Bismarck/ Tirpitz Aircraft Carrier conversion?

[Madcap]

Were there any plans to convert the Bismarck or Tirpitz into aircraft Carriers?

[Luca Bevilacqua]

Well....

The almost ready Graf Zeppelin was not completed, nor was begun the planned conversion of the much less powerful cruiser Seydlitz.

What sense would then make thinking about converting a fully operative, powerful (and much feared) unit, when with much less cost/effort DKM could have completed the Graf Zeppelin ?

Sorry, I do not want to be rude to you, I may just be missing the sense of your question.

Ciao

Luca

[Matthias]

Italy too had studied project to convert some minor cruisers, according to Giorgerini,in aircraft carrers,but it was too expensive.

Think about the cost of a battleship of the Bismarck class. Do ou think Kriegsmarine would have wasted again 100'000'000 of marks to rebuilt them completely?
They would have rather built another battleship then...

[RF]

Were there any plans to convert the Bismarck or Tirpitz into aircraft Carriers?

The Kriegsmarine had plans for six carriers:

Flugzeugtrager ''A'' - later named as Graf Zeppelin;

Flugzeugtrager ''B'' - not formally named, some have suggested Peter Strasser as the intended name;

Four cruise liners, including Europa and Gneisenau (not to be confused with Scharnhorsts's twin) were planned to be converted to carriers.

I'm not aware of any others and I can't imagine either Bismarck or Tirpitz being converted.

One point that is easily overlooked in questions like this is that Germany did not have a large fleet air force anyway - Goering tried to ensure that all military aviation came under his ambit.

[Karl Heidenreich]

I don´t believe that it could be considered as an engineer option. Simply put: it´s design, it´s cost, the practical building problems involved and the time needed would be too much. With a little bit more money and the actual design for the GZ the Germans could have a brand new, custom made, aircraft carrier fleet.

[marcelo_malara]

There are no antecedents of battleships converted to carriers (yes battlecruisers). What come to my mind is that removing the armour plates, located so low in the ship, and adding a flight deck (higher in the ship) would provoke stability problems.

[Tiornu]

Bearn, Kaga, and Eagle were carriers converted from battleships. But we can give a definitive "no" to the question of whether the KM put any serious thought into converting the Bismarcks. They didn't even complete the one carrier they had waiting for them. "Let's take our biggest battleships and hand their fate over to Goering." Not likely.

[tommy303]

Also Shinano?

[marcelo_malara]

I forgot Shinano too.

[Tiornu]

Yes, Shinano, and we can also cite Ise and Hyuga, but they came too late to be antecedents to a Bismarck conversion. If you go to the NHC site, you can find sketches of an Iowa carrier conversion. Someone scrawled a note on the corner of the drawing to the effect of "I don't think so."

[Madcap]

When looking for any information about the possibility of any period Bismarck aircraft carrier designs I found my question on this site on Google from my original search in 05.

Luca Bevilacqua I was simply making an enquiry if there were feasibility studies, initial or detailed design proposals of a Bismarck aircraft carrier design, whither or not they were going to carry them out is not the issue here. I simply found it of interest as to how a Bismarck aircraft design would look, and if there were any period design proposals.