The Monarch-class battleship has a hull length of 146.1 meters, a hull width of 26.8 meters, and a draft of 8.67 meters.

The battleship had a crew of 988 people and a conventional displacement of 18490 tons and a full load displacement of 20910 tons.

With the same four steam turbine propulsion units and 18 drum coal-fired steam boilers as the Dreadnought, the Monarch-class battleship was expected to reach a maximum speed of 21 knots, thanks to the expected design of four steam turbine propulsion units and 18 drum turbine steam boilers.

In terms of armor protection, the Monarch-class battleships followed the armor protection system of the Nassau-class battleships, and the strongest protection was the armor belt in the middle of the chord side, with a thickness of about 300 mm, which provided protection for the engine room and boiler room.

The thickness of the protective armor on the front sides of the main turret and the conning tower was 280 mm, which was on par with the maximum level of protection of the dreadnought.

In order to reduce weight, the Nassau-class battleships adopted a method of gradual reduction of their broadside armor from the middle to the ends.

The fact that the Sovereign-class battleships were not weakened in the broadside armor also resulted in the estimated full-load Monarch-class battleships being nearly 400 tons more than the full-water Nassau-class battleships.

In summary, in addition to the current fire system still using the mainstream German 280 mm gun, the power system and armor protection system can be balanced with the dreadnought, and the armor protection is even superior.

As long as all the guns are converted into 45 or even 50 times the caliber of 305 mm guns in the future, the Monarch-class battleship will become a real dreadnought, with all-round improvements.

After the design of the Monarch-class battleship was completed, Arthur was in such a happy mood that he even gave all the experts who participated in the design of the drawings a check for 10,000 Australian dollars.

Although it will take some time to put into production, and production will also face a period of exploration, it may not be until two or three years before the warship is actually launched.

But Australasia is about to have its own dreadnought, and that's enough for Arthur.

What's more, most of the great powers are currently only doing this, and it would be good to have a design plan for a dreadnought.

Australasia may be ahead of some of the great powers in terms of dreadnoughts.

Although Australasia's Monarch-class battleships did a good job of secrecy, William II learned of Australasia's dreadnought design.

Although William II was surprised that Arthur did not rush to produce the Nassau-class battleships, but based on the technical data of the Nassau-class battleships and the existing Dreadnoughts, he produced more excellent Australasia's own dreadnoughts.

But in the face of the fact that Britain and Australasia also chose the new technology steam turbine over the old three-cylinder reciprocating steam engine, Wilhelm II fell into deep thought.

The old three-cylinder reciprocating steam engine and coal-fired boiler used in the Nassau-class battleships have been tested many times, so there is no need to worry about practical performance.

But can he really match the steam turbine technology used in the UK? I'm afraid not only Wilhelm II, but even German experts are not too sure.

The reason why they tentatively rated the power system used by the Nassau-class battleship as old-fashioned technology was more to see the real data of the Dreadnought battleship after the sea trials, and whether there would be problems before making another plan.

However, judging from the design of the three dreadnoughts known to Germany, the Nassau-class battleships that were rebuilt with the help of Germany are in a backward position in terms of power system.

To this end, Wilhelm II made two decisions, one was to find a way to improve the power system of the Nassau-class battleships again, and maintain the expected maximum speed at the same twenty-one knots as the Dreadnought and the Sovereign-class battleships.

The second is to order Germany's major military factories to carry out large-scale research on 305 mm guns, and under the premise that new battleships uniformly adopt 305 mm guns, Germany must not lag behind in this industry.

Arthur and Wilhelm II also had a brief phone call, and an important deal was reached, in which Australasia would share the design of the Monarch-class battleship with Germany in exchange for the next three years in terms of artillery and submarine technology.

This is still important for Australasia. Although Germany has not yet mastered the technology of 305 mm 45 times the diameter of the artillery, more than two years later, Germany caught up and successfully developed a 50 times the diameter of the 305 mm gun.

This will greatly enhance the firepower of warships, and it is definitely a technology that should not be missed in the development of warships.

The second is German submarine technology. Up to now, Germany's submarine technology has lagged behind the great powers.

This is largely due to the fact that Germany did not pay much attention to the development of this technology when the submarine was first born.

Germany's first submarine was even the Trout, built in 1902 to a design by a Spanish engineer.

It was not until 1904 that the German Navy established a submarine construction office to be responsible for the construction of submarines in the German Navy.

