Kongo Replacements (1931) - Guide 380

The potential Kongo class replacement battleships, un-built designs of the Imperial Japanese Navy, are today's subject.
Read more about the ships here:
www.amazon.com/BATTLESHIP-DEM...
Naval History books, use code 'DRACH' for 25% off - www.usni.org/press/books?f%5B...
Free naval photos and more - www.drachinifel.co.uk
Want to support the channel? - / drachinifel
Want a shirt/mug/hoodie - shop.spreadshirt.com/drachini...
Want a poster? - www.etsy.com/uk/shop/Drachinifel
Want to talk about ships? / discord
'Legionnaire' by Scott Buckley - released under CC-BY 4.0. www.scottbuckley.com.au

[@Drachinifel]

Pinned post for Q&A :)

[@Shadooe]

I saw this question on the HMS Association Facebook page and thought: "Now there's a question for a Drydock." "I was wondering if anyone can answer my question. When on peacetime operations to what percentage were ships magazines stocked. For example Hood would have used a lot of fuel on her goodwill cruise and I imagine with 50% ammunition loaded as opposed to 100% that could have saved on fuel and wear and tear on machinery. Or was this not a concern?" I assumed in times of stability, they'd probably a ready to use emergency supply, plus maybe, something like reduced charges for gunnery exercises? In more turbulent times they could adjust as needed?

[@siepkotack2864]

Please do a deep dive on all gun layouts, why they were placed here and not there, their origin, reasoning, advantages and disadvantages etc, etc..

[@schullerandreas556]

How do you think a last cruiser gun duel would have went between the ARA Belgrano and the pair of HMS Tiger(C20) and HMS Blake(C99) would they not have been retired a decade prior to the falklands war? My take is that the Belgrano would have easily "de-gunned" the royal navy cruisers since the turrets on them had splinter protection at best. After a firepower kill the british would have had to cede the battle or call in for help from either air assets in the area or a submarine.

[@WarrantOfficerWill22]

What if the Washington Naval Treaty had capped cruiser guns at 7 inches for light cruisers and 9 inches for heavy cruisers?

[@scottmason2557]

I was watching Rex's Hanger's video on the Arado Ar 196 in which he believes it to be one of if not the best seaplane of the war and it got me thinking which do you believe would be the best seaplanes built by each navy during the second world war? Do you agree with Rex's choice for the Kreigsmarine?

[@seetengtan6746]

Ten 16” guns, speed of at least 28 to 30 knots and all to be at or under 35,000 tons… Paraphrasing a British warship designer on learning about Japanese designs, “They’re either building theirs ships out of cardboard or lying through their teeth (to come in under treaty restrictions)….”

[@AlcaturMaethor]

Take into consideration construction compromises (short cotadel most of all). A computer model of Hiraga I once saw was extremly unstable due to very high centre of mass; even a very minor flooding could cause it to topple over. Not sure how accurate this was, but it does seem to be a likely problem.

[@CAP198462]

The Emperor protects.

[@khairulhelmihashim2510]

south dakota class

[@klade5031]

@@khairulhelmihashim2510 The South Dakotas and the North Carolinas were already at the treaty limit. They achieved it partly by cramming 9 guns into only three turrets. 10 guns in FOUR turrets means the darn things won't be armored worth a damn.

[@MsZeeZed]

Sadly that “made out of paper” jibe made its way through all the crews & you can hear that opinion in the interviews with the survivors of Force Z on Jamie’s channel. The air gunners also thought they’d be shooting at paper planes too. I’m going to take that as a confusion about Japanese houses being made of paper as an earthquake precaution, but those gunners felt stupid about thinking that after the first wave.

[@kennethdeanmiller7324]

THANK YOU DRACH!!! I was "trying" to watch "War Stories" BUT I found that I was watching more commercials than actually anything else. Said "why bother?" And went looking through your stuff to see if there might be anything I missed or something I'd like to hear again. The latter I find myself doing a lot.

