Q&A · 5:05:31-5:06:03

Would pykrete make the Gustav-gun battleship useful?

The pykrete proposal exposes a tradeoff between brittle material and protection through sheer size.

Battleships Counterfactual History Pykrete Warship Design

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Question

Would building the 31-inch-gun ship from pykrete make it more useful?

Short answer

Probably not: pykrete is judged tough but brittle, and protection would depend largely on the vessel's enormous mass.

Notes

Pykrete does not remove the objections to the earlier super-battleship proposal. It is described as hard and tough but brittle. A sufficiently massive hull could still absorb punishment through its sheer size, which is compared with turning an asteroid into a battleship.