Viribus Unitis Preliminary Project VIII

On June 9, 1909, the final design contest was issued under the amended terms. The proposed displacement was increased to 20.500 tons, main guns were of 30,5cm L/45 calibre ones (The the 50 calibre ones had construction errors and thus not chosen) the secondary and tertiary guns were chosen of 15 and 7cm (66mm) ones with the increased armour belt of 280mm. For propulsion steam turbines were chosen with auxiliary oil fired boilers next to the coal ones. Popper had submitted six more proposals a few weeks later (varying in tripod or polemast arrangements) and of these, the design "F" was finally selected.

In 1910, the Joint Finance Minister of the Monarchy did not support the construction of new warships, so the Navy started to build ships at its own risk.
In addition to the problems surrounding the construction costs of the ships, their names did not go smoothly either.
At first the Navy proposed SMS Tegetthoff, SMS Prinz Eugen, SMS Don Juan and SMS Hunyadi for the ships while Archduke Franz Ferdinand wished to name the 4th ship SMS Laudon, but the Hungarians did, of course, start a fierce protest, as part of the cost of the ships was provided by the Hungarian parliament, so they expected that one of the ships receive a Hungarian name. This was a common practice in the Austro-Hungarian Navy (SMS Budapest, SMS Zrínyi, SMS Árpád etc).
In the end Emperor Franz Joseph I ended the debate with an iron fist naming the ships as follows:
SMS Viribus Unitis, SMS Tegetthoff, SMS Prinz Eugen and SMS Szent István
As a sidenote, for the 4th ship the following names were proposed:
SMS Corvin Mátyás after Matthias Corvinus
SMS Szent István after St. Stpehen, first Christian king of Hungary
SMS Erzsébet Királyné after Empress Elisabeth commonly known as Sisi

Montecuccoli dictated a forced pace for the designers, as the start of construction was planned for the spring of 1910. The cause was the peaceful rivalry between the KuK Kriegsmarine and the Regia Marina as the Austro-Hungarians wanted to build their battleships first and hence the construction was finally begun in the summer of 1910 even when the entire design documentation of the ships had not even been completed!

Design date: 1909/10
Dimensions: 151,5 (wl) x 26 x 8,6m
Displacement: 20.000tons (standard)
Engines: 25.000shp Steam Turbines, 4 shafts
Speed: 38km/h (20,5knots)
Armour: 48mm Deck, 230mm Belt
Armaments:
Project VI:
4x3 30,5cm/45 Skoda K10 Cannons,
10x1 15cm/50 Skoda K10 Casemated Guns,
14x1 7cm/50 Skoda K10 Guns,
4x1 53cm Torpedoes