Talk:Town-class cruiser (1910)

Machinery Notes

The introductory text states "The experimental two-shaft layout of Bristol was successful..." and "The ships used both coal and oil for fuel...". These are both true and inaccurate, and thus create confusion.

To the use of the two-shaft machinery arrangement, it should be noted that the Royal Navy continued to cleave to four-shaft arrangements for it's 3rd Rate Cruisers (aka Light Cruisers, or Lightly Armoured Cruisers, &c). Right through the 'C'-Class 6-Inch Gun Cruisers, the RN ordered a pair of "specials" with different machinery arrangements and machinery, seeking the best combination. While the two-shaft arrangement was not a failure, it was not successful in respect of its design role—the two-shaft arrangement never replaced the four-shaft arrangement. I rather think more discussion or less might be in order, because as it stand, one may wonder why a successful design was not carried forward. We might also note that Bristol employed Brown-Curtis direct-drive high-pressure steam turbines, rather than the Parsons turbines fitted to the rest of the class.

The issue of fuel is simpler. The Yarrow boilers fitted in almost all cruisers of the period, including the Town-Class, were coal-fired. They employed oil-fuel sprayers to increase the temperature of the furnace and produce more steam at high demand, but they did not draw power from oil-fired boilers. By contrast, a true mixed-fuel power plant combined coal-fired boilers and oil-fired boilers. But again, any one boiler is fired by only one fuel; spraying oil on air in an oil-enriched coal-fired boiler does not produce steam. There is no way to load coal into an oil-fired boiler without causing a casualty. Ranya (talk) 18:19, 6 December 2021 (UTC)

1 - that the two shaft arrangement was successful is cited.

2 it says that Bristol had different type of turbine

3 the cruisers did use both coal and oil for power. The sentence does not claim that they used oil-fired boilers. That the exact way they used it is not specified does not make the statement 'inaccurate'. GraemeLeggett (talk) 19:04, 6 December 2021 (UTC)

Naval historians do not draw any distinction between a mixture of oil- and coal-fired boilers and coal-fired with oil sprayers in my experience like you do. Find a source discussing the choice for four shafts in the ships after Bristol and add that information to the article.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 19:27, 6 December 2021 (UTC)

Not a class

The Town class as described in this article was actually three separate classes:

The 4,800-ton Bristol class turbine protected cruisers, 5,250-tonWeymouth class turbine protected cruisers, and the two variations of the 5,400-ton light cruiser design (Chatham and Birmingham type/class) along with the outlier Birkenhead type/class. The last three are normally considered of the same larger class, but the earlier two classes were very distinct from the later models. They are not universally considered to be 'Towns' except as far as their naming convention is concerned.

They should be treated as separate classes, since this is what they clearly were and were considered so at the time. 2A00:23C7:3119:AD01:B05E:A093:B53D:52C9 (talk) 22:01, 14 March 2023 (UTC)