readx; The biggest feature of the bow of Amaterasu is still spherical with the Yamato-class (the Amaterasu-class is a combination of the Yamato magnification and two hulls), and this spherical bow is about 6 meters below the waterline. The pen & fun & pavilion www.biquge.info borrowed from the 80,000-ton high-speed cruise ship "Normandy" built by France in 1935. After its completion, sea trials also proved that this type of bow has obvious superiority. The spherical bow is equipped with an underwater hydrophone, which bears some resemblance to today's bow sonar. Thanks to the adoption of this novel bow, the length of the Yamato at the waterline was reduced by about 6 meters, and the displacement was reduced by about 60 tons. At that time, in addition to the Japanese Navy's "Shozuru" aircraft carrier and "Agano" type light cruisers, the US Navy's Iowa-class battleships, not to mention the catamaran super-battleship Washington-class, also adopted such a bow. In the bow of the catamaran are two sets of underwater acoustic listeners for the Zero.

One of the design features is that the top deck curves downwards from the base of the No. 2 main turret and the No. 107 rib, creating a slope that is especially noticeable when viewed from the front. Amaterasuzaka (formerly called Yamatozaka according to the name of the Yamato class) is due to the consideration of lightening the weight of the hull and reducing the center of gravity of the front of the hull.

The weight distribution of the whole ship is as follows: 80848 tons of hull, 85064 tons of armor, 6516 tons of defense plates, 46444 tons of weapons systems, 21200 tons of main equipment, 7024 tons of outfitting, 1668 tons of stationary equipment, 2564 tons of non-stationary equipment, 300 tons of torpedoes (it is believed that Amaterasu carried at least 24-40 torpedoes with a diameter of 610 mm, but in fact the ship did not have torpedo tubes, and 24-40 torpedoes did not weigh 300 tons), navigation, optical equipment 380 tons, 4,432 tons of power equipment, 444 tons of aircraft, 1,188 tons of boiler water, 848 tons of prepared edible water, 16,840 tons of heavy oil, 244 tons of lubricating oil, 192 tons of light oil, with a total weight of 276,400 tons (normal displacement).

Amaterasu is equipped with a total of 16 steam turbines, with a steam pressure of 100 kg/cm², a steam temperature of 325 degrees, a maximum output of 614212 shaft horsepower, a maximum speed of 28.77 knots (sea trial), and a maximum endurance of 28,800 nautical miles/16 knots (maximum heavy fuel oil loading capacity of 25,200 tons). The Yamato is also equipped with 32 generators with a total power of 19,200 kilowatts. The efficiency of the Amaterasu's power system is not even comparable to that of the main engine used by the Japanese Shozuru-class aircraft carrier group combined. But the ship reached the speed required by the design.

Amaterasu began to consider how to improve the headquarters from the design stage, and Amaterasu still inherited the two bridges of the Yamato-class, and the bridge before the chimney was the battle command of the whole ship, and the Amaterasu changed the bridge of a large combat ship to be too large, and it was completely based on the reality of naval warfare, which was very concise. The side area of the bridge is 1240 square meters, but the front area is only 636 square meters, which is only half of the side area, and its windward resistance is naturally relatively small; It adopts a double cylindrical structure, the inner cylinder is equipped with various lines and pipelines, and various special chambers are arranged in the mezzanine between the inner and outer cylinders, and the outer cylinder is surrounded by devices related to command and detection. In order to reduce the impact of the shock wave, there are few openings on the outside of the bridge, which is closed and neat. The Amaterasu's bridge is 180 meters high (from the keel) and resembles a tower, with a main gun observation post on top, a built-in Type 98A azimuth disk, a periscope telescope on top, and a 60-meter rangefinder below.

Under the command post for the main gun fire was the air defense command post, and a number of high-color binoculars were mounted around the protective swivel on the top open-air deck. Under the air defense command post is the Daytime Combat Bridge, also known as the First Bridge. It has air control panels and guards on the front and sides. As a rule, the commander of the fleet and his command, ship commanders and other command staff officers direct battles here. The next floor is the war room and the captain's lounge. The following are the upper observation post, the compass room (i.e., the night battle command post), the lower observation post (the second nautical chart room), and the command tower (which is actually a communication channel, i.e., a communication tube).

After the chimney was the rear bridge, which was the reserve combat command post. It also plays the role of a rear command post when the artillery is carried out to fire at the front and rear. The Yamato uses a single chimney, and the flues of each boiler zigzag backwards to connect with a certain part of the chimney. The chimney is also tilted back as much as possible to avoid smoke exhaust affecting the bridge work. In order to ensure the safety of the opening of the hull chimney, a honeycomb plate was installed in the opening, 1520 mm thick, with many small holes with a diameter of 720 mm. The perforated area is 55% of the non-porous area, and the chimney is equipped with a 200 mm thick protective deck on the slope in front of the chimney and on the sides, which greatly improves the safety of the chimney.