[@jonmcgee6987]

I keep getting these "if your 45 and older then you need to prioritize your health etc etc". I don't need to be constantly reminded I'm getting old. My joints do that enough as is.

[@bobbenson6825]

Just a note to say that your "new by necessity" theme music has really grown on me.

[@novacolonel5287]

Oh, why "by necessity"? I just noticed a change, and kept wondering why.

[@josephthomas8318]

Same. I really didn't like it at first but I got used to it

[@ryanhodin5014]

​@@novacolonel5287The old intro music kept getting false copyright claims, and KZbin kept not doing anything about it because they're KZbin, so Drach surrendered and changed the music. Major shame IMO, but I have also come to enjoy the new music for the most part.

[@novacolonel5287]

@@ryanhodin5014Ah, I see. Quite a shame, but the replacement is fitting just as well. Thank you for enlightening me!

[@tadasdovii8262]

Somehow ir remind me 13th warrior theme

[@Jason-fm4my]

Imagine doing coffee runs for the bridge. That's at least 15 flights of stairs, one way😮

[@Jason-fm4my]

I guess it would be tea runs.

[@Sherwoody]

Just imagine those stairs in heavy seas.

[@JessWLStuart]

Don't spill the Sake!

[@jamesharmer9293]

Get the Chief Engineer to rig up a coffee machine in the chart room behind the bridge. Or a tea kettle, whatever.

[@paulsteaven]

Sadly, no elevators like on the Yamatos

[@BlahCraft1]

If the massively tall superstructure was paired with a Nelson or Richelieu style all forward armament, we might have gotten a truly ATLA Fire Nation warship.

[@klassehkhornate9636]

Ah yes, the Picasso funnel class

[@Sherwoody]

Picasso’s never famous “Funnel Descending Amidships” painting.

[@michaelkovacic2608]

To be honest, I'd feel more comfortable aboard the first design if they simply forgot about those 6inch turrets forward and aft. The IJN had a relatively numerous cruiser force, so having a weak secondary battery might not have been that big of an issue.

[@BleedingUranium]

3:20 Hiraga's is probably my favourite capital ship design ever. Of all time. I've always liked the Courageous-class's long slender hull with a lot of "nothing" fore/aft of the turrets, it's very "clean"; this does that to even more of an extreme, and much more symmetrically (roughly same hull distance fore/aft of the turrets, two superfiring fore/aft), with the superstructure neatly in the centre... and then that wonderfully dramatic tower superstructure and funnel. It's just so _cool!_

[@ryder6070]

Brother DrAch: Your comment section is generally very polite. "tip of the hat".

[@The_Modeling_Underdog]

Already knew about the designs from the Central Crossing videos, but I'm always glad when you cover the same topics. Would have liked to be a fly on the wall and watch Fujimoto and Hiraga berate each other to bits over their respective designs. The gifted alcoholic and the - also gifted - cantankerous old geezer. What a legendary pair for a comedy anime. Nice recap, Drach.

[@RedXlV]

With regard to Hiraga's design, not only were the 6" secondary turrets nominally dual purpose with that 75° elevation, one of the oddest parts is that *so were the casemates.* To allow for this, as you can see in Hiraga's scale mockup, the casemates are actually semi-turrets with their roofs extending partially outside of the weather deck. Since that's the only way such high elevation would be possible in a casemate.

[@mazdrpan4099]

Hiraga's design wouldnt be half bad if they went with 3 triple turrets and move the saved weight into extending citadel for more reserve bouyancy. Add in some creative accounting and IJN couldve had a few Littorios of their own...

[@85isaboat53]

Littorios were the best (not so) treaty restricted battleships

[@mazdrpan4099]

@@85isaboat53 Littorios were almost perfect. 30kt speed was a requirement and this necesitated raised barbette of the aft turret so that aft secondaries could be moved further aft to facilitate engine room space in order to achieve the desired speed. 28-29kt was achievable without those changes and would probably fit within 36k tons if the hull was shortened a couple meters as well. And imo, the ships would be even more beautiful, which is ofc the main consideration in any Italian design.

