The competition for the design of a high-speed armored cruiser of the 2nd rank was announced, apparently, in early April 1898. Already on April 10, the attorney of the German shipbuilding company Howaldtswerke AG received an assignment to design a 25-knot cruiser, and a day later - "30-node". And on April 28 (in the previous article, alas, it was mistakenly indicated April 10), an answer was given, apparently putting an end to the idea of a "30-knot" cruiser.
Representatives of the German company reported that in order for a cruiser of 3,000 tons to develop 25 knots, it would need machines with a total capacity of 18,000 hp. But in order to reach 30 knots, this power should be increased to 25,000 hp, while the power plant with a machine of this power will have a mass of 1,900 - 2,000 tons, and it turns out that for all other elements of the ship: the hull, weapons, fuel supplies, etc. there will be only a thousand tons or a little more. It is obvious that in such a displacement reserve it will in no way be possible to create a combat ship of some acceptable qualities. These considerations were very convincing, and Vice Admiral I. M. Dikov accompanied the German calculations with a note: “I believe that a 25-knot move is sufficient. It is hardly possible to demand more."
It is interesting that in this matter the Germans, perhaps, slightly exaggerated the colors. The fact is that the actual weight of the Novik power plant with a rated power of 17,000 hp. was about 800 tons, so it can be assumed that 25,000 hp. could be provided by bringing the mass of the propulsion unit to 1,150 - 1,200 tons, and by no means 1,900 - 2,000 tons. something suitably armed and protected so that it does not break on the first wave.
I must say that nine shipbuilding enterprises responded to the competition, including:
1) German - already mentioned above Howaldtswerke AG (Kiel), F. Schichau GmbH and Fríedrich Krupp AG;
2) English: London and Glasgow Engineering and Iron Shipbuilding Company and Laird, Son & Co (Birkenhead);
3) Italian - Gio. Ansaldo & C.;
4) French - SA des Chantiers el Ateliers de la Gironde (Bordeaux);
5) Danish company Burmeister og Vein, 6) Russian - Nevsky shipyard with technical assistance from British firms.
However, it should be borne in mind that three companies - the British Laird, the French and the Danish - entered only in January-February 1899, when the competition had already taken place, the winner was chosen, and a contract had already been signed with him. Therefore, MTK got acquainted with the proposals of the British and French only out of common interest, the firms were informed that new orders for ships of this type were not planned yet. As for the proposal of the Danish "Burmeister and Van", big politics intervened here, which is why the case ended with the order of the cruiser "Boyarin". But we will return to these events later.
Thus, six applicants submitted their projects to the competition on time: unfortunately, many details remain unknown today. So, for example, historians have not yet been able to find any materials on the British project, and the conclusion that the documentation submitted by the British did not correspond at all to the competition requirements is made on the basis that the documents were returned to the British only 9 days after their submission. As far as can be understood, the displacement of 3,000 tons was still a bit cramped for the designers - the project presented by the Nevsky shipbuilding shipyard had a displacement of 3,200 tons, the German Hovaldtswerke - 3,202 tons. The strongest armor was the proposal of the Russian plant - the thickness of the armored deck was 30 mm in the horizontal part and on the bevels in the bow and stern, and 80 mm on the bevels in the areas of engine and boiler rooms. The Italian project was distinguished by its "extremely thick" conning tower among the projects presented - the wall thickness was 125 mm. Well, the most original, perhaps, was one of the options presented by "Hovaldtswerke" - while the projects submitted for the competition mostly used Yarrow's "mine-bearing" boilers (and the "Hovaldtswerke" itself - Thornycroft), this version assumed boilers Belleville. In this case, the cruiser received a slightly greater width, in comparison with the cruiser that used the Thornycroft boilers, and a displacement of 100 tons, but it was assumed that the ship would still reach 25 knots. Obviously, the calculation was based on the fact that the Russian ITC, "in love" with the Belleville boilers, would not be able to resist such a proposal. But this time even Belleville did not work: the competition was won by the Sheehau, with which a contract was signed on August 5, 1898, under which the company undertook to present the cruiser for testing 25 months after the contract was signed.
