Russia's WW2 Flying Tank.

[Gamevizier]

You do know the first ever aircraft carrier was British? Brits made the first tank, the first jet, the first aircraft carrier, first real machine gun and the first rifle, experimentation does not mean they do now know their shit.

Thelexington class carrier seemed more battle-ready, built for that purpose. Argus while being the first carrier was considered experimental, the reason that britain didnt build more might be that perhaps because it was built from a converted ship.

Still, that adds to my point that building something out of ice seems stupid and shortsighted. Especially military weapons, no more stupid than a flying tank.

These things were EXPERIMENTS for a reason. Point being that OP is clearly trying to belittle russians by showing us some of their rather bizzare designs while completely being oblivious to the fact that alot of developed countries also did the same.

Im not a russia fan, but trying to bash a country like this is just shallow.

[Deleted]

Thelexington class carrier seemed more battle-ready, built for that purpose. Argus while being the first carrier was considered experimental, the reason that britain didnt build more might be that perhaps because it was built from a converted ship.

Still, that adds to my point that building something out of ice seems stupid and shortsighted. Especially military weapons, no more stupid than a flying tank.

These things were EXPERIMENTS for a reason. Point being that OP is clearly trying to belittle russians by showing us some of their rather bizzare designs while completely being oblivious to the fact that alot of developed countries also did the same.

Im not a russia fan, but trying to bash a country like this is just shallow.

The Lexington came at the end of WW2, the Argus the end of WW1, during this time we went from bi-planes to jets so of course one was better than the other. How can you not grasp this?

[Gamevizier]

The Lexington came at the end of WW2, the Argus the end of WW1, during this time we went from bi-planes to jets so of course one was better than the other. How can you not grasp this?

Didnt know ww2 ended before 1927

[Deleted]

Didnt know ww2 ended before 1927

It was a converted battleship that saw action halfway through the war, it really was no better than the Argus.

[Kalis]

And instead of building a carrier like how americans did 10 or so years before ww2 or maybe even buy the us carrier (they did buy alot of weapons from the US) they wanted to resort to building something out of ice?

Desperate times do lead to desperate ideas it seems.

The Royal Navy already had traditional aircraft carriers, e.g. HMS Illustrious. The idea behind the ice ship was that it wouldn't need to be particularly mobile and it needed to be as torpedo proof as possible, because the most likely candidates for attacking it were U-Boats.

[Gamevizier]

The Royal Navy already had traditional aircraft carriers, e.g. HMS Illustrious. The idea behind the ice ship was that it wouldn't need to be particularly mobile and it needed to be as torpedo proof as possible, because the most likely candidates for attacking it were U-Boats.

Then it wouldn't be exactly a "carrier" but a temporary island.

Besides, if the idea was practical then why wasnt it used? It was scratched because well...there were better, and more logical, ways to proceed.

[Kalis]

Then it wouldn't be exactly a "carrier" but a temporary island.

It was intended to be mobile, so not really.

Besides, if the idea was practical then why wasnt it used? It was scratched because well...there were better, and more logical, ways to proceed.

You've written that as some sort of 'gotcha', but I posted about it here because it was a crazy idea.

Initially they thought it would be a cheap and simple solution, but it was discovered that it wouldn't be cheap or simple, so they scrapped it.

[Techno-Druid]

With all this weird WW2 tech I have to wonder was the 1940s the decade of the steampunk...

[BlackwingHecate]

Then it wouldn't be exactly a "carrier" but a temporary island.

Besides, if the idea was practical then why wasnt it used? It was scratched because well...there were better, and more logical, ways to proceed.

Technically, the plan wasn't to build them out of regular ice. It was a material called pykrete, and was ice made from water mixed with wood pulp. The stuff is ridiculously strong, and it also melts a lot slower than regular ice to boot. The Mythbusters team covered it.

The reason they never did it was that, a, making that much ice was expensive, and B, the war ended.

[Gamevizier]

Technically, the plan wasn't to build them out of regular ice. It was a material called pikecrete, and was ice made from water mixed with wood pulp. The stuff is ridiculously strong, and it also melts a lot slower than regular ice to boot. The Mythbusters team covered it.

The reason they never did it was that, a, making that much ice was expensive, and B, the war ended.

And C to maintain it they needed a refrigerator system to keep the ice cool, and building such a system itself required steel, steel which was in high demand.

[BlackwingHecate]

And C to maintain it they needed a refrigerator system to keep the ice cool, and building such a system itself required steel, steel which was in high demand.

Not to maintain it, but to make it, yeah. But that's just part reason A.

Edit: To be fair, the plan was to basically make a giant floating island out of concrete-ice. I don't think anyone would argue that the idea isn't ludicrous. Hell, that was almost verbatim the Mythbusters conclusion, that it was plausible, but ludicrous.