HMS Dreadnought (1906) - Construction and Trials

Construction and Trials

To meet Admiral Fisher's goal of building Dreadnought in a single year, material was stockpiled in advance and a great deal of prefabrication was done before she was formally laid down on 2 October 1905. In addition, she was built at HM Dockyard, Portsmouth which was regarded as the fastest-building shipyard in the world. Christened with a bottle of Australian wine, Dreadnought was launched by King Edward VII on 10 February 1906, after only four months on the ways; the bottle required multiple blows to shatter on a bow that later became famous. She went to sea on 3 October 1906 for her steam trials, only a year and a day after construction started, although she was not commissioned until 11 December 1906, fifteen months after she was laid down. The ship cost £1,783,883 to build. The suggestion that her building had been sped up by using guns and/or turrets originally designed for the Lord Nelson-class battleships which preceded her is not borne out as the guns and turrets were not ordered until July 1905. It seems more likely that Dreadnought's turrets and guns merely received higher priority than those of the earlier ships.

Dreadnought sailed for the Mediterranean Sea for extensive trials in December 1906 and then to Port of Spain, Trinidad in January 1907. Her engines and guns were given a thorough workout by Captain Reginald Bacon, Fisher's former Naval Assistant and a member of the Committee on Designs. His report stated, "No member of the Committee on Designs dared to hope that all the innovations introduced would have turned out as successfully as had been the case." During this time she averaged 17 knots (31 km/h; 20 mph), slowed only by a damaged rudder, an unprecedented high-speed performance. This shakedown cruise revealed several issues that were dealt with in subsequent refits, notably the replacement of her steering engines and the addition of cooling machinery to reduce the temperature levels in her magazines (cordite degrades more quickly at high temperatures). The most important issue, which was never addressed in her lifetime, was that the placement of her foremast behind the forward funnel put the spotting top right in the plume of hot exhaust gases, much to the detriment of her fighting ability.