Th e Construction of the Tegetthoff Class

IV V VI VII

Hull&machinery 0.710 0.710 1.780 21.000 Armor - - - -

Armament - - 0.300 0.300

Propellant 3.710 3.710 3.710 3.710 Cartridge 1.010 1.010 1.010 1.010 Projectile 2.000 2.000 2.000 2.000 Fuze 0.300 0.300 0.300 0.300

Bursting charge - - - Electrical equip. 0.790 0.790 1.380 1.900 Magazines 0.750 0.750 0.750 1.500 Torpedo 0.620 0.620 0.620 0.620 Totals 9.890 9.890 11.850 32.340

February the Hungarian Delegation voted for the budget. Furthermore, the delegation voted for a resolution in which they gave the Marinekommandant vote of confi dence, which was an unprecedented act in the history of the Hungarian delegation.195

Th e proposal of the naval budget was laid before the Austrian Delegation on 1 March. During the debate some members of the delegation questioned the need of the battleships and proposed to invest this money instead in railway lines. Other members questioned the fi ghting value of the battleships while some other members questioned the ability of the Danubius to build a battleship. On the next day the Austrian delegation voted in favor of the budget.196

Th e Construction of the Tegetthoff Class

During the negotiations on the building at the industries’ own risk, coming to terms with the Škoda and the Witkowitz works was more important than with the STT because the determinant factors of the construction time of a battleship were the gun turrets and armor rather than the hull and machinery. Th e task was challenging because the manufacturing of these items should take place over the same period (four years) as in the case of the Radetzky class even though the new battleships had 20,000 tons of armor instead of 11,000 tons and their gun turrets weighed 11,000 tons instead of 5,400 tons. In August 1909, the Marinesektion informed Škoda that for the new battleships it should manufacture sixteen triple turrets and forty-eight 30.5 cm guns and for the fi rst unit it should deliver the complete armament in 1912. Montecuccoli requested Albert Rothschild, the owner of Witkowitz Ironworks, to increase his armor manufacturing capacity to 7,000 tons per year. Rothschild was ready to accomplish this expansion, but he made mention of some risks.197 During the negotiations the STT took the necessary steps for building the 20,000 ton battleships: the machinery shop was enlarged and the cranes of the two large slipways were heightened.198

On 29 November 1909, the Navy signed the contract with the STT on the building of the fi rst two units (Schlachtschiff IV and V). Th e delivery times were thirty and thirty-six months.199 Th e price of the hull and the machinery of one unit were 14 and 7 million Kronen, the price of the complete

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battleship with ammunition was 60.6 million Kronen. Th e STT deposited 4.2 million Kronen (10 percent) at the Creditanstalt in accordance with the contract.200 In January 1910, the Navy signed the contract with the Škoda on the armament.201 On 9 November 1909, the Navy signed the contract with the Wit ko witz Ironworks on the armor of the fi rst two dreadnoughts.202 Th e preparatory works of starting the lofting process in the mold loft on the two battleships were started in the spring of 1910. Th e cover-names of the two units were Objekt 427 and Objekt 428. Cover-names were needed because offi cially the Navy did not order these ships. It posed a problem that even in April 1910 some detailed plans were missing, so the subcontractors could not start to manufacture these parts in time.203 On 24 July, the keel of the fi rst unit was laid down. Due to the need for secrecy the usual ceremony was cancelled. Two months later, on 24 September the keel of the second unit was also laid down. Work on the fi rst unit progressed well despite the constant minor modifi cations of the plans, but the delays of some subcontractors, Witkowitz among them, foreshadowed the exceeding of the time limit. Škoda also informed the Navy that the delivery of the 30.5 guns of the fi rst unit would be delayed by a few months.204

After the delegations had voted in favor of the extraordinary credit the Navy could offi cially sign the contracts on all the four battleships. Th e Navy signed the contract with the Danubius on 20 April 1911 on the Schlachtschiff VII. Four days later, on 24 April the Navy signed the offi cial contract with the STT on the Schlachtschiff IV, V and VI. Th e time limits of the delivery of the STT ships were 1 July 1912, 1 January 1913 and 1 January 1914.205

As the launch date of the fi rst unit approached, the process of naming the ships was started. In the fi rst time of the history of the Navy the proposals were presented to the Military Chancellery of the Heir of the Th rone instead of to the Military Chancellery of the Emperor, but the Emperor retained his right to approve the proposals. On 8 March 1911, the Navy presented its proposal to the Military Chancellery of the Heir of the Th rone which contained the following names: IV Tegetthoff, V Don Juan, VI Prinz Eugen and VII Hunyadi. Th e Navy added that the rumors in the press that the name of the fi rst unit would be Franz Joseph were baseless. Franz Ferdinand answered that he approved the name Tegetthoff for the fi rst unit, and

31 Th e launch of the Tegetthoff on 21 March 1912

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there was no urgency about the names of the other three units. However, on 22 March the Military Chancellery of the Emperor informed Montecuccoli that the Emperor exercised his right for naming warships and he would give a name to the fi rst unit. On 28 March, Franz Joseph named the Schlachtschiff IV after his personal motto Viribus Unitis.

