Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Desert Tyrant on September 01, 2007, 03:36:30 pm
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Eh, becuase I feel like it.
My thoughts on the 'Yamato vs. Iowa' thing. It might be useful, might not.
"The Iowa-class Battleship had an armanant of nine 16in guns, divided into 3 batteries. The Iowa's 16/50Cal shells weighed 2,700 pounds, and could fire accurately for as far as thirty miles, if memeory serves me. Their back-up weapons were 5in/38Cal shells, as well as a large number of 40 and 20 millimetre weapon batteries. The Iowa's armour was definately not as thick as the Yamato's, however, it significantly could outrun the Yamato: The Iowa classes top-speed was 33 knots, while Yamato's was 24-27 knots. The famed German battleship Bismarck, for example, was capable of going up to 29 knots in optimal conditions.
There were four Iowas built: Iowa, BB-61, New Jersy, BB-62, Missouri, BB-63, and Wisconsin, BB-64. There were originally supposed to be six of them, the Illinios, and the Kentuky, which was fairly close to being completed.
On the other hand, there was two Yamato-class Battleships, the Yamato and the Musahshi, both of which suffered inglorious deaths: Mushashi was sunk in the battle of Letye Gulf, after taking a massive amount of damage.(Mushashi took 17 torpedos and 20 15,000 pound bombs. For comparison, the strongest bomb that the US had, short of the Nuke, was a 5,000 pound bunker buster IIRC. That is an incredible amount of firepower no matter how you slice it.)
Yamato wound up being sunk in a suicide mission against the US navy at Okinowa. Now, both never fought each other, but What If?
Yamato-classes armanant was nine 18.1 in. gun batteries, which wa sdivided into the same 3 gun battry arrangement as the Iowa-class. Her secondary armanant was 6.1 gun batteries, and had a smattering of 25 and 13mm gun batteries, which like the Iowa's 40 and 20mm were used for anti-aircraft duty.
Yamato was superior in terms of gunfire, but the US 16/50Cal guns were better at penatration. Yamato's real downside against the Iowa-class, aside from the fact that the American Battleship is much faster, is the fact that the Yamato-class' fire-control were decidely medicre. The Iowa used a Radar-control fireing system which by WWII standards were extremely accurate. Yamato's fire-control wasn't nearly as good.
Bottom line: Iowa had at least a 50% chance against The Yamato class, at the least."
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May I know why you called this thread "World War 2"?
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Judging from reading accounts of Jutland and Hood vs. Bismarck, seems whoever gets just one or two good hits first wins, so it goes to the Iowas greater accuracy.
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Nice ASCII art there, Snail. :) ... but you forgot to add depth charges dropping from the USS C ;)
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http://www.combinedfleet.com/ (http://www.combinedfleet.com/) sums it up pretty well. Japan was kinda screwed from the part where they decided to go to war with the US. The Nazis were ignoring all sorts of stuff we did (HEY UK HAVE SOME DESTROYERS! PAY LATER!) because they didn't want to fight the US and USSR at the same time. Then Japan went and brought the US into the mess and it was just attrition.
Also, there was the fact that the Japanese Navy was terrible at protecting its supply lines.
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I seem to recall the Yamato had problems with recoil on those main guns as well?
WDarkk is also right about protecting convoys, the Japanese 'warrior culture' meant that far too much was put into actually fighting and not enough into escorting the supply vessels. The Royal Navy learned some pretty harsh lessons from trying to go nose-nose with the Japanese battle fleet, though that was partly because they were stretched so thin, they lost the Prince of Wales to Torpedo Boats and could barely afford the assets to push more ships into the area what with engaging the German fleet.
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Now, both never fought each other, but What If?
The reason they would never fight each other was because naval air power, what Japan had used to progress early in the war and what was the dominant force in war, had been almost entirely lost to the Americans.
Aircraft were faster and able to reach targets before ships most times. Add to that the Japanese ships had poor antiaircraft defenses compared to their American counterparts.
A direct battle was unlikely.
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Japan was kinda screwed from the part where they decided to go to war with the US.
The war with Japan could have easily gone the other way due to the invention of the jet engine. In fact if the U.S. had waited a week or two, the war would have lasted a lot longer.
The Nazis were ignoring all sorts of stuff we did (HEY UK HAVE SOME DESTROYERS! PAY LATER!) because they didn't want to fight the US and USSR at the same time.
They didn't ignore anything. They almost instigated a war between Mexico and the U.S.
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May I know why you called this thread "World War 2"?
Because I can. Plus remember i'm a douchebag. ;)
Judging from reading accounts of Jutland and Hood vs. Bismarck, seems whoever gets just one or two good hits first wins, so it goes to the Iowas greater accuracy.
Well, Hood's a bit of an outlier. From what i've read on wiki(Take it with a grain of salt, though), Hood sounds like she was sunk by a freakshot that punched through the Deck armour.
And damn it, that she looked awesome too.
(It might be worth noting that Bismarck could survive longer in a straight-up fight, mainly because of the virtues of either ships design. The Hood had thin armour in comparison with a main battleship, but was nearly equaly armed as well, as both ships fired 15inch shells. Honestly, the concept of a Battlecruiser sounds much better suited for raiding than a BB like Bismarck. It might also be worth noting that Bismarck forced the Englishes newest BB, Price of Wales, to retreat. Then again from what i've heard the King George V wasn't a brilliantly designed ship)
(As an aside, I hear the US is going to comission the King George VI battleship soon. ;))
Now, both never fought each other, but What If?
The reason they would never fight each other was because naval air power, what Japan had used to progress early in the war and what was the dominant force in war, had been almost entirely lost to the Americans.
I know that, I posted that as a 'What if the USS Iowa did in fact engage the Japanese BB Yamato at Okinowa? Or the Mushashi at Letye Gulf? (And after reading up on that battle, jesus the Mushashi was a tough bastard.)
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May I know why you called this thread "World War 2"?
Because I can. Plus remember i'm a douchebag. ;)
Judging from reading accounts of Jutland and Hood vs. Bismarck, seems whoever gets just one or two good hits first wins, so it goes to the Iowas greater accuracy.
Well, Hood's a bit of an outlier. From what i've read on wiki(Take it with a grain of salt, though), Hood sounds like she was sunk by a freakshot that punched through the Deck armour.
And damn it, that she looked awesome too.
(It might be worth noting that Bismarck could survive longer in a straight-up fight, mainly because of the virtues of either ships design. The Hood had thin armour in comparison with a main battleship, but was nearly equaly armed as well, as both ships fired 15inch shells. Honestly, the concept of a Battlecruiser sounds much better suited for raiding than a BB like Bismarck. It might also be worth noting that Bismarck forced the Englishes newest BB, Price of Wales, to retreat. Then again from what i've heard the King George V wasn't a brilliantly designed ship)
You're almost right. The Hood was an old design with strong side armour but minimal deck armour (IIRC they may have even been wood decking). Due to advances in gun design, shells travlled in an arch, rather than directly at a target, so they would be arriving "from above". So to speak.
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What if the USS Iowa did in fact engage the Japanese BB Yamato at Okinowa?
Gun for gun it would probably have been a stalemate with both ships taking serious damage. I understand the Iowa had superior fire control systems with its mark1... which is the most important thing as armor ain't gonna do squat against shells this large, but that probably wouldn't mean much.
Ships of this kind rarely sail alone. Not only for the security of numbers but also because they need a great deal of support from the fleet. Everything from supplies to information has to be pumped into these ships or they are going to lose effectiveness quickly.
The Yamato had very little for backup in its final battle and, as a combat system, had failed before the first shot was fired.
Saying the Yamato was killed by aircraft is like saying Mike tyson lost a fight because he tripped over a folding chair on his way to the ring.
...but when you starve, blindfold, and intoxicate your fighter before sending him to the match, thats exactly the sort of thing that will happen.
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You're almost right. The Hood was an old design with strong side armour but minimal deck armour (IIRC they may have even been wood decking). Due to advances in gun design, sheels travlled in an arch, rather than directly at a target, so they would be arriving "from above". So to speak.
I know Hood was a fairly old design. I don't think that she was launched until... 1918-ish?
But yeah, Hood's deck armour was garbage. And no, I don't what to know what would of happened if the Yamato was there instead(Sure it'd never happen, but sometimes it's fun to speculate.;))
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Please appropriately title your threads when you create them. Thanks!
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The new title of this thread isn't perfect, either :doubt:
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The be-all, the end-all, the alpha and the omega, to this discussion: http://www.combinedfleet.com/baddest.htm
The reason why it's the best: http://www.combinedfleet.com/okun_biz.htm This guy does ballistics for a living, and he genuinely enjoys it. If he speaks, you best be listen' fool.
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Japan was kinda screwed from the part where they decided to go to war with the US.
The war with Japan could have easily gone the other way due to the invention of the jet engine. In fact if the U.S. had waited a week or two, the war would have lasted a lot longer.
I'm gonna have to ask you to back that up.
The Nazis were ignoring all sorts of stuff we did (HEY UK HAVE SOME DESTROYERS! PAY LATER!) because they didn't want to fight the US and USSR at the same time.
They didn't ignore anything. They almost instigated a war between Mexico and the U.S.
Wasn't that WW1? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimmerman_telegram Did the Germans try that again?
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The new title of this thread isn't perfect, either :doubt:
How is that?
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I'm gonna have to ask you to back that up.
I saw it on the History Channel during one of their 'WWII Days'. I'll hunt for a link tomorrow.
Wasn't that WW1? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimmerman_telegram Did the Germans try that again?
Curse my memory! :nervous:
Well, they still blew up merchant vessels! :arrr:
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I saw it on the History Channel during one of their 'WWII Days'.
But it's always WWII Day on the History Channel. They should call it the ****ing World War 2 Channel ffs. Honestly, would it kill them to do something other than WWII and Ancient Rome?
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They do dumba**.
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I saw it on the History Channel during one of their 'WWII Days'.
But it's always WWII Day on the History Channel. They should call it the ****ing World War 2 Channel ffs. Honestly, would it kill them to do something other than WWII and Ancient Rome?
Well, even with the jet engine, it'd be pretty drat hard for them to overcome the production gap: http://www.combinedfleet.com/economic.htm shows that the IJN was gonna get owned pretty hard by sheer weight of planes. Additionally, there were some problems with them not building new fighters virtually at all (they had an improved fighter designed to go up against US bombers, but made less than 500, which is tiny).
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When quoting, it helps to look at the post in question. :rolleyes:
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The history channel likes to exaggerate things for a better story. The Japanese completed one -- count 'em -- one flying prototype of an Me-262 derivative before the war ended. This aircraft, the Kikka (http://j-aircraft.org/xplanes/hikoki_files/kikka.html), was intended as a kamikaze. The Kikka, due to its poor engines, was not faster than Allied piston engined fighters and was certainly no war winning weapon.
An improved Me-262 clone, the Ki-201 Karyu (http://www.j-aircraft.org/xplanes/hikoki_files/ki201.html) was under development. No prototype was ever completed, and the aircraft could not be available until mid 1946 at the earliest.
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Fact is that jets wouldn't have saved Japan. The problem is in resources and industry. Even if Japan had significant fleets of jet fighters all of them would be grounded or nearly grounded by 1945 as they simply had no fuel left. USN submarines had cut off their major supplies of oil, British and American troops had captured most of their other land based resources in China and Burma and the Japanese were basically backed into a corner.
Even assuming they had all the raw materials they needed the next big problem was pilots. No experienced pilots left, save a few, as most squadrons were filled with newbie pilots with minimal training. The war was essentially over...Japan could have probably fought for a while more but all it would have determined was the final death toll.
The side points are that...had the war lasted longer the Soviets would have captured more Japanese territory and given them a stronger foothold in Asia than actually occurred.
Oh and History Channel loves to exaggerate. For instance, the popular Dogfights series was comparing the P-38 with the FW190 and gave the P-38 a check for superior firepower...simply not possible with any stretch of the imagination. Its a good series and the tactics are good but sometimes the facts are either wrong, bonkers, or simplified to the point where it gets a bit stupid.
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When quoting, it helps to look at the post in question. :rolleyes:
Whoops :sigh:
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I can't seem to remember the name of the operation, which is making it difficult to find the information.
From what I can remember, they discovered at least 20 operational jets that were fueled and ready to go. It was probably more than that, but I can't be sure until I find the operation name.
The biggest thing about the jets was that it would allow them to attack B-29s, so dropping an atomic bomb would have been quite difficult. In that case, they could have had the time to develop jet bombers, which would lay waste to the U.S. fleets. Then again, what the the VT fuse, they might not have been able to do that.
Meh, this is going to bother me all day.
::EDITED DUE TO WRONG MODEL NUMBER::
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"B-52s"??? :)
Read the article I linked to on the Kikka. A couple of dozen were in various stages of construction, but that's all. Germany produced 1400 Me-262s -- look what good it did them.... :)
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The new title of this thread isn't perfect, either :doubt:
How is that?
The true irony is that, considering our Intercontinental Ballistic Topic abilities, it probably will turn out to be about WW2 in general, it's already headed there ;)
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::EDITED DUE TO WRONG MODEL NUMBER::
« Last Edit: 03 September 2007, 11:53:26 by BloodEagle »
"B-52s"??? :)
36 seconds too late. :lol:
Germany produced 1400 Me-262s -- look what good it did them.... :)
Size over substance, the Me-262 was very dangerous in the hands of a trained pilot. Unfortunately (for Nazi Germany) there wasn't enough time left for them to be trained in its use.
Of course, the whole point I'm trying to make is that if the U.S. had waited a short time, the war would have lasted much longer than it did.
*grumbles about operation names and Google.*
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Perhaps, but the point really is, I think, that Japan did not possess jet aircraft in anything like the numbers required to make any difference, even if they had the pilots and fuel for them. The only factor in determining the date of end of the war was the date on which the US was going to drop the A-bombs. No cave of jets would have altered that reality in the slightest.
Here is something interesting, Japanese and back on-topic: :)
(http://www.wolfsshipyard.mystarship.com/Misc/NeverWeres/Super_Yamato.jpg)
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IIRC the 'Super Yamato wasn't so much as a 'Super' ship as it was just mainly fixing a lot of the Yamato-class' design flaws.
Good find though.
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Sorta -- that posting is of a true 'supership,' a 100,000 ton BB with 8x20" guns, intended as a follow on to the super Yamatos. These were similar to the Yamatos, but with 6x20" guns, and different armor and secondary weapons:
(http://xoomer.alice.it/bk/NWS/Imperial_Japanese_Navy/images/A150.jpg)
(http://xoomer.alice.it/bk/NWS/Imperial_Japanese_Navy/images/A-150.jpg)
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Interesting, although i've always been curious how the US Montana-class BB would of turned out. Alas, we never saw. :sigh:
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She would have been a real stunner:
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v415/ArizonaBB39/Line%20Art/sample.png)
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Wow...never heard of that class. Very impressive!
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Here is an unbuilt ship even fewer have heard of:
(http://www.wolfsshipyard.mystarship.com/Misc/NeverWeres/1912_BCb.gif)
This 1912 US battlecruiser design was 1250 feet (380m) long! The propulsion technology of 1912 was so limited that this was the only way to get a ship with 8x14" guns up to 30 knots. 56 boilers would have been required!
Visit Richard Pawling's page (http://rp-one.net/usn_1912_bc/usn_1912_bc.html) for some beautiful renders of this vessel.
(http://rp-one.net/usn_1912_bc/graphics/full_1_sig_sml.jpg)
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Wow...never heard of that class. Very impressive!
No?
The Montana class BB was actually supposed to be the Iowa's sucessor. The Montana had three more 16inch guns, going up to 12. The Montana class was supposed to be better in a scrape, as it was supposed to be more heavily armoured, at the cost of the speed that the Iowa had. More well-rounded, as it were.
The Montana class was all ready to go into production, the materiel, the manpower were in place.... but WW2 ended, so the Montanas were never built. Same with the two other Iowas that were already being built, the Illinois and the Kentucky were the unlucky Iowa's that were never finished.(The Kentuckey was 72% finished when they said '**** it' and cease her construction.)
If she had been completed, she would of been a beast.
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Not as knowledgeable here about the battleships as I am about the aviation aspect of World War II. I suppose I'll have to spend some time reading about naval vessels at some point :)
I've read a bit about the Bismarck/Tirpitz and the King George V class but thats about it.
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The be-all, the end-all, the alpha and the omega, to this discussion: http://www.combinedfleet.com/baddest.htm
The reason why it's the best: http://www.combinedfleet.com/okun_biz.htm This guy does ballistics for a living, and he genuinely enjoys it. If he speaks, you best be listen' fool.
Saw this site before...that guy knows some serious s***!
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Wow...never heard of that class. Very impressive!
The Montana...too bad that one was never built.. It could tear the Yamato appart ;7
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Wow...never heard of that class. Very impressive!
The Montana...too bad that one was never built.. It could tear the Yamato appart ;7
Hell, Iowa can do that more than half the time. the 16/50Cal. shells that the Iowa class used(And South Carolina, as well as What Montana would of used) had virtually the same penatration of the Japanese 18.1 inch. IOwa was faster, more agile than Yamato, had far superior fire-control systems, and could dictate the terms of battle to the Yamato.
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Oh, I know htat...
I was only saying the Montana would be even meaner than the Iowa (20" shells ;7 ;7 ;7 ;7 )
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MONTANA would have had the same 16" guns as IOWA, just 12 of them instead of only nine...
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Oh, I know htat...
I was only saying the Montana would be even meaner than the Iowa (20" shells ;7 ;7 ;7 ;7 )
No, Did you not this read this part:(And South Carolina, as well as What Montana would of used)
I stated that the Montana class would of used the same 16/50Cal. guns that the Iowa did, only they had 12 instead of nine(4 batteries on Montana vs. 3 batteries on Iowa). The South Carolina IIRC also used 16ichers, although they were 45Cal. instead of 50Cal that the Iowa used
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The only 20" gunned US design known to me was the Maximum Battleship design study of 1934, featuring 8x20" guns on around 70000 tons.
(http://xoomer.alice.it/bk/NWS/United_States_Navy/images/maxbb34.jpg)
This was intended to explore the design limitations of the Panama Canal, more than a serious plan for construction.
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Hell, Iowa can do that more than half the time. the 16/50Cal. shells that the Iowa class used(And South Carolina, as well as What Montana would of used) had virtually the same penatration of the Japanese 18.1 inch. IOwa was faster, more agile than Yamato, had far superior fire-control systems, and could dictate the terms of battle to the Yamato.
It depends on a lot of factors, but properly handled South Dakota or even Nelson could have given Yamato a run for its money at the least.
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The only 20" gunned US design known to me was the Maximum Battleship design study of 1934, featuring 8x20" guns on around 70000 tons.
(http://xoomer.alice.it/bk/NWS/United_States_Navy/images/maxbb34.jpg)
This was intended to explore the design limitations of the Panama Canal, more than a serious plan for construction.
I do belive that the Germans might of had a experimental design that would of used 20 inchers, but it never got anywhere off of the drawing board.
Anyways, I think the Brit battlecruisers and BBs were underrated in WW2, as far as BC/BBs could be. The KGV was pretty much Bismarck's equal(Despite the fact that the Quad-battery 14in weren't exactly brilliant.). I think the KGV's less-than-awesome reputation comes from Price of Wales, despite the fact that PoW had a bad luck streak about a mile wide.(Took some fairly nasty hits from Bismarck, although once Hood went down, she probably couldn't do too much more.)
ANd yes, I know it's been about 16 days since the last message, it's justs that this is a interesting topic and I prefer not to make another topic exactly like it.
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Well it wasn't a month; don't worry about it. :D
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The only 20" gunned US design known to me was the Maximum Battleship design study of 1934, featuring 8x20" guns on around 70000 tons.
(http://xoomer.alice.it/bk/NWS/United_States_Navy/images/maxbb34.jpg)
This was intended to explore the design limitations of the Panama Canal, more than a serious plan for construction.
I do belive that the Germans might of had a experimental design that would of used 20 inchers, but it never got anywhere off of the drawing board.
Anyways, I think the Brit battlecruisers and BBs were underrated in WW2, as far as BC/BBs could be. The KGV was pretty much Bismarck's equal(Despite the fact that the Quad-battery 14in weren't exactly brilliant.). I think the KGV's less-than-awesome reputation comes from Price of Wales, despite the fact that PoW had a bad luck streak about a mile wide.(Took some fairly nasty hits from Bismarck, although once Hood went down, she probably couldn't do too much more.)
ANd yes, I know it's been about 16 days since the last message, it's justs that this is a interesting topic and I prefer not to make another topic exactly like it.
As I understood it...the KGV class was largely hindered by the fact that the Royal Navy was actually building the ships according to the naval treaties enforced after World War I. If I remember correctly the KGV was not finished within the bounds of the treaty (because by the time they were ready everyone else had already broken it) but it was furthest along in initial design and did try to conform originally. Maybe you can comment in a more meaningful fashion :)
I have heard some argue that, given the restrictions, the KGV is probably the best design possible given the treaty restrictions.
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KGV was not a bad design, actually, but her main battery had significant problems (Prince of Wales achieved something like 40% of her theoritical output by weight of shells fired in the battle with Bismark, and her after turret jammed in train and wasn't cleared until two hours after the action was over.). Before US entry into the war (not that US had anything to do with it, but the date happens to work) she didn't have radar fire control. In 1943, with true "blindfire" radar fire control and the kinks worked out of her main battery operation, KGV could have stood up well to Bismark. Her 14-inchers lacked the power to penetrate the armor you would have found on a US ship, for example, but Bismark was extremely vunerable to plunging fire.
Prince of Wales possibly deserves a lot of the credit for Bismark's eventual sinking: an underwater hit from one of Prince of Wales' guns detonated in the liquid protection portion of Bismark's antitorpedo defense setup, and since Bismark did not have a void space inboard of the liquid portion, the shell apparently had a mining effect on the hull and flooded a lot of the forward compartments, as well as reducing the available fuel supply drastically.
The thing that's not often realized, but is really crucial to these discussions, is that basically by 1943 the best optical firecontrol in the world meant nothing. This means Allied ships had a huge advantage from that point on.
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As I understood it...the KGV class was largely hindered by the fact that the Royal Navy was actually building the ships according to the naval treaties enforced after World War I. If I remember correctly the KGV was not finished within the bounds of the treaty (because by the time they were ready everyone else had already broken it) but it was furthest along in initial design and did try to conform originally. Maybe you can comment in a more meaningful fashion :)
I have heard some argue that, given the restrictions, the KGV is probably the best design possible given the treaty restrictions.
IIRC The restrictions were loosened by 1935, from 35 to 45,000 tons. IIRC 1935 was when when the Brits began design of the KGV. Technically KGV was able to have heavier armour because the now slightly-less lax restrictions.
In a fair fight, the KGV was at least fairly equal to the Bismarck-class. Sure it's 14in shells weren't as rawly(New word apparently) powerful as Bismarck's 15inchers, but it was pretty vulnerable to plunging fire, at best.
To expand a bit more on my point about Brit ships being a bit underrated, HMS Repulse was said to be a crack-gunnery ship(IIRC she wasn't deployed to follow the Bismarck because of her thin armour. The Renown-class Battlecruisers, IIRC weighed something about 26,000 tons.)
HMS Hood would up blowing due to a freak hit. Hell, I don't think we really know for sure what took her down, ranging from Bismarck just hitting at the right moment, to one of Prinz Eugen's 8in shells punching through the deck armour. Hell, I even heard that Bismarck somehow hit 2 out of 4 shells and one went through the deck armour.
It's odd, at best. (Somebody suggested to me what would of happened if for some reason USS Iowa took the Bismarck's place...)
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Actually, the Hood hit was not so much a freak as it sounds. Bear with me here.
The Brits, and most nations, armored their turret barbettes heavily, but Hood's magazines had little extra protection against a round that penetrated the main deck armor. There was a one-inch antisplinter bulkhead seperating Hood's after main magazines from her engineroom. This bulkhead could not reasonably be expected to stop splinters from a heavy-calibur round which penetrated the main deck armor and detonated in the engine room compartment.
By all available testimony, Hood died in one of two fashions. Either a shell from Bismark or Prinz Eugen penetrated her main deck armor and detonated the after secondary battery magazine, which would have blasted the engine room to shreds and thrown splinters of what was left of the engine room through the bulkhead to detonate the after main magazines, or a shell from Bismark (Prinz Eugen's shells didn't throw out the necessary size of splinter) penetrated the engine room and detonated there, splinters penetrated the engine room/after main magazine bulkhead, and detonated the magazine.
(It is possible Bismark could have directly penetrated the magazine armor on Hood, but the turret barbette armor is right out, and any penetration of the magazine armor would have been by a shell that was in pieces and wouldn't have detonated properly if at all.)
This is actually a fairly common situation. Only US battleships, due to the experience of Arizona at Pearl Harbor, had sufficent splinter protection for their magazines. It was a very late addition to the South Dakota's design, but Iowa had them from the keel up.
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AFAIK Hood was designated to go to extensive overhaul in 1941 exactly to improve the lack of armor.. And to get rid of the rather unsuccessful qualities of Fisher's battlecruisers - concept which proved doomed already in Jutland. Though battlecruisers were never ever meant (originally) to engage battleships in fleet action but were more of a reminder of the WW1 era cruiser (and commerce raiding) warfare.
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YOU SHOULD OPEN UP FRED AND PUT THEM BOTH IN A MISSION AND SEE WHO WINS KEKEKE
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YOU SHOULD OPEN UP FRED AND PUT THEM BOTH IN A MISSION AND SEE WHO WINS KEKEKE
Remember people, crack is whack 8).
@Ngtm1r: Interesting. IIRC somebody on spacebattles said that if Bismarck had fired 15 seconds earlier, or 30 seconds later Hood possibly wouldn't of gone down. I'll try to dig up the exact quote...
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MONTANA would have had the same 16" guns as IOWA, just 12 of them instead of only nine...
I distincly remeber reading it would use 460mm cannons insted of 406mm ones.
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MONTANA would have had the same 16" guns as IOWA, just 12 of them instead of only nine...
I distincly remeber reading it would use 460mm cannons insted of 406mm ones.
460mm roughly equals about eighteen inches, not twenty.
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The MONTANAs were to be 16" gunned battleships.
Official US Navy Site (http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/usnshtp/bb/bb67.htm)
Montana class design characteristics:
# Displacement: 60,500 tons (standard); 70,965 tons (full load)
# Dimensions: 921' 3" (length overall); 121' 2" (maximum beam)
# Powerplant: 172,000 horsepower steam turbines, producing a 28 knot maximum speed
# Armament (Main Battery): Twelve 16"/50 guns in four triple turrets
# Armament (Secondary Battery): Twenty 5"/54 guns in ten twin mountings (ten guns on each side of the ship)
The USN did not like 18" guns. See Navweps (http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_18-48_mk1.htm) for details. In summary, the USN felt that an 18" gun offered only marginal improvement over a 16" gun but with a much lower rate of fire.
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18 inchers in general weren't needed, espcially by the USN, who's 16/50Cal. shells had virtually the same penatration.
While the 18inch shell might be slightly more powerful, it also bring too many drawbacks to be useful, yes. (Although the 18in shell was definately not a drawback for the Yamato-class, not at least in comparison with the piece of crap 25mm magazine-fed AA battery.)
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AFAIK Hood was designated to go to extensive overhaul in 1941 exactly to improve the lack of armor.. And to get rid of the rather unsuccessful qualities of Fisher's battlecruisers - concept which proved doomed already in Jutland. Though battlecruisers were never ever meant (originally) to engage battleships in fleet action but were more of a reminder of the WW1 era cruiser (and commerce raiding) warfare.
Sorry to bring the topic back again. I've been busy.
Hood actually having OMG terriblez armour is really a myth. Hood in reality actually wasn't that much weaker in the armour department than KGV, or Bismarck.
By 1941 Hood can only be called a Battlecruiser in the loosest sense imaginable. IMO against Bismarck Hood just got collosally unlucky against Bismarck.
Now... as much as Yamato was the King Japanese battleship of WW2, I have to say... I like the Kongo-class. Fast, and very respctably armed. (Kongo-class was armed with 14/45 gun cannons mounted in double barred batteries.) Post rebuilts in the 30's they became very nasty ships to go up against. (HIJNS Kirishima managed to moderately damage the American battleship USS South Dakota, before getting blasted and sunk by USS Washington).
The thing i'm wondering is how would they fare against HMS Renown or Hood.
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"(Mushashi took 17 torpedos and 20 15,000 pound bombs. For comparison, the strongest bomb that the US had, short of the Nuke, was a 5,000 pound bunker buster IIRC. That is an incredible amount of firepower no matter how you slice it.)"
How could the Americans drop 20 15,000 pound bombs if they only had 5000 pounders?
"Yamato-classes armanant was nine 18.1 in. gun batteries, which wa sdivided into the same 3 gun battry arrangement as the Iowa-class. Her secondary armanant was 6.1 gun batteries, and had a smattering of 25 and 13mm gun batteries, which like the Iowa's 40 and 20mm were used for anti-aircraft duty."
Japanese ships didn't have a 'smattering' of AA guns:
Iowa:
9 x 16 in (406 mm) 50 cal. Mark 7 guns
20 x 5 in (127 mm) 38 cal. Mark 12 guns
80 x 40 mm 56 cal. anti-aircraft guns
49 x 20 mm 70 cal. anti-aircraft guns
Total: 149 AA and Dual Purpose (anti-air and anti-ship) guns
Yamato
9 x 46 cm (18.1 inch) (3 × 3)
12 × 15.5 cm (6.1 inch) (4 × 3)
12 × 12.7 cm (6 × 2)
24 × 25 mm AA (8 × 3)
4 × 13 mm AA (2 × 2)
Total: 40 AA and DP guns.
(In the FS universe, I'd compare the Yamato to an FS2 era Orion, and the Iowa to a Hecate with BGreens on the sides instead of the TerSlashes.)
Back to the Iowa vs Yamato topic, and reality:
If I was captain of the Iowa, I'd give the Yamato a night it would never forget- from sunset to sunrise a shower of 16 in shells from beyond the horizon. And I'd be untouchable- no radar for the Japs = no aiming at me.
If I was in charge of the Yamato, I'd have to attack during the day to see my enemy, and I'd need some luck to damage the Iowa without getting shot up myself, and even more luck to do it fast enough to fall back before the US Navy sends 500 airplanes to get me.
Summing up- I think the Iowa would either win untouched the night before the battle, or win with the help of a local aircraft carrier if SHTF.
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does it even need aircraft to help her?
Yamato can't catch it anyway...it can just run away keeping it't distance and bombard it (in whihc case the Iowa has a far greater chance of scoring a hit at that range) or move outside it's gun range and stay there until ldark.
Either way Iowa wins.
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Either way Iowa wins.
Sums the topic up pretty nicely.
So a small change maybe:
Will the Battleship ever return?
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Naval battleship? Maby with rail/coil guns, bu doubtfull...they work FAR better in space than in atmosphere.
Now in space...bloody likely.
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The problem with the Yamato is that it's rather likely to be shot to hell before it ever closes the range with Iowa. At point-blank i'd give it to Yamato because of her gun superiority and armour. Otherwise, the Iowa is better.
Now a prosepctive Montana vs. Yamato class :drevil:
How could the Americans drop 20 15,000 pound bombs if they only had 5000 pounders?
Mistaken information, maybe? I could of sworn somewhere had Mushasho taking a a hell of a lot of bombs are torps before going down.
Japanese ships didn't have a 'smattering' of AA guns:
Only word I could think of at the time.
Iowa:
9 x 16 in (406 mm) 50 cal. Mark 7 guns
20 x 5 in (127 mm) 38 cal. Mark 12 guns
80 x 40 mm 56 cal. anti-aircraft guns
49 x 20 mm 70 cal. anti-aircraft guns
Total: 149 AA and Dual Purpose (anti-air and anti-ship) guns
Yamato
9 x 46 cm (18.1 inch) (3 × 3)
12 × 15.5 cm (6.1 inch) (4 × 3)
12 × 12.7 cm (6 × 2)
24 × 25 mm AA (8 × 3)
4 × 13 mm AA (2 × 2)
Total: 40 AA and DP guns.
Interesting. Not only did Yamato have less AA weapons than Iowa(A given, as Iowa was designed to escort the Essex-class carriers), it's alos worth noting that the magazine-fed tripled 25mm AA guns were pieces of ****.
Yamato for all her granduer, might and size, wasn't well protected.Either way Iowa wins.
Sums the topic up pretty nicely.
So a small change maybe:
Will the Battleship ever return?
I think they might make a return if we ever actually get off the damn planet and go to space. Chances are though they'll end something similar to the Omega-class Destroyers from B5, where it winds up being both a BB and a carrier.
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The problem with the Yamato is that it's rather likely to be shot to hell before it ever closes the range with Iowa. At point-blank i'd give it to Yamato because of her gun superiority and armour. Otherwise, the Iowa is better.
Now a prosepctive Montana vs. Yamato class :drevil:
Um....
Let me fix that:
Montana vs Super Yamato :P
And at short range both the Iowa and Yamato would probably be giving each other both entry and exit wounds (correct me if I'm wrong).
How could the Americans drop 20 15,000 pound bombs if they only had 5000 pounders?
Mistaken information, maybe? I could of sworn somewhere had Mushasho taking a a hell of a lot of bombs are torps before going down.
OK, wikipedia says the Musashi took 17 500lb bombs, 20 torpedoes and 18 near misses before going down. And that is a hell of a lot of bombs and torps.
I think they might make a return if we ever actually get off the damn planet and go to space. Chances are though they'll end something similar to the Omega-class Destroyers from B5, where it winds up being both a BB and a carrier.
Since WW 2 carriers don't have any offensive weapons, because it simply didn't work, but Freespace proves it's possible to have a big hangar with big guns, so who knows...
Naval battleship? Maby with rail/coil guns, bu doubtfull...they work FAR better in space than in atmosphere.
Now in space...bloody likely.
I think the BB's are coming back in a couple decades, with railguns. :)
From wikipedia:
The United States Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren Division demonstrated an 8 megajoule rail gun firing 3.2 kilogram (slightly more than 7 pounds) projectiles in October 2006 as a prototype of a 64 megajoule weapon to be deployed aboard Navy warships. Such weapons are expected to be powerful enough to do a little more damage than a BGM-109 Tomahawk missile at a fraction of the projectile cost.
P.S. In space- isn't recoil going to be a problem?
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OK, wikipedia says the Musashi took 17 500lb bombs, 20 torpedoes and 18 near misses before going down. And that is a hell of a lot of bombs and torps.
The trouble with this statement is that it reflects the total number of weapons to strike Musashi, and not the total number required to sink it. How many of these hits were just overkill?
For example, the light cruiser Yahagi was hit by ~7 torpedoes and 12 bombs before it sank. The first torpedo hit was enough to doom it, however. Note below the torpedo hitting the already sinking hulk.
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6f/Yahagi_03.jpg)
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The trouble with this statement is that it reflects the total number of weapons to strike Musashi, and not the total number required to sink it. How many of these hits were just overkill?
For example, the light cruiser Yahagi was hit by ~7 torpedoes and 12 bombs before it sank. The first torpedo hit was enough to doom it, however. Note below the torpedo hitting the already sinking hulk.
Warships are like people....some die when they trip on the long, flat road...other fall from a 10-story building and walk away.
Better build warships have better chances f'course.
The Prince of Wales and Repulse are good example of hte ammount of firepower that's needed to sink those behemoths. A LOT.
You needed a lot of plains with a lot of bombs and a lot of torpedos... sice most missed or never reached the target.
It's was not uncommon for warships to be hit so badly that they had to be abandoned, but even then they refused to sink. the example is hte Yorktown... even after it burned down and hte crew was evacuated it was still afloat hours after that. US destroyers tried to tow it back to harbor, but when the japs came back they hit it with 3 torps (IIRC) and it still took ages for it to actually sink.
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PRINCE OF WALES is an excellent example of my point. The very first torpedo hit was enough to inflict fatal damage. The other hits may have caused more damage and casualties, but they were not needed to sink her.
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Where do you get that idea from? The first torpedo wasn't nearly enough..
You're thinking the Repulse.. IT sunk after 3 torpedos..
Prince of Wales needed a lot more to go down.
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The thing about Repulse was that, unlike Renwon, she never got anti-torpedo blisteres Repulse evanded torpedos for quite a while before she cacked it.
I don't know Prince of Wales's defense was agains't torpedos.
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OK, wikipedia says the Musashi took 17 500lb bombs, 20 torpedoes and 18 near misses before going down. And that is a hell of a lot of bombs and torps.
You should have learned this from the FS scoring system by now...
Now, class... a near miss is still, truly and wholly... what's that? Good job! You are correct. A miss. :p "Near" miss = a very disappointing miss, damage dealt = 0. The only thing you might accomplish is scaring the #@!% out of whoever you are shooting at. :p :lol:
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(http://img170.imageshack.us/img170/2635/36720176jm6.jpg)
Upper left side of the picture - 16 inch shells in flight :D
You should have learned this from the FS scoring system by now...
Now, class... a near miss is still, truly and wholly... what's that? Good job! You are correct. A miss. :p "Near" miss = a very disappointing miss, damage dealt = 0. The only thing you might accomplish is scaring the #@!% out of whoever you are shooting at. :p :lol:
Now, teacher... You should have learned this from the FS scoring system by now:
bombs generate SHOCKWAVES, which are pretty unpleasant to the operators of the 25 mm guns.
The shrapnel and splinters are even more unpleasant, both to the crew on deck and the unarmored AA guns.
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Also even it had missed the ship and detonated under the water... The resulting shockwave would still cause large damage just in similar manner like prematurely detonating depth charges did. For example some of the torpedoes used in WW2 were specifically designed not to impact to the targets hull.. They just dove under the ship and detonated under the keel causing even more severe damage than simple hul impact would have.
And sorry.. missed the post about Hood...
Sorry to bring the topic back again. I've been busy.
Hood actually having OMG terriblez armour is really a myth. Hood in reality actually wasn't that much weaker in the armour department than KGV, or Bismarck.
Not terrible armor as overall.. Just rather weak deck armor.
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The thing about Repulse was that, unlike Renwon, she never got anti-torpedo blisteres Repulse evanded torpedos for quite a while before she cacked it.
I don't know Prince of Wales's defense was agains't torpedos.
quite good actually...It was a newer design..It took 9 torpeods and a qute a few bombs IIRC before going down.
It may not seem like much, but in those days bombers usually carried 1-2 bomb or 1 torpedo. Now consider that most ordinance never hit (ship evaded torpedos, bombs missed) and you'll see that you needed a lot of planes to sink a good battleship.
And let's not forget that the Prince of Wales is smaller than the Jap and USA counterparts and that no one had as many AA guns on their ships as the US and you can see just how difficult it woudl have been to sink a ship like Iowa.
They did actualyl try during those massed Kamikaze attacks, when hte Iowas was assugned to guard the Enterprise (or was it Essex??) Whatever..anyway it's cannons shredded jap bombers en masse and the Iowa sustained only minor damage.
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Now, teacher... You should have learned this from the FS scoring system by now:
bombs generate SHOCKWAVES, which are pretty unpleasant to the operators of the 25 mm guns.
The shrapnel and splinters are even more unpleasant, both to the crew on deck and the unarmored AA guns.
The student is wiser than his teacher.
/me runs away and hides in a corner.
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The student is wiser than his teacher.
What have I done...
:shaking: What have I done!?:shaking:anyway it's cannons shredded jap bombers en masse and the Iowa sustained only minor damage.
Well with over 140 guns, from accurate 20 mm's through the famous 40 mm Bofors up to 5 inchers with proximity fuzed shells (in FreeSpace 2: Flak), what else can you expect?
BTW - Japanese planes were way less armoured than their US equivalents, another reason why they couldn't do $#!+, while the Americans sank the Yamato and 5 of it's escorts with losing 10 (yes, TEN) aircraft.
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Technicly, ten aircraft is nothig to sneeze at, epseiclly given the full number of forces attacking the Yamato.
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An interesting story I heard about the Swordfidh bombers were that they were impossibly tough. Accoreding to the story, a Swordfish took roughly two-hundred hits from Bismarck's AA guns, and still was able to fly back to HMS Ark Royal. (Granted, said bomber was completely total, and the pilot was wounded, but the thing still got back. That's impressive)
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For older aircraft without complicated hydraulics systems and other things that could leak or catch fire, the only way it could be fatally wounded would be with a hit to the fuel tank, engine or pilot... so it's a case of "sh*t happens". Similar to the Japanese tanks of WW2 or the light tanks of the Spanish Civil War. The armor was so thin that there was no shrapnel to fly around after penetration... a shell would often go in one end and out the other without hitting anything important.
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I find that a little hard to believe, considering how fragile the Swordfish was in service; this is the aircraft where it was decided, until they acquired rockets, it should not engage in gunfire duels with a U-Boat. (Which at the time would have had, at best, a pair of twin 20mm mounts.) Bismarck didn't have the kind of light AA that left bullet holes; her lightest AA guns were of 20mm calibur, up to 37mm and 105mm. All of them would have exploded on impact with any significant object. Granted the Stringbags, being mostly canvas, could in theory have had even a point-detonating AA fuzed round pass through them; but the sheer number, and experience later in the war, dictates that that number of them doing so is unlikely.
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May not be the case ngtm1r...depends on how the ammo was belted and depends on what rounds they were using. There were problems with the HE rounds used by all sides in terms of what it would take to set them off (there were problems as you mention...a pre detonated or even a round that went through and then detonated...etc). I don't know enough about the belting of AA guns on battleships but the typical WWII fighter with 20mm or larger type cannons would usually have a mix of AP and HE rounds to achieve the best effect on the target aircraft.
An AP round against a Swordfish may prove somewhat harmless due to the simple construction and the possibility for the round to pass through one part of the plane, emerge from another, and not cause any significant damage. Its also quite unlike a monocoque aluminum alloy kind of aircraft where a great deal of the structural strength is in the actual skin of the aircraft so its possible to sustain the same kind of hit I just mentioned and not loose much in the way of integrity.
But you are right...if hit by a 20mm or larger HE shell it would be very bad for the aircraft as evidenced by the experiences with Hurricanes in the Battle of Britain (which did quite well against the 7.92mm MG17's off Bf109s) which were allot easier to patch up from the small hits but absolutely devastated by larger rounds where the Spitfire was better able to absorb that kind of damage. Of course any kind of hit to any of these aircraft has the potential of hitting something really important or something benign. Luck of the draw at that point.
The biggest problem for the Swordfish is really not survivability from battle damage since most of the weapons employed would shred most types of aircraft...the real problem is that the Swordfish has a very low top speed so its ability to evade gunfire is limited.
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IIRC almost all AAA guns onboard ships were time detonated HE rounds up until near the end of the war when they invented the small caliber proximity fuse.
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Well with over 140 guns, from accurate 20 mm's through the famous 40 mm Bofors up to 5 inchers with proximity fuzed shells (in FreeSpace 2: Flak), what else can you expect?
anyone what to model a 300m cruiser with 140 light anti-aircraft guns for FS2? :lol:
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Now that would just be unnecessary... as weak as FS flak seems at times it is actually a good deal more potent than the real thing. IMO the main problem is that FreeSpace ships don't have a utilitarian design and generally have terrible fields of fire (eg the Hecate, with loads of AAA but unable to kill a Seraphim wing). Plus the armament has to be split between the "bottom" and "top" of the ship, unlike in real life where you don't have to worry about air attack from under water.
What's needed is real tactics, a ship design that concentrates all of its firepower in one sector and relies on mutual support to get into a "phalanx" sort of formation where all sides are covered. Either that, or concentrate all firepower on one arc and constantly manuver the ship towards incoming bombers, since FS capships are so manueverable. But I digress.
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It's worth noting though that Bismarck's fire-control and AA guns aren't as good as, well, the Iowa-class. Both ships used 20mm weapons, but Iowa's IIRC wasn't magazine-fed like the Bismarck's 20mm. The 20mm used on Bismarck was semi-automatic and took much longer to reload than it actually took to fire.
Granted Biamarck's was pretty decent though.
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as weak as FS flak seems at times it is actually a good deal more potent than the real thing.
FS flak will tear apart an unshielded fighter/bomber, but it isn't that effective against shields (except for super weak shields like the Serapis or Horus.) It's pretty much how it would be in real life.
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Eh, try that philosophy on the Hardest difficulty level. :p
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anyone what to model a 300m cruiser with 140 light anti-aircraft guns for FS2? :lol:
Whoever does that- make sure that the cruiser has 140 guns and not 140 turrets.
BTW- another nice picture:
url because the picture is HUGE (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ea/BB61_USS_Iowa_BB61_broadside_USN.jpg)
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anyone what to model a 300m cruiser with 140 light anti-aircraft guns for FS2? :lol:
Whoever does that- make sure that the cruiser has 140 guns and not 140 turrets.
BTW- another nice picture:
url because the picture is HUGE (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ea/BB61_USS_Iowa_BB61_broadside_USN.jpg)
Ah, what a lovely sight. The Iowa-class was definately an awesome-inspiring group of BBs.
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TAke a closer look at the picture...the force of the blast is moving the ship SIDEWAYS.
Holy ****z, I'd hate to be on the recieveing end! :lol:
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Recieving end :D:
(http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USMC/USMC-C-Saipan/img/USMC-C-Saipan-p27a.jpg)
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Immagine a headshot with that! :lol:
In the immortal words of Grizzly (JA2): "Man, that's gotta hurt...But then again, maby not!"
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Immagine a headshot with that! :lol:
In the immortal words of Grizzly (JA2): "Man, that's gotta hurt...But then again, maby not!"
Um... A human hit by a 16in shell would either be turned into ****ing goo or be vapourised.
Anyways, i've been thinking about Bismarck and KGV again. The thing i've been wondering is: What the hell did the Germans spend their tonnage on Bismarck on? The King George V was no less than 6,500 tons lighter, and almost actually as much as 9,000. (KGV weighed 35,000 tons, Bismarck weiged 41- 44,000 tons.) But yet the KGV had thicker armour generally, and was operationally only a know slower than Bismarck. IIRC the only real complaint about KGV was that the armanant was weaker than comtempararies. (KGV's 14in were definately inferior to, say, the 16/45, 16/50, and 18/45. KGV's guns were roughly on par with the Kongo-class Battleship.)
So what did the Germans, yet again, spend an additional 6,500 to 9,000 tons on? The armour was generally inferior to KGV, and the Bismarck's gun were roughly on-par with the KGV, and IIRC the KGV's AA wasn't weaker.(10 14in vs. 8 fifteens)
So... what. (Also, as an aside, I'd rather have the KGVs than the Bismarcks... Heavier armour, and the fact that as far as BBs went KGV was actually cheap. The US built two North Carolinas, the French built two Reichlius, the Germans two Bismarcks... but the British built five of the KGVs, only one, the ill-fated Prince of Wales, was ever sunk.)
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Bismarck's belt armor was pretty much invunerable from 20,000 yards on in. Deck armor, not so. KGV's deck armor was better, belt worse.
And the ballistics of the 14" do not tell the whole story; the Brits had real problems with the 14" guns and it took several years to straighten them out. Similarly weight of shell was lighter than normal for a 14".
In answer to the question: Bismarck's secondaries. She had seperate antiair and antisurface secondaries, which was wasteful, but 5.9" antisurface guns are nothing to sneeze at if the range closes. They also achieved better rates of fire then KGV's 5.25" DP guns, because the 5.25" shell was a little too heavy for manual handling. On the other hand the 5.25" was generally superior to the 105mm Bismarck used for her primary antiair secondaries.
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Yes but the belt armor had a big flaw: It didn't go high enough to protect the bridge. Effectively that's why during its final battle it didn't return fire, the first shot hit the bridge and killed all the officers.
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It's a pity HMS Vanguard wasn't around during the war...it would have been interesting to see how Britain's largest battleship would have fared in combat.
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Now that would just be unnecessary... as weak as FS flak seems at times it is actually a good deal more potent than the real thing.
Real flak was a very potent and dangerous weapon. Hundreds of planes were lost in Europe to flak and examples like where RAF pilot and French fighter ace Pierre Closterman lead a group of 8 Tempests in a high speed attack run on a German airbase and were met with such a wall of flak that only himself and one other Tempest managed to escape unscathed and that their time over target was less than 12 seconds (this is a Tempest V at full bore diving in at about 450mph). WWII US Navy shipboard AAA, as Mars points out, was modified later on to have proximity fuses and brought down large numbers of Japanese kamikaze aircraft.
So in real life flak was very potent. Movies make it out to look like just one thing but really you had all different calibres of flak batteries that could put out allot of fire individually but were almost always used in groups and often with the benefit of optical or radar guidance systems that were primitive by modern standards but still deadly effective.
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It's a pity HMS Vanguard wasn't around during the war...it would have been interesting to see how Britain's largest battleship would have fared in combat.
Something i've wondered too. I'm not very familiar with HMS Vanguard herself though.
Thanks for the info about Bismarck. Am I the only person who finds it irritating when Bismarck fanboys bleat and prattle on about how Bismarck was the greatest warship evar, and Iowa and Yamato were inferoir? It's bull**** all around.
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Well some people are simply convinced that Germany had the best tanks, planes, rifles, self propelled and towed artillery guns, tactics, U-boats, secret weapons and even battleships during WW-II.
Now the problem is just proving that they're wrong (except for the SG44, the Me-262 and late war subs).
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TAke a closer look at the picture...the force of the blast is moving the ship SIDEWAYS.
Holy ****z, I'd hate to be on the recieveing end! :lol:
Common misconception. Let's try again from another angle. Note the wake.
(http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_16-50_mk7_Iowa_pic.jpg)
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Well some people are simply convinced that Germany had the best tanks, planes, rifles, self propelled and towed artillery guns, tactics, U-boats, secret weapons and even battleships during WW-II.
Now the problem is just proving that they're wrong (except for the SG44, the Me-262 and late war subs).
The problem with "best" that those people don't realize is that you really can't be the best at everything. Germany had some of the "best" tanks in terms of protection and firepower but they were much more difficult to mass produce and some of them were ponderous beyond all realistic expectations. You could argue that the Sherman tank was the best of WWII simply because it was easy to produce huge quantities of them and they were reasonably mobile.
I think its easy to argue that they didn't have the best anything because in WWII everyone had a generally even playing field technology wise and pretty much every weapon of WWII was a compromise in one aspect to achieve another.
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TAke a closer look at the picture...the force of the blast is moving the ship SIDEWAYS.
Holy ****z, I'd hate to be on the recieveing end! :lol:
Common misconception. Let's try again from another angle. Note the wake.
(http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_16-50_mk7_Iowa_pic.jpg)
No misconception. The ship really does move slighly sideways from the force.
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TAke a closer look at the picture...the force of the blast is moving the ship SIDEWAYS.
Holy ****z, I'd hate to be on the recieveing end! :lol:
Common misconception. Let's try again from another angle. Note the wake.
(http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_16-50_mk7_Iowa_pic.jpg)
Lovely view.Well some people are simply convinced that Germany had the best tanks, planes, rifles, self propelled and towed artillery guns, tactics, U-boats, secret weapons and even battleships during WW-II.
Now the problem is just proving that they're wrong (except for the SG44, the Me-262 and late war subs).
The problem with "best" that those people don't realize is that you really can't be the best at everything. Germany had some of the "best" tanks in terms of protection and firepower but they were much more difficult to mass produce and some of them were ponderous beyond all realistic expectations.
Indeed. The Panther was nearly as heavy as a heavy tank, and the King Tiger weighed a staggering 69 tonnes. The German tanks also had a problem with, y'know, overengineered to hell.
You could argue that the Sherman tank was the best of WWII simply because it was easy to produce huge quantities of them and they were reasonably mobile.
Sherman gets a very unfair amount of drumming. The later war models 76mm gun was quite good at taking Panser III and IVs. (IIRC the US produced a staggering 52,000 Shermans during the war.)
The Sherman was a good, no-frills AFv. So much so that the Israelis upgraded them to have 105mm guns in the 60s.
I
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No misconception. The ship really does move slighly sideways from the force.
LOOK AT THE WAKE.
's straight. :P
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Previous picture dude...TI's clearly moving sideways (slightly)
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Immagine a headshot with that! :lol:
In the immortal words of Grizzly (JA2): "Man, that's gotta hurt...But then again, maby not!"
Um... A human hit by a 16in shell would either be turned into ****ing goo or be vapourised.
Anyways, i've been thinking about Bismarck and KGV again. The thing i've been wondering is: What the hell did the Germans spend their tonnage on Bismarck on? The King George V was no less than 6,500 tons lighter, and almost actually as much as 9,000. (KGV weighed 35,000 tons, Bismarck weiged 41- 44,000 tons.) But yet the KGV had thicker armour generally, and was operationally only a know slower than Bismarck. IIRC the only real complaint about KGV was that the armanant was weaker than comtempararies. (KGV's 14in were definately inferior to, say, the 16/45, 16/50, and 18/45. KGV's guns were roughly on par with the Kongo-class Battleship.)
So what did the Germans, yet again, spend an additional 6,500 to 9,000 tons on? The armour was generally inferior to KGV, and the Bismarck's gun were roughly on-par with the KGV, and IIRC the KGV's AA wasn't weaker.(10 14in vs. 8 fifteens)
So... what. (Also, as an aside, I'd rather have the KGVs than the Bismarcks... Heavier armour, and the fact that as far as BBs went KGV was actually cheap. The US built two North Carolinas, the French built two Reichlius, the Germans two Bismarcks... but the British built five of the KGVs, only one, the ill-fated Prince of Wales, was ever sunk.)