[@85isaboat53]

@mazdrpan4099 yeah they were probably the coolest axis battleships

[@kilianortmann9979]

@@mazdrpan4099 Japan might have needed a bit more range from their ships, but within the confines of the Mediterranean, the Littorios were amazing.

[@paulsteaven]

Hiraga probably knows that IJN high command will demand that this Kongo replacement has 'modest' number of main guns. He might have think ahead of them.

[@DamianMaisano]

The latter one seems like it would have the trademark stability issues of Japanese designs of this period. The superstructure being so high and those triple turrets super firing. . . I wouldn’t want to be their in a storm

[@iatsd]

Meanwhile, WG is busy ignoring actual paper ship designs in favour of drunken Friday afternoon fantasy designs

[@themanformerlyknownascomme777]

I remember reading about these, quite interesting vessels.

[@paulsteaven]

Interwar IJN capital ship designs were really weird looking, good thing that they got the Yamato right.

[@bkjeong4302]

Unfortunately for them, they got it right when it was completely pointless. Fortunately for them, so did everyone else. Unfortunately for them, that only evened things out, meaning they were STILL at a massive disadvantage in terms of being able to build stuff in wartime.

[@Graham-ce2yk]

The goal Hiraga was aiming for was to keep the battery as compact as possible to maximize the chance of getting first round hits.

[@paulsteaven]

@@Graham-ce2yk their 'compactness' is the thing that I don't like about this Kongo replacement. It leaves little area for future upgrades like most of IJN capital ships. But overall, better than what they had including the Nagatos.

[@scottgiles7546]

Helldiver pilots would agree with that. (Ships so wide I CAN'T miss!!🤩)

[@leftcoaster67]

They couldn't the the French have all the fun!

[@lewiswestfall2687]

Thanks Drach

[@yamato-yosoroku-klausketeer]

Thank you!! 石橋孝夫氏は著者のなかで金剛代艦の艦尾の15.2cm連装砲について背負式に二基を左右並列で描く研究者が居るがそれは違うみたいなことを仰るおられたが なんとその後、左右並列のスケッチが見つかって驚いた！

[@NigelDeForrest-Pearce-cv6ek]

Fascinating!!! Thank You!!!!

[@aaroncarter4089]

Great video, appreciate the hard work.

[@user-hw1qo2mu9e]

Thanks Drach.

[@merafirewing6591]

These are my favorite Japanese Battleship designs.

[@greycatturtle7132]

Pretty interesting

[@vikkimcdonough6153]

3:14 - Maybe they were counting on the bow and stern secondary magazines being far enough away from all the others to prevent an explosion of one of those secondary mags from setting off the mags amidships?

[@fishingthelist4017]

The most obvious problem with magazines near the bow and stern is the effect a magazine explosion would have on the maneuverability and sea keeping of the ship.

[@gwtpictgwtpict4214]

Even so, if your 6" magazine cooks off you've lost either the bow or stern of your ship. Potentially survivable but you are best out of the fight, at worst sinking.

[@comrade_commissar3794]

Mfw the stern magazine cooks off and the rudder/propellers are now gone

[@Pilvenuga]

@@comrade_commissar3794 you would not have to armor the walls around those magazines, only the floors. If the easiest point of escape for the explosive wave is up and sideways you just have a massive hole on your aft, where the 155mm guns were. But it would not be a gaping chasm down into the machinery. Just some unfortunate sailors plastered and intertwined with mangled steel hull.