Let's see what they did.
Displacement
I must say that the German designers were faced with the most difficult task: the creation of a 25-knot cruiser with a displacement of 3,000 tons, and, very likely, they themselves were not completely sure of the successful solution of which. And therefore, a course was taken not only for the strictest weight discipline in order to prevent any overload, but also for all-round constructive relief of the cruiser in order to provide it with a displacement of 3,000 tons less than the contractual value., to say the least, strange decisions: but it would be wrong to blame the Germans for this, since the ITC, apparently, adhered to the same positions and was only happy about the ship's all-round relief. The fact is that, despite the conclusion of the contract at the beginning of August 1898, the approval of the cruiser's drawings dragged on simply ugly - in fact, work on the construction of the ship began almost a year and a half after the conclusion of the contract - in December 1899! True, such a delay was influenced not only by the slowness of the MTK, but also by the delays of the steel mills in the delivery of metal, but there is no doubt that it was MTK that played the main role in the delay.
Looking ahead, we note that, if we count from the moment the work began, the cruiser was built very quickly - on May 2, 1901, the ship was already completely ready and went to factory tests, while less than a year and five months had passed since the start of construction. A similar period for the "Varyag" under construction in the USA was about 2 years - the exact date of the start of work on this cruiser is unknown, but presumably it is August 1898, and for the first time the cruiser left the sea on July 9, 1900. But, comparing the construction time of the "Varyag" and “Novik” we must not forget that the “Varyag” was still more than twice the size of the brainchild of the “Shikhau” company. If we take domestic shipyards for comparison, then from the moment of the start of work on the construction of the cruiser Zhemchug, which is almost the same type for Novik, and until the first launch of the cruiser at sea for factory tests, it took about 3.5 years (February 19, 1901 - August 5, 1904 G.).
When the Novik entered its first trials, its normal displacement was almost 300 tons lower than that stipulated in the contract. Oddly enough, its exact meaning is unknown, because the data of Russian-language sources have slight discrepancies. So, for example, according to A. Emelin, the normal displacement was 2,719, 125 tons, but does not specify what kind of tons are in question, metric or "long" English, having 1,016, 04 kg. But in the monograph by V. V. Khromov, it is indicated that such consisted of 2,721 "long" tons, that is, in metric tons, the displacement of the Novik is 2,764, 645 tons. But, in any case, this is much less than indicated in the contract.
Frame
From the point of view of structural strength, perhaps we can say that the Germans managed to literally go along the edge, lightening the ship's hull as much as possible without compromising its seaworthiness, and perhaps even slightly stepping over this edge. In subsequent ships of the series, built on the model of Novik at domestic shipyards, the hull was considered necessary to be reinforced - on the other hand, Novik quite confidently withstood storms, and the transition to the Far East, and hostilities against the Japanese without much criticism.
Usually, a complaint about the project is the absence of a double bottom, brought to the level of the lower slopes of the armored deck throughout most of the hull. As an illustration, let's see the cross-section of the armored cruiser "Bogatyr"
And Novik
On the one hand, the claim is undoubtedly true - the double bottom of the Novik really rose to the level of the armored deck only at the extremities. But on the other hand, one should take into account the limitations of this form of protection - in fact, the double bottom protects only from leaks in the skin and grounding, and the second only if only the outer skin is damaged. As for combat damage, a double bottom is almost useless against them. In addition, the presence of a double bottom provides a slightly more robust hull. But, as we know, the strength of the Novik's hull turned out to be acceptable, and as for navigational accidents, a lot depends on the areas of the ship's combat use. For example, in the Baltic it is extremely important, but in the Pacific Ocean the same American destroyers, although they did not have a double bottom, did not suffer much from this. You can also recall the British experience - after the First World War they preferred to build their destroyers without a double bottom, which made it possible to "squeeze" maximum power machines and boilers into narrow hulls, while the safety of the ships was ensured by numerous watertight bulkheads. It was on this principle that Novik was designed - it had 17 watertight bulkheads from the bottom to the armored deck, and 9 - above the armored deck! The Bogatyr cruiser, for example, had 16 watertight bulkheads, of which three continued above the armored deck. Thus, in spite of the absence of a continuous double bottom, the Novik was nevertheless very resistant to flooding by the ship.
