Ersatz Yorck-class battlecruiser
Line drawing of Ersatz Yorck
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| Class overview | |
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| Name: | Ersatz Yorck |
| Builders: |
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| Operators: |
 Kaiserliche Marine
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| Preceded by: | Mackensen class |
| Succeeded by: | O class |
| Planned: | 3 |
| Cancelled: | 3 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type: | Battlecruiser |
| Displacement: |
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| Length: | 227.8 m (747 ft) |
| Beam: | 30.4 m, (99.5 feet) |
| Draft: | 8.7 m (28.5 ft) |
| Propulsion: | 4 shaft Parsons type geared steam turbines, 32 boilers, 90,000 shp |
| Speed: | 27.3 kn (50.6 km/h; 31.4 mph) |
| Range: | 5,500 nmi (10,200 km; 6,300 mi) at 14 knots (26 km/h; 16 mph) |
| Complement: |
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| Armament: |
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| Armor: |
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The Ersatz Yorck class was a group of three battlecruisers ordered for the Imperial German Navy in April 1915. The name derived from the fact that the lead ship was intended as a replacement (German: ersatz) for the armored cruiser Yorck, lost to mines in 1914. They were a slightly enlarged version of the Mackensen-class battlecruiser, armed with 38 cm (15 in) guns as opposed to the 35 cm (13.8 in) weapons on the preceding design. The boilers would have been trunked into a single massive funnel. The three ships were originally ordered as part of the Mackensen class but the design was changed when details of the British Admiral-class battlecruisers became known to German intelligence. The vessels were ordered under the provisional names Ersatz Yorck, Ersatz Gneisenau, and Ersatz Scharnhorst. They were considered to be replacements for the armored cruisers Yorck, which had been sunk by German mines in 1914, and Gneisenau and Scharnhorst, both of which had been sunk at the Battle of the Falkland Islands also in 1914.
As with the Mackensens, the three ships of the Ersatz Yorck class were never completed. This was primarily due to shifting wartime construction priorities; U-boats were deemed more important to Germany's war effort, and so work on other types of ships was slowed or halted outright. The lead ship, Ersatz Yorck, was the only vessel of the three to have construction begin, though she was over two years from completion by the time work was abandoned. With the hull incomplete, the ship could not be launched and towed to ship-breakers; as a result, Ersatz Yorck was broken up in situ.
The Ersatz Yorck-class ships were an enlargement of the previous Mackensen-class ships. They were 227.80 m (747 ft 5 in) long, compared to 223 m (731 ft 8 in) on the earlier vessels. Ersatz Yorck had the same beam as the earlier vessels, at 30.40 m (99 ft 9 in), and the same draft of 9.30 m (30 ft 6 in). The ships were planned to displace 33,500 tonnes (33,000 long tons) at standard weight, and up to 38,000 t (37,000 long tons) fully laden. This was approximately 2,500 t (2,500 long tons) heavier than the Mackensens. The Ersatz Yorck-class ships' hulls were to have been constructed with longitudinal steel frames with the outer plating riveted on.
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