Talk:English ship Ark Royal (1587)

Stated length of the first Ark Royal

I just thought that 290ft seems rather long for a ship of this period, displacement and beam. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.170.240.10 (talk) 11:40, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

You'd be surprised. She was the largest ship in the navy at the time. The Great Michael, built some 80 years before was supposedly 240 feet (73.2 m) long. The figures are from Steve Crawford (1999), Battleships and Carriers. Grange Books by the way. Benea 11:54, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Me Again: I have found several reports that state she was '100ft on the keel'. I can't think there was an extra 190 ft of 'overhang' or whatever it's called - sorry but I'm not in with the proper nautical terminology. 290 ft puts her 70ft or so longer than even HMS Victory which was much larger in displacement and beam. I can't think that proportions would be so different for the First Ark Royal than for contemporary ships (not that Victory is contemporary of course! I just used that as a length comparison). 7 to 1 beam to length ratio seems rather 'thin' for the period. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.170.240.10 (talk) 19:41, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Hmm it does seem suspicious. A lot of the sources you're talking about are in fact mirror sites of each other, but Lavery's Ship of the line lists her as 103ft long, and I'd be inclined to trust him over Crawford. I'll alter this in the text. Benea 20:14, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

The official Table of General Details of 1602 (State Paper Dom. CCLXXXVI) as reproduced in Nelson's The Tudor Navy lists Ark Royal as 100' x 37' x 15'. Given the idiosyncrasies in measurement methods, the difference between those dimensions and those currently listed is trivial. A more significant issue is tonnage. Tonnages in most official lists - which are widely reproduced in modern sources - are approximations (effectively closer to the later rating system than to an accurate gauge of the ship's size,) usually taken by rounding up the ship's calculated Tons Burthen to the nearest hundred (ie, Dreadnought of 360t is listed at 400, Vanguard of 449t at 500). For some ships, however, the increase is much greater; AR is perhaps the worst case of this, going from a calculated 555t (610t using the dimensions in this article) to a ridiculous 800. It should also be noted that tons displacement is a modern metric that is generally not applied to sailing ships built prior to the 19th century. 68.22.204.37 03:09, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

I would just like to say now nice it is to see two people in thoughtful conversation. I am in the states, and I am so tired of people ranting at each other. I am sure this is very much off topic, so I will with grace, take my comment's removal. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.111.183.7 (talk) 08:24, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Name change

As far as I can see the discussion ended with a suggestion that the names should change to "English warship Troutbridge", rather than "English ship Troutbridge", but there doesn't seem to be a consensus yet. Have we jumped the gun here, or have I missed something? --Old Moonraker (talk) 16:53, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

No, not really... that comment was added after I started renaming. The policy page was updated yesterday with no opposing comments, so I started renaming in accordance with the policy as it now stands. Although I think 'warship' is a better word to use in the title, and suggested it myself some time ago, that just brings us back to a massive and convoluted discussion about the general naming policy (rather than just the specific issue of the use of HMS in titles), that came no where near consensus before, and would probably be unlikely to again. I don't think anyone's really wanted to restart that debate just at the moment, so I think it's safe to proceed at this point. Martocticvs (talk) 20:24, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification. "HMS" in the name of older ship articles definitely needs to change, and I can understand your reluctance to re-start the more general wrangle. I suppose sneaking your preference just into the most obvious cases (such as this one) is out of the question? --Old Moonraker (talk) 13:29, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Probably best to keep to the established naming system for the time being, rather than singling out one or two for special treatment. Hopefully at some point in the future the system can be improved, but for now I'm just happy that we can be removing HMS from ships that shouldn't have it. Martocticvs (talk) 21:22, 21 March 2011 (UTC)