Weather limitations in carrier aviation in the interwar and WWII eras (1 Viewer)

[Admiral Beez]

Comparing her and her sisters to modern ships (like the US Wasp and Ranger) ignores the advances made in Steam machinery and other 'details' that could save well over 1000 tons of weight to use on other things.

They were old, that's for sure. Ironically of all the RN's carriers of 1939, only their half-sister Furious (and Argus) survived to postwar. The saddest loss for the RN was that of HMS Ark Royal with her modern machinery and advanced design. Those skinny lifts made Ark ideal for the F4F and F6F.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

I wouldn't call the Ranger a modern ship. It was with good reason that she saw limited combat use and was never sent to the Pacific even after the US had lost Lexington, Yorktown Wasp and Hornet.

Aside from anything else, the absence of useful torpedo defense in a theater that had shown Japanese torpedoes to be a serious threat would certainly be folly. Look at what happened to Wasp or Hornet to see how bad that could get.

 

[Shortround6]

I wouldn't call the Ranger a modern ship.

It was one of the treaty limited ships, trying to fit a quart in a pint pot.
But she had early 1930s engines and boilers and early 1930s construction techniques/engineering. Compared to 1914-15 engines/boilers/engineering.
Furious and sisters had boilers that were good for 5000hp each, Rangers boilers were good for 8900hp each. They may have been bigger but the power per ton was a lot lower which meant there was more tonnage in her limited hull for other things. Wasp did even better, 11,666hp per boiler.

Have to search for actual armor weight but According to Friedman the Ranger had none, except for 2in on the steering gear sides and bulkheads and 1 in deck over the steering gear.
Nothing over the machinery and magazines. A real egg shell.

 

[don4331]

Excellent points. Mind, the post-Midway Japanese made due with conversion carriers that were not much better. Give Courageous and Glorious to the IJN and they'd be happy enough. Though they'd probably extend the flight deck in a light weight fashion, like on the merchant conversion carrier Kaiyō, shown below.

View attachment 786970

That merchant conversion has much more 'robust' lines, especially in the bow. than the Courageous class LLC conversion. Block coefficient is ~.56 for IJN CVE versus 0.50 for the RN CV. RN CVs were 4k tons overweight vs as built (additional 0.7m draft and bow wasn't up to required strength to begin with. The structure on Kaiyo might be open but the weight of the deck is still there.

To extend the deck over the bow, C/F/G need a bulbous bow to restore trim, then they need to be razed to the keel to increase the hull strength so the ship doesn't split in 2 the 1st time it heaves. Even the Japanese would sooner just move the nameplate across.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

According to Friedman the Ranger had none, except for 2in on the steering gear sides and bulkheads and 1 in deck over the steering gear.
Nothing over the machinery and magazines. A real egg shell.

Wasp was little better. Granted, no carrier would likely survive three Type 95s landing so quickly, but the Stinger got stung where she really had little defense at all. Put those same three fish into an Essex, pray for great DC or kiss 'er goodbye.

Ranger, and Wasp, would have little hope even against two Type 95s. No torpedo defense integrated, and both built light for treaty reasons. Shake, rattle and roll ... over.

 

[GrauGeist]

I beleive the thinking behind the early carriers, were that they were a compliment to a battle group in the age of battleships.

The carriers were not force projection, but rather a tool to aid a battle group, so they were not armored as such.

Of course, this ideology would soon change in massive learning curve.