Naval History Forums

I repeat the warhead of a G7(...) typically did not detonate even when hit directly by a detonating HE shell.

I repeat the warhead of a G7(...) typically did not detonate even when hit directly by a detonating HE shell.

I get that. Why the repeat?

Garyt wrote:

the problem is, that Schießwolle 36 was (almost)completely insensitive for even direct hits and detonation of 20,3 cm HE-shells.

The Long Lance was an excellent torpedo, but on a Heavy Cruiser at least something more along the line of the above might have made more sense for the Japanese.

Just thought I'd add while a hit to the torpedoes can be devastating, it's not quite the same as a magazine detonation. I'd compare a magazine hit to a penetrating round, and compare an on deck torpedo detonation to a non penetrating round.

That is true, but when it happened in the actual case it had much the same effect in that it resulted in loss of the ship.

That is true, but when it happened in the actual case it had much the same effect in that it resulted in loss of the ship.

Seems they were usually immobilized or close to it after this, and later scuttled.

Not quite as much of an instant kill as say they hood, but yeah they were pretty well shot.

In home waters or at least non enemy waters they probably could have been towed in and repaired, or perhaps with enough time and some work gotten underway again. Then the trip to home port hoping a sub does not finish them off.

Going back to the original question I think that there are major flaws in the PE that would rule it out as a contender for the best Heavy cruiser of WW II. The ship at 14,000 tons is overweight and with 1,600 men over crewed. What do you get for this massive increase , not much. Compare the PE to the Exeter for example. The overall protection is comparable with various sources giving the Exeter a
3 inch belt for the boilers and machinery, and 4 inch box protection for the magazines, and an armoured deck that runs from stem to stern with a thickness of 1.5 inches. Turret armour is less than the PE but greater than the county's with a maximum thickness 0f 2.5 inches. We are all aware of the significant damage from heavy guns that the Exeter survived at The River Plate. The Exeter also has nearly double the cruising range of the PE , Exeter with 10,000 miles at 14 knots vs 5000 miles at 15 knots for the PE. The Exeter also proved itself a good shooting ship at long ranges. At 8390 tons the Exeter comes with only 6x 8 inch guns but its bursting charges for the sap round are more than twice as large as those for the PE's ap 11.5 pounds vs 5.1 pounds. So for a 66 percnt increase in tonnage what do you really get with the PE ?

Slaterat

slaterat wrote:So for a 66 percnt increase in tonnage what do you really get with the PE ?

Slaterat

... You get to hit targets moving at 29kts at 20km distance, thanks to the 34km range of the main battery, and battleship-level redundancy and battery-stability systems, ensuring a longer survivability in combat. You also get more flotability and thus more resilience in combat.

I do not know of any other WW2 cruisers obtaining hits in the conditions and in the ranges that Prinz Eugen and Hipper managed to do (Achates sunk at 18km through snowstorm and Hood struck at 20km).

Japanese cruisers at the Battle of the Komandorskis scored several hits at +/- 20,000 yards under difficult gunnery conditions.

B

The Exeter hit the Graf Spee at ranges >20,000 yards. Check the the discussion in naval history.

Slaterat

alecsandros wrote: I do not know of any other WW2 cruisers obtaining hits in the conditions and in the ranges that Prinz Eugen and Hipper managed to do (Achates sunk at 18km through snowstorm and Hood struck at 20km).

And that's it? Two instances of good gunnery? What about power plant reliability? Secondary battery? Aircraft arrangements in the dangerous central location where they are an extreme fire hazard? AA capability? I don't see why flotation would be any better than other ships of the same size. How about secondary power generation in locations separate from and not reliant on the boilers as with widely separated diesel generators? How about split power plants? How would it do trying to operate for many months away from any yard availability like US and British cruisers did, while covering thousands of miles of ocean, much of it at high speed while operating with carriers? How were it's underway replenishment arrangements for fuel and stores?

I don't think Prinz Eugen would be very useful to the USN. It was probably pretty efficient at running out of port for a short time threatening convoys and then returning.

Steve Crandell wrote: I don't think Prinz Eugen would be very useful to the USN. It was probably pretty efficient at running out of port for a short time threatening convoys and then returning.

They still took a great deal of interest in it when it fell into their hands at the end of WW2.

RF wrote:

Steve Crandell wrote: I don't think Prinz Eugen would be very useful to the USN. It was probably pretty efficient at running out of port for a short time threatening convoys and then returning.

They still took a great deal of interest in it when it fell into their hands at the end of WW2.

Absolutely. It had a very interesting sonar and the fire control system was definitely worth studying. That in no way makes it the best heavy cruiser of the war, however. There is a lot more to a heavy cruiser than sonar and FC, and I don't think the latter was significantly better than what the US had then. I served on submarines with the same type of sonar though, several technical generations down the road.

Byron Angel wrote:Japanese cruisers at the Battle of the Komandorskis scored several hits at +/- 20,000 yards under difficult gunnery conditions.

B

Point taken,
Yet the hits at Komandorski happened over a long period of time (3 hours or so), and hit rates were ~ 0.4% or so. Prinz Eugen hit Hood rapidly and kept hiting her and Prince of Wales at Denmark Strait.

@Slaterat
Exeter may have obtained hits at 20.000y, but that is highly debatable (especialy because there is no documented evidence for the timing of the hits, hence for the probable range between Exeter and Graf Spee at the time of the hits. Dave makes a good case for 19-21km hits FROM Graf Spee TO Exeter, but when were the 2 x 8" hits scored ON Graf Spee is much harder to know. Also the available evidence for RN 8" cruiser shooting does not show any other hits at 20.000yards or beyond).

Steve Crandell wrote: What about power plant reliability? Secondary battery? Aircraft arrangements in the dangerous central location where they are an extreme fire hazard? AA capability?

They were all rather bad... The point I was trying to make was that they had the upper hand in a 1 cruiser vs 1 cruiser scenario...

I don't see why flotation would be any better than other ships of the same size.

... Not better than other ships of the same size, but better then contempoary heavy cruisers, which were 50% smaller.

I don't think Prinz Eugen would be very useful to the USN. It was probably pretty efficient at running out of port for a short time threatening convoys and then returning.

Most likely so.
Prinz Eugen was less a cruiser and more a heavily armed raider...

alecsandros wrote: ..... Prinz Eugen hit Hood rapidly and kept hiting her and Prince of Wales at Denmark Strait.

Until Antonio revised the timings for the DS battle after the destruction of Hood I had found the Prinz Eugen hit rate against POW rather curious - only three hits against Bismarck's four, yet having fired on POW for longer and with a faster rate of fire, whereas against Hood the Eugen, until switching its fire to POW, had matched/exceeded Bismarck's hitting rate over time.

With the much shorter time period to the POW breaking off the action, the disparity of hits against POW does make more sense - three hits in say three or four minutes seems more likely than only three hits in nearly fifteen minutes. The latter isn't really good shooting....

RF wrote:

alecsandros wrote: With the much shorter time period to the POW breaking off the action, the disparity of hits against POW does make more sense - three hits in say three or four minutes seems more likely than only three hits in nearly fifteen minutes. The latter isn't really good shooting....

Indeed,
this was probably due to the less effective artillery of Prinz Eugen (compared to Bismarck), and due to... pure luck. The battle lasted a very short time, and was to short anyhow to draw statistical conclusions (5 minutes battle with Hood and extreme angles and 3 minutes battle with Prince of Wales before turning away at maximum speed shrouded in smoke, while the GErmans were retreating in the opposite direction and losing their fire control solutions)