206 Despite the initial problems, the construction of the Schlachtschiff IV progressed well. In March 1911, the date of the launch was fi xed as 24 June 1911. Eleven month after the keel laying, on 24 June 1911 at 9:10 a.m. the fi rst dreadnought of the Austro-Hungarian Navy, the battleship Viribus Unitis was launched in Trieste. Th e sponsor was Archduchess Maria Annunziata, the half-sister of the Heir of the Th rone. Among the participants beside Franz Ferdinand were the three common ministers, four Austrian and three Hungarian ministers. Th e 6/1911 issue of the “Die Flagge” was published as special “Dreadnought Number” on this occasion. On 23 October 1911, the Military Chancellery of the Heir of the Th rone informed the Marinesektion that Franz Ferdinand wished to give the names Tegetthoff to Schlachtschiff V and Prinz Eugen to Schlachtschiff VI. In 1912, the Emperor approved the two name proposals. In 1912 the Navy named the class after the second unit (Tegetthoff class, in the offi cial documents Typ Tegetthoff ).207 Because there was no offi cial explanation, the motivation behind this decision is still unclear. It may have been a message to Italy in the naming the fi rst Austro-Hungarian dreadnought class after the victor of Lissa. Th ere is another possible explanation: perhaps the Navy wanted to fl atter Franz Ferdinand because the Heir of the Th rone had wanted to give the name Tegetthoff to the fi rst unit of the class.

In October 1911, Franz Ferdinand expressed his wish via his Military Chancellery for a separate suit on the Viribus Unitis for himself inspired by the German example. Th e German Kaiser, Wilhelm II had an own suite on the standard battleship Deutschland and on one unit of every dreadnought class. In the spring of 1912, the Navy made the conversion for 82,000 Kronen.208

Th e works on the Viribus Unitis progressed well but due to the great delays of some subcontractors it was clear that the original building time would not to be kept. On 18 September 1912, on her 2 hours full power trial the Viribus Unitis attained an average speed of 20.49 knots and 20.76 knots maximum for a short period while her machinery produced 27,383 SHP.209 Although on the basis of the preliminary calculations the Navy had expected a speed over 21 knots,210 the Viribus Unitis easily exceeded the contracted speed of 20 knots. Th e fi rst dreadnought of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy was commissioned on 6 October 1912 at 2 p.m. under the command of Linienschiff skapitän Anton Willenik. Th e Viribus Unitis was the fi rst commissioned dreadnought of the Mediterranean and the World’s fi rst battleship in service with triple turrets. On 7 October, the Österreichische Flottenverein presented a special ensign (Ehrenfl agge) to the ship, which was ceremonially hoisted to the mainmast on the order of the Flotteninspektor, Vizeadmiral Anton Haus. While the ship had been commissioned two months earlier, the Navy did not offi cially take command over her until 5 December 1912.211

During the trials of the Viribus Unitis some problems developed. Th e heavy superimposed triple turrets made the ship top heavy, with her center of gravity being determined as 1.79 m over the waterline.212 When the ship turned at full speed with maximum rudder angle (35 degrees), she listed by 8.3°. Th e list of her STT-built sisters was even greater (Tegetthoff 11.3°, Prinz Eugen 10.75°). As a solution, the Navy ordered that the maximum rudder angle would be no more than 20° aside from slow speed maneuvers.213 However, this was not an isolated case among battleships and battlecruisers with superimposed turrets. For example, the list of the German battlecruiser Derffl inger was 8° when she turned at full speed.

Th ere was also a problem with the capacity of the Yarrow-boilers. Th e engineers of the STT optimistically counted the steam consumption of the Parsons-turbines at 7 kg/HP but it turned out that the real consumption was 8 kg/HP. In consequence of this the STT built ships could maintain their full speed only for two hours instead of for eight hours. After two hours the steam pressure dropped.214 On 24 May 1915, on the way back from the Bombardment of Ancona the Viribus Unitis could maintain only 17.5 knots despite every eff ort of the stokers and the shutting down of such auxiliary steam consuming systems like the fi rewater pipeline.215

When the Viribus Unitis was docked, deformations were detected in the structure of the double bottom under the aft gun turrets. A report dated on

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32 Viribus Unitis getting one of her 30.5 cm guns installed

2 October 1912 stated that the deformations had been caused by the docking itself.216 During the installation of the gun turrets it turned out that the armored cupola of the rangefi nder of the fore superimposed turret – the installation of the turret rangefi nders was one of the modifi cations ordered by the Navy during the building of the ship – blocked the forward view from the conning tower so it had to cut new slits above the original ones.217 Th ere was a little debate between the Navy and the STT about the contracted displacement, the Navy stated that the shipyard had exceeded the displacement by 66 tons while the STT accepted only 12 tons.218

During fi ring trials of the 30.5 guns the ship was damaged in fourteen locations. Among others the conning tower, the foredeck, the boats and the funnels were damaged, and the cost of the repair work exceeded 1,500 Kronen.219

Th e building of Schlachtschiff V was much slower, because the majority of the workers of the STT worked on the fi rst unit. Due to the slow works, STT had to postpone the date of the launch from December 1911 to March 1912. On 21 March, at 10:40 a.m. the Tegetthoff was launched in the presence of the Heir of the Th rone, Franz Ferdinand. Th e sponsor was Archduchess Blanca, the wife of Archduke Leopold Salvator. Th e progress of works was slow, even after the launch. On the request of the STT the date of the delivery was postponed from 1 January 1913 to 16 April 1913. Due to a series of turbine problems the STT could not keep even this time limit. On 25 April 1913, on her 2 hours full power trial the Tegetthoff attained an average speed of 20.31 knots while her machinery produced 25,638 SHP.220 Th e Tegetthoff was commissioned on 14 July 1913 under the command of Linienschiff skapitän Franz von Holub.221

Th e keel of the Schlachtsiff VI was laid on 16 January 1912 in the STT on the slipway which had been freed after the launch of the Viribus Unitis. Th e battleship Prinz Eugen was launched on 30 November 1912 at 11:30 a.m. Th e timespan of ten and half months between the keel laying and the launch was an absolute record in the history of Austro-Hungarian battleship building. Th e sponsor was Archduchess Maria Christina. Six days before

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