Question about the Camouflage on the Bismarck

ap · Post by ap » Mon Oct 02, 2006 2:18 pm

Hi everybody! I'm new to this forum. I've seen few months ago the J.Cameron film about the Bismarck and was very impressed. But I wanted more informations and details about the Bismarck and the other ships, so I googled it and came across this excellent website and read it almost all its content. I virtually don't know anything about naval navigation so please be indulgent with me. So here's my question: I saw the pictures and drawings of all the different scheme the Bismarck had. Now what I basically don't understand is how the camouflage painted on each sides of the hull is supposed to work. How this paint is supposed to give a false idea to the opponent ? Was the shortened ship painted supposed to give a false identity or a false length so the opponents has wrong distance informations?... please don't laugh, I just can't figure it out.

AP

Karl Heidenreich · Post by **Karl Heidenreich** » Mon Oct 02, 2006 4:13 pm

I didn´t believe that camouflage could fool anybody. The Germans only had two big 50,000 ton BBs (and only one operational at May, 1941) so there was not a lot of use for that camouflage. I believe they use because in some rule book saids it must be done.
But that it´s irrelevant because the first time Bismarck went into battle (without the camo) at DS the British thought that PE was Bismarck and so Hood fired at the wrong ship.
Anyway, it looks nice in the photos and in the models!

Best regards

Zaku II · Post by **Zaku II** » Mon Oct 02, 2006 10:50 pm

Hi ap

The camouflage of Bismarck works in three different forms:

- The bow and stern painted with a darker gray gives the impresion of a shorter ship, or more useful a more distant ship (difficult the estimate of range)

- The false wave on the bow and stern gives the impresion of a ship at full speed although she was dead in the water.

- The baltic stripes black and white break the silouette of the ship makin more difficult to determine the deflection os the target (is shi aproaching or moving away or have a perpendicular course).

With this camouflage it was intended to deceive the observers i the three factors to determine a fire solution: distance, speed and angle of deflection.

Salu2, Leonardo

PD. The Baltic scheme was mean to be an anti-submarine pattern.

ap · Post by ap » Tue Oct 03, 2006 8:49 am

Thanks to both of you for your quick informative replies, specially Leonardo for the full explanation. It make sense to me now.

Zaku II wrote:- The false wave on the bow and stern gives the impresion of a ship at full speed although she was dead in the water.

What's the point of having two waves (bow and stern) ? The ship sails in one direction, so why they would make believe it would go in opposite direction at the same time

ontheslipway · Post by **ontheslipway** » Tue Oct 03, 2006 12:18 pm

Note that applying darker shades at the far ends of the ship will enhance true length of the ship. Also, applying straight lines on a ship makes it easier to estimate its course. Bismarck's scheme wasn't very good actually, they did not use the conclusions of their own studies. neither did the British or the Americans. In WWII it was already clear that an even grey layer (matched with the average lighting in the area of operations) was very effective.

ModelMangler · Post by **ModelMangler** » Tue Oct 03, 2006 9:53 pm

More effective but not near as pretty.

Karl Heidenreich · Post by **Karl Heidenreich** » Tue Oct 03, 2006 11:24 pm

ModelMangler:

More effective but not near as pretty.

RF · Post by RF » Tue Oct 10, 2006 1:52 pm

Karl Heidenreich wrote:I didn´t believe that camouflage could fool anybody. The Germans only had two big 50,000 ton BBs (and only one operational at May, 1941) so there was not a lot of use for that camouflage. I believe they use because in some rule book saids it must be done.
But that it´s irrelevant because the first time Bismarck went into battle (without the camo) at DS the British thought that PE was Bismarck and so Hood fired at the wrong ship.
Anyway, it looks nice in the photos and in the models!

Best regards

I have heard elsewhere (in fact from the 1980's) that Bismarcks false bow wave was designed to help make Bismarck from a distance look like a Hipper class cruiser.

One book on submarines again from the 1980's said that the false bow wave is designed for the benefit of enemy sub commanders looking through their periscopes and deceive them as to the targets true length.