Unfortunately, another important drawback of the Novik hull is often overlooked. Of course, no one has the right to reproach the German designers for the fact that their brainchild had a long and narrow body, the length-to-width ratio of which was very high. So, for "Bogatyr" with a maximum length of 132, 02 m and a width of 16, 61 m, it was 7, 95, and for "Novik" with a maximum length of about 111 m (106 m, indicated in sources, is the length between perpendiculars) - almost 9, 1. Without a doubt, such a ratio was absolutely necessary to achieve an extremely high speed of 25 knots at that time. However, it also predetermined one of the most significant shortcomings of the ship - a strong lateral roll, which made the Novik a very unstable artillery platform. At the same time, this disadvantage could be to some extent leveled by the installation of side keels, but those could negatively affect the speed, and, apparently, therefore, "Novik" did not receive them. BUT. von Essen, having already assumed command of the cruiser, wrote in a report about such keels:
"Which, although, probably, would have a detrimental effect on the speed of the cruiser, but at the same time would give it the stability necessary for artillery fire."
As for the seaworthiness of the Novik, it is not easy to give an unambiguous assessment. On the one hand, it would be difficult to expect much from a small ship built for speed. And indeed, when in the winter Mediterranean Sea "Novik" got into a storm, then with a passing wave, the ship "rolled" strongly - the roll reached 25 degrees, while the swing frequency reached 13-14 per minute. However, when the cruiser turned around and went against the wave, then, according to N. O. von Essen: "carried on perfectly, not taking water at all with his nose, and experiencing a relatively slight roll."
Power plant
In order for the cruiser to develop 25 knots, three four-cylinder steam engines with a nominal power of 17,000 hp were placed on it. and 12 water-tube boilers of the Schihau system (in fact - slightly modernized boilers of Thornicroft). At the same time, in the direction from the bow to the stern, first there were two boiler rooms, then a machine room with two machines, a third boiler room and behind it a second machine room (with one machine). This arrangement practically excluded the possibility of failure of all vehicles as a result of one combat damage, and gave the Novik its easily recognizable silhouette (the third pipe is separated from the second and third).
It must be said that the Schikhau boilers left an ambiguous impression on our specialists. On the one hand, their advantages were noted, but on the other, there were also disadvantages. So, access to the lower ends of the water-heating pipes was quite difficult, and the pipes themselves had a large curvature, contributing to the formation and accumulation of scale. As a result, MTK, during the construction of Zhemchug and Izumrud, preferred to return to the more familiar Yarrow boilers. To what extent this was a well-grounded decision, we will consider later, when we analyze the results of the Novik's combat service.
In the meantime, let's say that on acceptance tests a cruiser, with a machine power of 17,789 hp. at 163, 7 rpm, on five runs developed a speed of 25, 08 knots. This did not correspond to the contractual requirement to maintain the 25-knot stroke during the 6-hour run, so we can say that the German company, despite the ship's all-round relief, was still unable to fulfill the contract requirements. But, in any case, at that time "Novik" was definitely the fastest cruiser in the history of ships of this class - no other cruiser in the world had ever developed such a speed.
