1931 HMS Rodney and HMS Nelson

1931. British Movietone News. The Nelson class was a class of two battleships of the British Royal Navy, built shortly after, and under the terms of, the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922. They were the first British battleships built since the Revenge class (ordered in 1913) and their orders were not followed until the King George V class of 1936. In order that they comply with the limitations of the Washington treaty, these ships were of an unusual design with many novel features. In order to reduce the weight of armour, the main gun turrets were mounted all forward, shortening the necessary armoured length. All three were in front of the bridge; 'B' was mounted superfiring over 'A', with 'Q' turret at the main deck level behind 'B', and therefore unable to fire directly forward or aft. The large superstructure, which was triangular in plan, was sometimes referred to as the "Queen Anne's Mansions", from its similarity to a 14-storey brick residential development of the same name, opposite St. James's Park underground railway station in London.Their main armament of 16-inch (406 mm) guns were mounted in triple turrets, the only RN battleships with this feature. The guns themselves were a step away from standard British designs. Where previous RN weapons fired heavy shells at a moderate velocity, the Nelson's weapons followed the German practice of a lighter shell at a higher velocity.Because of their unusual silhouette, HMS Nelson and her sister Rodney were sarcastically nicknamed Nelsol and Rodnol by the Royal Navy - their manoeuvrability issues and single-funnelled silhouettes reminded Navy men of oil tankers, and a series of fleet oilers had been built during the First World War that bore names ending in "ol".

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• Royal
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• Nelson-class
• HMS
• Nelson
• Rodney
• 1930
• 1931
• Mediterranean
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• Gibraltar
• British

[MadMilitiaMen]

@Bazgatow87 Nelson and Rodney both survived the war my friend.

[kuluku]

Most powerful battleships beofre WWII.

[sthill1993]

@enterprise160 Well Bismarck was superior in Speed and Armour, but then Nelson and Rodney had better armament. Bismarck looks better however, the Nelsons look like they're back to front! ;)

[enterprise160]

@sthill1993

Yes, the Rodney sure did pawn the Bismarck! I always enjoy watching the movie, Sink the Bismarck, but I shake my head when Admiral Lutjens says, "You are sailing on the largest, the most powerful battleship afloat. Superior to anything in the British navy." Not so! The Rodney had 16-inch guns as opposed to the Bismarck's 15-inch armament.

[RGV250100]

@semperfidelis677

i know, i was mainly referring to the fact there were the only big guns in the navy that were on ships that were in use.

[semperfidelis677]

@RGV250100 No not the biggest guns in RN, Courageous and Glorious mounted 18" guns as battlecruisers, but were later converted to Aircraft Carriers in the 1930s.

[bahoonies]

Many thanks for posting this video. It's the best footage I've seen of the sisters. Where did you find it?

[sthill1993]

@GravesRWFiA I like the way they look, not because it's aesthetically pleasing but because they're distinctive. They're so ugly they're awesome!

[sthill1993]

@Bazgatow87 You claimed that both the Nelson class ships were sunk, when very clearly they did not. As for the second part; 1. THEY SURVIVED so they weren't weak, and Rodney owned the Bismarck.

[Bazgatow87]

@adventussaxonum what?? probably the next thing you wanna tell me is, that germany did lost the war?!

[TheBByamashiro]

and now they are paperclips:(

[GravesRWFiA]

astetically i've always found the Nelson class truly ugly ships. that forward mounted tri-utrret arangment just throws the lines all to hell.