Utterly shameless necrothread bumpage, but I fully intend on reviewing the rest of this series when I get over my writer's block. Here's how collection stands right now:
Here's how I'd rate each:
Agassiz: Excellent
Alliance: Excellent
Bartolmeo Colleoni: Decent
HMS Beagle: Good
HMS Belfast: Good/Very Good
Bellona: Decent
Bertha L Downs: Very Good
Blandford: Very Good
Bounty: Very Good
Campbeltown: Fair
USS Constitution: Fair
Dreadnought: Excellent
Diana: Very Good
Endeavour: Good/Very Good
Essex: Very Good
Fairmile 'D': Good/Very Good
Fuso: Very Good
Granado: Very Good
Hood: Very Good/Excellent
Intrepid: Good/Very Good
Pandora: Very Good
Queen Mary: Very Good
Takao: Very Good/Excellent
Type VII: Fair/Good
Type XXI: Fair/Good
Victorious: Very Good
Victory: Fair/Good (Print quality of 2010 edition is atrocious!)
Warspite: Good
Yamato: Very Good
I recently obtained a copy of the the Type XXI volume, and it's a bit of a disappointment. It was originally printed in Germany as an unrelated title, and got "Frankensteined" into an Anatomy of the Ship book when republished in English. Lots of interesting pictures, but most of the drawings are redrawn versions of original shipyard plans, many of which are basic General Arrangement plans which have been reproduced elsewhere. I'm still waiting for a definitive warts-and-all technical study of the XXI. These boats have always fascinated me, even if they've been hopelessly mythologized over the years. If you have to choose between the three submarine "Anatomies," go with the one on
Alliance. If you're interested in the
XXI, Eberhard Rossler's
The U-Boat has a lot of excellent material on the Elekroboot designs.