However, already during the tests, an unpleasant defect of the ship was revealed - due to errors in the weight calculations, the Novik had a fairly pronounced trim on the bow. At the acceptance tests, the Germans managed to "adjust" this moment - the ship had a trim not to the bow, but to the stern: the draft with the stem was 4.65 m, with the sternpost - 4.75 m. However, in the course of daily service in Port Arthur, these indicators were already others, reaching 5, 3 and 4, 95 m, respectively, that is, the trim on the bow was up to 35 cm (during the transition to the Far East it was less - somewhere on the order of 20 cm). Sources claim that such a trim caused a strong drop in speed - in Port Arthur, on April 23, 1903, the cruiser at 160 rpm was able to develop only 23.6 knots.
However, here, most likely, the issue is not so much in the differential as in the operational overload of the ship - after all, the ship, it turns out, sat with the bow at 65 cm, and at the stern - 25 cm deeper than during the tests, when the cruiser was provided with its normal displacement. The fact is that during the tests that took place on July 5, 1901, when the Novik was not overloaded with anything, it developed 24, 38-24, 82 knots during two runs of 15.5 miles each, while later it turned out that the distance was measured incorrectly, and in fact the cruiser had a great speed - it probably exceeded 25 knots. At the same time, it was noted that during the run, the cruiser sits strongly with its nose. Unfortunately, the author has no data on the ship's displacement during these tests, or information on the size of the trim, but, apparently, in this case, the latter did not particularly affect the cruiser speed.
I must say that the ship's ability to develop 23.6 knots.in Port Arthur it is quite a decent indicator - usually ships in everyday operation are still unable to show the transfer speed during tests, losing to it by 1-2 knots. Let us recall "Askold", which, having shown a speed of more than 24 knots during the tests, in the same Arthur confidently held only 22.5 knots.
As we have already said, the normal coal reserve was 360 tons, the full one - 509 tons, despite the fact that the contract provided for a cruising range of 5,000 miles at 10 knots. Alas, in fact it turned out to be much more modest and amounted to only 3,200 tons at the same speed. The reason, oddly enough, lay in a three-shaft power plant, the use of which on battleships of the "Peresvet" type turned the latter into "coal eaters". But if on "Peresvets", planning to go economically with an average car, they did not think at all about the resistance that two non-rotating propellers out of three would have, then on “Novik” it was supposed to go economically under the two extreme machines. However, the principle of the problem remained the same - the middle propeller created a lot of resistance, which is why it was still necessary to set the third car in motion, albeit at low revs. The only difference, perhaps, was that for "Peresvetov" it is usually indicated the need for a mechanical transmission, which the average machine could drive not only its own, but also neighboring screws, while for "Novik", apparently, it was enough would only be the uncoupling mechanism of the screw with the machine.
Reservation
The basis of the Novik's armor protection was the "karapasnaya" armored deck of a very decent thickness. In the horizontal part, it had 30 mm (20 mm of armor on 10 mm of steel bedding) and bevels of 50 mm (35 mm of armor on 15 mm of steel). In the middle of the hull, the horizontal part was located at 0.6 m above the waterline, the lower edge of the bevels adjoined the board at 1.25 m below the waterline. At a distance of 29.5 m from the stem of the ship, the horizontal part gradually lowered to 2.1 m below the waterline directly at the stem. In the stern, the deck also made a "dive", but not so "deep" - the descent began at 25, 5 m from the sternpost in contact with the latter at 0, 6 m below the waterline. I must say that the cruiser's steam engines turned out to be too massive and did not fit under the armored deck. Therefore, the cylinders protruding above it had additional protection in the form of vertical glacis with a thickness of 70 mm.
Coal pits were located directly above the bevels, providing additional protection. Thus, the only difference between Novik and other, larger domestic armored cruisers was the absence of a cofferdam at the waterline level. The latter, although it was not able, of course, to somehow protect against a direct hit from an enemy projectile, still could significantly reduce the leaks that occur at close explosions.
