Calling the Daily Star a 'newspaper' is a bit of a stretch. 'Tabloid' would be generous. Litterbox lining would be accurate. On the subject of a Deltic engine in a tank, my (admittedly weak) knowledge is that the Deltic was complicated and a bit of a pig to maintain. To get around that, operators held spare engines for when something went wrong, shipping broken-down units back to the factory. For attack boats and railway engines, that's practical. For tanks, not so much.
Having to replace the engine regularly on any piece of equipment really isn’t great. Problems like that are a large part of why the EMD locomotives took over so quickly after privatization
And they're LOUD, not a desirable quality for AFVs but acceptable for trains and mitigatable on MGBs There was a pack from 2010ish on Train Sim for York to Newcastle that got the engine sound on the Deltic absolutely right.
Okay so that is kinda a misconception: WW2 era tanks had very comparatively short engine lifespans, a T-34 (which actually in the later parts of the war had above average engine lifespans) running a relatively weak engine in comparison, could only manage around 300 hours of operating time before needing to be replaced (the official warranty figure was 200 hours at first, and 250 later on, with anything above 300 likely granting a driver-mechanic a literal Hero of the Soviet Union medal) Modern tanks can do in field engine swaps, while back in WW2 you would just sent the whole tank back, and so if you can manage to make a deltic engine run for even like 150 hours, it would be less reliable than what you ideally want, it could theoretically be used in a tank, the issue you would run into then, however, is the fact that you would be putting 1000HP+ through a WW2 tank, so the gearbox, transmission or something else would likely be quite prone to exploding unless you design an absolutely massive, overengineered tank to account for this, and actually necessitate an engine of such caliber in the first place
More problematic for tank use is that while compact overall for its displacement, the engine is quite tall - it's unlikely to fit comfortably under the deck lid on a reasonably sized tank, though the Maus could probably cope. Also tend to be very smokey, particularly after prolonged idling. On the plus side IIRC some naval versions were started/emergency started using shotgun blanks.
Speaking of the TH-cam Algorithm problems, I just realized I haven't seen any of your recent 5 Minute Guides pop up on my feed in at least a month or two. I'm subscribed, and make sure I watch every Drydock (since I get the Patreon announcement and day-early release.) Not sure why, but it definitely seems the Algorithm's got something against you.
Folks in Iowa who are interested in "inland museum ships" could mosey down South a few miles to Muskogee, Oklahoma, which proudly displays the USS Batfish (SS 310). The submarine had an impressive WW2 record, plus an entertaining story post-war, when people in the (rather larger) city of Tulsa, Oklahoma tried to "adopt" a museum ship but could only get it up the Arkansas River as far as Muskogee. Visitors to Muskogee with a penchant for WW2 naval history might also want to feast their eyes on the nearby Neosho River, which lent its name to another USN vessel which had a bad experience during the battle of the Coral Sea.
Unfortunately the Batfish isn’t doing the best right now, a flood unseated her a while back, leaving some damage and means tours on board have been suspended for quite a few years now
Yeah, even as a battleship critic that makes absolutely no sense. What rendered the battleship obsolete was the loss of their OFFENSIVE capability in naval actions (due to vastly increased battle ranges, which only became a thing once carriers came along) not anything that could sink them.
HATE, is a terrible thing. You shouldn't do that to yourself. Hating anything can make you evil. And then you find yourself hating more & more. And it gives those things power over your thoughts & feelings. If you just mearly dislike something then it gives you the freedom to rule yourself. I was playing guitar for tips outside a Metro station near DC & a person remarked to me "Don't you just hate people that DON'T give?" I replied "Over 99% of those that go past do not give. That is way too much for me to try to hate!"
@@kennethdeanmiller7324 When I said pet hate I meant it as an over the top way of expressing a petty annoyance. It's a human traite to exaggerate. Hmm, that rhymes.
52:20 If I am reading that diagram for the base fuse correctly, the operation goes: 1. Gun fires, putting pressure on the pressure plate and jamming it forward. This moves the wide part out of the way of the small retaining bolt and arms the mechanism. 2. The small retaining bolt cutout is now free to move (section AA) and so is the centrifugal bolt. 3. Since it is explicitly named 'centrifugal' bolt, my guess is that rapid rotation of the shell in the barrel forces it outward (to the left in section DD). Stages 1-3 are safety mechanisms. The shell must experience hefty base overpressure *and* rapid rotation before it will arm. After this, I am a bit less sure. But it seems to go: 4. Channel in the centrifugal bolt is now aligned with the channel leading from the detonator. On impact and consequent deceleration, the detonator is forced against spring pressure into the needle and explodes. This flash communicates through the central channel toward the bottom of the shell. 5. The pea ball is forced by deceleration out of position, overcoming side friction from the retaining bolt. This opens the channel leading to the powder pellets (section CC). 6. Flash from the detonator is now free to ignite the powder pellets, which burn upward and create a delay mechanism. Once fully burned, the powder magazine (section DD) ignites and detonates the business end of the shell.
