Comments by "Sar Jim" (@sarjim4381) on "The Drydock - Episode 072" video.

Ranger was always considered kind of developmental carrier, a step between Langley and the Yorktowns. US wargames of the 30's showed flush deck carriers presented few advantages compared to the operational efficiency of having an island, and stacks exhausting through the top of the island were far superior to the side mounted exhausts of Ranger. She could have been a better carrier if the stacks could have been changed when the island was added but, this still being in the depths of the Great Depression, the money wasn't available for that drastic of a redesign. Nothing could be done to improve her low (for a fleet carrier) top speed, and the flight deck and hangers all required strengthening to cope with the demise of the biplane. For the rest of the war, other than a few relatively low intensity periods of combat, Ranger worked out what was to become an increasingly important carrier task - transportation of and flying off fighters to reinforce AAF aircraft and crews in Africa and Europe. After a disastrous start to this task that caused the loss of ten aircraft on her first mission, she was able to fly off more AAF P-40s from the deck to supply badly needed replacements in North Africa. As far as I know, these are the only instances of P-40's flying off from a carrier. She settled down to her transport task until 1944 when she returned to the East Coast to operate as a training carrier. Given the flood of new carriers and pilots coming online, this was probably her most important role. Her role as a training carrier continued until October, 1946 when, being well and truly worn out, she was struck off the naval register and sold for scrap in January, 1947.
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For those who may not have seen it, there's an interesting postwar summary about the 40mm Bofors from the Bureau of Ordnance at https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/Admin-Hist/075-Ordnance/075-Ord6R.html. While the 2 pdr was the finalist in the USN medium AA gun along with the Bofors gun, it was the continued British use of cordite powder that caused the Bofors to be the winner. Muzzle velocity was indeed important, but the fact the 2 pdr was already using inch measurement compared to the known problems of adapting metric to inch for the Bofors was an important variable that probably would have led to the 2 pdr's adoption if not for the cordite issue. Since it was a powder no longer in use in the USN, it would have required an entirely new manufacturing and supply line for the round, or a total dependence on Britain for supply. Neither one was considered desirable and, after September, 1940, it was considered that British supply might not even be possible. All the other issues could have been worked out, but cordite powder did the pom pom in for the USN.
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@kemarisite The USN used Cordite N flashless propellant during WWII for cruiser and battleship main guns. The US didn't manufacture flashless propellant at the time because it required huge amounts of electricity to make, and the power plants on the Canadian side of Niagara Falls was the only place in North America with the required power while still being reasonably close to shipping ports and ammunition factories. The Bureau of Ordinance considered it dangerous because it was brittle and contained unstable nitroglycerin, the cause of many RN magazine explosions. Because it deteriorated and became even more unstable in the presence of heat or moisture, the first uses of shipboard refrigeration plants was for magazines. They had to be inspected at least once per watch for any temperature or humidity variations outside regulations. If conditions got too far out of spec, the propellant case had to be dumped overboard, something that could cost a ship's captain a promotion, so magazine inspections were quite rigorous. For night fighting use, we had nothing better than Cordite N, so we imported about 250,000 tons a year from 1943 until late 1944. The BuOrd developed their own smokeless charge, Alabanite, which contained no nitroglycerin and produced even less flash than Cordite N. The only downside was shells using Albanite were about 10% heavier than those using Cordite N. The USN was willing to accept this tradeoff for a more stable and less flammable propellant. Albanite started being used in 1945, but it didn't really get into mass production until the very end of the war. So, the short answer is, even though we didn't make Cordite N, we imported large quantities of it until it could be replaced by Albanite.
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@stevevalley7835 It did get as far as several design sketches, but it was clear early on that conversion costs were going to be about 20% of her new build cost, and the naval budget just couldn't handle that. The 29 knots was trials speed in her original displacement of 16,9000 tons. By 1944, her displacement had crept up to 19,900 tons, and top speed was down to 26.1 knots. She was still useful as a fleet carrier early on in the war, when fleet speeds in general were only about 27 knots, but that changed rapidly once the Essex class, Iowa class and the Cleveland/Baltimore classes came into commision. All these ships could easily exceed 30 knots, and they became the determining factors for what ships could work with the main task forces. Ranger was still quite useful as a fast aircraft transport.
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@kemarisite Yes, it did, since the use of cordite ammunition was something the BuOrd was 100% against. There was an accumulation of reasons why the Bofors won, but the use of low velocity Cordite propellant was one of the main ones.
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@kemarisite We were also using cordite ammunition in WWI, and there's a good chance we may have had the same magazine explosion problems if our capital ships had been involved in a Jutland type battle. In the days when cordite was the only true smokeless propellant, starting about 1895, the increase in visual range without all the smoke was considered an acceptable risk. It required meticulously following anti-flash precautions to prevent fires and explosions, and that's what the British weren't doing.
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@kemarisite I think you're confusing standards with practice. All the other non-nitroglycerin powders were adopted as standard for new and remanufactured guns, but there were still guns on older battleships that could only use cordite. I believe the same was true for some earlier 5"/51 and 6"/50 guns as well. As I've already written, we imported hundreds of thousands of tons of cordite during WWII for use in all capital ship guns because it gave less flash than any of the adopted standards. Night fighting with the Japanese, who were using almost 100% cordite propellant, demonstrated why we needed to rapidly reduce the flash from our own guns. The BuOrd didn't like it, but we really had no choice. It was only with the invention of Alabanite that we had a propellant that could replace all the others on a one for one basis.
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@stevevalley7835 The cordite loading of the 2 pdr was a real mark against it. As you say, the guns had to sit loaded in the tropical heat, sometimes for days if there were no aerial attacks. The magazines were huge in terms of capacity, but that also meant they were heavy and time consuming to reload. Lack of high velocity rounds and no tracers until late in the war were more problems when the gun was operated in local control. The whole question about which gun did the job better should have been solved when the Vanguard was built using only Bofors guns for the medium AA battery. I believe it was the first major ship in the RN completed with no 2 pdrs.
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@scottgiles7546 LOL. It may not just be your glasses though. I use Arial font in Chrome, and pom and porn look virtually identical. It's only that little space between the "r" and the end that sets them apart.
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@Exkhaniber LOL. I just wish I had Drach's smooth delivery and posh accent.
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Breakfast for me, but the same sentiment otherwise. :-)
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Happy Birthday, Dr. Potato!
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@dr.potato76 You're welcome. How many years do you have on the clock?
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