Popowka (ship type)
Popowka is the name for a class of circular ironclad ships that were developed for the Russian Black Sea Fleet in the 1870s .
Based on the experience of the lost Crimean War , a class of heavy armored ships was designed under the direction of Vice Admiral Andrei Alexandrowitsch Popow (1821-1898) to defend the shallow coastal waters around the Black Sea ports of Sevastopol , Nikolayev and Ochakov , which had a very shallow draft and at the same time as possible should be able to rotate quickly. This principle was implemented with the greatest consistency: the design of the Popowka, already proposed for the English coastal defense by Sir Edward James Reed , the chief designer of the Royal Navy in the 1860s , was lens-shaped, its floor plan therefore circular and the deck convex; The superstructures (chimneys, gun systems) were placed on this unique platform. The ships with a draft of only 4 m and a diameter of 30.8–36.6 m displaced 2,490–3550 tons; they could bunker up to 250 tons of coal.
The armor thickness was 40.5 cm above the casemates and 22.9 cm at the gun turrets. The Popowka was armed with two parallel 30.5 cm guns in the central turret, each of which could pivot 35 ° from the center line; there were also eight light rapid-fire guns and seven torpedo tubes.
At the expense of greater maneuverability, a lower top speed was accepted: the Popowka ran at most 8.5 knots. It was powered by six screws by two steam engines with a total of 3,066 hp. Due to their circular design, however, the ships had problems keeping the keel line and tended to pull out and turn around their own axis when firing; the mileage was only sufficient when the sea was calm.
The first Popovka was built in parts under the name Novgorod in Saint Petersburg in 1872 and then transported to Nikolayev, where it was completed by 1874. The larger sister ship Kiev (later renamed Vice Admiral Popov ) was built entirely in Nikolayev and was launched in 1875. Of the ten originally planned ships, these two remained, although they were the first ironclad ships in the Black Sea. The imperial state yacht Liwadija was created according to the same design, with a normal ship's hull rising on the "floating saucer". The warships were used as part of the Danube Flotilla during the Russo-Turkish War from 1877 to 1878; In 1892, they were now out of date, reallocated purely for coastal protection and served as supply ships until they were retired in 1903. After 1912 they were scrapped.