About that youtube algorithm bit at the end, I _highly_ recommend everyone switch their youtube bookmark from the "Home" tab to the "Subscriptions" tab. It's literally just a chronological list of every video uploaded by every channel you're subscribed to, perfect for keeping up with all your channels without missing things, and also filtering out clutter. :)
FYI, for those maybe 1 or 2 of you out there that haven't seen it, or those who'd like to see it again, the excellent movie Master and Commander is available for free on TH-cam videos.
An interesting asset the US had in Iceland was the New Mexico class in its entirety with Wichita and I believe Louisville with escorts. They had no chance of catching Bismarck but they could head straight to a point denying her safe harbor while Ranger and NC with escorts try to track Biz down.
I seem to remember a curious droid video that mentioned almost all launch tracking systems until very recently (late space shuttle?) were mounted on the carriage of a 5" 38.
My Uncle Harold went ashore in Normandy as part of an RAF FOO (Forward Observation Officer) He was a radio operator and driver. They directed the Typhoons on to targets. They had an RN Observation Officer with them who could also call down fire from the bombardment ships when needed. When they moved out of range of the guns he went back to the Navy.
02:41:34 - Why don't we ever hear about a Belgian navy? One BIG factor: Belgian Neutrality was guaranteed by Great Britain! Belgians didn't feel a need to have a great fleet to "protect" their imperial shipping because the Royal Navy protected their shipping by default. Anyone with a navy who might want to fight Belgium also tended to have long shared borders and big armies as well, so there was little point to a Belgian Navy because any war would be decided on land.
On the "parts of warships used in scientific instruments" question, similarly to the Lovell radio telescope the ADU-1000 "Pluton" deep space communications complex in Crimea used the turret ring from the uncompleted Stalingrad Battlecruiser.
On they YT recommendations issue, I haven't had an issue getting your vids, but I've heard a lot about this effecting Shad Brooks and his main channel, best of luck mate, and keep up the good work
@drachinifel as a heads up the deltic Napier used by the RN was used in pairs in the locomotive deltic and its 22 production siblings so in theory a smaller version could work in tanks
HMS Malaya 1941 After temporary repairs were made, she continued to the New York Navy Yard, where she was docked for four months.[21] During that time, personnel from the ship ferried ten Banff-class sloops (Lake class USCG cutters) to Britain.
On the subject of warship parts being used for scientific research, the excellent book "Ignition!: An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants" mentions a laboratory that (somehow) acquired a German U-boat periscope which they used to look into the room where rocket fuels were being mixed from a 'safe' distance. There's a great passage in the book that describes the last test they performed: "Ignition in 3... 2..." "Sir, there's a leak!" "Light it anyway!" KAAAABOOOOOM!!!!!!!! Apparently the techs found the periscope lodged in the attic a few weeks later and quickly disposed of it before the scientists could come up with any new ideas. P.S. Scott Manly has a great review of the book on his channel (the video is titled "The most dangerous rocket fuels ever invented") and if you have the time it's well worth the read.
01:02:05 If you want to see the competition between naval sales forces just look at the pre WWI Janes Fighting Ships. I swear the first half of the 1914 edition is advertising.
Regarding the US Navy and the Bismarck...while everyone knows about the US Navy co-pilot "adviser" (Ensign Leonard "Tuck" Smith) who flew in an RAF Coastal Command PBY that found the Bismarck, there were two other Coastal Command PBYs that later shadowed the battleship. Each had a US Navy pilot, again acting as an "adviser" to the British. In addition, at least four US Navy PBYs took off from Argentia, Newfoundland and searched for the Bismarck. Of course they didn't find anything, but in effect this was the US Navy's first combat mission of WWII. President Roosevelt was aware of the Bismarck and was kept abreast of developments. At one point he asked his advisers, "Suppose she does show up in the Caribbean? We have some submarines down there. Suppose we order them to attack her and attempt to sink her? Do you think the people would demand to have me impeached?" Someone answered, "Only if the Navy misses." Given the state of US Navy submarine torpedoes at the time...well...I think we could guess what the outcome would have been. One interesting tidbit about Smith, he was later at Midway on the night of December 7/8 when Japanese destroyers shelled the islands. He was in a hangar that was hit, but escaped injury.
Naval vessels scrapped by former enemies. Some Australian WWII destroyers were scrapped in Japan in the sixties. HMAS Arunta sank while under tow in 1969, so creating the legend of the ship that committed suicide rather be broken up by a former enemy.
There’s also Yukikaze’s case of being an IJN warship that ended up fighting as part of the ROCN for a few decades and was scrapped there after typhoon damage finally managed to end her career.
Regarding stupid naval takes, the habit of calling every warship a battleship gets to be real damn annoying. Cruiser? battleship! Frigate? Battleship! Dinghy used by pirates with one guy with an AR on board? Battleship! One documentary I once watched about FDR said about the destroyers for bases: "... the US gave the UK 50 destroyer-class Battleships..." So close yet so far. Also had a (non-historic) book calling a US civil war ironclad (think CSS Virginia) a battlecruiser
I used to think the USS Indianapolis of WW2 fame was a battlecruiser, because that’s what some movie called it. Years later I was looking through American cruiser designs and realized “wait, that’s really not right”
2:16:32 This is actually why only IJN capital ships (both battleships and carriers) and cruisers had the imperial seal: everything below that *weren’t even considered warships.* That included even the destroyers and submarines.
