Lion

History

Design

The Lion-class battleships were a class of six fast battleships designed for the Royal Navy in the late 1930s. While the Second London Naval Treaty limited the caliber of battleship guns to 14 inches (356mm), the refusal of Japan to sign the treaty resulted in the caliber limit reverting back to 16 inches (406mm) in April 1937. While it was too late to alter the King George V-class to accommodate larger guns, work began on a new class of battleships that could carry 406mm guns. In the interest of saving time, many design features of the King George V-class were reused. A well balanced ship would weigh some 40,000 tons, but the 35,000 ton treaty limit forced several compromises, such as the reduction of secondary mounts from eight to six, and the deletion of aviation facilities.

However, the refusal of the Japanese to disclose details of their battleships under construction caused the US, Britain, and France to invoke the escalation clause, which increased the tonnage limit to 45,000 tons. Due to cost and the dimensional limits of Royal Navy home docking facilities, such as the major naval dockyards of Rosyth and Portsmouth, the designers chose to limit themselves to approximately 40,000 tons standard; the two deleted secondary mounts and aviation facilities were restored.

The Lion would use 406mm/45 guns of a new design; unlike the wire-wound BL 16-inch Mk.I on the Nelson, the new Mk.II guns are built up, and would fire a 1,077 kg APC shell at 747 m/s muzzle velocity. The secondary armament would be the same as the King George V-class, eight dual 134mm/50 dual purpose guns. As designed, the AA gun armament would have consisted of six octuple 40mm "pom-poms". The machinery was largely duplicated from the King George V-class, with a slight increase in power to 130,000 SHP at overload condition, which drove the ship at 30 knots. The protection scheme from gunfire and torpedoes were also largely repeated from the King George V. The Admiralty approved the design in December 15, 1938 and bids were solicited very shortly afterwards.

The design changed several times in response to the removal of treaty restrictions on size and in light of war experience. Notably, the 1942 design had increased fuel load due to the concerns about range based on King George V's fuel state during the hunt for the Bismarck. The requirement to fire the gun turrets forward at 0 degree elevation was removed in order to accommodate a bow shear to reduce the amount of water shipped over the bow. The beam was increased to 108 ft in order to increase torpedo protection and reduce draft; however this severely limited the number of home docking facilities that could handle these ships. The number of AA gun amounts were also increased. To reduce weight, the belt armor over machinery spaces was reduced to 350mm. While not laid down, this revised design contributed to the Vanguard, the last battleship Britain ever built.

The Lion in game is the 1938 design approved by the Admiralty, with hypothetical increases in AA armament and raked funnel caps found on the Vanguard

Service

Six Lion-class ships were planned, two each in the 1938, 1939, and 1940 Naval Programmes. The first pair, Lion and Temeraire, were ordered on 28 February 1939 from Vickers Armstrongs and Cammell Laird respectively. Lion was laid down at Vickers' Newcastle-upon-Tyne shipyard on 4 July 1939 while Temeraire preceded her at Birkenhead on 1 June. Contracts for Conqueror and Thunderer were awarded on 15 August 1939 to John Brown and Fairfield. It is uncertain if Conqueror was actually ordered, but Thunderer was not. Neither ship was ever laid down, and construction on Lion and Temeraire was later suspended shortly after World War II began in September 1939 in order to free up resources for escorts needed to protect supply convoys; both ships were scrapped after the end of the war.

Historical inaccuracies

• The Lion-class never considered 16.5 inch (419mm) guns at any point of the design process. The 419mm guns were a part of studies done in the 1920s.
• British armor thicknesses are actually 0.98 times their nominal thickness, due to using 40 lb/sq ft as the approximate weight of steel (actual weight is 40.8 lb/sq ft). Consequently, the nominal 15 inch (381mm) belt is in reality 14.7 inch (374 mm) thick.