Preston: Worst warships of all time

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lwd
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

Post by lwd »

Bgile wrote: .... The partial loss of electric power for several minutes? As far as I know, that could have happened on any battleship in the world, given the mistake that was made. Are you saying this condemns an entire class of battleships as "worst ever" because someone bypassed isolation procedure and locked in a circuit breaker?
Pretty much trivial compared to the reworking of Scharnhorst fire control wasn't it?
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

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Bgile wrote:
Karl Heidenreich wrote:Well, if we consider what is expected of some battleship, the outcome of a certain episode and we can freeze time on a single date, in this case the night of Nov.14-15, 1942 then USS South Dakota will take over, with honours, that title, no sweat.

Because what happened to HMS Glorious was her skipper´s fault, not something inherent to the ship design or building. But what happened to South Dakota, was the ship itself.
I'm not sure what you are referring to. The partial loss of electric power for several minutes? As far as I know, that could have happened on any battleship in the world, given the mistake that was made. Are you saying this condemns an entire class of battleships as "worst ever" because someone bypassed isolation procedure and locked in a circuit breaker?
I haven't been there that long - I enjoy this board! - but I can tell you exactly what is going on here: Karl is apparently hugely sensitive to his Bismarck obsession, and defends it jealously - Bismarck just has to be the greatest, most wonderful, best BB ever. The US' fast battleships of that period were technically very sound designs, and this is threatening, and so... Karl's gotta find flies on them somewhere, and he's both imaginative & determined!
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Terje Langoy
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

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lwd wrote: Pretty much trivial compared to the reworking of Scharnhorst fire control wasn't it?
Did I miss out on something about the fire control of the Scharnhorst class?
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

Post by lwd »

Terje Langoy wrote:
lwd wrote: Pretty much trivial compared to the reworking of Scharnhorst fire control wasn't it?
Did I miss out on something about the fire control of the Scharnhorst class?
I seem to recall she required an extensive reworking of her fire control system early in her carreer.
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

Post by yellowtail3 »

Terje Langoy wrote:
lwd wrote: Pretty much trivial compared to the reworking of Scharnhorst fire control wasn't it?
Did I miss out on something about the fire control of the Scharnhorst class?
I have a recollection of reading somewhere that they had to replace - and re-route, I don't recall? - lots of cabling, and that a bunch of FC-related stuff just didn't work - she was nowhere near combat-ready when commissioned, until they corrected those problems. don't recall specifics
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

Post by Bgile »

Bismarck went on her final mission with very little AA practice and arguably one of the worst AA weapon systems afloat in the 37mm single shot "AA" guns. Was the "unlucky" torpedo hit really that unlucky or a reflection of poor AA performance?

I don't like this topic because it encourages mud slinging to no good purpose.
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Post by Terje Langoy »

From my rather unstable recollections I was left with the impression that the experiences gained during the Atlantic trials of the Gneisenau (June & July 1939) her fire control actually showed such promising results that the decision was made to install the exact same fire control aboard Bismarck - no changes.

But, and that´s a rather huge butt, this is quoted from memory and I can assure you that whenever there´s a Gneisenau involved I tend to remember the positives rather than the negatives.

I have not read about any larger reconstruction of fire control power supply or similar. If anyone should be in a position to provide a direct reference to an online source or author I would be very grateful as this info is all new to me.
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Post by lwd »

Terje Langoy wrote:From my rather unstable recollections I was left with the impression that the experiences gained during the Atlantic trials of the Gneisenau (June & July 1939) her fire control actually showed such promising results that the decision was made to install the exact same fire control aboard Bismarck - no changes.....
That might not be inconsistent with the Scharnorst haveing problems. Just looking at:
http://www.german-navy.de/kriegsmarine/ ... index.html
Scharnhorst is launched 2 months earlier but isn't commissioned until month and a half after Gneisenau.
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Post by Terje Langoy »

Sorry for the late reply...

I´m not one to argue that these ships were similar other than in general design. Pipe and power supply should very likely separate ship from ship. That said it must also be recognized that when the radar mattress and service station were added on top of the foretop turning cover (1939-40) both ships would naturally need to re-wire their foretop. That´s however not a flaw - its an addition.

From what I know so far no constructional defects of the kind in question has been recorded in the case of Gneisenau. On the other hand it appears to be a faint of substance to the statement that Scharnhorst was the more troubled of the twins and that this may be on account of the simple fact that she was built at another shipyard - as you point out in your latest reply.

Scharnhorst was not commissioned month and a half after Gneisenau. She was commissioned half a year later. (May 1938 - January 1939) This may however support the point you made even further.
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

Post by Byron Angel »

For what it's worth, SOUTH DAKOTA's power failure at Gaudalcanal II was caused by an error (unauthorized act) on the part of an electrician. It was not the result of a design fault.


Byron
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

Post by Bgile »

Byron Angel wrote:For what it's worth, SOUTH DAKOTA's power failure at Gaudalcanal II was caused by an error (unauthorized act) on the part of an electrician. It was not the result of a design fault.


Byron
That's been explained ad nauseum, but it doesn't matter to Karl. It's the worst warship ever built.
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Gary
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

Post by Gary »

Perhaps the British Monmouth class armoured cruisers of 1901 deserve a mention.

Her heaviest gun was 6 inch, many of which were located too near to the waterline meaning that they became unusable (effectively) in all but a calm sea.
Her armour was thin for an Armoured cruiser.
These explain Monmouths loss at Coronel a few years later.
Whatever possessed the Royal navy to purchase 10 of these I dont know?
God created the world in 6 days.........and on the 7th day he built the Scharnhorst
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

Post by Bgile »

My least favorite US ship class is probably the Omaha class cruisers. They were designed at just the wrong point in cruiser evolution and their gun battery was obsolete when they were completed. They were cramped and just not a very satisfactory design IMO.
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Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

Post by lwd »

Byron Angel wrote:For what it's worth, SOUTH DAKOTA's power failure at Gaudalcanal II was caused by an error (unauthorized act) on the part of an electrician. It was not the result of a design fault.
...
Well there apparently was a problem. The "unauthorized act" was in apparently due to repeated circut breaker trips. IE it was intended to fix a problem which it just made worse. Of course the base problem wouldn't have been anywhere near as severe as the fix was and from what I understand the base problem was corrected not long after that.
Byron Angel

Re: Preston: Worst warships of all time

Post by Byron Angel »

lwd wrote:
Byron Angel wrote:For what it's worth, SOUTH DAKOTA's power failure at Gaudalcanal II was caused by an error (unauthorized act) on the part of an electrician. It was not the result of a design fault.
...
Well there apparently was a problem. The "unauthorized act" was in apparently due to repeated circut breaker trips. IE it was intended to fix a problem which it just made worse. Of course the base problem wouldn't have been anywhere near as severe as the fix was and from what I understand the base problem was corrected not long after that.

..... You made me curious on the score of material deficiency found in the electrical system, so I went back and re-read SODAK's Battle Report and Damage Report. There was indeed mentioned a problem encountered with new and apparently over-sensitive automated circuit breakers that were replaced by conventional manual units after the battle.
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