Re: FT-Fighters and launch bays

Ryan Gill wrote:

> At 10:04 PM -0400 6/6/01, Richard and Emily Bell wrote:
> >
> >Wet navy carriers have different problems.  The reason as many
> >planes are on the
> >deck as there are is to make room in the hanger deck for servicing.
> >As a gross
> >percentage of total tonnage, the Nimitz carries a pittance.	Less
> >than five percent
> >of its mass is its airgroup (unless the average carrier aircraft is
> >fifty tonnes).
> >At one point per fighter, the typical FT:FB1 carrier usually triples
> >that number.
>
> Funny how they carry a larger air group. 80+ aircraft... The Ark
> Royal carrier that the NAC uses only has 36...

Using the masses in FB1, the US CVN has a mass of about 900 (fully
loaded).  An Ark Royal scaled up that large would carry 27 squadrons of
six fighters.

>
> >
> >If your cargo space has the facilities to fuel and arm the fighters,
> >it is a launch
> >bay without the external hatch, so it will be almost as expensive.
>
> Aye...
>
> >
> >Did they operate more fighters than they were designed to, or did
> >they previously
> >operate fewer sea harriers due to budget constraints?
>
> Its my understanding that Carrier ops have wiggle room as to the
> number of aircraft you can operate. Typically British WWII carriers
> didn't have any deck parking, the US went with deck parking in
> addition to below deck parking. Combine that with the arrangements of
> the armour and deck numbers (US had 2 below deck aircraft areas vs 1
> for the British iirc) and we had more larger air groups.

The US also left out most of the armor, the british had the unusual idea
that a carrier might be caught in a surface engagement, so they
protected
their carriers against 6" shell fire.