Bismarck vs. Rodney: hand to hand?

[dunmunro]

I´m not that sure about that. I believe Leach was a little bit battered when he ordered his withdraw. He was Royal Navy. And Royal Navy fights! Royal Navy never withdraws, only under very bad situations. Leach called the smoke screen and the run away because he was having big problems: Bismarck and PZ were hitting him bad and, moreover, since Bismarck sunk Hood and targeted him, PoW was unable to score on Bismarck again. His main batteries were failing, his bridge blown, he was the one LOSING the combat. So, he retires. Why else a commander retires? Because he was winning? Nope, sir, nope.
He reengaged, from a very, but very, comforting distance after he managed to solve his inboard problems. And did so time after the combat, no during the combat. Again, he turn away when Bismarck seemed to accept his challenge.

In this forum this issue has been discussed a lot and there seems to be some room for saying that a further continuation of the DS combat could have been the end of PoW. At least that ending is more likely than the end of Bismarck at DS.

PoW, a new and less than fully efficient ship, was faced with a two on one situation, at close range, and one opponent carried torpedoes. Leach very properly opened the range, and allowed the senior officer, Wake-walker to take charge of the situation, and form his force into a tactically sound formation. In fact the KM squadron also declined further combat, and it was the Bismarck that suffered the most damage.

[Bgile]

That table has nothing to do with reality.

Gun size x #guns # rate of fire?

So what they did is set Bismark rate of fire = 3 and other ships = 2, thereby giving Bismarck a 50% advantage before any other things are taken into account. No way is that what actually happened. Most of the time all those ships fired at about the same rate in actual combat. Yes, Bismarck could fire faster sometimes, but seldom did so for practical reasons such as time of flight.

Comparing Iowa's 16" with Bismarck's 15" is also laughable. Iowa's shells were over 60% heavier than Bismarcks. There is way more difference in power between these two guns than between the number 16 and the number 15.

[lwd]

....Comparing Iowa's 16" with Bismarck's 15" is also laughable. Iowa's shells were over 60% heavier than Bismarcks. There is way more difference in power between these two guns than between the number 16 and the number 15.

Well if you take the ratio and raise it to the 7th or 8th power you get close....:)

[lwd]

...In this forum this issue has been discussed a lot and there seems to be some room for saying that a further continuation of the DS combat could have been the end of PoW. At least that ending is more likely than the end of Bismarck at DS.

We're wandering off topic but ...
If both sides had taken up the engagment again it is possible that either one could have lost all their ships. However that's extremly unlikly. More likely is that both BBs, Eugen, and at least one British CA would take significant additional damage. If Bismarks was enough that she decided to head home and handn't lost too much speed she might make it. Otherwise she probably goes down sooner than historical. I suspect that the most likely result would be POW getting the worst of the exchange with Bismark and Eugen getting the worst of the exchange with the two British CAs. The British have lots of friendly ports they can head for the Germans don't.

[lwd]

Shell bursters do not prove armour piercing ability; consider this information from "battleship.org" Firepower Table

I tried to go there and got a web hosting page. How about posting the url?

Intersting that they consider caliber important but don't talk about MV and such. How do they account for supercharges? or reduced charges for that matter? Looks to me like they are saying a 16" 45 for instance is the same as any other 16" 45. Effectivly the Colorado and South Dakota had a fair difference in firepower even though both had 16" 45 caliber guns.

[dahlhorse]

http://www.battleship.org/html/Articles ... Better.htm

Shell bursters do not prove armour piercing ability; consider this information from "battleship.org" Firepower Table

I tried to go there and got a web hosting page. How about posting the url?

Intersting that they consider caliber important but don't talk about MV and such. How do they account for supercharges? or reduced charges for that matter? Looks to me like they are saying a 16" 45 for instance is the same as any other 16" 45. Effectivly the Colorado and South Dakota had a fair difference in firepower even though both had 16" 45 caliber guns.

[dahlhorse]

My friend it does have something to do with reality; consider the fact that Bismarck very nearly sank both Hood and POW with gunfire alone,had POW not run; and it took churchill to sick half of his navy on the crippled Bismarck and they still could not get the job done. That my friend is reality; accept it.

[dahlhorse]

Well the Yamato was never proved in combat was it.! The Bismarck and Scharnhorst were; you must accept that as fact my friend. The yamato never was engaged by another battleship so I would say to you that labaling the yamato as the most powerful battleship afloat is also unrealistic.

Yes, I've seen that web page, and it has no perceptible value for a realistic understanding of ship capabilities. The fact that Scharnhorst has a higher firepower rating than Yamato is the clearest indication of its lack of value. The weakest modern battleship ranked above the strongest--isn't that a sufficient clue?

