What's This One?

[geofflambert]

I'm certain you're right with the DP guns, and with the higher caliber guns on the other hand, I think 3x3 is better than 4x2, but it's debatable.

More than that, if you've got proximity fuse shells coming out every so often, I'm not sure single gun turrets aren't best, for flak purposes.

[Sardaukar]

ORIGINAL: wdolson

I think the most likely reason there were no triple 5 inch turrets was due to mass production and the least common denominator was DDs which didn't have the beam for a wider turret.

However, another possibility might have been the logistics of space. 5 inch guns were, I believe loaded by hand and you had to have a loading crew standing around the gun. In a twin turret the crews could be somewhat to the side of the gun and not interfere with each other. In a triple turret, the middle gun crew would end up in the way of the other two guns.

Larger caliber guns were loaded with ammunition lifts since the shells were too heavy for a human being to manhandle. Though there did have to be people there to run the mechanism and such. The actual distance between the gun breaches on a triple turret of larger caliber would also be larger just because of the gun size, which would give the crew for the center gun more room to maneuver.

Just a thought. I'm far from an expert on naval gunnery.

Bill

I think you are spot on with that. Plus extra crew, turret can only accommodate so many.