Aurora-class corvette

The Aurora class was a group of screw corvettes built for the Austro-Hungarian Navy in the early 1870s. The class comprised three ships: SMS Aurora, SMS Frundsberg, and SMS Zrinyi (1870).

Design


Like other major navies in the 1850s, the Austrian Navy began building a series of screw frigates and corvettes (and converting existing vessels to steam power), but unlike their foreign contemporaries, the Austrian Empire neither had or sought an overseas colonial empire. Instead, the cruising vessels of the fleet were intended to be primarily used as training ships. The Aurora class, which the historians Erwin Sieche and Ferdinand Bilzer refer to as sloops, were the last in this series.

The ships of the Aurora class were 69.08 m long overall and 59.1 m long between perpendiculars. They had a beam of 10.45 m and a draft of 5 m. The ships had a displacement of 1353 LT. They had a flush deck and very minimal superstructure. Steering was controlled by a single rudder at the stern. Their crew numbered 210 officers and enlisted sailors.

The ships were powered by a single 2-cylinder, horizontal triple-expansion steam engine that drove a screw propeller. The number and type of boilers is not known, but smoke from the boilers was vented through a single funnel located amidships, between the fore- and main mast. The propulsion system was capable of generating 1000 ihp, for a top speed of 11 kn. On her initial sea trials, Aurora reached a top speed of 11.2 kn from 1165 ihp; trials data for the other two ships has not survived. The ships were fitted with a three-masted barque sailing rig to supplement the steam engine on long voyages.

Aurora, Frundsberg, and Zrinyi were armed with a main battery of four 15 cm Wahrendorf breechloading guns. The guns were mounted individually in sponsons in the sides of the hull. Two guns were placed just aft of the mainmast and the other pair were placed at the stern. The ships also carried a pair of 7 cm guns and two 25 mm machine guns. By 1891, the ships' armament had been revised significantly. Two of the 15 cm guns, one of the 7 cm guns, and both of the 25 mm machine guns were removed, and a new light battery of four 9 cm guns and two 47 mm Hotchkiss revolving cannon were installed.