[Bgile]

That is actually quite a good website, but the firepower comparison is terribly flawed. As I mentioned previously, giving Bismarck a "3" rate of fire figure compared to the normal "2" and then multiplying it automatically gives her a 50% improvement over other ships in the comparison. We know that she didn't normally fire that fast for a variety of reasons, and that Yamato could fire at about the same rate as everyone else. As near as I can tell, people just assumed she couldn't because her guns were so large.

[dahlhorse]

Provide them then!

Well, this scoring system is funny, but no more. If BS could really achieve the 3,3 RPGPM, she would have to fight at a few kilometres, since her gun range at the loading angle is not very far. Besides, she never achieved this RoF in her engagements.

Scharnhorst et 3rd place is laughable as well. This system leaves out factors like shell weight, shell quality and penetration power.

A silly comparison at the very best.

You should better consult authorative sources and cross check them rather than to rely on such flawed excersises to support your view.

The peolpe here can provide them if you want.

Yamato`s RoF of 1,5 RPGPM is at her maximum range while the one of BS at her minimum, barrels need to be elevated and the German elevation rate compares rather poorly though it's somewhat compensated by her low trajectory guns.

Yamato had comparable RoF (both about 2 RPGPM) at common ranges and much more penetration power.

Consulting navweaps is a good start but then you should read anything: (from navweaps)

3) Many references claim that this was the fastest firing large caliber gun ever built. The ROF figures listed above represent generally published data that would support that claim. However, Krupp official documents cite the ROF as being 26 seconds at a four degree elevation, not notably faster than that of other nations' large-caliber weapons. Note that at this elevation the range would be considerably less than 10,000 meters. It is possible that well trained gun crews would reduce this time to the 20 seconds necessary to meet a ROF of 3 times per minute. A May 1941 report by the German Artillerieversuchskommando - AVSK (Artillery Testing Command for Ships) stated that the turret ammunition hoists on Bismarck were capable of delivering between 23 and 25 rounds per minute (for all four turrets), the equivalent of 3 rounds per minute per gun. However, this same report stated that design faults in the hoists led to two significant breakdowns during the evaluation, both of which caused long interruptions in the ammunition supply. Finally, it should be noted that Bismarck fired a total of 91 rounds during her thirteen minutes of firing at the Denmark Strait battle, which is actually less than one round per gun per minute.


The other tables are extremely flawed as well..

[Bgile]

Well the Yamato was never proved in combat was it.! The Bismarck and Scharnhorst were; you must accept that as fact my friend. The yamato never was engaged by another battleship so I would say to you that labaling the yamato as the most powerful battleship afloat is also unrealistic.

So obviously USS Washington (BB-56) is more powerful than USS Iowa (BB-61), right? That's ridiculous. It's the kind of argument one uses when logic fails and you need an excuse to make your favorite ship more powerful than others. You can eliminate most of the competition that way and come up with some outrageous statements.

I am curious though ... what exactly was it Scharnhorst did in combat to show she was more powerful than Yamato? It appears to me that she spent most of her time running away, and didn't come out all that well against a british destroyer, which was obviously more powerful than she was.

[David89]

Well the Yamato was never proved in combat was it.! The Bismarck and Scharnhorst were; you must accept that as fact my friend. The yamato never was engaged by another battleship so I would say to you that labaling the yamato as the most powerful battleship afloat is also unrealistic.

On those grounds you can discard any ship that did not see combat as being "not proved in combat". But Scharnhorst was proved in combat, she was sunk by an overwhelmingly superior enemy, the battleship Duke of York, which interestingly enough features below the Scharnhorst in that table you are quoting to prove the superiority of German ships. And yes, I know there are extenuating circumstances in that the Scharnhorst could not return fire because she had earlier lost her radar, but in a day fight, 1v1 I would expect Scharnhorst to be sunk, while Duke of York would sustain damage to her superstructure. Scharnhorst's only chance in such a fight would be to run at the start or hope to knock out Duke of York's radar and rangefinders before she sustained crippling damage, as the 11in shell has very little chance of doing serious damage to the Duke of York's hull or guns. So why should Scharnhorst feature so high in that table? And would you also dismiss the South Dakota and Iowa classes because on the one occasion that South Dakota fought another BB she performed badly?

Bismarck, of course, was also proved in combat, she sunk an old battlecruiser and was in turn sunk soon after. In her unmanouverable state, either of the British battleships could have beaten her into silence easily, even one of the old 15in gun battleships or Renown could have done so with only slightly greater problems than those experienced by the KGV and Rodney. Even if the Bismarck had been manouverable, King George V and Rodney were an overwhelming enemy that she had little or no chance of wnning against. Yamato would have stood a far better chance, since while not much more difficult to cripple, considering how close the British would have needed to get to penetrate her belt, and considering how hard it would be to put out of action her massively armoured turrets, Yamato would have been in the fight much longer and would quite possibly have sunk or severely damaged one or both of the British battleships.

