Lexington class aircraft carrier
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Lexington class Aircraft carrier | |
|---|---|
 USS Lexington, in early configuration with tapered bow and original armament |
|
| Class Overview | |
| Type: | Aircraft carrier |
| Name: | Lexington |
| Number of ships: | Six ordered as battlecruisers, two launched and commissioned as carriers |
| Preceded by: | USS Langley (CV-1) |
| Succeeded by: | USS Ranger (CV-4) |
| General characteristics | |
| Displacement: | Designed: 36,000 / 38,746 tons 1942: 50,000 tons |
| Length: | 888 ft (270.7 m) |
| Beam: | 106 ft (32.31 m) |
| Draught: | 24 ft 3 in (7.39 m) |
| Propulsion: | Design: 16 × boilers at 300 psi; Geared turbines and electric drive 4 × shafts; 180,000 shp |
| Speed: | 33.25 knots |
| Range: | 10,000 nautical miles at 10 knots |
| Protection: | Belt: 5–7 inches 2 inch protective 3rd deck 3 inch flat to 4.5 inch over steering gear |
| Complement: | 2,122 |
| Armament: | 4 × twin 8 inch 55 caliber guns 12 × single 5 inch guns |
| Aircraft: | 91 |
| Ships of the class | |
| USS Lexington (CV-2), USS Saratoga (CV-3) | |
The Lexington class aircraft carriers were the first operational aircraft carriers in the United States Navy (USS Langley was a strictly developmental ship which only served for a short time as an active fleet unit before being converted to a seaplane tender AV-3). The ships were laid down and partly built as battlecruisers before being converted to carriers while under construction. Saratoga, the third ship, was more complete than the second ship, Constellation, when the vessels were under consideration for conversion, so Saratoga was continued and Constellation was scrapped. Successful wide-scale operations with these ships, compared to the very limited operations possible with the much smaller USS Ranger convinced the Navy that larger carriers were more effective than smaller ones, a trend which has continued through the years; the modern day Nimitz class supercarriers are one hundred percent larger in tonnage than the Midway class ships of fifty years ago.
The original battlecruiser design studies had much in common with Lord Fisher's "large light cruiser" concept, studies were made on low-displacement battlecruisers with virtually no armor, armed with up to twenty guns in five quadruple turrets of 12" guns. A semi-finalized design came forth in 1916 with ten 14" guns in two twin and two triple turrets and very thin armor, with half of the boilers above the protective deck, on a displacement of 36,500 tons. By the time the battlecruiser design had been finalized, the ships had a conventional displacement of over 43,000 tons and were conventionally armed with eight 16" guns and 16 6" guns, though for commonality's sake the secondary battery probably would have been changed to a mixed battery of 5" anti-surface and anti-air guns before installation, and replaced by a uniform battery of dual 5"/38 DPs during World War II. The canceled battlecruisers were the last-ever use of the two-gun turret in US Navy ships, the subsequent WWII-era "fast battleships" used triple turrets exclusively.
As commissioned, the aircraft carriers had a heavy cruiser-style battery of four dual 8" gun turrets; the Navy's Bureau of Construction and Repair (later Bureau of Ships, now NAVSEA) had no confidence in aircraft as armament and equipped the vessels with the heavy guns even though they would have ripped up the flight deck if ever fired in anger. Their official displacement on commissioning was 33,000 tons (in accordance with the Washington Treaty) even though in reality both ships were well in excess of that, 36,000 tons standard displacement and nearly 40,000 tons fully loaded with fuel, ammunition, aircraft and gasoline. Shortly after Pearl Harbor, both ships' 8" batteries were lifted off of them for use as shore-defense guns in Hawaii; these weapons were replaced on Saratoga with 5" DP guns that were more suitable for carrier use. Lexington was sunk in the Coral Sea before receiving her new guns. The ships set the pattern for future American carrier design: Very large, long ships, with a topside flight deck, starboard-side island combining command and control spaces and the ship's funnels, and a capacious, remarkably deep hangar deck. With 17'6" clear height, the Lexingtons' hangars were the deepest of any carriers until the postwar Forrestal class carriers.
The name source for the battlecruisers was famous past ships of the U.S. Navy, which continued to be the name source for aircraft carriers until CV-66 USS America. CV-67 John F. Kennedy started a trend of naming carriers for political figures, a trend which continues as of this writing. The exceptions prior to John F. Kennedy were CV-42 USS Franklin D. Roosevelt (named for the late president), CV-38 USS Shangri-La (named for the fictional city, which had been used as a code name for USS Hornet (CV-8) early in the war), CVL-49 USS Wright (named for the Wright Brothers), CV-59 Forrestal (named for James V. Forrestal) and CV-63 Kitty Hawk (again named in honor of the first flight).
The Lexington class carriers were the largest aircraft carriers in the fleet until the late-war Midway-class carriers, and had the deepest hangar decks in the world until the early-50s Forrestal-class supercarriers.
There were two Lexington-class carriers: CV-2 USS Lexington (also called "Lady Lex") and CV-3 USS Saratoga (also called "Sister Sara"). Lady Lex was sunk in the Battle of Coral Sea in 1942; Saratoga survived to be disposed of in the Bikini Atoll nuclear tests after the war.
For the history of the class prior to the decision to convert two units, please see Lexington class battle cruiser.
| Lexington-class aircraft carriers (converted from battlecruisers in accordance with the Washington Treaty) |
| Lexington | Saratoga |
| Lexington-class battlecruisers (scrapped in accordance with the Washington Treaty) |
| Constellation | Ranger | Constitution | United States |
List of aircraft carriers of the United States Navy |
