Smooth deck beams

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Smooth-deck carriers are aircraft carriers without an 'island', the usual command tower structure on an aircraft carrier deck .

technology

Smooth deck carrier Langley
Shin'yō smooth deck girder

Smooth-deck carriers, as the name suggests, have a completely smooth flight deck, unlike aircraft carriers with an island. The structure called the island on an aircraft carrier deck houses both the navigating bridge for the guidance of the ship and the aircraft, in particular the aircraft on the deck. With a smooth deck carrier, these tasks are accommodated in rooms below the flight deck.

In the case of an aircraft carrier of the island type, the radio and radar antennas are also installed on the island in order to achieve a greater range and better reception of the radio and radar systems, while these devices are set up on a smooth-deck carrier on the edge of the flight deck.

The island also houses the chimney, while the chimney or chimneys are attached to the sides of the ship in the case of smooth-deck girders, which, in contrast to the chimney built into an island, leads to difficulties in flight operations on the flight deck when the hot and possibly sooty exhaust air escapes .

The smooth-deck girder is inferior to the girder with an island because the ship's command does not have the same good overview of the sea area and because it is very difficult to navigate the aircraft in the air and on the girder deck without a direct view of the girder deck.

history

Furious as a smooth deck carrier
Furious with island

Due to a lack of experience with aircraft carriers, smooth-deck carriers were built at the beginning of the development of aircraft carriers and often later upgraded with an island, such as the British Furious or the Japanese Akagi . A smooth deck girder is much easier to build than a girder with an island, as the island with its structure to the left or right of the flight deck disturbs the balance of the ship and the island itself is a structure in itself.

Because smooth-deck girders can be built faster and cheaper than girders with islands, the construction of smooth-deck girders was reverted to during the Second World War in order to be able to deploy wheeled aircraft at sea quickly . Mostly they were used as escort carriers for the air security of convoy trains.

Only island-type aircraft carriers have been built since World War II. The initially planned American smooth deck carriers of the United States type for large bombers that were supposed to be armed with atomic bombs were no longer built.

Examples of smooth deck girders are the English Argus , the Japanese Shin'yō and the American Langley .

literature

  • Clark G. Reynolds: The Aircraft Carrier . Bechtermünz Verlag, Eltville am Rhein 1993 ISBN 3-86047-054-X
  • The history of the aircraft carrier. From the First World War until today. Karl Müller Verlag, Erlangen, without a year.