[@personthing88]

@@gwtpictgwtpict4214HMS Eskimo would disagree (but that’s probably a special case)

[@johnfisher9692]

At least these ships would have a very distinctive profile

[@user-mb8wn1zx8m]

動画紹介画面のコンセプトデザイン画は、平賀譲（Hiraga Yuzuru）中将が描いたものです。彼は金剛の代わりの戦艦の建造が計画されていたとき、既に人事異動で海軍技術研究所の所長となっており、権限はありませんでした。金剛の代わりの戦艦のデザイン会議が開かれて出席したとき、コンセプトデザイン模型を公開して会議は混乱したそうです（権限がない人が勝手にデザイン模型を作って来たため）。

[@simon2493]

I do hope someday gajin will add them, they said that with navy as long as there are blueprint ship can be added.

[@BleedingUranium]

The rule for War Thunder is the ship had to have been laid down, which, as much as I _love_ Hiraga's design, is the most sensible place to draw the line when it comes to ships. We can still see the Amagis, Kagas, and Kiis though (and Yamatos of course).

[@ottaviobasques]

​@@BleedingUraniumLions too.

[@BleedingUranium]

@@ottaviobasquesI was just listing Japan, but yes. G3s, original South Dakotas, Lexingtons, H39s, etc too.

[@Nexusgamer8472]

I wasn't aware the Japanese had plans to replace the Kongo's

[@thegrandnope7143]

In hindsight it makes sense, the Kongo's were rather old by the time of this ship's drafting, how they went about doing it however was utterly incomprehensible and very weird, so in the end keeping the Kongo's around was the better option and not weird.

[@christopherreed4723]

The Kongos were *supposed* to have been replaced or augmented by the four Amagi class ships in the 1920s. Two of those were, in fact, begun - Amagi and Akagi - but were severely damaged while under construction by a powerful earthquake. The Washington and London naval treaties made starting the other two impossible, and the one existing hull that was salvagable was converted to an aircraft carrier under the treaties' conversion clause, becoming the one-off carrier Akagi. This meant that the Kongos got upgraded twice, once in the 1920s, and a much more comprehensive job, basically a complete reconstruction, in the 1930s that turned them into viable escorts for the fast carrier groups. That job was originally going to be done by the four (!) planned Amagis, but geology, the economy, and treaty negotiators killed that plan.

[@anantr99]

@@christopherreed4723 Minor correction, Sir: Akagi wasn't even remotely affected by the Great Kanto Earthquake, since she was built in Kure, which was quite far away from the epicentre, which was near Tokyo.

[@ATW090]

if built, could be interesting to see how some of these design to handle a storm

[@Shrike58]

The thought that comes to my mind when really thinking about these ships is that they had zero, zip, zilch potential for an expansion of their anti-aircraft capability; barring a full reconstruction.

[@Katy_Jones]

Having the triple turrets superfiring seems like an unneeded increase in top weight?

[@anantr99]

Probably an attempt to ensure the aft turret didn't end up accidentally firing through the aft 6" superfiring turret. That said, the point of those 6" turrets can be debated to start with.

[@fishingthelist4017]

The Pensacola class had topweight problems with the same turret arrangement.

[@charlesc.9012]

The hull shape is also a serious consideration. A triple turret needs a massive barbette and loading arrangement, and the citadel would naturally be wider. The swooping bow shape also obstructs the firing arc of wide turrets, so you have to rotate the turret much more in order to clear all 3 guns from the bow. A large battleship takes minutes to make that extra turn, and that is bad for your reaction speed. If you want high speed, you also need a thin tapering hull, Mr. Hiraga's proposal certainly had that hull form in the drawing, that makes a wide citadel and barbette impossible to have. The A and D turrets cannot be too big, and the citadel cannot be too wide, otherwise the explosive parts would be directly against the hull. In a gunfight, hull space mattered, especially against the large HE shells the Nelson class could hurl at long ranges. By designing the front and rear turrets to be smaller, you could also make the front part of the hull narrower, which not only increased speed, but allowed huge weight savings to conform to treaty limits. Besides, large guns have a lethal muzzle blast, so by minimising the large guns at deck level, you could hopefully leave deck space amidships for more secondary guns in open mounts.

