We are now getting the F-35B and as far as the Royal Navy is concerned it will not have a capability of refueling this aircraft. If it has to take off and investigate any contact then it has a limited time in the air before the requirement to return to the ship and refuel. This will be the time the carrier will be vulnerable with a limited amount of aircraft and no means of in-flight refueling.
Going back to the original alleged concept of these carriers, I am led to believe a steam option was considered for fitting catapults and this would have been cheaper than the newer EMALS system?? (question)
I keep asking myself where the boilers for these catapults would be located, what would they be used for and how much space they would occupy.
Would these boilers be like an electric kettle where they could be switched on and solely used whenever the ship was at flying stations or would they take time to bring onto line and build up the required amount of steam pressure? I am assuming we are talking about a boiler capable of operating systems requiring a pressure in excess of 300Ib per square inch and capable of launching multiple heavy aircraft over a very short period which would indicate the need of an exceedingly large kettle which in turn would surely take SEVERAL hours to build up the required pressure to go on lineand start launching multiple aircraft??
Once the required pressure is built up then what would happen to the boiler, where would it dump the excess steam or would the ship have other items of machinery capable of using this excess steam? If the answer is yes then would this boiler be used to run machinary when not at flying stations? If the answer is yes, then surely the boiler\boilers would have to have the capability of running machinary, plus launching aircraft and would this mean HUGE boilers capable of pwering the ships engines and if so why have huge gas turbines to power the ship when the boilers are already installed? If this boiler is shut down on completion of flying stations then would that in itself take hours to accomplish and do we then have an extremely large area of 'dead space'?
I ask this because from what I understand the ship has no requirement for any large boiler system and is powered by gas turbines along with other diesel powered items, all the equipment is not designed for any type of steam power? (question)
I was under the impression that the EMALS system was all self contained and had its own diesel powered generators that produced the copious buckets loads of volts that are required to launch and current Naval fixed wing aircraft?
Is there any conventional aircraft carrier in commission anywhere in the World that is not steam powered and has steam powered catapults?
I ask this as it looks like our new carriers were designed from the outset to be powered by gas turbines so what method was PLANNED to launch fixed wing fast jets??
Please read this post as me asking questions as I just feel we are being told any old yarn that will hopefully baffle us with so called science and hopefully the Boffin will put my mind at ease and explain all my silly queries.