Comments by "Steve Valley" (@stevevalley7835) on "The Drydock - Episode 208 (Part 1)" video.

After rolling the "which rebuild to sacrifice to rebuild Hood" question for a few hours, and foregoing future knowledge, I think I would have sacrificed Renown. The question is which rebuild results in the most satisfying result? QEs can go toe to toe with other battleships. So can Hood. Renowns are too thin skinned. Give both Renowns a modest update changing out all the low angle 4" secondaries for DP twin 4", and several Pom-Poms. with an eye to making them fast escorts for carriers, able to fend off aircraft and attacking destroyers and cruisers.
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@Segalmed fwiw, I saw a movie many years ago about the passengers from a ship that had been sunk, in a lifeboat. Instead of oars, the boat was propelled by a screw driven by the passengers pushing and pulling on vertical levers that extended from the bottom of the boat. A Google search yielded a few photos of such a lever driven screw propelled lifeboat being demonstrated at the King George V dock in London in 1925.
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@kemarisite That is what I was thinking. The UK had a highly developed ammunition industry. Not a big deal to copy the French shells. iirc, when the RN was using US built 14" guns on some monitors in WWI, they made their own shells for them, but bought USN smokeless propellant for them as using cordite imposed a range penalty.
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