Shipbucket

denodon wrote:Would they be direct drive or diesel-electric which would allow for cruising and high performance engines?

The Brommy-class CAs were equipped with twelve MAN 9-cylinder V-configuration double acting two-stroke diesel engines that were designed to provide a total of 165,000 shaft horsepower at 250 rpm (geared). The engines were arranged in three sets of four, each of which drove one of three shafts. The shafts each turned a screw that was 4.3 m in diameter. No diesel-electric drive.

The 1926 formed german airline Lufthansa had great plans for worldwide routes. Therefor airports, landing strips and fuel stations were needed. The Alvensleven was converted into a floating airfield. Equipped with a landing deck and the brand new arresting cables (german espionage on the RN was successful) the now called Transatlantikplattform 'Meerwein' was given in 1930 to Lufthansa. 1931 the Meerwein was placed on the route Berlin-New York. She was able to service any flying boat (ok, not the Do-X) and special small cargo aircraft with arrestor hook. Two of her three engine rooms contained now gas tanks and spare parts. The hanger was big enough to service even the large flying boats.
After 1938 the era of the longrange aircraft began and transatlantic flights without stop made the floating airfield needless. The blitzkrieg of 1939/40 saw 'Meerwein' untouched but in 1944 with upcoming war rumors Lufthansa gave the 'Meerwein' back to Kriegsmarine where the old battlecruiser was converted for her last mission (keep waiting please).

Nice!

Check space under main mast, I see couple of errors.

Ashley wrote: The Brommy-class CAs were equipped with twelve MAN 9-cylinder V-configuration double acting two-stroke diesel engines that were designed to provide a total of 165,000 shaft horsepower at 250 rpm (geared). The engines were arranged in four sets of three, each of which drove one of four shafts. The shafts each turned a screw that was 4.3 m in diameter. No diesel-electric drive.

You mention four shafts here yet before you said they have triple screws, just a niggle.

I'm really loving how the Meerwein looks too.

denodon wrote:

Ashley wrote: The Brommy-class CAs were equipped with twelve MAN 9-cylinder V-configuration double acting two-stroke diesel engines that were designed to provide a total of 165,000 shaft horsepower at 250 rpm (geared). The engines were arranged in four sets of three, each of which drove one of four shafts. The shafts each turned a screw that was 4.3 m in diameter. No diesel-electric drive.

You mention four shafts here yet before you said they have triple screws, just a niggle.

Thanks, corrected.

You're welcome.

Rhade wrote:Nice!

Check space under main mast, I see couple of errors.

Thanks, errors corrected on upper drawing.

Nice!

When Lufthansa gave back the ex-BC Alvensleven, now Transatlantikplattform Meerwein, the OKM had to make a decision about the worthy hull. Operation Sealion was to become reality next year and the Kriegsmarine was hastily building ships like never before, older ships were refitted to stand against the so said best navy in the world.
For a refit into a fullscale carrier there was no time, the hull contained only a third of its earlier enginepower. Half of the ship was fitted with a flight deck but the other half would have needed a complete rebuild.
So she was finally converted into a mobile starting platform for V1M missiles, the navalised and enlarged version of the V1. The concept was well tested with the cruiser Passau and the mobile airfield was the ideal source for a successful conversion.
The flightdeck was reduced to a helicopter landingdeck with hanger. The former repair facilites around the lift were removed for more storage. The big single catapult on the foredeck was replaced by two smaller ones. Some aa and directors were added, ready was the missilemonitor 'Baldur'. She was now able to store 60 V1M and every two minutes another pair of the could be fired. The ready-time for a V1M was eight minutes (fix wings, check electronics, carry it from the tracks to the catapult, finaly check, program target, final test and go), twelve could be carried ready.
'Baldur' had the speciol mission to attack the homefleet at Scapa Flow. In the night before the invasion she took position 90 miles east of Scapa Flow, one hour before sunrise the wrecking of homefleet began. Baldur managed to fire all 60 missiles until she was found by RN destroyers. But the ship was abandonded, the destroyers sank just an empty old wreck.

I'm sorry, but that ship makes no sense.
The V1 could, on a good day with a fixed ramp and known weather parameters, hit a target about the size of London and you're going to use it to hit point targets you can't see, from a location that isn't 100% certain, from a moving deck in the middle of the night?