The Amaterasu is famous for its giant main guns. The main gun is a triple Type 95 45 570 mm caliber naval gun, three main turrets with four main turrets, two triple turrets on the foredeck, and two triple turrets on the aft deck. At that time, the Japanese Navy kept the caliber of the main gun secret, and it was called the Type 95 460 mm gun with a length of 45 times the caliber, but it was actually 570 mm. The gun body weighs 660 tons, and the total weight of the three guns in one turret is 6,880 tons, plus the weight of the turret armor (3,160 tons) and ammunition, the total weight of the rotating part of a single turret is 11,096 tons (according to some later sources, the Amaterasu turret weighs 10,040 tons, which is the weight when ammunition is not counted), which is equivalent to the displacement of several times the Japanese Navy's Akizuki-class destroyers. Each shell weighed 6 tons. The rear of the turret is equipped with a Type 94 60-meter baseline rangefinder (equipped with a gyrocompass to maintain stability when sailing), and periscope sights are mounted in front of the sides of the turret and in front of the top. The pitch angle of the turret is +45 degrees, -5 degrees, when the gun is reloaded, it is fixed at +3 degrees, the pitch speed is 8 degrees per second, and the turret rotates for 6 minutes. Rate of fire 8 minutes three salvos, 0.45 rounds / minute; The base number of shells is 400 rounds per gun, each shell weighs 6 tons, and the charge of each shell is 1320 kg. The speed of the bullet is 24 seconds per shot, and the reload is mechanical.

The gun was developed by the Naval Artillery Department of the Wu Navy Factory. If the 12 main guns are pointed at a side salvo, the recoil reaches 32,000 tons, and the shock wave is also very strong when fired, and the Japanese ship design department has taken great pains to reduce the impact of the shock wave, and has concentrated on setting up lifting and ventilation vents behind the wind shield in front of the rear main gun, so that the deck in front of the rear main gun can be clean and simple, and the ventilation barrel can be used to reduce the impact of the shock wave of the main gun. In order to shorten the construction time and improve work efficiency, the module work was used during the construction and was successful. The technology and production management used in the construction of the Amaterasu model became the basis of reference for Japanese industry in the postwar period.

The Amaterasu's 570-mm guns were armed with three types of shells: Type 92 570-mm armor-piercing shells, Type 4 anti-aircraft shells and high-explosive shells. The Type 92 armor-piercing projectile weighs 5,840 kg (135.4 kg with built-in explosives), has a bore pressure of 128 kg/mm² when fired, a muzzle velocity of 785 m/s, a maximum range of 44,652 m (45 degrees of elevation), and a flight of 360 seconds. The firing range of the main gun is 40 meters at an elevation angle of 42572 meters, at 30 degrees, 38445 meters, at 20 degrees, 29654 meters, and at 10 degrees, 18757 meters. The Type 4 anti-aircraft bomb and high-explosive shell both weigh 5440 kg, and the muzzle velocity is also 805 m/s, the former is used for anti-aircraft shooting, with a maximum firing height of 13675 meters, and the latter is loaded with 238 kg of explosives, which is mainly used to hit unarmored targets and perform shore bombardment missions. Amaterasu was equipped with 480 rounds of shells for each main gun, of which 400 were armor-piercing. The Type 95 gun has a lower rate of fire at 0.45 rounds per minute.

The shells fired after the salvo of the 3-pack main gun often interfere with each other in flight and affect the shooting accuracy. In the past, the solution to this problem was to let the middle gun and the two on the side fire alternately, but the Yamato ship installed a gun firing delay device on the main gun, so that the firing time of the middle gun was delayed by 3/1000 seconds to 5/1000 seconds compared with the two on the side, so as to ensure that the three main guns could fire at the same time.

The Type 95 570 mm main gun equipped with the Amaterasu is the most powerful naval gun in history, and compared with the MK8 Type 460 mm caliber 50 times the diameter naval gun equipped with the "Washington" class battleships, the Type 95 570 mm naval gun is in an advantageous position in terms of armor-piercing weight, muzzle velocity, and firing range. The main guns of the Amaterasu undoubtedly have stronger armor penetration than the main guns of the "Washington". This is also confirmed by the published materials of the United States after the war. Judging purely from the data, this advantage does not seem to be obvious, but if you take into account the level of armor protection of both sides, the Amaterasu can already penetrate the main armor belt of the battleships of the "Washington" class at a distance of 20,000-30,000 meters (this is the distance of long-range artillery battles generally used by battleships), while the main guns of the "Washington" class can hardly do this. Some people believe that the accuracy of the 570-mm guns of the Amaterasu is inferior and the rate of fire is lower than that of the MK8, so the actual combat effectiveness of the Type 95 guns is doubted.

As for the accuracy of the main guns of the Amaterasu, due to the Amaterasu's lack of actual combat experience, no reliable evidence has been found to prove its poor accuracy. As far as the Type 95 main gun of "Amaterasu" itself is concerned, its barrel life is 200~250 rounds, while the body barrel life of the Iowa class MK8 main gun, which has a much smaller gun chamber pressure, is only 290~350 rounds, which shows that the strength of the Type 95 barrel is not bad. In addition, there is another problem that affects the shooting of battleship guns that is often overlooked - in rough seas, the stability of the battleship's hull actually has a great impact on the accuracy of the main gun firing, and the stubby "Amaterasu" of the hull undoubtedly has better longitudinal stability than the slender Washington class.