Interms of the money spent on Hood by the Admiralty both the original battlecruiser design in 1915, to redesign her post Jutland 1916 as more a fast battleship, to build her and to man her for 20years with a large crew she has to possibly be in that light one of the worst things ever built to protect the British Islands and her Global Empire.
She offered poor value for money, she offers the same firepower as an QE or R class which the later has 6inch secondary's. Of course Hood has the Mk2 15" and a little more range as built. Her main usefullness is her speed and thus she was one of the few heavy ships which could operate with a carrier until the KGV's began to commission from the Winter of 1940 onwards.
Of course she is arguably the most beautiful warship of any navy ever built throughout the entire 20th Century. The best way to analyse her design though is she is much closer in 1920, as built, to a QE class, she is virtually a 30knt QE class! comapre the armour schemes. Then compare her to Repulse or Renown and their armour schemes as first built, you will see why on retrospect we can call her the world's first attempt at a 30knt battleship.
At the time she comissioned or when on the 1924 Empire Cruise this term wasn't around at the time and thus she was always classified a battlecruiser for simplicity. If you also look at the Royal Navy's proganda, whoops sorry PR! material at the time, you will always read "HMS Hood the world's most powerful battleship" "HMS Hood the world's largest warship afloat etc etc" part of this is press stupidity and part of this is she really isn't a true battlecruiser and is considered something a little bit different.
She also operated as part of the BC squadron in the early months of the war really only as part of a fast squadron to hopefully bring to action Scharnhorst & Gneisenau or a Pocket battleship. Thus you will find her covered in such battlecruiser books. It is only post WW2 we can look back on reflection and see her design history in the context of all the 20th building programs.
Finally I'm not here to slate Hood, I'm just here to make you aware that history is revisionist we reinterpret things constantly. I once considered Hood just as merely 'just the last Royal Navy's last battlecruiser' However as I began to read some of the best references, and started to ask questions and think 'out of the box' my opinion is now revised. She was the world's first attempt towards a 30knt battleship brought about from Jutland experience, and one pretty damn fine looking one at that!
Interms of the money spent on Hood by the Admiralty both the original battlecruiser design in 1915, to redesign her post Jutland 1916 as more a fast battleship, to build her and to man her for 20years with a large crew she has to possibly be in that light one of the worst things ever built to protect the British Islands and her Global Empire.
She offered poor value for money, she offers the same firepower as an QE or R class which the later has 6inch secondary's. Of course Hood has the Mk2 15" and a little more range as built. Her main usefullness is her speed and thus she was one of the few heavy ships which could operate with a carrier until the KGV's began to commission from the Winter of 1940 onwards.
Of course she is arguably the most beautiful warship of any navy ever built throughout the entire 20th Century. The best way to analyse her design though is she is much closer in 1920, as built, to a QE class, she is virtually a 30knt QE class! comapre the armour schemes. Then compare her to Repulse or Renown and their armour schemes as first built, you will see why on retrospect we can call her the world's first attempt at a 30knt battleship.
At the time she comissioned or when on the 1924 Empire Cruise this term wasn't around at the time and thus she was always classified a battlecruiser for simplicity. If you also look at the Royal Navy's proganda, whoops sorry PR! material at the time, you will always read "HMS Hood the world's most powerful battleship" "HMS Hood the world's largest warship afloat etc etc" part of this is press stupidity and part of this is she really isn't a true battlecruiser and is considered something a little bit different.
She also operated as part of the BC squadron in the early months of the war really only as part of a fast squadron to hopefully bring to action Scharnhorst & Gneisenau or a Pocket battleship. Thus you will find her covered in such battlecruiser books. It is only post WW2 we can look back on reflection and see her design history in the context of all the 20th building programs.
Finally I'm not here to slate Hood, I'm just here to make you aware that history is revisionist we reinterpret things constantly. I once considered Hood just as merely 'just the last Royal Navy's last battlecruiser' However as I began to read some of the best references, and started to ask questions and think 'out of the box' my opinion is now revised. She was the world's first attempt towards a 30knt battleship brought about from Jutland experience, and one pretty damn fine looking one at that! :lol_3: