Naval History Forums

Hi guys. Even with clear weather inaccuracies are to be found in celestial navigation. Look at the conflicting positions of the battle of the River Plate, occurred in the austral Summer at 35° of lat. They are about 30 miles apart. According to the Germans: 34º34'S, 49º 17' W " British: 34º 27...

(a) get visual directional fixes on two (or perhaps more) prominent nearby terrain features Hi Byron. It is not necessary to have two points, one would suffice. The navigator needs to take successive bearings to the same point, that would give multiple lines of position. But, taking into account co...

A few of questions. What was the distance between the torpedo bulkhead and the outer hull amdships? What was the height of the double bottom amidships? What was the depth of the hull sides amidships from keel to upper deck? What was the height of the main armor belt? What was the length of the cita...

Thanks. Would you post them in full? There isn't anymore info on the logs that's relevant to time zones. Norfolk records Hood blew up at 0602 but Hood and PoW open fire is recorded as 0555. PoW records open fire at 0553 and Hood hit and sunk at 0605 Suffolk: 0553 battle of Denmark Straits begins' 0...

Sorry, now I see in Dunmunro´s map that B is Z+2 :stubborn: You're correct that it's confusing, but I suspect that the RN was using a TZ map that matched your previous post. This is from Suffolk's and Norfolk's log of May 24: suf.jpg Norfolk_log_M24.jpg Thanks. Would you post them in full? There is...

marcelo_malara wrote: ↑Wed Aug 07, 2024 12:42 pm Sorry, now I see in Dunmunro´s map that B is Z+2

You're correct that it's confusing, but I suspect that the RN was using a TZ map that matched your previous post. This is from Suffolk's and Norfolk's log of May 24:

This is what I get when I use Astroart 8's star chart and the lat/long for Hood's sinking: The altitude shows the Sun position relative to the horizon (without calculating refraction).

In Kennedy's book on Bismarck 's voyage, looks a good guess that the times he gives for events are two hours ahead of Greenwich Time -- British Double Summer Time, or whatever it was called. Is that the usual? When we read that Hood was sunk at 0600, that means 0400 Greenwich Time? And the Catalina...

The wreck of Bismarck seems to show evidence of relatively few hits on the side of the hull, this IMHO suggests Bismarck’s hull wasn’t badly riddled by gun fire, so she probably retained considerable reserve stability and buoyancy until the end of the gunnery action and the beginning of thr final s...

Hi All, Related to this, I am intrigued that, even prior to the final battle, Bismarck seems to have had a pronounced list to port. The Baron notes a considerable list, and in the survivor testimony one says: During this period the ship had a marked list to port so that the 15 cm turrets were in th...

Fraserian2 wrote: "the considerable narrowing of the TPS towards the citadel's ends is definetely an aspect not to neglect" This aspect was not neglected by Bismarck designers. At turrets ordinates, where TDS is narrowing more, vitals (magazines and shell rooms) were not in contact with t...

@dunmunro: Yes, the considerable narrowing of the TPS towards the citadel's ends is definetely an aspect not to neglect. - As I have already stated: As a member of the crew I would be significantly more worried about this than about the assumed "design flaw". :whistle: That doesn't mean t...

I think it would make sense to differentiate between a "design flaw" and a mere "design weakness" in the TPS, more or less along the following lines: mere "design weakness": a recognized property of the TPS leading to expected unfavorable consequences; e.g. (if you ins...

Why? It seems the Germans were very confident in their design. To have no armored slope behind the main belt could be considered as design flaw as well, if we follow your reasoning. Anyway, the design flaw we’re talking about is the small distance between the double bottom and the wing passage bulk...

Thank you. I'm not sure if this is exactly the document that Bill mentioned. However, "Einführung in das Unterwassersprengwesen" again demonstrates a complete lack of awareness of any potential design flaw. In general terms, anytime the failure of the final armoured bulkhead allows floodi...