Sir, I applaud your restraint, commenting on the apparently sad state of the UK's news sources ablity to think as simply "balderdash"...which is ALSO the first time I've heard that turn of phrase in a long time!
Battleship armor was used as radiation shielding at Brookhaven National Lab on Long Island. The lab had particle accelerators (like those at CERN, but much smaller) back in the early 1970s when I visited as a physics undergraduate. The accelerators smashed elementary particles together and generated quite a bit of dangerous radiation. Big thick slabs of steel made excellent shielding, stopping the radiation before it got to sensitive instruments (or curious undergraduates!).
00:36:02 Believe it or not the base design of the Napier Deltic motor - a single cylinder with two opposed pistons, was the same for the vertically opposed 6 cylinder 12 piston diesel (multi-fuel) L-60 Leyland motor of the Chieftain tank, and it was a complete dog. The BHP output was lower than that of the R/R Meteor, in the Centurion. The Deltic motor was used in the Dark Class fast attack craft, the Ton class and the Hunt Class Mine Sweeper of the 1950s.
The Napier Deltic was based on Napier investigating the use of a diesel engine in aircraft. They bought the rights for a Junkers Jumo engine. it was unsuccessful in aircraft. After the war a Deltic was fitted in an E Boat, it weighed a third of the previous German petrol engine. There have been many opposed piston engines due to there weight to power ratio. The largest I am aware of was the Doxford Maine Engine
01:13:44 A triple 8 inch turret from the Northampton class cruiser Louisville CA 28 was used at Nevada Test Site and converted into a rotating radiation detector test facility, Pretty sure it is still there.
2:37:30 Concerning radar and separating closely spaced targets, one of the biggest challenge you face is the radars beam width. With the (relatively) low frequency of WWII radars, beam width tends to be quite wide, even with physically relatively large antennas. Due to this, several closely spaced targets will tend to show as a slightly larger blob on the PPI in stead of as separate targets. This problem persists to this day with even the most modern radars struggling to separate targets flying in close formation, particularly at range. This is however not really a very large problem when directing heavy AA-guns (5-inch etc.) as the combination of the guns dispersion pattern, slight variation in the timed fuses and other inaccuracies usually means that you have a reasonable change of hitting pretty much any aircraft covered by said blob by simply aiming for the middle.
To be more clear, I found it surprising to learn that the U.S., were it in the war at the time, almost realistically would not have had available the ships capable of catching and sinking the Bismarck.
I just watched Operations Room/Intel Report talk about this yesterday on their Desert Storm video. It is unfortunate that you have taken a hit. Just as long as you don't make this series or the 5 minute guide disappear
wrt the question about ships being scrapped by a nation other than the one who built and operated her, I went through the list of Essex class carriers as an example. Bennington was scrapped in India. Shangri-La was scrapped in Taiwan. I remember seeing a photo in a newspaper, probably in the 60s, of a couple of carriers under tow. The caption said they were being towed to Japan for scrapping. I did not see any Essex or Independence class ships listed as scrapped in Japan. I don't have time at the moment to wade through all the CVEs.
Last night, I found a pic of two CVEs, Guadalcanal, of U-505 fame, and Mission Bay, under tow, bound for Japan, as scrap, in 1959. I think that is the pic I remember seeing, years ago.
The Brazilian battleship Sao Paulo (commissioned 1910) was built in Britain and was also sent back to Britain for scrapping (1951), though she never actually got there as she broke her tow and sank in a storm.
So, who else read the title of the "dumbest take" article and thought Drach was being a little petty about a writer complaining about ~$240 million on a single gun? Thanks for the highlights, they were very helpful after I already listened to what you had to say. I will push back a bit, and say that there were undoubtedly some extraordinary dumb takes on ships back in the day, but those articles have probably been lost to time. Who wants to bet that some journalists were praising the superiority of the early American Navy's Mosquito Fleet?
Great content as always Drach. Further to the piece about spotters for warships offshore, I know I have mentioned my Grandfather before at Gallipoli where he was part of a Naval Gunfire Support Team. His job was to relay the positions of the Turkish soldiers back to two or three Royal Navy vessels offshore. Obviously in 1915, he did this with semophore flags as apart from Aldis lamp this was the only form of real time communication possible given the technology at the time. Do we know when this practice started and when did it end (if it has?).
On the scientific reuse of warship parts I can immediately think of two. The first is more general -- reuse of warship hull plating or armor as low-background steel within particle detectors, because pre-war steel wasn't contaminated with atmospheric radioactive elements from the bomb blasts ( and later nuclear testing) and so wouldn't interfere with the experimental results like newer steel could (though I believe we can now make new low-background steel and so the pre-war stuff isn't as needed) The second is Project HARP, which used a couple of 16" gun barrels to make an IIRC around 90 caliber long barrel for launching scientific payloads into the upper atmosphere.
