Congratulation Beardmore Shipbuilding for awarding design Geryon
HMS Geryon is going to be laid down in September 1907 and HMS Gaia in December 1907.
Runner-up: Caperdown
This time I will not write why each design was not chosen but show evaluation process. In case you have some other opinion or other view, I would like to see your comments. It will not change the results of competition but could be interesting debate.
1. minimal protection - it is good to set up minimal requested protection for design. As design meet this criteria, other reason things as costs could be considered more important
a) horizontal - I consider 1.5" deck armour as minimum however at least 2" highly prefered as even now at 1.5" armour deck protect against 14"(Q-1) at 12000 yards.
b) vertical - It is needed at 5000 yards against 14"(Q-1) needed protection is 12.3" so I considered that total belt armour and sloped deck armour should be at least 13"
Design discarded: none
2. Speed - as evaluation was declared to be based on overall firepower, protection and costs any speed over 21 knots is considered as very slight advantage
Design discarded: none
3. Firepower - there are mainly 2 difference - using 6 or 8 main guns on design. I have not decide yet which principle is better but I set some guidelines of each principle.
a) 8x14" guns - as firepower is priority, the costs are not and quality of protection is most important
b) 6x14" guns - as they are only 6 guns, important is costs which needs to be at least 25 % cheaper than variant a) and have a little better protection
Design discarded: Revenge, B2 (usual design has costs 10.5-11M per gun, these 2 designs are much more expensive going over 12.5M per gun and their protection is not signaficantly better)
2. Protection of 8x14" designs
a) protection of 1.5" deck armour - at least 1" better turret and belt armour to any reamining design
Design discarded: Variant E, F
b) comparison of protection between Caperdown, B1, Gaia design
- turret armour - Gaia (13.5/3) and Caperdown (13/4) almost equivalent, B1 slightly inferior (13/2.5)
- deck armour - Gaia and B1 (2") slightly inferior to Caperdown (2.5")
- citadel vertical protection (belt/sloped deck) - Caperdown inferior (11/2.5"), Gaia inferior (12/2" and 11/2") to B1 (12.5/2")
- extended belt - Caperdown (2/1) and B1 (2/1) inferior to Gaia (11/0 but limited)
- extended deck - Gaia inferior (none protection) to Caperdown and B1 (1")
- torpedo protection - B1 inferior (none) to Caperdown and Gaia (TDS lvl 1)
- CT - minimal difference between Caperdown (2"), B1 (3"), Gaia (4.5")
importance of each part from most important to less: turret armour, citadel vertical protection, deck armour, torpedo protection, extended belt (it is not as important as for battlecruiser), extended deck, CT
Design discarded: B1, Gaia
3. Final comparison between Caperdown (winner 8x14") and Geryon (winner 6x14") - only quality of ships itself
a) costs per gun - not significant difference
b) propulsion - as stated in criterias it is equivalent
c) protection
- turret armour - Caperdown (13/4), Geryon (13.5/3) - a little better for Caperdown
- citadel vertical protection (belt/sloped deck) - Caperdown (11/2.5), Geryon (12/2) - a little better for Geryon
- deck armour - Caperdown (2.5"), Geryon (2") - a little better Caperdown
- extended belt - Caperdown (2/1), Geryon (2/0) - a little better Caperdown
- extended deck - Caperdown (1"), Geryon (1") - a little better Caperdown
- CT - Caperdown (2"), Geryon (4") - a little better Geryon
Evaluation of protection: Protection is considered as equal if we take coal bunkers into considaration
4. Strategy evaluation
As both ships have almost equal protection, most important will be strategy view.
6x14" - more smaller ships
8x14" - more powerful single ship
Budget considaration - costs per month: Caperdown (3188), Geryon (2432)
Budget available: 3.6M for 7 months, 6.1M after with reserve 42M ==> up to 7 M per month
Comparison with foreign designs:
No ship in construction is expected to be more powerful than any of designs.
Variant a)
2 Caperdowns - 12M reserve budget and fund blockade for 27 months
Variant b)
2 Geryons - 29M reserve budget and after 7 months +2.3M for another construction program (possible even better design after 1 year)
Winner - Geryon as with 2 ships in construction it gives more flexibility
note: the first design discarded does not mean that it was worst, the procedure was done to evaluate designs by easist way