Because compared to the King-class battleship announced by the Navy of the Kingdom of Krul, the Yonglin-class battleship that is still under construction can compete in terms of firepower, but it is at a huge disadvantage in terms of armor protection and power speed.
As for the high probability, let alone the new generation battleship of the Kingdom of Krul that uses a 350 mm caliber naval gun. The large caliber main gun alone is scary enough.
The performance is estimated to be able to instantly defeat all warships currently in service, under construction or even on the drawing board in the world!
Faced with such huge pressure, there are naturally calls within the Daheng Empire Navy to build capital ships with larger tonnage and larger caliber naval guns.
But the Daheng Empire, not to mention more advanced naval guns, even the 300 mm and 30 times the caliber naval guns were barely able to produce them with the efforts of the whole country. It is impossible to get larger caliber naval guns in a short time.
Therefore, the Daheng Navy can still only build warships with a caliber of 300 mm and 30 times.
As for why we continue to build a large number of seemingly outdated battleships, it is because even if the performance of the subsequent improved Yonglin-class battleships is somewhat lagging behind, it does not mean that they are useless.
No matter how advanced the warships of the Kingdom of Krul are, they still have the limitations of the times. The only ones that can survive are the 350mm caliber breech-mounted guns, steel-faced ironclads, and triple-expansion steam engines that use strong ventilation technology and higher air pressure.
But even if the other party possesses comprehensive advantages in firepower, protection and power through stronger industrial technology capabilities, it is still impossible to be one-sided.
The power of the Eirin-class 300 mm and 30 times caliber naval gun is enough to threaten any warship currently in service, including the King-class battleship of the Kingdom of Krul, and even their secret new warship may not be able to stop it.
If the opponent's armor is too thick, then the worst possible outcome is to get closer and hit him.
This is also the reason why countries have chosen to build smaller tonnage coastal defense ironclads or second-class ironclads for many years. Poor performance does not mean that they cannot fight!
As for the performance gap, what should we do?
According to the consistent thinking of Daheng people, if the performance is insufficient, the quantity must be made up!
The original plan was to build two Yonglin-class improved battleships, but the Navy has changed the plan. Two ships are not enough, and four ships must be built.
The navy's ideas are simple and honest!
Lin Ziran didn't say much about this. Anyway, in the early shipbuilding plan of the second phase of the naval plan, there was a plan for eight battleships. According to the previous plan, in addition to the existing two unified-class battleships, Yu Qiansheng
Two ships were started in the second year, three ships were started in the third year of Qiansheng, and three ships were started in the fourth year of Qiansheng, making up eight ships.
However, the construction of any ship did not start in the third year of Qian Sheng, and it will not start this year for the time being.
So it is normal to make up for it later.
Anyway, the funds have already been reserved. Now that the Navy has made a decision, let’s start construction!
Soon, the Navy's shipbuilding plan was approved. It is expected to start construction of two ships in the second half of the fourth year of Qian Sheng, and two more in the first half of next year, for a total of four new battleships.
The first ship of the new type of battleship is the Endless Sea, also known as the Endless Sea-class battleship.
The Endless Sea-class battleship is a mature and improved version of the Yonglin-class battleship, with a standard displacement of 10,500 tons. Like the Yonglin-class battleship, it has a low-freeboard, semi-enclosed exposed turret design, and is equipped with a central axis of double-mounted 300-meter front and rear turrets.
The main gun has a caliber of 30 mm, six secondary guns of 150 mm and 30 mm, and multiple small-caliber secondary guns of 75 mm and 40 mm.
Its main armor belt is made of steel-faced iron armor, with the thickest point reaching 380 mm, the thickest point of the gun mount armor reaching 300 mm, and the thickest point of the command tower reaching 300 mm.
Using a new type of steam engine, the power reaches 7,500 horsepower and the speed reaches 15.5 knots.
The design of the Endless Sea battleship is also a typical design scheme of the battleships of the Daheng Empire Navy in recent years. It adopts a central axis front and rear dual-mounted large-caliber main guns and a semi-enclosed exposed turret with low freeboard design. Although this design is difficult to operate in complex sea conditions.
The seaworthiness is poor, but as the main gun becomes more and more powerful, and even steel-faced armor cannot withstand the main gun, in order to ensure the protective performance, the armor must be very thick, which makes it impossible to take full measures.
For a closed turret, the center of gravity cannot be set too high, and the tonnage and cost need to be controlled.
Such a low freeboard design became the inevitable choice of the designers of the Daheng Empire Navy in the early years.
Interestingly, the King-class battleships of the Krull Kingdom Navy also adopt a low-freeboard semi-enclosed open-air turret design.
Of course, the Krul Kingdom Navy did not copy the battleship design of the Daheng Navy. They used this design much earlier than the Daheng Navy.
To be honest, the battleship designers of the Daheng Navy borrowed a small amount of the designs from the Krul Kingdom Navy.
Well, the Battleship thing can't be said to be plagiarism, it's just a reference!
Generally speaking, the changes in the Endless Sea-class battleships and Yonglin-class battleships are not major, and the details have changed. In addition, the biggest change is the change in armor, and this also represents the rapid technological changes on Blue Star in recent years.
In just a few years, the armor of warships of various powerful countries has changed from wrought iron armor to steel armor.
Luohai Iron and Steel Plant successfully replicated and produced this type of armor based on foreign samples of this type of armor after three or four years of technical research. Although this type of armor is more expensive, its protective performance is much better than that of wrought iron.
After live ammunition testing, 300 mm steel-faced armor can obtain the protective effectiveness of 400 mm wrought iron armor.
This also allows the warship to reduce the weight of the armor per unit area, allow the armor belt to be laid in a wider or thicker area, and free up weight to equip more secondary battery firepower or increase the power system.
Although the caliber barrel length of the attached main gun has not changed, the barrel life is longer and the ability to withstand bore pressure is better. It can even be fired with strong charges.
In terms of power, the triple-expansion steam engine is naturally still used, but the processing technology of the steam engine is better, which improves the power of the steam engine. At the same time, when the maximum power is turned on, the endurance time is longer, and it has barely reached the average level of steam engines in major powers.
.
In addition, it will also be equipped with a new four-year armor-piercing projectile, which is an armor-piercing projectile product developed by the Jingzhou Machinery Bureau. Well, it is said to be research and development, but in fact it is a copied pointed armor-piercing projectile from the Kingdom of Krul.
The warhead of this thing is made of hardened high-strength steel. The tail of the projectile has a cavity and is equipped with explosives. It uses powerful kinetic energy to penetrate the armor of enemy warships and then explode to kill the enemy.
And according to the different internal charges, they are divided into armor-piercing bullets and semi-armor-piercing bullets!
Although the Endless Sea-class battleship, which uses a series of new technologies, does not appear to be much different from the Yonglin-class battleship on the surface, and even has similar tonnage, in fact the performance gap between the two sides is relatively large.
To a certain extent, the Endless Sea-class battleship is actually headed for the navy of the Kingdom of Krul. Especially the steel-faced armor technology is not very mature yet, and the cost is also very expensive.
But in order to fight against the König-class battleships, even if the technology was immature and the cost was high, the Navy gritted its teeth and went ahead.