Re ship size vs ship numbers: at some point there's a maximum number of ships that can be controlled, if the force required for a task exceeds that, cleverness in mitigation becomes important. An obvious strategy is to have fewer, stronger ships - more power per controlled unit. Intangibles matter more Nelson had a fleet that understood its task and how it was to be accomplished, a subordinate as capable as he was (less 0.0001%). He split his fleet into two and clobbered an opponent whose fleet lacked vision of how to win, or even what winning was. It helped not at all that the fleet was split on nationalistic lines. The English crews had a statement of function thy could believe, understand and achieve. Paraphrasing Collingwood "if you get off three broadsides in the first five minutes, we'll win." So did the officers. Paraphrasing Nelson "when the SHTF, you can't go wrong by seizing an enemy and beating the crap out of him." Jellicoe complained about the difficulty of managing the number of battleships he had (ISTR he put the maximum controllable at 24) and the physical effort of command (delegating routine operations like taking the fleet to sea was not in the cards, neither was stripping some of his obsolescent junk of crew to man Tiger). He did not win at Jutland, but he did win. At Leyte, the USN had overpowering force in the two engagements that didn't matter, but the IJN was mission capable in the one that mattered (they'd have been in a run but can't hide engagement after). The USN was comparatively well rested, very well trained and well lead in the South and centre. Their crews knew what their jobs were, and the morale was sufficient to keep them going. I think that knowing your job, believing in your mission, and trusting your leaders matters.
If I could subscribe a second time I would. Drachinefel is the only reason I still have TH-cam. I've been subscribed since before the transition from Robo voice.
So, about hilariously-bad takes in the media, I have two. A little outside the scope of the channel, but still funny. A few years ago, there was a big to-do about Donald Trump ordering a Carrier Battle Group to deploy to the Sea of Japan to confront China. First, the story itself was bunk, as it was a routine deployment that had been planned months in advance, without any involvement from the President. But the really funny bit was a supermarket tabloid I saw propping up the story, with a full-color picture of a warship. By the rounded turret and angled missile launchers on the foredeck, the warship was obviously built by the Soviet Union. The second I didn't personally see, but it's a funny story and I wouldn't be a bit surprised if it was true. One of the aircraft at the National Air and Space Museum is the B-29 _Enola Gay_ which dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. The plane's unusual name comes from the mother of the pilot, Col. Paul Tibbets. Then as now, the atomic bombing is the subject of much debate: Was it necessary, was there a way to avoid it, could it have been detonated on a small island as a warning, and so forth. That debate extends to the presentation and information about the airplane at the museum. So cue at least one newspaper headline along the lines of "Air and Space Museum Confronts Enola Homosexual Controversy".
Re: Natural disasters impacting navy yards. Even if the yard itself comes through in decent shape, damage to the surrounding area could have a significant impact. Transportation infrastructure and worker housing both strike me a highly vulnerable. Workers need somewhere to live and a way to get to and from work.
In terms of dumb takes on naval matters, there is a video clip of an Australian senator having a full 20 minute merry-go-round with an admiral, as to why submarines need propellers. The admiral in question deserves the VC for not losing the will to live.
~@2:34:07 I on a consultant team looking at privatization of certain military bases and one of the bases was the Washington Naval Yard near WDC. Looking at the old base plans, the yard once had a foundry for casting battleship guns, but i don't recall if it was for 14" or 16", nor the caliber(length).
I know some folks that work in TV news, and one of our local stations had a reporter do a story about a LCS with a local city's name being commissioned, and in the story they called it the Navy's newest battleship. After the story aired, some more educated folks had to explain to them that a littoral combat ship is not a battleship, even though combat and battle are similar words...
Feel I comment nit picky stuff too often and don't admire the breadth and depth of knowledge displayed so often we take it for granted. Age of Sail components and Industrialization?
In the 3x12 vs 4x9 gun ships, good account, but forgot to mention that the skilled manpower per gun, given more ships, would be a greater burden for the smaller navy
wrt the question about a 12 gun KGV, from what I have read, in both engagements with Bismark. Prince of Wales' and KGV's B turrets functioned perfectly. All the faults were experienced in the quad turrets. If the twin B turret was replaced by a quad, on paper they gain two guns, but how much unreliability would they gain? With increased unreliability, would there be any net increase in rounds fired, or would there be a reduction of the number of rounds fired?
Indeed. The more attractive alternate history scenario is for the RN to double down on the excellent 15" gun post-Washington naval treaty. Build the Nelrods with 3x3 15" guns (the F3 design), then build the KGV's with (slightly improved versions of) the same 3x3 15" turrets, and chances are they have functioning turrets during Denmark Strait.
There’s Project HARP which repurposed spare 16inch gun barrels to create a “Supergun” to study the viability of firing shells filled with Satellite payloads into orbit as a cost effective replacement for rocketry.
Wish you would do an episode on the ‘Sino American Cooperative Organization (SACO) that operated behind Japanese lines. This was a US Navy operation working w/the. Hines’s Nationalists, Communists, & OSS. It was commanded by Captain Milton ‘Mary’ Miles. It was my late Fathers WW2 outfit that not a lot of people know or aware abt.
