to Wire Wound Construction. Wire wound construction was largely abandoned at this point. The QF system was still used for most guns under 6 inch caliber.

Mark 4 (1925): The Improved Welin Stepped Interrupted Screw Breech System improved the mechanical system by which the breech was opened and closed. In one motion, the breech could be unlocked and opened after firing, the new shell and powder rammed home and then the breech block snapped back into place in one motion. This did come at the cost of extra weight for the mechanicals, but wasn't nearly as heavy as the de Bange system of the 1880s. With the breech system improved, the guns of this period mostly switched to this breach system, while the QF system was relegated to guns of 4 or 3 inch or less.

Mark 5 (1930): The Hybrid Construction Technique was introduced by the Japanese for their 18.1 inch guns. Made up of an effective hybrid of both construction techniques (built up and wire wound), combining the cheap easy construction, easy rifling liner changes and preserving some of the superior accuracy of the Built Up Gun construction, but preserving some of the barrel life of the wire wound gun construction. It was a Jack of All Trades approach to Gun Construction which had no glaring downsides, but had less effective upsides.