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The HMS Queen Mary, launched in 1912, was the last British battlecruiser completed before the outbreak of the First World War. Being the
sole member of her class, she was a continuation of the battlecruisers of the Lion class, with which she shared an almost total similitude.
She differed from the Lion class in a number of minor details and the distribution of the armour; as a curiosity, she was the first
battlecruiser fitted with a sternwalk. The illustration shows the HMS Queen Mary as she was in 1916, with
shortened masts and splinter protection around the bridge and the fire control station above.
The HMS Queen Mary preserved one of the most unfortunate traits of the design of the Lion class: the position of the turret Q. This feature
allowed a lighter hull by not concentrating all the weight in the ends of the hull, but it created a separation in the engine rooms and a severe
restriction in the firing arc of the turret. And precisely it was the explosion of the ammunition of the turret Q which caused the loss of the
ship during the Battle of Jutland, after being hit twice by the German battlecruiser SMS Derfflinger. After the battle all the ships of the
Great Fleet were modified to remove the deficiencies caused by an improvised placement of the heavy artillery.
Class: Queen Mary (1 unit - Queen Mary)
Type: Battlecruiser
Length: 214.6 meters
Beam: 27 meters
Draught: 8.8 meters
Displacement (normal): 26924 tonnes
Propulsion: 4 x shaft, 4 x steam turbine Parsons, 42 x boiler Yarrow, 78700 horsepower
Speed: 28 knots (51.9 kilometers/hour)
Range: 5600 nautical miles (10400 kilometers) at 10 knots
Fuel: 1016-3760 tonnes of coal and 1148 tonnes of petrol
Complement: 997 (1275 in wartime)
Armament: 8 x 343-millimeter 45-caliber cannon, 16 x 102-millimeter 50-caliber cannon, 2 x 533-millimeter torpedo tube
Armor: 102-229 millimeters in belt, 102 millimeters in bulkheads, 25 millimeters in upper deck, 25-63 millimeters in main deck,
203-229 millimeters in barbettes, 102-229 millimeters in main turrets, 254 millimeters in conning tower
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