GUNS AND ARMOUR?

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 655, 4 November 1909, Page 7

GUNS AND ARMOUR?

«■■■' ■ <■ " FRENCH'EXPERIMENTS. UNIFORM PROTECTION ADVOCATED. WATERUNE WEAKNESSES. (Br Teiesrapn-PMse AwotlMio'n-Copyrleht 1 ' < Peril, Nov'ombor 2. In oidar to4ost modern gun firo against modn. Crn armour, the frronch nnval authorities cxro porimented. on the battleship Jona, which was c 0 disabled by an explosion, in 1907. ■ o The guns boat the arniour'in ovory instance, ,d and proved that no vessel is euffielontly pro- ' e . tected against the latest types of projectiles. It a _ was also found to lip essential thfit tlto tvhoi* , n of tlw vessel should he uniformly protocted." (a French vessel, 1 ! are considered to bt better |u protected than 'those of other nation's. It is do-' 0. clarcd that (ho battleship Danton, Prance's tg latest type, would float, while a Dreadnought je or a Gbrmnn Niwm would,nak'tho Russia*, ships nl Tsushima if hit on the waterline, *" TV/b CONFLICTING TYPES. ii. ENGLISH AND MU3NOH ARMOURING METHODS. P' The foipfoing moMogo illuhlvatrs Iho unsaliert lJcloiy, iiaUirc. of, niEii} of the cuircnt cable, i|ios'a(,*s and is evidently a-condensation of , 0 details turni'Jipd lo s'jliie English liapor by 'ft writer aho is complete!; ignorant ot LkcqvQSunns at istiio.jn Hie complex problem—ship"' 7, armour and its fttlack. The armour of the ~ Jena and iU penetrability or'oUienviso' is too'' j well known lo require but tlio mos-' j. cage soenii to assume i (1) Thnt there is some n doubt oMjtuig in Ihp inSnds pf experts as lo the . d ponehabilltj of Known tjpes Mid thicknesses of i 1. armour; (1) that there is a difference of opitt--0 'ion as io i whether .-ships ,ofi>)vaf .should bei' r, urmourqcl armoured only. iu^atu., |j Comper.satloiu for. Reduced -Armouri t' -- As to {ho first point, 'the pencil ability of >- hriipp-comented plates is exactly estimable for Lnown rouges, typns cf puns, and IJpcs'of prpjpctilcs by tho application of n mathematical process known ns Twidor't. lormula. As to the t vrond point, there ne\er hws been any question of tho desirability of plating a ship all over, but pvpi.v -hip is built on a giion csti. male, and Iho problem which plwtj* eorifroiil»i" v| the naval aiclutect is whether, bv tlio sacrifice of h certain ainourl of nimnur. othc points of utility could be embodied in the i.'iip which nould'lnorr than cnlnpMi< itt> for' <he disndvnlitase of hti-.inii lurße ure.is of the 4hip's side., nunrlnoured. Tho question is a oomples 'one, lult, in ypiiPinl, it is cicivwhero admitted that the disadvahtni((> of unplated portions is (m > the present atalp of bhlli'lies) more than compenfittted for by the extra ijmi.powor or onßiiioy power secured by the'iiacrifico in weight of arm- , our. ' , ' French Waiorlinc Belt., ,' For prncticnt purposes tho only question Iβ: How , <-hould ft m\en weiitiil of armour bo hl>' plied P 111 Sir Willinhi White's deans'n vei- r. ticdl citadel was nlwnys built dp in tho wbistt of tho nliip. while thi> ends were totally unprotected. The opiiosilc typo io this was the French design* of M. JJrl-Lin and'others, when one lons strip of armour ran aloug tho waterine from ptom lo btetn, while the upper portions in "tho heart of the ship" were left exposed. Both sljlp3 lm\o their stroni; und weak 1 noints, and tho Dreadnought (designed by Sir . Phillip Watts), is a compromise between' the two. It was probably to throw additional light 1 on the morits and demerits of these two radic- ! ally different idens thnt experiments on the ■■' Jena were conducted. The cablegram, however,' omits certain essential details,' vis., rangos, type of Runs cmnloyed, and the naturo of tho projectiles, whether fitted with,the Johnson A.B. cap'or not. " ■ ' , > Tsushima No Parallel. Witli lo tho portion of the cablegram rcferrini; to the proWwra of the'Danton . ' as againfet thai ot tho Dtradnought, it is true that the, belt cf the Danton olp£js is, vertically, n-.oro extensive then m the case of most other Clarees of battleship, but Ihe superior broad- * > side of the Dreadnought' atid the Nassau nioro , thhh oomiMnsntts for this. The llurfiari.Bhips, which v.to Mink nt Tsushima, have nothing to do with the rase, ns Hiesc tyjKS and the ether typnuneiitioned in lhe o «nblcgrtun.tire (or I i mrc) # cni'inly diw-imilar. In any east,,'theiiiwcn w'r-s mot their doom, uot bv, perforat'on of tho bell, but by steady shcll-fire ap- , phpd all over. 'He. raon os they,were flooded 'siiflloieitly )o' nffeci," their' stability, at all, they capslred. It was recoßnised wicn these , 'Inns wore launched thnt tM metawntro in each wm daiiacroiMy low, ahd Ihe ringe'ftf correspondingly sinalli This was .not improved by the fuc 1 that they carried Test quantities of o\il ou dock when going info' action r .. i i'