Sir William Symonds was appointed "Surveyor of the Navy" (the officer responsible for supervision of material policy and of the shipyards) as part of the Whig First Lord of the Admiralty Sir James Robert George Graham's 1832 naval reform package (that also included the abolition of the Tory dominated Navy Board).

Although he was the first holder of this office not to be a professional shipwright, and actual ship-design was now not supposed to be part of the newly redefined tasks of the Surveyor, he did in fact introduce radical changes in ship design: giving his ships greater beam and a more wedge-shaped bottom, thus obtaining greater speed and stability, and, by requiring less ballast, increasing the stowage and permitting heavier armaments. He was guided mainly by experience and observation, being an amateur designer who had made his reputation with fast small vessels, such as Pantaloon (1832) designed for the Duke of Portland as a yacht, and later purchased by the Admiralty and adapted as a 10-gun brig. His larger ships were indeed fast (a requisite if an unwilling enemy was to be forced to fight), but they were subject to excessively rapid roll, making them unsuitable gun-platforms.

Throughout his period of office an acrimonious three-cornered debate ensued between his "empirical" school of thought, the "scientific" school based on the first School of Naval Architecture (closed down in 1832), and the "traditional" school centred round a number of Master Shipwrights from the Royal Dockyards.

In the mid 1840s the new Tory Board of Admiralty sent a series of "Experimental Squadrons" to sea to investigate (actually, to attempt to disprove) the suitability of Symond's designs. The Times newspaper contained reports of the activities of these squadrons:

• 1844 reports: In 1844 separate cruises pitted Symonds' brigs and ships of the line against other designs. The brig squadron, that sailed from Portsmouth on 22 October and returned on 6 December, was commanded by Captain A.L. Corry in the paddle-steamer Firebrand and was made up of Flying Fish and Pantaloon, designed by Symonds, Mutine, Osprey, Espiegle, Waterwitch, Daring, modern vessels by other designers, and the elderly Cruizer. The squadron of ships of the line, commanded by Rear-admiral William Bowles contained Symonds' Queen (three-decker) and Albion (two-decker), and the earlier St. Vincent and Caledonia (three-deckers). Queen, St. Vincent and Caledonia left Portsmouth the day after the brigs, fell in with Albion after briefly calling at Lisbon on 3 November, and returned to Portsmouth on 27 November.
• 1845 reports: In 1845 three cruises pitted Symonds' ships of the line against earlier designs. In the first two cruises, his Queen (three-decker), Albion, Vanguard and Superb (two-deckers) were matched against Trafalgar, St. Vincent (three-deckers), Rodney and Canopus (two-deckers). The third cruise was limited to the two-deckers, but also included the brig Daring, which had taken part in the 1844 brig squadron.
  In the first cruise the squadron, under the command of an ailing Rear-Admiral Hyde Parker, sailed from Portsmouth on 15 July, was at Cork from 7 to 18 September, and docked at Plymouth on 20 September. On the second cruise the squadron, now under Rear-Admiral Sir Samuel Pym, sailed from Plymouth on 28 September and returned there on 10 October. On the third cruise the squadron sailed from Plymouth on 21 October and returned there on 3 December. During this third cruise it was commanded by one of the ship's Captains as Commodore (initially Moresby in Canopus, and then Willes in Vanguard, that joined later), the Admiralty apparently having no confidence in the available (and generally extremely elderly) Admirals.
• 1846 reports: In 1846 the squadron of evolution contained a mixture of sailing ships of the line and steamers.

The results of all these trails were inconclusive, for example Queen performed very badly in the 1844 squadron, but was the star of the next year's cruises. The great influence of aspects such as skill and inclination (and sometimes - political feelings) of the captain, or stowage of the hold on the sailing properties of the ships was insufficiently realised. Nonetheless, in 1846 the Board appointed a "Committee of Reference" to judge the Surveyor's work and introduce modifications at its own discretion. Symonds understandably objected to this procedure, and resigned in October 1847.