The US Navy had three operational carriers in the Atlantic in May of 1941, two of which had torpedo bombers aboard. Assuming the worst case scenario of Ranger and Yorkrown the US carrier force had a reasonable chance of outright sinking Bismarck. The ability to do would depend on whetner the Mk 13s decided to work that day. Even so, multiple attacks by close to 100 dive bombers would almost certainly mission kill Bismarck at which point the surface engagement would be a mop up. The New Mexico class was in the Atlantic in 1941. Notyh Carolima plus one Mew Mexico seems to be enough to finish the job. Neither North Carolina nor Bismarck could stand up to the other's guns at practical battle ranges so who hit something vital first would likely win the engagement.
Regarding the reuse of military ship parts for scientific purposes at about 1:14: while not a "system part" but rather a "structural part", there is of course the example of pre-atomic steel from such sources as the High Seas fleet at Scapa Floe being used in scientific (and medical) instruments where having minimal radiation from the metal matters.
The only WW2 tank to use diesel electric was the Porshe Tiger which became the Elephant/Ferdinand tank destroyer, which was prone to over heating and unreliable. I believe that the U.S. navy adopted diesel electric technology developed by U.S. railways for their locomotives, for submarines.
2:25 I was in mid-high school during the 1990-91 Gulf War, and frequently felt compelled to calm those of my classmates who had read analyses and projections that the land combat would last months or longer and that dozens, perhaps hundreds, of US / Allied tanks and warplanes would be destroyed and 1000s++ soldiers would be killed, by “non-WMD” means. Completely separate from discussion of the reasons for it, there was never a chance the Iraqi forces would cause that much damage without some form of WMD.
The Prince of Wales scenario naturally could go the wrong way too - Bismark takes more damage after Hood blows up, making the Atlantic raid impossible, so Bismark either goes after PoW or at minimum makes a beeline for Norway aircover and survives. By the time she is repaired Tirpitz is in service ...
The historical damage inflicted by PoW on Bismarck reduced tne ships maximum speed to 27 knots and was incapable of catching the British battleship. Additional damage may have further reduced Bismafck's maximum attainable speed.
On the subject of Deltic engines in tanks, I thought there might be a cruel joke there about WW2 Nazi tank design. 'We have a super-cool design with amazing power-to-weight that is technically, cool but tricky, resource-intensive, horribly expensive and insanely difficult to maintain, you want it?'. To which the Soviet tank designer would say 'Hell, no' and the Nazi tank designer would say 'Hell, yes!'.
02:23:33 Far more complex, some calibres relate to full length of bore, some nations it relates to rifled bore length - length shell moves, some rate of twist of rifling is constant and some is progressive, again my favourite type the 155 mm L Mle 1877 De Bange had a progressive twist in the original 1877 iteration and a constant twist in the Mle 1877/16 which replacement barrels manufactured in 1916 for still in service artillery pieces.
Thanks for answering my question! Reading the messages I have to agree on the unhinged part and I find it quite surprising they were willing to send such messages via telegram, especially since the whole Zimmermann telegram situation had occurred by this point.
If PoW had 3 quads, she could have half salvoed her forward turrets and have better firing solution earlier, either lucking out on the turrets like Nelson almost did, or force Bismark to focus on her instead of Hood.
Well on the 1941 USN vs Bismarck id like to point out that for sure the Big 5 (CO and TN classes) the PA Class and the NV class where all most definitely in the Pacific in 1941 so if the USN was deployed as historically until the hunt starts you are looking at the NY class and AR as North Carolina's backup.
While Luxburg was apparently mostly a raving nutbar, he might not have been *utterly* wrong about Chile - the Chilean army had been modernised and equipped along German lines in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, to the point that as late as 1910 the commander of the Chilean army was a German officer called Emil Korner. So there might have been a bit of an angle (to be prised open with a bayonet, if needed)...or at least, Luxburg might have thought there was.
01:13:44 Other examples of battleship parts being used in scientific equipment are from steel taken from the German ww1 High seas fleet that was scuttled in Scotland after the war. Pieces of the steel were salvaged for use in the voyager space craft that are now exiting our solar system. Another example for use of this steel is in the construction of radiography detectors used inside nuclear power stations. These pieces of equipment check the radiation exposure of people and equipment passing in and out of the facility to make sure no radiation is leaking. The necessity of using this steel is that post ww2 ALL steel produced since is contaminated by low levels or radiation produced by the first nuclear weapons used. Not exposure that will cause any harm to anyone but contaminated enough to make it useless in this type of testing equipment. No matter where on earth the steel is made it will be contaminated doe to the radioactive particles in the air. Steel produced pre ww2 and located submerged is protected from this contamination due to waters ability to dampen radiation absorption and so is clean so can be used to make accurate testing equipment that mustn't be radioactive itself while testing for radiation.
wonder if hood gets so much attention because she went out so fast. she never got to show what it was capable of through literally no fault in design or the crew, it was a lucky/unlucky hit depending on which side you were on, they happen. they were floating bombs and still are if they're carry ammunition for anything. one hit to the wrong/right place can send everything to the bottom, why navies have been trying find better alternatives to carrying their own demise with them and tons of safety until they do. she was a good ship, good crew, she just got the worst hits possible.
