Design and Description
The Charlemagne-class battleships were 117.7 metres (386 ft 2 in) long overall and had a beam of 20.3 metres (66 ft 7 in). At deep load, they had a draught of 7.4 metres (24 ft 3 in) forward and 8.4 metres (27 ft 7 in) aft. They displaced 11,275 metric tons (11,097 long tons) at deep load. Their crew generally consisted of 727 officers and enlisted men as a private ship, or 41 officers and 744 men as a fleet flagship.
The Charlemagne-class ships did not function well in a head sea. Stormy weather in the Bay of Biscay in 1900 caused the captain of Gaulois to complain that the ship's forward gun turret and casemates were flooded out and that the ship generated enormous sheets of spray when water came over the bow. Like most French capital ships of the period, they had pronounced tumblehome. Gaulois's captain also said that his ship was a steady gunnery platform and manoeuvered well in tight spaces but he criticized the armour layout as not high enough to prevent munitions from penetrating above the main armour belt and detonating below the secondary armament positions.
The ships used three 4-cylinder vertical triple expansion steam engines, each engine driving a 4.3-metre (14 ft) propeller. Rated at 14,500 PS (10,700 kW), they produced between 14,220–15,295 metric horsepower (10,460–11,249 kW) during their sea trials using steam generated by 20 Belleville water-tube boilers. The boilers had a maximum operating pressure of 17 kg/cm2 (1,667 kPa; 242 psi). The ships reached top speeds of 18.024 to 18.5 knots (33.380 to 34.3 km/h; 20.742 to 21.3 mph) on their trials. They carried a maximum of 1,050 tonnes (1,030 long tons) of coal which allowed them to steam for 4,200 miles (3,600 nmi) at a speed of 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph).
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