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Tizer
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Posted -  20/01/2008  :  17:15
Warship, two funnels, Sydney harbour, 1913

 Warship, four funnels, Sydney harbour 1913

Postcard, 1913, warships in Sydney harbour, Australia

The bottom picture is from an Australian postcard which features in an article by Philip J. Chapman on page 32 of "Picture Postcard Monthly" magazine (January 2008 - lots of interesting poctcards shown in each issue!). I have kept the image small to avoid upsetting Mr Chapman. I have enlarged the two warships from the postcard image. Mr Chapman wonders whether the ships are Australian Navy or Royal Navy. The card is dated 17th November 1913 and was sent from "Wal" in Australia to "Pearl" in Wymondham, Norfolk, UK. The view is of Sydney harbour with the ships at anchor.

I have put these pictures on the OGFB site for general interest but also because someone might be able to provide more details of the ships. I started a new thread rather than disrupting the objectives of thomo's thread!

Tizer 


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Tizer
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Posted - 05/06/2008 : 10:21
Malcolm, thanks for the info. The newspaper touched on that one but said the other was thought to be due to being hit by one of its own torpedoes.


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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart


36804 Posts
Posted - 05/06/2008 : 13:10
I did hear about two years ago that the various navies were working very hard on a system that allowed them to track their torpedoes more accurately once launched.  The official reason was so that they could be recovered if necessary but there was some scepticism about this. 

Funny how I have always been interested in subs and anti-sub measures.  It might stem from the latter years of the war when my dad told me about some spigot mortars they were making at GGA in Audenshaw.  He said they were for a Top Secret (!) anti sub weapon called Squid, I'm not certain but I think it replaced one called Hedgehog.  But that's 65 years ago so it will not be secret now!


Stanley Challenger Graham




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Tizer
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Posted - 05/06/2008 : 17:01
Under that BAe picture of the Ikara it says "long-range guided anti-submarine weapon". But it's being fired up in to the air! As someone who knows nowt about such things this seems odd - shouldn't it being fired under water to find a sub?


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pluggy
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Posted - 05/06/2008 : 22:36


quote:
Tizer wrote:
Under that BAe picture of the Ikara it says "long-range guided anti-submarine weapon". But it's being fired up in to the air! As someone who knows nowt about such things this seems odd - shouldn't it being fired under water to find a sub?


The Ikara was effecively a small rocket propelled plane with a torpedo on its underside.  The idea was that if you detected a submarine 20 miles out which was to far for the torpedo to travel under water you fired an Ikara which flew the 20 miles in a few seconds and then released the torpedo in the vincinity of the submarine. The torpedo could be swapped for a nuclear depth charge if you wanted to make a real mess.  There was much speculation aboard the Aurora as to whether we had nukes on board.  

It was a better idea than it worked in practice, they were unreliable and even if the missile got the torpedo close to the submarine, the torpedo would often explode when it hit the water at several hundred miles an hour.  A helicopter could fly 20 miles in a few minutes and drop a weapon just as well. It could also be used as an air ambulance, post van, eye in the sky and a dozen other uses.


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frankwilk
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Posted - 06/06/2008 : 07:53
Ah Pluggy that would be the 600 lbs Nuclear Bomb  then ????



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Tizer
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Posted - 06/06/2008 : 12:46
Who knew on the ship whether or not nuclear weapons were aboard?


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pluggy
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Posted - 06/06/2008 : 19:58
Presumably those that needed to know, the general ships crew certainly didn't.  I don't know the details of the stuff the Ikara could carry. I just knew it had options and a nuke was one of them. I beleive the nuke wasn't carried most of the time, it was just put on if they thought we might need it. But we never really knew one way or the other.  The launcher was under a retractable cover most of the time.  It was rarely on display as in the photo of the Ajax.


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Tizer
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Posted - 03/02/2009 : 17:00
Battle cruisers off Scillies files/pictures/16/122/20090203174506_1994_1_rs.JPG

I wonder if anyone can help with background to this picture? (Click on the picture for a bigger version.) This is a photo I took - with the camera held way above my head -of a picture on the wall in the cafe of the Geevor tin mine in Cornwall. So please excuse the poor quality - there is reflection from the glass in the picture frame and distortion due to the angle (my arms are two short!)

The picture appears to be printed in "landscape" format in a journal of some kind - to the right is the top of the page with the date August 10th 1901. What appears to be the title of the journal is simply "The King". The picture was drawn by Norman Wilkinson and is titled "The Great Fight Off the Scillies" and captioned "Our drawing depicts an absolutely unique event in the naval manoeuvres - the first time when two large cruiser squadrons have met and fought. This magnificent sight was seen last week off the Scilly Islands and was made more interesting by the fact that the engagement was carried out at 18-knot speed. Drawn by Norman Wilkinson."

What puzzles me is that I can't think of any fighting off the Scillies by British warships in 1901. I wonder if they meant it was a staged event for practice or publicity? It's worth having a look at more pictures by this artist (I wonder if he is related to our own Frank Wilkinson?) and some are shown on this web site. together with details of his background. Go to:
http://www.art-gallery.co.uk/sell_artists/norman_wilkinson.html
read about him, then click on the "Click here to view stock" for more pictures.


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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart


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Posted - 04/02/2009 : 06:45
Bit puzzled, it says on the caption that it was 'manoevres'. They were having a practice!


Stanley Challenger Graham




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Another
Traycle Mine Overseer


6250 Posts
Posted - 04/02/2009 : 07:29
The only war we were involved in at that time  was with the Boers in South A|rfica and i'm pretty sure that they did not have much of a navy. Must be manoevers. Nolic


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Tizer
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Posted - 04/02/2009 : 11:05
Ah, so you are interpreting "manoeuvres" in the strict sense of naval practice, not in its more general sense which can mean tactical moves in the engagement of the enemy. There seems to be a lot of steamin' and shootin' going on, so I thought it was more warlike than a practice. But then the hard men of those days probably practised by shooting up each other's ships!

I recall that the Royal Navy sank a lot of the Russian fleet some time at the beginning of the 1900s but that was in the English Channel and not just off the Scillies.

Did you look at the Wilkinson pictures on that web site? They are not only of interest to ship enthusiasts - there are other subjects and even a painting of Blackpool beach and tower!


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Tizer
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Posted - 30/09/2009 : 20:24
Aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal has had a refit and her hull has been painted with `intersleek' paint. The navy claims this reduces fuel usage by 9% and raised top speed by 2 knots to 20 knots.


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Stanley
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Posted - 02/10/2009 : 08:01
So they are catching up with the sharks then?


Stanley Challenger Graham




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Tizer
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Posted - 03/10/2009 : 11:33
More on the Intersleek paint here. And more on shark skin's properties, which are being mimicked, here.


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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart


36804 Posts
Posted - 04/10/2009 : 09:41
Shark skin was commonly used as an abrasive/polisher by carpenters before the days of modern abrasives. I have an idea it was used on sword handles as well to give a firm grip.


Stanley Challenger Graham




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