[@ottaviobasques]

The triple turrets superfiring twins was pretty common. Battleships of that time often weren't super wide nor long, so, in order to fit torpedo protection and retain some speed, you gotta need to fit narrower barbettes at the extremeties.

[@anantr99]

@@ottaviobasques It wasn't. While a number of designs had such arrangements, the only major warships completed with such an arrangement was the Pensacola-class cruisers. Those ships had to do so because of the width of the hull, but they did have stability concerns as a result.

[@holysmoke8439]

I never do well in this ship in the game. U sacrifice alot of amor for a little speed

[@andrewseamans1419]

Makes me think of the Littorio or SoDak.

[@barryelverson9486]

Nothing wrong with dreaming. Sometimes you start at the max and let reality whittle it down to being an actual thing. I swear, every time I hear anything about a super ship from that period, makes me think of The Great Yamato aka Dai Yamato Zero aka Great Galaxy anime/manga designs. Yes, Maharaba too. Dang fandoms. 😂😉

[@ps5801]

What is it with the shape of the bows of Japanese war ships? I always see photos of them throwing huge mounds of spray us the side of the bow. Then, to counter all the spray, they have the strangest, most extreme flare up high on the topsides. I've never seen any other nation produce ships with that arrangement. Anybody know what's up with that?

[@rutabagasteu]

Maybe its a typhoon bow ?

[@jeremiaas15]

My guess would be- conducting trials mostly on the relatively calm Seto inland sea and upscaling the results in hope it would work on open ocean. That's also a probable reason for the poor seakeeping of the German big destroyers, which were designed almost entirely with tests conducted on the Baltic in mind.

[@Dana-nv4ej]

Would’ve been interesting to see one of these designs going up against the Washington at Guadalcanal

[@dimitriskapetanakis1625]

Hey bro you must make a video about a forgotten ship this being the SMS Grosser Kurfurst (1913)

[@larryramsey6892]

I'm sure someone has addressed this before but why would anyone put a triple turret above a double? Seems like unnecessary top weight to me.

[@lucascousins6934]

The Pensacolas did the same thing, and I can't remember why, but I don't think it has an effect on stability

[@Tuning3434]

@@lucascousins6934 not enough hull beam at the forward turret, so a smaller double turret barbette was all that could fit in.. An engineering compromise balancing fire-power, torpedo pretection and a long slender hull for speed. Torpedo protection at the forward magazine is tricky in fast hulls, Iowa had to compromise there too. It usually does not give desirable results, and after the Pensacola's a gun was dropped for three triple turrets instead in followup Northampton class and beyond.

[@user-rk3yb6nd1n]

IIRC the Pensacolas were like that due to the width of the hull at the points where the turrets were installed. The hull was too narrow where the twin turret was for a triple turret.

[@jimmyz003]

I think you should be knighted by the king! Sir Drac arise!

[@bigsarge2085]

⚓️

[@oldbearbrian]

Well, guess what ship WoW will be designing next? 🙂

[@leftcoaster67]

Naval Engineers outside Japan feverishly look at their slide rules. And go WTF is with these calculations?

[@hideoyamada4999]

Looking at 5:00,my impression is "Was Hirago so dumb!?" Wonder if this video is for real?

[@americanmade6996]

What benefit is there in the triple turrets being the superfiring mounts?

[@boobah5643]

As mentioned elsewhere in these comments: it's to keep the hull narrow at the ends; 2-gun turrets have smaller barbettes than the 3-gun turrets. The US _Pensacolas_ had a similar arrangement, but the stability issues led the USN to drop down to three 3-gun turrets afterward.

[@Doc_Tar]

I wonder what the Japanese would have built instead of the Yamato class if they had decided not to go the route of super battleships.

[@theodoremoore2549]

The question as they were looking at was "Which Super battleships" were they going to build. If for some reason aircraft carriers had not been something better the idea might have worked for them.