RE: Bismarck chase Wasp was also in the Atlantic at this point, wasn't she? Admittedly, off the east coast. Yorktown was also in or near Bermuda, as well. And wasn't Washington just commissioned earlier in the month as well? Seems like no need to have N Carolina take her on alone with these other assets around, as well as the New Mexico-class BB in Iceland. Bismarck is toast even if the RN wasn't available.
@@princedetenebres Washington commissioned only a few days before Bismarck sailed, so without even a shakedown voyage under her belt I wouldn't describe her as combat ready. I was essentially going with the assets the USN would either plausibly have in interception range or which could shape a course there.
@@Drachinifel oh of course, I was just adding that there were assets beyond those in theater. I am always annoyed by the amateurs who for some inexplicable reason regard the Bismarck as though it were some unstoppable force that only through the collective effort of the RN and a healthy dose of luck were they able to compel the KM to scuttle her. I was just trying to articulate that if one removed the RN from the scenario, the US itself had ample forces in the Atlantic to put Bismarck down as well. I do understand Washington was just commissioned, but I wonder if the USN would prefer to have N Carolina take on Bismarck in a 1:1 or wouldn't rather have even a brand new ship there to make it 2:1, much as PoW was sent out with civilian workers still aboard, obviously ideally they wouldn't be put in harm's way but of the two options, the risk of a fair fight seems to me to outweigh the risk of sending in a new untried ship, but I don't know if the USN brass would see it that way. As I said though, probably wouldn't have been necessary as both Ranger and Wasp were out there as well. Was Yorktown not in a position that she'd be of use? I thought she had left Bermuda at that point and wouldve been potentially involved if it came to it (in the scenario the question posed). And Wasp was also. In theater and depending on how long the chase went on, surely would have been a factor as well, no?
@@princedetenebres The US had at least two carriers with enough punch to put down Bismsrck if the TBDs had a Shoho kind of day and the Mk 13 torpedoes worked. The SBDs/SB2Us probably could have done enough damage to make a New Mexico sufficient to finish her off
The media that will call just about any ship with a gun from gunboat size on up a battleship is the same media that calls just about every plane a fighter. For example just saw a Su-25 called a jet fighter
Margi Murphy....who wrote the daft article about the 5 inch gun...has gone up in the world and is now Bloombergs Cybersecurity reporter.....rather worrying...
Sometimes I wonder if TH-cam has a dislike for anything factual. I forget now which channel i was watching, but the host listed off things that TH-cam didnt like, and it was clear that a rules-lawyer could easily bend the guidelines to classify a historical program as breaking the rules by telling the truth about historical events.
Don't be too hard on the media. Remember, gentle reader, that to anyone with a degree in journalism, anything in the water that is painted grey is automatically a battleship.
Calling the Daily Star a 'newspaper' is a bit of a stretch. 'Tabloid' would be generous. Litterbox lining would be accurate.
On the subject of a Deltic engine in a tank, my (admittedly weak) knowledge is that the Deltic was complicated and a bit of a pig to maintain. To get around that, operators held spare engines for when something went wrong, shipping broken-down units back to the factory. For attack boats and railway engines, that's practical. For tanks, not so much.
Having to replace the engine regularly on any piece of equipment really isn’t great. Problems like that are a large part of why the EMD locomotives took over so quickly after privatization
And they're LOUD, not a desirable quality for AFVs but acceptable for trains and mitigatable on MGBs
There was a pack from 2010ish on Train Sim for York to Newcastle that got the engine sound on the Deltic absolutely right.
Okay so that is kinda a misconception:
WW2 era tanks had very comparatively short engine lifespans, a T-34 (which actually in the later parts of the war had above average engine lifespans) running a relatively weak engine in comparison, could only manage around 300 hours of operating time before needing to be replaced (the official warranty figure was 200 hours at first, and 250 later on, with anything above 300 likely granting a driver-mechanic a literal Hero of the Soviet Union medal)
Modern tanks can do in field engine swaps, while back in WW2 you would just sent the whole tank back, and so if you can manage to make a deltic engine run for even like 150 hours, it would be less reliable than what you ideally want, it could theoretically be used in a tank, the issue you would run into then, however, is the fact that you would be putting 1000HP+ through a WW2 tank, so the gearbox, transmission or something else would likely be quite prone to exploding unless you design an absolutely massive, overengineered tank to account for this, and actually necessitate an engine of such caliber in the first place
More problematic for tank use is that while compact overall for its displacement, the engine is quite tall - it's unlikely to fit comfortably under the deck lid on a reasonably sized tank, though the Maus could probably cope. Also tend to be very smokey, particularly after prolonged idling. On the plus side IIRC some naval versions were started/emergency started using shotgun blanks.
Speaking of the TH-cam Algorithm problems, I just realized I haven't seen any of your recent 5 Minute Guides pop up on my feed in at least a month or two. I'm subscribed, and make sure I watch every Drydock (since I get the Patreon announcement and day-early release.) Not sure why, but it definitely seems the Algorithm's got something against you.
Thankfully my logarithm has respected Drach's channel, but I have the same problem with other youtubers.
To be fair, the algorithm also goes by your recent views as well. I am subscribed and get *most* notifications for the 5 minute guides, but not all.