Forget secondaries, I'd be a good 90% of that extra weight was fuel. Bismark could go about 3x as far as a KGV on single fill-up. http://www.combinedfleet.com/b_oper.htm
EDIT: Although secondaries might have been a bit more, http://www.combinedfleet.com/b_second.htm shows Bismark as having about double the secondary firepower.
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Previous picture dude...TI's clearly moving sideways (slightly)
It's the overpressure from the guns firing, it creates an effect in the water that makes it appear as though the ship actually moved sideways and generated waves in the process, but since you insist on persisting in the error, Navweps has WHOLE PAGE devoted to proving you wrong.
http://www.navweaps.com/index_tech/tech-022.htm
And, once more, with feeling, LOOK AT THE WAKE. Perfectly straight. If anything the ship would appear to have moved towards the direction it was firing in both pictures.
(http://www.navweaps.com/index_tech/tech-022_Missouri_pic.jpg)
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Well waddayaknow...you learn something new each day :p
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You could argue that the Sherman tank was the best of WWII simply because it was easy to produce huge quantities of them and they were reasonably mobile.
The T-34 was just as simple, and was mass produced an about the same numbers, but was much better design. The Sherman was really tall for a medium tank, so it was effectively a big target. Also the Sherman had terrible cross country performance because it's treads were too narrow, so the amount of pressure it put on the ground was actually greater than the Tiger 1's. It was still way better than its predecessor, which really was crap.
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Yep could have mentioned the T-34 as well which was a very smart design. Particularly the sloped armor.
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Well some people are simply convinced that Germany had the best tanks, planes, rifles, self propelled and towed artillery guns, tactics, U-boats, secret weapons and even battleships during WW-II.
Now the problem is just proving that they're wrong (except for the SG44, the Me-262 and late war subs).
The Panthers were definitely better than the Shermans
EDIT:
Oh **** didn't read all the replies sorry!
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Yep...better on a one to one level but theres more to it than that. As you probably read :)
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Yup.
Wikipedia says that the Sherman guns were upgraded but the History channel has said the opposite, which is correct?
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A Sherman with the high-velocity 76mm gun (they did indeed upgrade them, though it was not always consistant; some fought to the end of the war with their original guns) was a capable enough tank for most purposes; it would not take a Tiger, but neither would the T-34. The Panther could penetrate armor better, but the Panther had the ridiculously long-barreled 75mm/L70 with the muzzle velocity to beat almost anything. Still, one on one, a Sherman/76 would have had a fighting chance against a Panther and better-than-even odds against the Panzer IV. And the Sherman was subjected to continous upgrades; the M3E8 version with improved frontal armor could shrug off an 88mm/L70 hit at a thousand yards, something no version of the T-34 that ever went into combat could claim.
To say nothing of the Brit variations on the Sherman mounting the superb 17-pounder antitank gun, which could take a Tiger. The VC Firefly was probably the best medium tank the Western Allies produced. If there had ever been an M3E8 with the 17-pounder then it would have been the best Allied medium tank period.
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Yup.
Wikipedia says that the Sherman guns were upgraded but the History channel has said the opposite, which is correct?
Actuall history is. Post-WW2 had some Shermans upgraded to Sherman Firefly, which was a Sherman varient that mounted the 105mm cannon, which was in service with the Israeli defense force until the 70s. Most Shermans had their gun upgraded to HV 76mm from 75mm. The Sherman definately couldn't kill a King Tiger, barring Firefly upgrade, but it could very well put a hurting on one and it could very badly damage to mission-kill a Panther. It definately could kill a late-war Panzer IV.
The Sherman was a good tank, hell, a damn good tank, it's just always presented against the heavy-hitters like the Tiger and Panther. It was still a very capable tank in it's own right.
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The Israeli Sherman was known as Super Sherman, not Firefly.
It is worth pointing out the existence of the Pershing, a tank in the same weight class as the Panther. This vehicle was the father of post war American tanks such as the Patton, and was certainly a match for the Panther.
Pershing blasts Panther (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-oDnst7fAEU).
Had the war lasted much longer, the Germans would be facing Centurions with their Panthers -- OUCH!
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I knew about the Pershing, just that they weren't exactly as common as the Sherman was. Although I could sworn that the Pershing was the eqivilant of the Tiger :confused: Thanks for the correction on the Sherman.
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If we are totally honest the main good quality of Sherman was the ease of manufacturing. It was very tall tank making it a rather easy target. The early versions often burst into flames even from a minor hits - earning many not so admiring nicknames... like 'Tommycooker' or 'Ronson' - though i guess that is still better than the nick Lee/Grant had... 'coffin for seven comrades'. As the US didn't equip Shermans with 90 mm AT gun or with British 17 pounder but instead selected 75/76 mm guns the tank was hopelessly out classed against Mk V and Mk VI panzers. IIRC in one document it was mentioned that standard US tactic was to put 4 to 5 Shermans against a single Panther or Tiger in order to beat it - with losing only 2 or 3 of the attackers.
Shermans' saving grace when going against Mk V or VI was the sheer amount of Shermans - allies could well afford to lose a handful of Shermans for each Panther/Tiger as those tanks remained rather rare.
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the tank was hopelessly out classed against Mk V and Mk VI panzers.
The problem with this statement is that the Sherman was not intended to fight these tanks, or indeed any enemy tank. This was a job for dedicated tank destroyers such as the M10, M18 or M36. US doctrine viewed tanks as anti infantry vehicles, hence the preference for 75mm guns. Thus rathern than the "5 Shermans vs 1 Panther" chestnut, the US doctrine called for deploying these dedicated tank destroyers to fight enemy tanks. The war showed that this was a flawed doctrine, to be sure, but it certainly didn't save the Germans.
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A Sherman with the high-velocity 76mm gun (they did indeed upgrade them, though it was not always consistant; some fought to the end of the war with their original guns) was a capable enough tank for most purposes; it would not take a Tiger, but neither would the T-34. The Panther could penetrate armor better, but the Panther had the ridiculously long-barreled 75mm/L70 with the muzzle velocity to beat almost anything. Still, one on one, a Sherman/76 would have had a fighting chance against a Panther and better-than-even odds against the Panzer IV. And the Sherman was subjected to continous upgrades; the M3E8 version with improved frontal armor could shrug off an 88mm/L70 hit at a thousand yards, something no version of the T-34 that ever went into combat could claim.
To say nothing of the Brit variations on the Sherman mounting the superb 17-pounder antitank gun, which could take a Tiger. The VC Firefly was probably the best medium tank the Western Allies produced. If there had ever been an M3E8 with the 17-pounder then it would have been the best Allied medium tank period.
Let me fix something:
M4A3E8, not M3E8.
And one thing- the Panther's 75 mm was simply long.
This is rediculously long:
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b8/Tiger-II-La_Gleize.jpg/300px-Tiger-II-La_Gleize.jpg)
88 mm cal, 71 calibers long (6.25 meters).
To reach ludicrous length, we need the 128 mm/L55 (7.04 meters)
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/c/c5/Pak_44_1.jpg/300px-Pak_44_1.jpg)
I knew about the Pershing, just that they weren't exactly as common as the Sherman was. Although I could sworn that the Pershing was the eqivilant of the Tiger :confused: Thanks for the correction on the Sherman.
I think the M26 Pershing was the best WW II tank, even though it came to the front lines in Feb 1945.
Those things weren't heavy enough to be a pain in the @$$ to be moved around the battlefield (41.9 tons, vs ~45t Panther, ~57t Tiger I, ~70t Tiger II or 61.4t Abrams), they killed Panthers (and a few Tigers and King Tigers with a little luck too), and in the Korean War they scored half of all T-34/85 kills, showing that they're better not only than the German, but Soviet tanks too.
(http://strangevehicles.greyfalcon.us/mauspic/e3.jpg)
Pershing behind an unfinished German E100 prototype
BTW- to get the thread a bit back on topic:
The P-1000 Land Cruiser Ratte, armed with 2 280 mm naval guns, a 'secondary' 128 mm and a bunch of AA guns, was meant to weigh 1000 tons. Too bad it never made it to production, Hitler would have killed himself as soon as he'd see the refueling bill, ending the war on Day 1 the P-1000 was deployed. The monster was to be powered by either 2 U-Boat engines or by 8 torpedo boat engines, giving it up to 17 000 HP, and a road speed of 40 km/h.
(http://strangevehicles.greyfalcon.us/Picturesc/ratte7.jpg)
(note the 128 mm is in the hull, because the turret mounted guns are too high for close range fighting)
(http://i.somethingawful.com/inserts/news/images/08-2003/08-25-2003-rattecomparison.gif)
(dimmentions in milimeters)
(http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/3769/p1000003yc6.jpg)
(2 twin 37 mm Flak turrets on the back)
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And here are some awesome color film clips of various Japanese ships in 1945:
HYUGA (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyQ0IliNfr0)
HARUNA (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=co1Q9bSGhnk)
AOBA (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9jPGBpMft8&NR=1) (you can see right through her bow!)
AMAGI (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcBVNEXKwDM)
IDZUMO (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rv19p_lYA6M)
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*Snip*
I don't suppose we could stay away from the Germans' paper army. Not that it isn't rather interesting, but everything just gets damned asinine very quickly when people start bringing up the Maus or the P-1000.
Oh, and for the record, let's also refrain from getting into a pissing match over what the best tank of the War was. The T-34 was awesomely mass produced, the Panther was awesomely designed, the VC Firefly was awesomely effective, whatever. There are too many variables to pin it down to a single tank. Purely theoretically, the "best" tank of the War would invariably stem from far more than simply design or kills, and must stretch into price, construction, resources needed, tactical and strategic effectiveness, etc. As such, it's a little beyond a bit of internet research to conclusively state the winnar with any hope for accuracy or impartiality.
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Oh, nonsense. The best tank of WWI was without a doubt the Bob Semple (http://mailer.fsu.edu/~akirk/tanks/newzealand/newzealand.html)!! Fear the mighty Kiwis....
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/27/Sempl_2.jpg)
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Naah, Bob was second best, right after Goliath:
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/83/Mini-tanks-p012953.jpg/781px-Mini-tanks-p012953.jpg)
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I don't suppose we could stay away from the Germans' paper army. Not that it isn't rather interesting, but everything just gets damned asinine very quickly when people start bringing up the Maus or the P-1000.
They did actually complete and deploy the Maus, but it ran out of gas on its way to meet the Red Army and was abandoned. The P-1000 was pure fantasy; you'd never find terrain able to support it, and "engineering casuality" keeps coming to mind every time I look at the thing.
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Naah, Bob was second best, right after Goliath:
The Goliath wasn't too bad an idea. It was just ahead of its time, and the technology to make it work exactly as intended simply didn't exist.
But hey, at least it's a damn sight better than the Soviet idea to strap explosives to dogs and train them to run under German tanks. :doubt:
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They did actually complete and deploy the Maus, but it ran out of gas on its way to meet the Red Army and was abandoned. The P-1000 was pure fantasy; you'd never find terrain able to support it, and "engineering casuality" keeps coming to mind every time I look at the thing.
We should try to bild something like that now, with current tech and knowledge.
Mammoth tanks FTW!
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We should try to bild something like that now, with current tech and knowledge.
Mammoth tanks FTW!
Aaand then a single Hellfire rocket disables it.
The usefulness of the main battle tank concept in modern warfare is starting to be questioned, and you want to bring back the age of the land battleship!? :wtf:
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(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v106/NelsonAndBronte/FS2/ElectricalExperimenter1917-07.jpg)
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We should try to bild something like that now, with current tech and knowledge.
Mammoth tanks FTW!
Aaand then a single Hellfire rocket disables it.
The usefulness of the main battle tank concept in modern warfare is starting to be questioned, and you want to bring back the age of the land battleship!? :wtf:
So what do you want to replace the land battleship (I mean Abrams, not the one Admiral Nelson posted) with? A Stryker MGS?
The only thing that has the armor, and could hold it's ground against tank rushes would be...
Maybe not an Abrams and not a Mammoth for sure, but a 20+ tons lighter beast similar to this:
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/6b/Expeditionary_Tank.jpg)
but it will still be a tank.
P.S.
Back to BB's:
(http://afisd.com/images/mo_shell.jpg)
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Aaand then a single Hellfire rocket disables it.
The usefulness of the main battle tank concept in modern warfare is starting to be questioned, and you want to bring back the age of the land battleship!? :wtf:
It's not that simple. More to the point, the people questioning the usefulness of the MBT are questioning its usefulness in anti-insurgency actions. (They've also obviously never seen one used in that situation. They make a superb anchor for a force of lighter vehicles and infantry.) The tank, and all AFVs/APCs are going to be with us until someone invents something better.
I'd also note that a T-90 or an M1A2 can take a Hellfire to the front glacis plate and live to tell.
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MBT's were going to be phased out till Afganistan proved them to be so useful. Same thing happened to the A-10 actually (almost ironic as its on the other side of that battle). The Canadian military sent in our tanks and then opted to lease more tanks from Germany to help our forces in Afganistan as the MBT is still the final word in land combat. They provide cover for troops, they have big guns, they can absorb allot of punishment (MBT's have been known to take several RPG-7's and keep going apparently) from what insurgents can pump out.
Something like the Stryker isn't quite there. I think the MBT as a concept will stay but it might change somewhat. I think we'll see some smaller, faster, lighter, but equally as powerful tanks in the future that will have similar capability but be easier to transport. The Stryker is just a little too far towards lighter I think. On the other hand the Israeli's are quite happy with having their Merkava V's around...big honkin suckers those are!
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MBT's were going to be phased out till Afganistan proved them to be so useful. Same thing happened to the A-10 actually (almost ironic as its on the other side of that battle). The Canadian military sent in our tanks and then opted to lease more tanks from Germany to help our forces in Afganistan as the MBT is still the final word in land combat. They provide cover for troops, they have big guns, they can absorb allot of punishment (MBT's have been known to take several RPG-7's and keep going apparently) from what insurgents can pump out.
Against malsupplied insurgents working with aging technology, sure. But what about a clash between modern armies? The technology of anti-tank missiles and similar munitions has advanced almost parallel to the MBT concept, leading IMO to the point where the vulnerabilities of an MBT against a top-of-the-shelf antitank rocket will ultimately outweigh the advantages of having a fully mobile assault platform.
Although to be honest that's just IMO from what i've seen and read, and i'm getting a little too far into armchair general territory for comfort (:nervous:). Hence, let's just get back to the topic at hand:
Has the age of the battleship truly passed, or could a revival be on the horizon with the advent of more advanced technology, ie. railguns that can follow the curvature of the Earth to shoot faster, farther, and inflict more damage than an entire Carrier Air Wing?
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We do have these things, called "cruise missiles". An Exocet or Sunburn is nothing to laugh at, especially if there is a bunch of them heading your way.
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Problem with cruise missiles is that you can:
a)fool them with chaff/flares/ECM
b)shoot them down
With a high power railgun (I really hope the Iowas will still exist when such a weapon will be developed), you'll have darts flying at the enemy.
These darts won't have to be guided because their speed will guarantee they reach the target before it takes evasive action, so they can't be jammed.
The darts will also not need explosives and rely on kinetic energy to shoot through armor a few meters thick, which means you can't detonate it in flight like a missile.
The railgun also has the advantage of firing the next shell as soon as the previous one leaves the rails, giving it a rate of fire limited by rail overheating and speed in which the next projectiles can be loaded (ie. 9 oversized machineguns firing short bursts from the Iowa).
Also with the arrival of railguns on the battlefield, heavy armor will be needed for a ship to even think of surviving a single salvo, giving another reason for the BB to come back, only this time in a more expensive version, with multilayer armor belts, and maybe reactive armor on the exterior surface.
On the other hand, the battleship will have a carrier alternative, with nearly invisible, unbelievably maneuverable unmanned fighters and bombers, giving us a reason to continue this topic. :P
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Reactive armor ain't exactly useful against kinetic warheads... more like useless
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We should try to bild something like that now, with current tech and knowledge.
Mammoth tanks FTW!
Aaand then a single Hellfire rocket disables it.
The usefulness of the main battle tank concept in modern warfare is starting to be questioned, and you want to bring back the age of the land battleship!? :wtf:
There are very few missiles in the world that could pierce a 300+ mm armor or similar.
A land battleship would have redicolous armor, and would require specialized weapons to even graze.
Expensive? Yes.
Excessive? Yes.
Cool to the max? YES.
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Well.. standard issue RPGs penetrate past 700 mm of armor...
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Against malsupplied insurgents working with aging technology, sure. But what about a clash between modern armies? The technology of anti-tank missiles and similar munitions has advanced almost parallel to the MBT concept, leading IMO to the point where the vulnerabilities of an MBT against a top-of-the-shelf antitank rocket will ultimately outweigh the advantages of having a fully mobile assault platform.
Has the age of the battleship truly passed, or could a revival be on the horizon with the advent of more advanced technology, ie. railguns that can follow the curvature of the Earth to shoot faster, farther, and inflict more damage than an entire Carrier Air Wing?
Top-of-the-line gear was used and has continued to be used (rarely) against the M1A2 in Iraq by insurgents, including some of the latest and best of the Russian ATGMs like the Metis. They were at best capable of knocking a tread off. The Chobham ceramic armor is simply too difficult to penetrate for anything that's not a kinetic-kill weapon, because it simply laughs at the heat-based component of most explosives and is tougher than armor-grade steel.
We do have these things, called "cruise missiles". An Exocet or Sunburn is nothing to laugh at, especially if there is a bunch of them heading your way.
Funny, but true: there are currently very few ships that could put to sea in an active combatant role in the world that could possibly take a hit from one the big Russian cruise missiles like the Shipwreck or Kingfish, and keep fighting. Any US CVN, the Charles De Gaulle, the Adm. of the Fleet Kunstenov, annnndddd...an Iowa-class. The first three get by on size alone. The Iowa gets by because face-hardened armor plate laughs at the HE warheads on antiship missiles.
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True...modern warship have no armor to speak off.
Well.. standard issue RPGs penetrate past 700 mm of armor...
:lol: :lol: :lol: :wakka: :wakka:
Oy! That's a good one.
According to you a RPG fired by a soldeir could punch clean trough Iowa and exit on the other side. :lol:
Try removing one 0 from that statement and you'd be closer to the truth.
APC and tank armor is in the 60-100mm range. Most RPG's can't penetrate the thicker armor of the main battle tanks.
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You clearly have no idea what you are talking about... All measured/scaled against 'standard' steel armor
Man portable RPGs i am familiar with
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/APILAS 720mm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M72_LAW 300mm
ATGM..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BGM-71_TOW 600 - 900mm
Modern APC has precious little chance of surviving a direct hit from a relatively modern RPG. Or did you think the US added the slat armor - ie. the 'fence things' - on their APCs just to make them look more kewl?
IIRC one interesting idea for penetrating modern high tech armor was a move to old large bore kinetic penetrator (ie. stuff used in WW2). Dunno how feasible it would be but idea was that as modern armor plating is designed to defeat HEAT warhead by directing the stream and to defeat sabots by trying to break the rigid kinetic penetrator it leaves the tank surprisingly vulnerable to non-sabot kinetic penetrators.
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You clearly have no idea what you are talking about... All measured/scaled against 'standard' steel armor
Modern APC has precious little chance of surviving a direct hit from a relatively modern RPG. Or did you think the US added the slat armor - ie. the 'fence things' - on their APCs just to make them look more kewl?
The Bradley can take RPG-7V hits easily. The Stryker has more trouble. Russian BMP-2D can sometimes be penetrated, not often. BMP-3 cannot. BTR-series can. (The Striker, interestingly enough, roughly corresponds to the BTR, as the Bradley does to the BMP. There's a reason the Brad's not being replaced by the Stryker, and it's because the Stryker is much less capable.)
Measurements against standard steel are highly deceptive, as "standard" is structural steel, which is significantly weaker then even light armor steel like STS. 900mm of structural steel is maybe 450mm of light armor steel, considerably less of high-grade homogenous or face-hardened armor steel, to say nothing of titanium or other advanced alloys/armoring materials.
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If any soldier fired RPG manages to penetrate Iowas armor, I'll eat my own shorts for breakfest.
As ngtm1r said, those numbers are highly decpetive.
What use it is if it sez it can penetrate 1000mm, when it fails to penetrate even a tank armor? I can write pretty numbers to boost sales and look cooler on paper too...
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Just for reference the RHA refers to steel armor ('rolled homogenous armor') and not to structural steel... RHA is pretty much - if not exactly - the same thing as the standard WW2 era armor. So modern anti tank weapon has no problems what so ever penetrating Iowas armor. Which shouldn't really be any wonder at all.
Also RPG-7V is rather outdated... no tandem charge, rated barely over 300mm penetration. No wonder any decent IFV (like Bradley/BMP) can take a hit. Though there are several reports of modern RPGs penetrating modern MBTs frontal armor - like British Challenger 2.
And what else would you use as reference if not steel armor plate?
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The RPG-7V is the standard, pretty much, by which light antitank infantry weapons are judged, because it is the most common and most commonly encountered.
The probablity of a Challenger 2, which is one of the best-armored tanks currently in service, getting hit by anything short of a TOW-type heavy ATGM and penetrated, is very low. I think that you might find such reports referring to them being "disabled" "knocked out" but not armor penetration. That's a tread off or a turret jam. More modern versions of LAW and its cousins can stop but not kill most IFVs.
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Believe what you will... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/05/13/nmod13.xml
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b)shoot them down
A Sunburn is actually not that easy to shoot down, since it comes at you low and fast.
a)fool them with chaff/flares/ECM
Can;t comment on that, not sure how easy it is to spoof one of them.
Any US CVN, the Charles De Gaulle, the Adm. of the Fleet Kunstenov, annnndddd...an Iowa-class. The first three get by on size alone. The Iowa gets by because face-hardened armor plate laughs at the HE warheads on antiship missiles
In situations like that you would use more than one. :p
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So modern anti tank weapon has no problems what so ever penetrating Iowas armor.
I'll belive it when I see it...in other words, never. :p
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So modern anti tank weapon has no problems what so ever penetrating Iowas armor.
Well they do. And a damn big one:
The Iowa's armor is interior, which means the anti tank weapons would detonate on the outside wall, make a huge mess in the room outside the armor, and maybe burn the paint on the belt/deck/bulkhead/barbette/whatever.
Spaced armor on AFV's works the same way.
The only place I wouldn't be surprised to be penetrated by a depleted uranium, tank-fired shell would be the turret, with 50 cm of steel tilted at 45 degrees (giving the round some 700 mm to blast through, possible). But since the DU dart is small, and the turret is huge, it probably wouldn't make any serious damage inside (far less serious than the 16 inch shell that would hit the tank as a 'thank-you' :P).
Tank armor and anti-tank weapon website- focused on armor and penetration in mm's of RHA (http://members.tripod.com/collinsj/protect.htm)
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Given that a 406mm cannon round is bigger than a RPG warhead, and Iowas armor was designed to shrug such impacts, I find it extreemly hard to belive that a RPG could do anything to an Iowa.
Especially the turrets - they were the most heavily armored parts on the ship.
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Well...
(http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/m829-2.jpg)
(cross section of the M829 depleted Uranium shell from the Abrams's 120 mm smoothbore, the dart is the only thing that's intended to hit the target, making a hole .8 inch in diameter, and up to 765-795 mm deep, shot 2 000 m from the target)
(http://www.geocities.com/fort_tilden/shell.jpg)
(largest picture I found, here the whole bullet flies to it's target and makes a 16 inch hole in it, up to 747 mm deep@ 4 572 m)
And another thing:
How does the steel used to armor the Iowa compare to RHA?
The Internets tell me that the Iowa is 30% harder than your avarage WW II tank's armor. What a pity to whoever tries to shoot through the BB's turret with whatever antitank weapon he has (unless he's more lucky than most lottery winners). :P
And back to the Sunburn cruise missiles:
Those things have huge, 250 kg warheads, but they aren't designed to penetrate heavy armor (ie. no shaped charge). A hit would hurt the Iowa as much as a bomb with the same amount of explosives would, that is *not* drilling deep holes through the ship.
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http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_16-50_mk7.htm search for 'armor penetration'
You can see that your mighty 16 inch guns are just barely more effective in armor penetration than standard RPGs - and even that is from point-blank range.. And unlike HEAT warheads that armor penetration of kinetic warheads drops quite rapidly. Of the semi-armor piercing warhead in the 16 inch guns (like essentially in all large naval guns) makes a lot effect after the penetration as after the armor piercing cap has gone through the armor the rest of the shell detonates - sorta like high explosive round. Except it happens inside the target.
So sure... 16 inch guns makes more boom - and damage - but as for actual penetration it ain't that miraculous. And neither are Iowa's or other warships' armors.
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RPGs (shaped charge warheads) depend on inflicting "spall" type damage on the interior of a tank. The idea is to send bits of hot metal flying everywhere, which works fine in a tank crew or ammo compartment but will just start a few fires here and there on a battleship. Battleship shells also have range, plus they have a strong HE effect for shore bombardment tasks. So RPGs just wouldn't feel the same...
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In case Wanderer didn't notice:
The AP bullet from the Iowa weighs 2 tons, and makes a hole 16 inches in diameter, the APDS is a dart 0.8 inch in diameter.
What it means is that the tank, who's armor would stop any RPG, sabot or even 16 inch round, will still be bent and twisted beyond all recognition.
Another thing:
Spall proofing in the Abrams was done by installing a kevlar liner all over the inside surfaces of it's armor.
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Not literally "spall", just the effect of hot metal flying around in the crew compartment, whatever that's called. Spall is when the external armor gets hit so hard that flakes fly off the interior and bounce around even if no actual penetration is made.
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So sure... 16 inch guns makes more boom - and damage - but as for actual penetration it ain't that miraculous. And neither are Iowa's or other warships' armors.
It's the classic case. During the Anzio landings a company of German tanks, including a few Tigers, actually made it as far as the beach, at which point they were engaged by direct fire from a US destroyer. At least two Tigers were hit directly by 5"/38 HC shells. Armor was penetrated for neither of them by the hits, but they were nevertheless knocked out. Concussion from the shellhits turned the tank interiors to dust and killed the crews. In another case for the same action, but further away, a Panzer II was actually flipped over backwards when an 8"/55 HC shell detonated a couple of feet in front of it. A naval shell is not the same as a land artillery shell. They tend to be much bigger and heavier, and fired with much larger propellant charges from much longer barrels.
A parallel more recent in time comes from the First Gulf War, in which on the opening day Kuwaiti Navy patrol boats standing close to shore engaged, and killed, Iraqi T-55s and T-72s with their 76mm/62 OTO/Melara Compact guns. 76mm is no longer considered decent ante for a tank gun, you need at least a 105mm to compete and a 120mm to be a serious contender, and on the surface of it the statement that even a T-55 was killed by 76mm fire is ludicrious. But these were naval guns, firing naval shells.
Also, there is a significant point you missed. Iowa's armor scheme was not the best, pound for pound, that ever went to sea (that honor is reserved to the South Dakota-class), but it was extremely well thought-out and superior to any of her contemporaries. Most significant are two facts: the ship was in fact built of STS steel, so in a sense it was actually made of armor plate. Impact on practically any part of it will count as having to pierce some kind of armor. And in addition to that, there was a 1" STS plate outboard of the main armor plating intended to remove the armor-piercing cap from an incoming shell. Things like the APDS round will still likely penetrate, but shaped-charge and tandem-charge warheads will detonate well before they threaten something vital.
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And back to the Sunburn cruise missiles:
Those things have huge, 250 kg warheads, but they aren't designed to penetrate heavy armor (ie. no shaped charge). A hit would hurt the Iowa as much as a bomb with the same amount of explosives would, that is *not* drilling deep holes through the ship.
That's because the Sunburn was designed to go after Aegis cruisers, not battleships or carriers. For those you'd want a Shipwreck or Kingfisher.
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A parallel more recent in time comes from the First Gulf War, in which on the opening day Kuwaiti Navy patrol boats standing close to shore engaged, and killed, Iraqi T-55s and T-72s with their 76mm/62 OTO/Melara Compact guns. 76mm is no longer considered decent ante for a tank gun, you need at least a 105mm to compete and a 120mm to be a serious contender, and on the surface of it the statement that even a T-55 was killed by 76mm fire is ludicrious. But these were naval guns, firing naval shells.
Do you remember where you read that? I love info on obscure conflicts.
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Do you remember where you read that? I love info on obscure conflicts.
It was very obscure; I'm not sure of the original source, but it was mentioned in a book on the first Gulf War called Desert Victory, which was published within a couple of years of the fact. Parts of the Kuwait military fought very well, like their air force (the Iraqis bombed the runways on day one but the A-4KUs operated from the highway next to the base instead for four days, withdrawing to Saudi Arabia only when the base was overrun; and all the aircraft got out) and some of the navy. But the army was pretty much a bust.
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A naval shell is not the same as a land artillery shell. They tend to be much bigger and heavier, and fired with much larger propellant charges from much longer barrels.
Err? Naval shell is no different from 'land shell' - assuming bore and caliber are identical.
A parallel more recent in time comes from the First Gulf War, in which on the opening day Kuwaiti Navy patrol boats standing close to shore engaged, and killed, Iraqi T-55s and T-72s with their 76mm/62 OTO/Melara Compact guns. 76mm is no longer considered decent ante for a tank gun, you need at least a 105mm to compete and a 120mm to be a serious contender, and on the surface of it the statement that even a T-55 was killed by 76mm fire is ludicrious. But these were naval guns, firing naval shells.
You better try to rethink that... After brief google search...
OTO melara has muzzle velocity of below 1000 mps.. Projectile weight is around 6.5 kg. Neither of which are in any way special or exceedingly high. So something like 'naval gun firing naval shells' does not explain that at all. More likely explanation is that T-55 is outdated tank with obsolete armor for MBT.
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He's talking about HE vs AP.
A HE hit of that size could cause spall in an older T-55/72 without modern lining. Also remember that the definition of "destroyed" depends on who you ask. A 76mm HE hit could certainly immobilize a tank or knock out its optics, regardless of how modern it is.
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Err? Naval shell is no different from 'land shell' - assuming bore and caliber are identical.
Nope. Really now, rethink that statement yourself. A naval gun is not under the same restrictions of handling as land artillery, nor are its propellant charges. The shells are often larger, so are the charges. I should know, I have an expended 5"/54 cartridge casing I use for an umbrella holder, relic of my father's service in the USN. What does a 203mm projectile weigh on land? What does it weigh at sea? (Over a thousand pounds, if we're talking about a Mark 8 APC round.) There are significant differences, you just don't choose to see them.
You better try to rethink that... After brief google search...
OTO melara has muzzle velocity of below 1000 mps.. Projectile weight is around 6.5 kg. Neither of which are in any way special or exceedingly high. So something like 'naval gun firing naval shells' does not explain that at all. More likely explanation is that T-55 is outdated tank with obsolete armor for MBT.
Sure it does. First, realize that a naval gun is designed to be extremely accurate against much more difficult targets than a tank; aircraft and even other ships are much faster and more manuverable. Then realize that the OTO is also capable of this degree of accuracy while firing in a fully automatic mode. T-72s died to this as well. We're not talking about them hitting and killing with one round each, but closer to 10 or 20 in rapid succession.
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Made another brief google search for your enjoyment..
US 8 inch gun, naval.. projectile weights something just below 120 kg. Land based guns - as well as howitzers - have projectile weights around 100 kg (110 to 90). So no difference there. Of course as barrel lengths were different the muzzle velocities - and used propellant amount - varied greatly but that is not the issue - again if the barrels are roughly equal in size (bore and length) then both the projectile and propellant amounts are roughly the same.
And only things special in naval gun is that it is often stabilized (well always). As for accuracy.. Its exactly the same. Naval guns are not in any mysterious way more accurate than land based ones. And as for the rate of fire... there is just no room to make automated systems like the ships have as in ships the gun mounting extends deep into the ship. As what comes to the accuracy against flying targets... using radar range finding and tracking first shots trajectory helps a lot (ships tend to have radars...) as well as the minor detail that AA guns of that size do not try to hit the target - just detonate close enough and cover the target in shrapnels.
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Tank guns are also stabilized....
Back to battleships:
(http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USMC/USMC-M-Tarawa/img/USMC-M-Tarawa-p58.jpg)
The hole was drilled by a 16 inch shell.