[@Doc_Tar]

@@theodoremoore2549 Assuming they could train all the pilots, flight crews and service personnel needed to make more carriers operational. Looking back perhaps they should have put a lot more effort into anti-submarine warfare.

[@boobah5643]

@@Doc_Tar By at least one metric, the IJN weren't professionals. That is, they didn't really _do_ logistics, and that included protecting what logistics capability they did have. It also, relatedly, included keeping their skilled pilots alive to teach what they know to the new guys.

[@RocketHarry865]

If only world of warships created a battleship split with one half being the slow battleships and the other half being the battle cruisers and the paper fast battleships. The slow battleship line ending in the Yamato, while the battle cruisers line end in the Number 13 design

[@thatsme9875]

another excellent day, with another excellent production by Drach!! and I think at 6.3 seconds I am first !!

[@gwaters8067]

Way down deep in the middle of these ships... Um Bongo was made

[@jermasus]

Bongo was a real province of Japan so they could’ve named a BB the Bongo

[@malcolmtaylor518]

Llike the technical drawings. Design looks innovative, and who knows what they would have been like. The kongo's were battlecruisers after all.

[@Eulemunin]

I think I like the unconventional designs.

[@michaelmoorrees3585]

More "fuel" for video game designers !

[@Jedi_Master_Obi-Wan_Kenobi66]

Shhhh, dont let the devs at Wargaming find out about this one

[@Aelvir114]

WoWs will never implement this. Meanwhile Naval Creed added it as Izumi

[@andromedach]

wow, the video ended before I expected

[@Warthunder_battle_gameplay]

#GaijinEntertainment where ya at

[@salty4496]

:)

[@andrewalderman9489]

Come on, shake your body, do that Konga !

[@Vinemaple]

I've heard people say the B-68 "supercruiser" design was considered a replacement for the Kongou class, but that would presumably be later. It's B-68, right? I can never remember which one was the supercruiser design, and which was the Soviet sub they used to have in San Diego, was that the B-93?

[@Drachinifel]

The B-64/65 design series were late 30's/ early '40's idea to replace them again 😀

[@Vinemaple]

@@Drachinifel Ohhhh, it's B-64, and there WAS a B-65? I'll have to look that up

[@la_potat6065]

B-64 is Amagi Class. B-65 is often confused as the version with 356mm/45cal Type 41 guns in 3 twin turrets, while the original design with 310mm/50cal guns gets mistakenly called as B-64, which is what Amagi Class is. With that said though, Kii class is often labelled as a modified B-64 (well it is an up armoured and slightly slower Amagi) and I’ve seen it being referred as also B-65 at times, although the latter is likely incorrect.

[@scottymac5174]

A Pocket battleship on steroids.

[@merlinwizard1000]

73rd, 23 March 2024

[@mattwoodard2535]

I saw those and my brain said anime. sm

[@ScreamingSturmovik]

only thing i can say is......but why?

[@lawrencefriedman4210]

I just noticed that Drachinifel calls himself a Naval Histriographer. I thought the correct term was "historiographer." Or is he combining history with histrionics?

[@blueboats]

Typical me first thinking Replacements meant "functional replacement" . . . oops

[@patrickwentz8413]

Why Japan? Why did you and the French come up with the craziest designs for really expensive warships?

[@halkyuusen8626]

That sounds like an excellent Hetallia sketch

[@idrilek]

dess

[@crazyafrican9955]

After 380 ships he ran out

[@davidrenton]

did Kongo beget Kong, or did Kong beget Kongo

[@FinnishJager]

So many of the Japanese designs that were not chosen for construction are hilariously ugly. Somehow these Kongo replacements look even worse!

[@LeeBrasher]

"Kongo replacements" in a sense -- but these are no battle-cruisers.

[@chpet1655]

Truly ummm “interesting” designs. In truth I’d really not want to serve aboard them I think they are sinkers for sure