For some reason I can't wrap my head around the rules regarding ship speeds. According to the Ircwcc.com website. my Predreadnought goes 28 sec./100' while a standard convoy ship goes Convoy Ships 34 sec./100'. Does that speed ratio mean how long it takes to get 100' or does it say that will take 28 seconds to get to 100' which would make my predreadnought faster than the convoy ship. Thanks, Stu
The second one, your predreadnought will be faster than a convoy, it will go the 100 feet six seconds faster than the convoy. Convoys are slow so anyone can catch them and hence they need to be protected or they are easy targets. Fast gun speeds (for warships anyway) are based on the fluid mechanics of how the water flows over the hull so they better recreate how the actual ship's hull interacted with the water. (At least thats what ive been told and the numbers look like they work out so I believe it, but I dont know who came up with that idea in the first place, my hat off to them.) And then grouped into catagories to make life easier, it also has the side effect of making WW1 ships not be totally out classed by WW2 ships also slower ships tend to turn better, both increase playability. So in a fluid dynamic sense fast gun speeds are much more scale than speeds in some of the clubs that have "scale speeds" all depends on what you use to scale with. That and the water is still 1:1
A guy by the name of William Froude came up with the concept. Waky pedia ref for those that like it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Froude_number Read any undergrad fluid mechanics enginering book for more info.