Otherwise, the armor protection of the ship was extremely limited - the wheelhouse was protected by 30 mm armor, there was also a pipe of the same thickness, through which the control wires went under the armored deck (including the electric rudder drive). In addition, the 120-mm and 47-mm guns had armored shields. On the one hand, of course, such protection was very far from ideal, because it did little to protect the crew from shrapnel, unless the enemy shell exploded in front of the gun - the shields of the armored cruiser Askold, similar in area, received very critical reviews from those who participated in the battle. July 28, 1904 officers. But, on the other hand, such shields were noticeably better than nothing, and one can only regret that the shield of the bow gun blocked the view from the conning tower to such an extent that it had to be removed.
In general, the following can be said about the Novik's armor protection. Abstracting from the viciousness of the armored deck scheme (especially since there was no way to provide vertical side armor on a high-speed ship of less than 3,000 tons with a displacement), it should be noted that it was very good on our cruiser. The thickness of the armored deck was quite capable of providing protection against 152-mm shells at a distance of about 20 cables and beyond, and in this respect was not much inferior to armored cruisers twice as large as the Novik. But, of course, the 30 mm conning tower and pipes with drives looked clearly not enough, here at least 50 mm, or better 70 mm armor, would be needed, and it cannot be said that its use would lead to any fatal overload. Another drawback of the Novik's booking scheme was the lack of armor protection for chimneys at least up to the level of the upper deck.
Artillery
The "main caliber" of the armored cruiser "Novik" is represented by six 120-mm / 45 Kane guns. Oddly enough, information about these weapons is very fragmentary and contradictory. It is reliably known that the projectile of this gun (old model) weighed 20, 47 kg, and the gun had a unitary loading (that is, the "cartridge" from the projectile and the charge was loaded immediately). The 152-mm / 45 Kane cannon initially also had a unitary loading, but it was almost immediately transferred to a separate one (the projectile and the sleeve were charged separately), which was fully justified by the large weight of the projectile. At the same time, the weight of a 120-mm / 45 gun shot apparently did not exceed 30 kg (according to Shirokorad's data, the case weight was 8.8 kg, respectively, the shot weight was 29.27 kg), that is, the 120-mm shot turned out to be even easier than only one lightweight 152-mm / 45 projectile of the Kane cannon, which had a mass of 41, 4 kg.
Judging by the available data, the high-explosive and armor-piercing projectiles of the 120-mm / 45 cannon had the same mass, but cast-iron and segmental projectiles were also relied on, the mass of which, unfortunately, is unknown to the author. Also, alas, the content of the explosive in the shells is also unknown.
The initial velocity of 20, 47 kg of the projectile was 823 m / s, but the firing range is still a rebus. So A. Emelin in his monograph dedicated to the cruiser "Novik" gives data that the maximum elevation angle of the "Novik" guns was 15 degrees, while the firing range of 120-mm / 45 guns reached 48 kbt. However, according to other sources, the maximum elevation angle of this gun was 18 degrees, while the firing range of the "old" projectile was 10,065 m or more than 54 kbt. The diagram of Kane's 120-mm / 45 deck gun, given by A. Emelin in the above-mentioned monograph, is completely confusing, because according to it, the maximum elevation angle of this gun is 20 degrees.
Thus, the only thing that can be said for sure is that the 120mm / 45 was inferior to the six-inch Kane in firing range, but how much is difficult to say.
Naturally, the 120-mm / 45 gun was inferior to the six-inch shell in terms of the power of the projectile - more than twice, but the weight of the deck-mounted one hundred and twenty was almost two times inferior to the 152-mm / 45 gun (approximately 7.5 tons versus 14.5 tons). But in the rate of fire and the ability to maintain an intense rate of fire for a long time, the 120-mm / 45 was obviously superior to the 152-mm / 45 - simply because of the unitary rather than separate loading and the lower weight of the projectile and charge.
