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SMS Boa
SMS ''Boa'' was a torpedo boat of the Austro-Hungarian Navy. Built as a unit of the , she was typical of the seagoing torpedo boats acquired by Austria-Hungary between 1896 and 1914. In 1910 she was renamed ''Torpedoboot 15.'' Development ''Boa'' and her sister ships, ''Python'', ''Kígyó'' (Snake) and ''Cobra,'' were the result of competitive tests between two torpedo boats built in 1895–96. ''Natter'' was built by the firm of F. Schichau at Elbing, while ''Viper'' was built by Yarrow on the Thames at Millbank. Admiralty ''(Marinesektion)'' officials were better satisfied with the performance of ''Viper,'' and four slightly larger examples were ordered from Yarrow. Design A steel-hulled vessel of 132 tons displacement, ''Boa'' measured six inches (152 mm) in length with a beam of and a draft of four feet six inches. Her reciprocating engines of gave a speed of . Armament consisted of two quick-firing guns and three torpedo tubes. Service history Launched on the T ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yarrow Shipbuilders
Yarrow Shipbuilders Limited (YSL), often styled as simply Yarrows, was a major shipbuilding firm based in the Scotstoun district of Glasgow on the River Clyde. It is now part of BAE Systems Surface Ships, owned by BAE Systems, which has also operated the nearby Govan shipyard (formerly Fairfields) since 1999. History Origins in London The company was founded by Alfred Yarrow, later Sir Alfred Yarrow, 1st Baronet, in the year 1865 as Yarrow & Company, Limited. Originally it was based at Folly Wall, Poplar, then in 1898 as the company grew, Yarrow moved his shipyard to London Yard, Cubitt Town.History of London Yard by Angela Brown and Ron Coverson, 2001 Hundreds of steam launches, lake and river vessels, and eventually the |
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south. The country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain, which lies in the North Atlantic, and includes over 100 smaller islands, such as the Isles of Scilly and the Isle of Wight. The area now called England was first inhabited by modern humans during the Upper Paleolithic period, but takes its name from the Angles, a Germanic tribe deriving its name from the Anglia peninsula, who settled during the 5th and 6th centuries. England became a unified state in the 10th century and has had a significant cultural and legal impact on the wider world since the Age of Discovery, which began during the 15th century. The English language, the Anglican Church, and Engli ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cobra-class Torpedo Boat
The ''Cobra'' class (also known as the ''Python'' class) was a class of four torpedo boats built by the British shipbuilder Yarrow Shipbuilders, Yarrow for the Austro-Hungarian Navy in the late 1890s. All four ships served through the First World War and were Ship breaking, scrapped in 1919. Design and construction In 1895, the Austro-Hungarian Navy purchased one torpedo boat each from the British shipbuilder Yarrow Shipbuilders, Yarrow and the German shipbuilder Schichau-Werke, two specialist builders of torpedo vessels. The two torpedo boats, which carried identical armament, were evaluated against each other. While there was little to choose between the seaworthiness of the two ships, the German-built ship, , suffered vibration at high speed, while the Yarrow-built torpedo-boat, , did not suffer such vibration and the Yarrow design was chosen for further development, with four more torpedo-boats ordered from Yarrow to a modified design. The new torpedo boats were long at the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Torpedo Boat
A torpedo boat is a relatively small and fast naval ship designed to carry torpedoes into battle. The first designs were steam-powered craft dedicated to ramming enemy ships with explosive spar torpedoes. Later evolutions launched variants of self-propelled Whitehead torpedoes. These were inshore craft created to counter both the threat of battleships and other slow and heavily armed ships by using speed, agility, and powerful torpedoes, and the overwhelming expense of building a like number of capital ships to counter an enemy's. A swarm of expendable torpedo boats attacking en masse could overwhelm a larger ship's ability to fight them off using its large but cumbersome guns. A fleet of torpedo boats could pose a similar threat to an adversary's capital ships, albeit only in the coastal areas to which their small size and limited fuel load restricted them. The introduction of fast torpedo boats in the late 19th century was a serious concern to the era's naval strategists, i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
QF 3-pounder Hotchkiss
The QF 3-pounder Hotchkiss or in French use Canon Hotchkiss à tir rapide de 47 mm were a family of long-lived light naval guns introduced in 1886 to defend against new, small and fast vessels such as torpedo boats and later submarines. There were many variants produced, often under license which ranged in length from 32 to 50 calibers but 40 caliber was the most common version. They were widely used by the navies of a number of nations and often used by both sides in a conflict. They were also used ashore as coastal defense guns and later as an anti-aircraft gun, whether on improvised or specialized HA/LA mounts. Operational history French service The French Navy used two versions of the Hotchkiss 3-pounder: the short-barreled M1885 and the long-barreled M1902, which had a larger muzzle velocity than its predecessor. The French L/40 M1885 and the British QF 3-pounder were largely the same gun. Like the British who paired their 3-pounders with the larger QF 6-poun ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Torpedo Tube
