Naval History Forums

Rodney was much more vulnerable to shells passing below the belt than either Bismarck or KGV. The belt is both shallow and sloped. There was a probably of Rodney taking such a hit in this scenario.

In his Book the Baron said he received an order to take over fire control but that Albrecht was still directing the secondary armament - how was he able to do that if the FC position was hit? I dug out my von Muellenheim book which is the revised 1990 edition. I need to make a few corrections to so...

The critical hits which determined the early course of the battle were the damage to the fire control positions. For example, the aft battery remained in action for a long time after the central fire control was disabled, but was ineffective, being forced to rely on local control. If Rodney had not ...

I'm actually at a loss as to how Bismarck's main FC was disabled by Rodney's hit though, the wreck shows a hit that seems to have hit B barbette while penetrating the upper deck, that's a long ways away from the foretop unless that was also shot away in the same salvo or another shortly after. Seve...

How quickly are the two forces closing? http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/UN/UK/RN/BS-14_POW+Repulse/img/BS-14-5.jpg Kurita turned away to the N. E. and was heading toward a rendezvous with Kondo's battle fleet with he made at 0230. Phillips in no way wants to get involved with the combined forces of...

Phillips was cognizant and careful about radio silence. He sent Tenedos away to transmit messages to Singapore historically. He will certainly not use his wireless unless absolutely necessary. He will signal his command with signal lamp. The element of surprise is crucial for the British in this sce...

But............there are LOT of variables, and a night battle is an dire event, so only a reverse looking crystal ball could truly predict the outcome. :whistle: The IJN's night fighting prowess and their torpedoes could come as nasty shock. True Force Z has radar, but to utilize the gunnery radars...

Civilization was originally doomed by an impending "Ice Age", according to claims which date back to the 70s. When that became too difficult to sell to the public, "Global Warming" became the new agent of the impending extinction of civilization. When the bald-faced and ubiquitous data-fiddling of ...

One must be cautious to not assume that normal, or abnormal, weather events are indicators of long term climate trends. For example, the northern European heat wave this summer was caused by unusually cold ocean waters in the Atlantic off Africa. From an article at Wattsupwiththat by Joe D’Aleo CCM,...

15 nautica l miles is about 30,000 yards. POW's 273 picking up IJN cruisers at that range might be a stretch under normal conditions. That's not to say it could not have happened. Radar pickup range can vary quite a bit. Sometimes it could exceed expectations by quite a bit. Sometimes it could fail ...

The weakness of the German scheme is that the area of armoured deck (and the length of the citadel) is increased, so the total thickness has to be reduced. Thus South Dakota has a 1.5" weather deck and a 5" on 1" main deck with 5/8" splinter armour below for a total of 8.125" (over 205 mm) over all...

The belt thickness was further reduced in the H class to 300mm but with a deeper belt and increased thickness of the slopes. It increased the overall protection because the slope thickness is more important than belt thickness in this type of protection scheme. This was an improvement of the design ...

Thanks Dave, I have also read another of your posts about British Radar, very informative, thank you. I’ve read the type 284 took about 45 minutes to warm up, presumably this means to achieve maximum reliability of contact detection. If so it would lend weight to a suggestion that most radar sets w...

The 284 as a gunnery radar mounted to the main director would likely be kept switched off until a surface combat threat materialized. It required that it be rested at intervals when in operation, so there was little incentive to leave it switched on all the time, especially if spare vacuum tubes and...

Let us try to choose the best armament for our battleship. I am going to agree with Dave on the secondary armament. The only available alternatives are USN's 5"/38 or the RN's 5.25". We will select the 5.25" as it will be better for dealing with destroyers or aircraft dropping Fritz-X bombs. Howeve...