@@prussianhill likewise here.
Mine, neither. I'm subscribed so I see them, but they're not hovering over there on my laptop.
I have to set notification to "all" to get notifications..
Folks in Iowa who are interested in "inland museum ships" could mosey down South a few miles to Muskogee, Oklahoma, which proudly displays the USS Batfish (SS 310). The submarine had an impressive WW2 record, plus an entertaining story post-war, when people in the (rather larger) city of Tulsa, Oklahoma tried to "adopt" a museum ship but could only get it up the Arkansas River as far as Muskogee. Visitors to Muskogee with a penchant for WW2 naval history might also want to feast their eyes on the nearby Neosho River, which lent its name to another USN vessel which had a bad experience during the battle of the Coral Sea.
Unfortunately the Batfish isn’t doing the best right now, a flood unseated her a while back, leaving some damage and means tours on board have been suspended for quite a few years now
Okay. This would be the closest naval museum to me. I thought it was N.O., but half the distance from NC Arkansas. Thanks 😊
The dumbest take on naval matters I ever saw was on the World of Warships forums "Battleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 1866".
Ah, that sounds like a jeune ecole fanboy...
The torpedo that had a range of under a kilometer when back then guns still ranged out over a couple miles?🤣🤣🤣
Yeah, even as a battleship critic that makes absolutely no sense. What rendered the battleship obsolete was the loss of their OFFENSIVE capability in naval actions (due to vastly increased battle ranges, which only became a thing once carriers came along) not anything that could sink them.
I think they meant “self propelled, flying, human-guided torpedo capable of launching bombs and other torpedos” and “1945”
@@AtholAnderson Oh, look! The Young School. How quaint. (laughs in radar sighted 5"/38)
That first question reminds me of this head I read: “army’s newest weapon that can fire lazers at the speed of light”. Still have a screenshot.
I dunno …. The speed of light is pretty fast. I haven’t been able to get my laser to go faster than the speed of sound.
I guess if they could "Fire Lasers" at a speed other than the speed of light, that will have been quite impressive!!!!
@@stanislavkostarnov2157well, lasers in StarWars travel pretty slow, jedis can block them with sabers.
Saying battleship when warship is meant is a pet hate of mine
Or Tank for a wheeled personal carrier.
Same. I hate it when everyone calls any warship a battleship
Happened all the time in the Ukrainian war, until the Russians ran out of ships.
HATE, is a terrible thing. You shouldn't do that to yourself. Hating anything can make you evil. And then you find yourself hating more & more. And it gives those things power over your thoughts & feelings. If you just mearly dislike something then it gives you the freedom to rule yourself.
I was playing guitar for tips outside a Metro station near DC & a person remarked to me "Don't you just hate people that DON'T give?" I replied "Over 99% of those that go past do not give. That is way too much for me to try to hate!"
@@kennethdeanmiller7324 When I said pet hate I meant it as an over the top way of expressing a petty annoyance. It's a human traite to exaggerate. Hmm, that rhymes.
52:20 If I am reading that diagram for the base fuse correctly, the operation goes: 1. Gun fires, putting pressure on the pressure plate and jamming it forward. This moves the wide part out of the way of the small retaining bolt and arms the mechanism. 2. The small retaining bolt cutout is now free to move (section AA) and so is the centrifugal bolt. 3. Since it is explicitly named 'centrifugal' bolt, my guess is that rapid rotation of the shell in the barrel forces it outward (to the left in section DD).
Stages 1-3 are safety mechanisms. The shell must experience hefty base overpressure *and* rapid rotation before it will arm.
After this, I am a bit less sure. But it seems to go: 4. Channel in the centrifugal bolt is now aligned with the channel leading from the detonator. On impact and consequent deceleration, the detonator is forced against spring pressure into the needle and explodes. This flash communicates through the central channel toward the bottom of the shell. 5. The pea ball is forced by deceleration out of position, overcoming side friction from the retaining bolt. This opens the channel leading to the powder pellets (section CC). 6. Flash from the detonator is now free to ignite the powder pellets, which burn upward and create a delay mechanism. Once fully burned, the powder magazine (section DD) ignites and detonates the business end of the shell.
About that youtube algorithm bit at the end, I _highly_ recommend everyone switch their youtube bookmark from the "Home" tab to the "Subscriptions" tab. It's literally just a chronological list of every video uploaded by every channel you're subscribed to, perfect for keeping up with all your channels without missing things, and also filtering out clutter. :)
FYI, for those maybe 1 or 2 of you out there that haven't seen it, or those who'd like to see it again, the excellent movie Master and Commander is available for free on TH-cam videos.
An interesting asset the US had in Iceland was the New Mexico class in its entirety with Wichita and I believe Louisville with escorts. They had no chance of catching Bismarck but they could head straight to a point denying her safe harbor while Ranger and NC with escorts try to track Biz down.
I seem to remember a curious droid video that mentioned almost all launch tracking systems until very recently (late space shuttle?) were mounted on the carriage of a 5" 38.