A torpedo tube is a cylindrical device for launching torpedoes. There are two main types of torpedo tube: underwater tubes fitted to submarines and some surface ships, and deck-mounted units (also referred to as torpedo launchers) installed aboard surface vessels. Deck-mounted torpedo launchers are usually designed for a specific type of torpedo, while submarine torpedo tubes are general-purpose launchers, and are often also capable of deploying naval mine, mines and cruise missiles. Most modern launchers are standardized on a diameter for light torpedoes (deck mounted aboard ship) or a diameter for heavy torpedoes (underwater tubes), although other sizes of torpedo tube have been used: see Torpedo#Classes and diameters, Torpedo classes and diameters. Submarine torpedo tube A submarine torpedo tube is a more complex mechanism than a torpedo tube on a surface ship, because the tube has to accomplish the function of moving the torpedo from the normal atmospheric pressure within t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Austro-Hungarian Navy
The Austro-Hungarian Navy or Imperial and Royal War Navy (german: kaiserliche und königliche Kriegsmarine, in short ''k.u.k. Kriegsmarine'', hu, Császári és Királyi Haditengerészet) was the naval force of Austria-Hungary. Ships of the Austro-Hungarian Navy were designated ''SMS'', for ''Seiner Majestät Schiff'' (His Majesty's Ship). The k.u.k. Kriegsmarine came into being after the formation of Austria-Hungary in 1867, and ceased to exist in 1918 upon the Empire's defeat and subsequent collapse at the end of World War I. Prior to 1867, the Imperial Austrian Navy or simply the Austrian Navy, saw action in the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars, the Austrian expedition against Morocco (1829), the Second Egyptian–Ottoman War, the First and Second Wars of Italian Independence, the Second Schleswig War, and the Third War of Italian Independence. Following Austria's defeat by Prussia and Italy during the Seven Weeks' War, the Austrian Empire reformed itself i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Schichau-Werke
The Schichau-Werke (F. Schichau, Maschinen- und Lokomotivfabrik, Schiffswerft und Eisengießerei GmbH) was a German engineering works and shipyard based in Elbing, Germany (now Elbląg, Poland) on the Frisches Haff (Vistula Lagoon) of then-East Prussia. It also had a subsidiary shipyard in nearby Danzig (now: Gdańsk, Poland). Due to the Soviet conquest of eastern Germany, Schichau moved to Bremerhaven in March 1945, and its successors continued in business until 2009. Early years Ferdinand Schichau had studied engineering in Berlin, the Rheinland and Great Britain. In 1837, he founded the engineering institution, later known as F. Schichau GmbH, Maschinen- und Lokomotivfabrik (F. Schichau engineering and locomotive factory) in Elbing. It started with the production of hydraulic presses and diggers; in 1860, it began to produce locomotives for the Prussian Eastern Railway. From 1867 locomotive construction began in earnest, and three years later, the factory was connected to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Millbank
Millbank is an area of central London in the City of Westminster. Millbank is located by the River Thames, east of Pimlico and south of Westminster. Millbank is known as the location of major government offices, Burberry headquarters, the Millbank Tower and prominent art institutions such as Tate Britain and the Chelsea College of Art and Design. History The area derives its name from a watermill owned by Westminster Abbey that once stood at a site close to present day College Green. Norden's survey, taken during the reign of Elizabeth I in 1573, records the existence of such a mill although much of the area that comprises Millbank today, was referred to by Samuel Pepys and others as Tothill Fields. Described as a place of plague pits and a "low, marshy locality" suitable for shooting snipe in the nearby "bogs and quagmires". After Cromwell's victory at the Battle of Worcester in September 1651, some 4,000 defeated Royalists were imprisoned at Tothill Fields prior to being so ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quick-firing Gun
A quick-firing or rapid-firing gun is an artillery piece, typically a gun or howitzer, which has several characteristics which taken together mean the weapon can fire at a fast rate. Quick-firing was introduced worldwide in the 1880s and 1890s and had a marked impact on war both on land and at sea. Characteristics The characteristics of a quick-firing artillery piece are: *A breech-loading weapon with a breech mechanism that allows rapid reloading *Single-part cased ammunition, i.e. a cartridge containing both shell and propellant *Recoil buffers to limit recoil, so the barrel can quickly return to the same position after firing *The use of smokeless powder – nitrocellulose, nitroglycerine, or cordite – which create far less smoke than gunpowder, meaning that gun crews could still see their target These innovations, taken together, meant that the quick-firer could fire aimed shells much more rapidly than an older weapon. For instance, an Elswick Ordnance Company 4.7-inch gun ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
