by DrPR » Wed Apr 17, 2019 2:11 am
The most likely collection of drawings to have the hull lines would be for the initial ship of the class. Any drawings for subsequent ships in the class would only include changes from the original design. For example, for the 27 ships of the Cleveland class and the subsequent missile conversions there are seven sets of drawings (about 12,000 individual drawings) in the Archives. However, only the drawings for the first ship, the USS Cleveland CL-55, have any drawings of the hull.
The Table of Offsets (if it exists) is much better than the hull lines drawings. The table gives the numeric dimensions of the hull that were actually used in the ways to build the hull. Often the basic Table of Offsets is included on one of the hull line drawings, but sometimes it is found in the "mold loft offsets" in papers included with the drawings.
If you are interested in the hull plating the Table of Sight Edges (in the mold loft offsets data) gives the numeric positions of the edges of the hull plating. This is far more accurate than trying to estimate the three dimensional curved edges of individual plates from flat two dimensional drawings.
I don't know when these tables started to be used, so they might not exist for ships built in the 1800s.
Phil
The most likely collection of drawings to have the hull lines would be for the initial ship of the class. Any drawings for subsequent ships in the class would only include changes from the original design. For example, for the 27 ships of the Cleveland class and the subsequent missile conversions there are seven sets of drawings (about 12,000 individual drawings) in the Archives. However, only the drawings for the first ship, the USS [i]Cleveland[/i] CL-55, have any drawings of the hull.
The Table of Offsets (if it exists) is much better than the hull lines drawings. The table gives the numeric dimensions of the hull that were actually used in the ways to build the hull. Often the basic Table of Offsets is included on one of the hull line drawings, but sometimes it is found in the "mold loft offsets" in papers included with the drawings.
If you are interested in the hull plating the Table of Sight Edges (in the mold loft offsets data) gives the numeric positions of the edges of the hull plating. This is [i]far[/i] more accurate than trying to estimate the three dimensional curved edges of individual plates from flat two dimensional drawings.
I don't know when these tables started to be used, so they might not exist for ships built in the 1800s.
Phil