[dahlhorse]

Actually, no it is not my favorite ship; But it seems to me we are getting off the subject of which you started; the Rodney against the Bismarck. And I am starting to wonder if you know anything about what happened in the Denmarck Straits; I am making comments based on facts of a battle you sir are making comments based on only data. Surely you must realize that the Rodney with its 16 inch guns never and I say never split a ship in two with its guns and for that matter no other ship in WW11 did either. Bismarck with Guns and Guns alone exploded one of the most powerful ships afloat The Hood; wether or not the excuse is made about armour or not, the real historical fact is that it happened and that is not just empirical data that a scientist came up with my friend!

Well the Yamato was never proved in combat was it.! The Bismarck and Scharnhorst were; you must accept that as fact my friend. The yamato never was engaged by another battleship so I would say to you that labaling the yamato as the most powerful battleship afloat is also unrealistic.

So obviously USS Washington (BB-56) is more powerful than USS Iowa (BB-61), right? That's ridiculous. It's the kind of argument one uses when logic fails and you need an excuse to make your favorite ship more powerful than others. You can eliminate most of the competition that way and come up with some outrageous statements.

I am curious though ... what exactly was it Scharnhorst did in combat to show she was more powerful than Yamato? It appears to me that she spent most of her time running away, and didn't come out all that well against a british destroyer, which was obviously more powerful than she was.

[dahlhorse]

Scharnhorst was defeated by shear numbers of ships not by ships that were superior and it was not just the duke of york there were several other british ships that had surrounded the scharnhorst another combat historical fact that you my friend are not recognizing!

Well the Yamato was never proved in combat was it.! The Bismarck and Scharnhorst were; you must accept that as fact my friend. The yamato never was engaged by another battleship so I would say to you that labaling the yamato as the most powerful battleship afloat is also unrealistic.

On those grounds you can discard any ship that did not see combat as being "not proved in combat". But Scharnhorst was proved in combat, she was sunk by an overwhelmingly superior enemy, the battleship Duke of York, which interestingly enough features below the Scharnhorst in that table you are quoting to prove the superiority of German ships. And yes, I know there are extenuating circumstances in that the Scharnhorst could not return fire because she had earlier lost her radar, but in a day fight, 1v1 I would expect Scharnhorst to be sunk, while Duke of York would sustain damage to her superstructure. Scharnhorst's only chance in such a fight would be to run at the start or hope to knock out Duke of York's radar and rangefinders before she sustained crippling damage, as the 11in shell has very little chance of doing serious damage to the Duke of York's hull or guns. So why should Scharnhorst feature so high in that table? And would you also dismiss the South Dakota and Iowa classes because on the one occasion that South Dakota fought another BB she performed badly?

Bismarck, of course, was also proved in combat, she sunk an old battlecruiser and was in turn sunk soon after. In her unmanouverable state, either of the British battleships could have beaten her into silence easily, even one of the old 15in gun battleships or Renown could have done so with only slightly greater problems than those experienced by the KGV and Rodney. Even if the Bismarck had been manouverable, King George V and Rodney were an overwhelming enemy that she had little or no chance of wnning against. Yamato would have stood a far better chance, since while not much more difficult to cripple, considering how close the British would have needed to get to penetrate her belt, and considering how hard it would be to put out of action her massively armoured turrets, Yamato would have been in the fight much longer and would quite possibly have sunk or severely damaged one or both of the British battleships.

[Lutscha]

Where to begin?

Gun penetration: http://www.navweaps.com/index_nathan/index_nathan.htm
Here you will find a variety of different info about guns and armour.
You can take dunmunro's link as well

Okun's BS paper (needs some revision but its stil excellent): http://www.combinedfleet.com/okun_biz.htm

On the German marinearchiv you'll find schematics on penetrations of the guns of BS, VV, Richelieu and KGV against each other at range intervalls from 15km to 24km. Longer rangees and more ships will come in the next days I think. Unfortunately you have to register (atm page 3-1): http://forum-marinearchiv.de/smf/index. ... 20.30.html

A BS paper from Garzke and Dulin who have published 3 excellent volumes about BBs: http://www.navweaps.com/index_inro/INRO_Bismarck_p1.htm
I think a more detailed and up to date version will be published in the future with the help of Bill Jurens who has provided a variety of outstanding works and posts as well.

Books: take the battleship books from Garzke and Dulin, Ravens and Roberts, Friedman, Campbell (though navweaps provides the statistics of his book)
Avoid older editions of Breyer`s books which are extremely flawed due to a lack of sources at that time and don't read Brennecke who seems to present false data on purpose. It seems to me that German works neglect the technical side in general, but Josef Kaiser's book is said to be very good.


There are many more which I can't think of right now.