The standard ammunition load of 120-mm / 45 guns of the cruiser "Novik" is unknown, but, taking into account the information provided by N. O. von Essen on the stocks of the cruiser before moving to the Far East, it can be assumed that the ammunition for the gun consisted of 175-180 rounds, of which 50 were high-explosive, and the rest (in approximately equal proportion) armor-piercing, cast iron and segmental.
In addition to 120-mm / 45 guns, the cruiser had six more 47-mm cannons and two single-barreled 37-mm artillery systems (on the wings of the aft bridge) and two 7, 62-mm machine guns on Mars. In addition, the cruiser, of course, had a 63.5-mm Baranovsky landing cannon, which could be placed on a longboat, and a 37-mm gun (apparently two) for arming steam boats. All this artillery, with the exception, perhaps, of the landing cannon, had practically no meaning and we will not consider it in detail.
To measure the distance, the ship was routinely relied on Lyuzhol-Myakishev's myrometers, but in Port Arthur the Novik received the Barr and Stroud range finder.
In the pre-war years, domestic armored cruisers were equipped with a centralized fire control system. The latter was a rather complex electrified system, consisting of transmitting and receiving dials, which made it possible to transmit from the conning tower to the guns the bearing to the target, the type of projectiles that must be used on it, the fire control commands "short alarm", "attack", "shot", as well as the distance to the target. Unfortunately, nothing of the kind was installed on the Novik - the fire control was supposed to be carried out by "old-fashioned" methods - by sending orderlies, drumming, and commanding the bow gun was supposed to be done directly from the conning tower.
As we said above, due to the design features aimed at achieving record speed, the Novik was not a stable artillery platform. Lieutenant A. P. Ster, acting as an artillery officer of the cruiser, indicated in the report:
“Due to the fact that the cruiser by its design is easily subject to strong lateral rolling, shooting from it is very difficult and without sufficient practice it cannot be a mark … … Therefore, it is advisable to give the opportunity to practice auxiliary shooting from the barrels (probably, we are talking about barrel shooting - author's note) under all weather conditions in excess of the prescribed number of firings and, if possible, on the counter-tack and at high speed."
Note also that N. O. von Essen was with his acting. the artillery officer was in full agreement.
Mine weapons
According to the initial project, the cruiser was supposed to have 6 * 381-mm torpedo tubes with ammunition for 2 Whitehead mines per vehicle, two mine throwers for steam boats, as well as 25 anchor mines. However, in the process of approval and construction, it has undergone a significant reduction. So, in connection with the extreme narrowness of the compartments at the stem, it was decided to abandon the installation of a bow torpedo tube, so that, in the end, there were five of them. All of them were surface, while the bow pair was located in the hull at a height of 1.65 m from the waterline on the side in the bow of the ship (on the side projection of the ship, the lateral ports are visible under the barrel of the bow 120-mm gun). The second pair of mine vehicles was located closer to the stern, in the area of the third chimney just below, 1.5 m from the waterline. Both pairs of "pipes" were hinged, were movable, and could be guided: bow at 65 degrees. in the nose and 5 degrees. in the stern, fodder - by 45 degrees. in the nose and 35 degrees. in the stern (from the traverse). The fifth torpedo tube was stationary and located in the stern of the ship.
As a result, they abandoned the placement of barrage mines and mine vehicles for steam boats. The steam boats "Novik" were too miniature to make up a mine raft, and without this, keeping mines on it did not make much sense. Therefore, their number was first reduced to 15, and then they were abandoned altogether, and the mine vehicles of the boats were removed at the same time.
On the whole, Novik's mine armament is difficult to recognize as satisfactory. The 381-mm mine of the Lessner plant's design, model 1898, had a relatively small explosive charge - 64 kg, but, most importantly, an unfortunate short range - 600 m at a speed of 30 knots. or 900 m at a speed of 25 knots. Thus, in order to hit someone, the cruiser had to come very close, at a distance of less than 5 cables - of course, in a combat situation this was hardly possible. But the placement of these torpedoes above the armored deck, without any protection, could lead to disaster in battle.
