Comments by "Steve Valley" (@stevevalley7835) on "The Drydock - Episode 259" video.

wrt the Lexington's protection. As Drac said, USN Scouting Group doctrine was 35kts. The 1919 Lexington design was better protected than the earlier designs. From what I have read, the need for better protection was acknowledged, but the reduction to 34kts to gain the protection was only grudgingly accepted. The ship could easily have been better protected, but TPTB were not willing to accept a further reduction in speed. The alt history possibilities post-Treaty are interesting. Reportedly, the UK was willing to accept a single ship maximum of some 42,000 tons, because of Hood. If the other powers had dug in their heels and demanded that each was entitled to build a 42,000 ton ship, because of Hood, what would the US have done? If they completed one South Dakota, it would have been a red-headed stepchild as no other US battleship could keep up with it. With two Lexingtons being converted to carriers, a new mission for the battlecruiser emerges, as consort for the carriers. Seems most likely that, if the US had been allowed one 42,000 ton ship, it would have been a Lexington, not a South Dakota.
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@captain61games49 replacing twin 16" turrets with triple 14" would probably not save any weight. An interesting possibility would be to replace three twin 16" turrets with triple 14"/50s, of which the USN had a surplus in inventory by 1921, and delete turret #4. Besides eliminating the weight of the turret and barbette, deleting #4 would also allow the belt and armored deck to be shortened. You could sit down with Springsharp, first laying out Lexington as designed, then start making modifications to see if you can cut enough weight to allow better protection over what vitals remain, and maintain that 34-35kt speed. I have done that exercise a couple times, but I was not designing for a speed that high.
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@JimmyCricket93 organized training depots, as opposed to "on the job training", seems to have been established much later than I would have imagined. The RN effectively stopped using press gangs after 1815, but Parliament was still passing laws allowing press gangs as late as 1835. Great Lakes appears to have been the first official USN "boot camp", established in 1911. The first US Army training camps were established in 1917.
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