HMS New Zealand (1904)
HMS New Zealand between 1904 and 1911.
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| History | |
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 United Kingdom
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| Name: | HMS New Zealand (later HMS Zealandia) |
| Namesake: |
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| Ordered: | 1902/03 Estimates |
| Builder: | Portsmouth Dockyard |
| Cost: | £1,424,643 |
| Laid down: | 9 February 1903 |
| Launched: | 4 February 1904 |
| Completed: | June 1905 |
| Commissioned: | 11 July 1905 |
| Decommissioned: | 20 September 1917 |
| Renamed: | Renamed HMS Zealandia on 1 December 1911 |
| Nickname(s): | The King Edward VII-class battleships were known as "The Wobbly Eight" |
| Fate: | Sold for scrapping 8 November 1921 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | King Edward VII-class pre-dreadnought battleship |
| Displacement: | 16,350 tons standard (as built) |
| Length: | 453 ft 8 in (138.28 m) |
| Beam: | 78 ft (24 m) |
| Draught: | 25 ft 6 in (7.77 m) |
| Installed power: | 18,000 ihp |
| Propulsion: |
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| Speed: | 18.5 knots (34 km/h) |
| Range: | 2,000 nautical miles (3,704 km) at 18.5 knots (34 km/h); 5,270 nautical miles (9,760 km) at 10 knots (18.5 km/h) |
| Complement: | 777 |
| Armament: |
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| Armour: |
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| Notes: | 2,164–2,238 tons coal maximum; 380 tons oil |
HMS New Zealand was a King Edward VII-class battleship of the Royal Navy. Like all ships of the class (apart from HMS King Edward VII) she was named after an important part of the British Empire, namely New Zealand. She was renamed HMS Zealandia in 1911, the only Royal Navy ship to have carried this name.
HMS New Zealand was ordered under the 1902/03 Naval Estimates and built at Portsmouth Dockyard. She was laid down on 9 February 1903, launched on 4 February 1904, and completed in June 1905.
Although New Zealand and her seven sister ships of the King Edward VII class were a direct descendant of the Majestic class, they were also the first class to make a significant departure from the Majestic design, displacing about 1,000 tons more and mounting for the first time an intermediate battery of four 9.2-inch (234-mm) guns in addition to the standard outfit of 6-inch (152-mm) guns. The 9.2-inch was a quick-firing gun like the 6-inch, and its heavier shell made it a formidable weapon by the standards of the day when New Zealand and her sisters were designed; it was adopted out of concerns that British battleships were undergunned for their displacement and were becoming outgunned by foreign battleships that had begun to mount 8-inch (203-mm) intermediate batteries. The four 9.2-inch were mounted in single turrets abreast the foremast and mainmast, and New Zealand thus could bring two of them to bear on either broadside. Even then, New Zealand and her sisters were criticised for not having, a uniform secondary battery of 9.2-inch guns, something considered but rejected because of the length of time it would have taken to design the ships with such a radical revision of the secondary armament layout. In the end, it proved impossible to distinguish 12-inch and 9.2-inch shell splashes from one another, making fire control impractical for ships mounting both calibres, although New Zealand had fire-control platforms on her fore- and mainmasts rather than the fighting tops of earlier classes.
Like all British battleships since the Majestic class, the King Edward VII-class ships had four 12-inch (305-mm) guns in two twin turrets (one forward and one aft), the first five King Edwards, including New Zealand, mounting the Mark IX 12-inch. Mounting of the 6-inch guns in casemates was abandoned in New Zealand and her sister ships, the 6-inch instead being placed in a central battery amidships protected by 7-inch (178-mm) armoured walls. Otherwise, New Zealand's armour was much as in the London-class battleships, although there were various differences in detail from the Londons.
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