Turbines exposed dependence on a wider industry

High-performance turbines required specialised manufacturing, investment, experience, and dependable spare-parts support. German ships relied on Parsons, Curtis, Thornycroft-derived boilers, and licensed or derivative machinery while domestic alternatives developed, with consequences for schedules and hull design. Repeated attempts to find a domestic plant, followed by a foreign order and hull adaptation, could slow completion, while the Kaiser and König classes reveal several competing turbine solutions within closely related programmes. German engineers such as Hermann Föttinger were not short of ability, but industry lacked a sufficiently large and consistent market to fund every specialist capability at once. Suppliers could profit on both sides of the naval competition and export an older turbine generation after improving the design retained for home customers. The delayed American Lexington-class battlecruisers offer a parallel example of how developing a suitable domestic power plant could hold up an otherwise ambitious ship. Britain’s advantage lay in a mature industry whose volume could spread costs, advance each turbine generation, and sustain parts support. German purchases could therefore strengthen British industry even while helping the Kaiserliche Marine build its own fleet.