I keep pondering gun layouts for a Florida. Part of me says use B and C turrets for side mounts and stern gun in E as a “safe setup”. Part of me like the idea of a 15deg’ish funny gun in C and side mounts in B and D or E. What other quirky layouts might actually be feasible?
Sidemounts in D and E with a stern gun w/ hellish down angle in C. you could give that stern gun like 3-5 degrees off center and basically back up to somebody, almost touch them with the stern, and pound them with ons and belows. then, if they try to get spicy on you, you have both sidemounts. the back end of the boar would be an angry porcupine. In any other config, she's basically just a smaller, less capable Texas. I've seen a lot of (understandable) shade thrown at the bulged florida because she's basically a pure tumblehome, which makes her a pain to sheet and really vulnerable to ram damage, but I think @modelshipsahoy 's FB Florida hull is a close quarters monster waiting for an experienced captain to take her out and clean clocks.
Don't put bow sidemounts in B turret if A turret is unoccupied. All you end up doing is exposing the distance between the turrets to get shots on. 28 second ships do more chasing than the faster ones, so bow sidemount is probably a better idea than for other ships. A turret sidemount, B turret funny gun, stern turret sidemount. Or, go for the classic death Y with B turret funny gun and sidemounts in the rearmost turrets. As for rams and sheeting, eh, if you take your time it shouldn't be too hard, not any harder than Nagato or Fuso. You might take some rams, but so does QE. Just know your boat and be aware. Florida is one of those its so ugly its cute ships.
I'd posit that the SoCak would be a far better ship for the Death-Y setup though. Same speed, same combat units, 6 inches shorter, and Lord knows how much more maneuverable now with the new 4 square inch rudder rules. That weird overhanging C turret on Florida is the biggest reason that I'd want to build one as opposed to an Arkie or SoCak. Besides Arkie just being a Coors Light version of Texas. But, like ya say, my chaser guns on Texas do get a TON of work. especially during the later phase of a sortie when nobody wants to play hug-and-slug with the 28 second boat. And yeah, I'm in agreement with the sheeting/ram stuff. she's a tad rounder at the hips than Texas, but overall, I never have any problems with my tumblehome hull getting rammed any more than my (non-round bulged) Idaho. it's just not a problem to me. If anything, Idaho gets ram damage far more often. And Sheeting.... yeah the air castle would be a tad laborious, but looking at the pics, it's far more manageable than my Texas' air castle.
The midships turret is too close to the center of the ship. The stern moves side to side as you rotate, the center stays relatively motionless and the guns are much harder to put on target. Iron Duke center turret similar dilemma. Arkansas with its stacked turrets would work much better for 1-2-3 stacked arrangement. Socal is shorter but only 2 shafts. 4 shafts is superior because drag disks.
Point-of-impact for a C turret stern gun with a 3-5 degree down angle still wouldn't change. The duke's C turret can't fire directly to stern due to the superstructure and due to being laid out like the Texas with a superfiring D turret in the way. But the Florida can fire straight off the back because of that ridiculous turret layout that has the C turret superfiring over D and E. I thought there was a rule change allowing drag disks on two shaft boats? If not, SoCak's still going to be more maneuverable than florida due to the reduced length (she's even shorter than a Nassau), and with the light weight, I bet you could get decent acceleration by using bigger props.
You can have drag disks on 2 shaft ships but it is not as effective. Shooting the stern gun like that you will get a lot of dispersion, similar like the wing turret sturn gun on Moltke. Not saying you couldn't do it, but you would get higher hit percentage using the traditional mount. But single stern guns on battleships aren't worth it to me anyway, I'd be asking what mounting would be more effective than this single stern gun. Points maker, yeah, sure, but if I want to shoot for points I'd battle a cruiser.
Oh ok that makes sense. I was testing my dual bow chasers on Texas for shot grouping at optimal range and the shot group was like 4 inches in diameter, even with full length barrels. I get the appeal of having sterns on a BB, but personally don't like them at all. But I usually just assume that others would prefer them because I'm an odd duck. Me, funny guns and chasers all the way. yeah I don't fiddle with drag disks on my two-shaft boat anyways, mostly because I have way bigger things I need to address on the hull. Just heard it was an option. But without using that superfiring C turret as a stern gun, I'm kinda at a loss as to why to use the Florida instead of the SoCak. it's just an odd duck with drag props then, and a Texas or Arkie would significantly increase wallop power. They're cool lookin boats for sure. I think I'd have to really see how the B turret lines up with that forward casemate to make the call for a Death-Y. get that barrel right in the notch at the perfect angle so that she's splashing just forward of the prow.... that might be a nice touch.
If I was building it, I would probably put in dual sterns in E at 15 degrees, stern sidemount in D, and bow sidemount in A or B. In terms of damage quality, the 15 degree dual sterns can be very effective. Being only 4 units is unfortunate since you can’t get two sidemounts (50 and 25) with dual sterns. I would probably run it most of the time with just aft guns armed, but have the bow sidemount as an option depending fleet composition. Stern sidemount in D will have issues with down angle based on beam and low barbette height, but barrel length would be good and if the boat runs low in the water then it would be fine. I would not run a down-angle-15 degree bow gun based on the ram bow. It might be below the penetrable area on some ships but likely to draw ram calls more often and not, and could do some serious ram damage. Any other bow gun is a plinker in my opinion. The other gun arrangement I’d consider would be death Y, but bow gun would be destroyer-like, and I don’t see Florida as a good sidemount boat compared to the competition based on freeboard and ram susceptibility. A juicy boat like that is better off with stern guns to ward off attackers in my opinion. I wish the Florida class had better attributes, I visited the Utah memorial several times when I was in Pearl. Hard for me to justify though when I compare it to Courbet, which has better casements, a stringer that prevents ram damage, flat bow profile, better turret arrangement (superfiring aft and wing turrets), 4.5 units, etc. We have a local Arkansas mold that I might use since I could do the Agincourt gun layout, or maybe make an Arizona in the future
Yeah, the Arkie might be pretty fun. The Texas has some pretty good advantages too. if not for having a bonkers gun layout, then for 5.5 units, the new rudder rule, and that sort of thing. That fat fantail on Arkie and Texas can give you some nice long sidemount barrels too. I think you'd have a lot of fun with AZ. Especially since you've already done the CandyCornia, and know how to get the most out of a Standard-Type hull form. with the bow casemates on AZ/NM, you can get a really nice bow gun by tucking it into the crook. If I do another STB, I'll probably do a pre-refit New Mexico. Been kinda itching to figure out those cage masts.
I did some ballasting and measuring! I ballasted it to 21lbs 13oz or so which is about 1lb under max weight of 22.88lbs (22lbs 14oz). When sitting at a pretty level keel the ram bow is ~1.75” below the waterline, the bulges turn in ~1.25” below the waterline, the bulge/belt stringer would be ~o.25” above the water line, and the rear deck is ~1.25” above the waterline. To me that indicates that it might not be quite as ram/rammer susceptible as I first thought. The freeboard back aft is not quite as high as I thought. I’m going to rough up some tape lines to simulate and see how I feel about it. I think there is going to be less penetrate area above the waterline than I anticipated too. We shall see. Ignore the tub. It’s the spare we never use except to clean out nasty stuff
I think Florida could still be a fun ship for sure, its certainly an interesting ship visually. Death Y (similar to SoCarolina) probably the best from a purely competitive standpoint, but stern gun/haymaker, bow sidemount gives you one of everything. It is very small and has lots of hard area. Like a lot of ships, if you have good guns, it makes you less of a target no matter what you build. Looking forward to seeing your progress!