So far, the submarine technology mastered by Germany is not advanced, but Germany has sufficient potential for the development of submarines.

And now that Australasia is most likely to obtain the source of submarine technology, Germany, Arthur will naturally not give up this opportunity.

In exchange for the complete design data of the Sovereign-class battleship in exchange for artillery technology and submarine technology in three years, Wilhelm II was still very satisfied.

After all, this is the most advanced warship designed by Australasia alone, and its advanced level is definitely the best in the world.

Even in Germany, Wilhelm II thought that it was impossible to share such technology with other countries without bloodletting, let alone Australasia, which was already relatively backward in technology.

Thanks to the complete design of the Monarch-class battleships, the German construction plan for 1907 was also different from the historical one.

Historically, Germany built four Nassau-class battleships in 1904, namely the Nassau, Westphalia, Rhineland and Posen.

With the possession of the more advanced-looking Monarch-class battleships, the German Admiralty temporarily decided to convert the Rhineland and Posen into Sovereign-class battleships, and like the other two Nassau-class battleships, construction began in mid-1907.

As soon as he finished negotiating business with the Germans, Arthur gave the naval experts another difficult problem, that is, to develop a fast battleship, or battle cruiser, which was very powerful and more powerful, and could appropriately reduce the armor protection ability.

In order for these experts to have a full understanding of the so-called fast battleships, Arthur also explained them very carefully.

The so-called fast battleship is actually a battlecruiser in the true sense of the word.

Each country has a different view of the battle cruiser, and the first country to build the battle cruiser was the United Kingdom, whose concept of the battle cruiser was to value firepower and speed and neglect armor protection.

The Germans, on the other hand, built their own battle cruisers in the future, and their view of the battle cruisers was to value armor and speed, and to pay less attention to firepower.

Regardless of the point of view, a battle cruiser was a warship of great tactical value with a slight reduction in armor and firepower in exchange for higher speed.

Because of its extremely fast speed, coupled with the firepower that matches the battleship, the battlecruiser can fight the battleship in advance, and the retreat can be suppressed by speed and firepower, which will absolutely crush other small and medium-sized warships that are not battleships.

It is precisely because of the high speed of the battle cruiser that it can also be circled and intercepted by the enemy fleet during naval battles.

And as long as the high speed advantage of the battlecruiser remains, it will not quickly fall behind the times like the battleship.

Compared with the dreadnoughts that have just been born, the battle cruiser is more suitable as the main warship to expand the scale of Australasia's warships.

Of course, this does not mean that dreadnoughts are no longer important to Australasia. It's just that the pace of replacement of dreadnoughts is too fast and is not suitable for mass construction in a short time.

Having received Arthur's order, the design team of the naval shipyard was again busy.

Arthur had the most basic requirements for this type of warship, known as a fast battleship, to reach a speed of at least 25 knots, and to carry at least ten 280 mm guns, leaving room for improvement in the future with 305 mm guns.

What does this mean? This means that this kind of warship is comparable enough to battleships in terms of firepower, and even enough to be comparable to dreadnoughts that have just been born.

Looking at the speed again, the maximum speed of the battleship Dreadnought, which has broken the maximum speed record of the battleship, is only 21 knots, while Arthur's maximum speed requirement for a fast battleship has reached 25 knots, which is not a small change.

Although in order to ensure the strength of firepower and speed, Arthur agreed to reduce the armor in some unimportant areas to balance.

But it is debatable which piece of armor to cut and to what extent.

Arthur's request was a headache for the Australasian experts, and even some questions had to be consulted by the German experts.

But they can't actually be blamed for that. The first battlecruisers in the world were the British Indomitable, Invincible and Steadfast battlecruisers, also known as the Invincible-class battlecruisers.

Although construction of all three battlecruisers had already begun, it would not be until a year later in 1907 that they were actually launched.

Before they were launched, all three battlecruisers were kept under wraps and, like the battleship Dreadnought before them, were one of the British Navy's top secrets.

This also led to the fact that apart from the current British experts, there were not many shipbuilding experts who came into contact with the theory of battlecruisers.

This also has to praise Britain in shipbuilding advanced and powerful, dreadnoughts, battle cruisers and other warships that changed the naval system and pattern were all born in the shipyards of the British Empire.

The first update of 3,000 words, ask for support!

(End of chapter)