My Uncle Harold went ashore in Normandy as part of an RAF FOO (Forward Observation Officer) He was a radio operator and driver. They directed the Typhoons on to targets. They had an RN Observation Officer with them who could also call down fire from the bombardment ships when needed. When they moved out of range of the guns he went back to the Navy.
02:41:34 - Why don't we ever hear about a Belgian navy?
One BIG factor: Belgian Neutrality was guaranteed by Great Britain! Belgians didn't feel a need to have a great fleet to "protect" their imperial shipping because the Royal Navy protected their shipping by default. Anyone with a navy who might want to fight Belgium also tended to have long shared borders and big armies as well, so there was little point to a Belgian Navy because any war would be decided on land.
Bonus points for a Last Crusade Reference.
On the "parts of warships used in scientific instruments" question, similarly to the Lovell radio telescope the ADU-1000 "Pluton" deep space communications complex in Crimea used the turret ring from the uncompleted Stalingrad Battlecruiser.
Absolute best opening tune on TH-cam…
Comment for the algorithm: I used to work at Washington Navy Yard. I'm "pleased" to report it still floods quite regularly.
On they YT recommendations issue, I haven't had an issue getting your vids, but I've heard a lot about this effecting Shad Brooks and his main channel, best of luck mate, and keep up the good work
@drachinifel as a heads up the deltic Napier used by the RN was used in pairs in the locomotive deltic and its 22 production siblings so in theory a smaller version could work in tanks
I love this channel. I hope youtube fix their algorithm so that this and other great history channels get more widely recommended
in many ways in a USN chase of Bismarck Ranger being the carrier and being forced to use Divebombing may be advantageous as at least the bombs work.
HMS Malaya 1941 After temporary repairs were made, she continued to the New York Navy Yard, where she was docked for four months.[21] During that time, personnel from the ship ferried ten Banff-class sloops (Lake class USCG cutters) to Britain.
On the subject of warship parts being used for scientific research, the excellent book "Ignition!: An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants" mentions a laboratory that (somehow) acquired a German U-boat periscope which they used to look into the room where rocket fuels were being mixed from a 'safe' distance. There's a great passage in the book that describes the last test they performed:
"Ignition in 3... 2..."
"Sir, there's a leak!"
"Light it anyway!"
KAAAABOOOOOM!!!!!!!!
Apparently the techs found the periscope lodged in the attic a few weeks later and quickly disposed of it before the scientists could come up with any new ideas.
P.S. Scott Manly has a great review of the book on his channel (the video is titled "The most dangerous rocket fuels ever invented") and if you have the time it's well worth the read.
Another spectacular Drydock ! And...
Dubuque - "buque" rhymes with "puke", a fine appellation for the author of the article about the 5" gun.
01:02:05 If you want to see the competition between naval sales forces just look at the pre WWI Janes Fighting Ships. I swear the first half of the 1914 edition is advertising.
Regarding the US Navy and the Bismarck...while everyone knows about the US Navy co-pilot "adviser" (Ensign Leonard "Tuck" Smith) who flew in an RAF Coastal Command PBY that found the Bismarck, there were two other Coastal Command PBYs that later shadowed the battleship. Each had a US Navy pilot, again acting as an "adviser" to the British.
In addition, at least four US Navy PBYs took off from Argentia, Newfoundland and searched for the Bismarck. Of course they didn't find anything, but in effect this was the US Navy's first combat mission of WWII.
President Roosevelt was aware of the Bismarck and was kept abreast of developments. At one point he asked his advisers, "Suppose she does show up in the Caribbean? We have some submarines down there. Suppose we order them to attack her and attempt to sink her? Do you think the people would demand to have me impeached?" Someone answered, "Only if the Navy misses."
Given the state of US Navy submarine torpedoes at the time...well...I think we could guess what the outcome would have been.
One interesting tidbit about Smith, he was later at Midway on the night of December 7/8 when Japanese destroyers shelled the islands. He was in a hangar that was hit, but escaped injury.
Came here to post something similar, but you were quicker on the draw.
1:37:32 USN may not have been able to hunt down Bismarck, but the USCG sure seems to have given it a go.
Naval vessels scrapped by former enemies. Some Australian WWII destroyers were scrapped in Japan in the sixties. HMAS Arunta sank while under tow in 1969, so creating the legend of the ship that committed suicide rather be broken up by a former enemy.
There’s also Yukikaze’s case of being an IJN warship that ended up fighting as part of the ROCN for a few decades and was scrapped there after typhoon damage finally managed to end her career.
Regarding stupid naval takes, the habit of calling every warship a battleship gets to be real damn annoying. Cruiser? battleship! Frigate? Battleship! Dinghy used by pirates with one guy with an AR on board? Battleship! One documentary I once watched about FDR said about the destroyers for bases: "... the US gave the UK 50 destroyer-class Battleships..." So close yet so far. Also had a (non-historic) book calling a US civil war ironclad (think CSS Virginia) a battlecruiser
I used to think the USS Indianapolis of WW2 fame was a battlecruiser, because that’s what some movie called it. Years later I was looking through American cruiser designs and realized “wait, that’s really not right”
Every time I hear the term "Battleship" in the news I grind my teeth in disgust.
Oooh! I bet that the documentary which said that was one that started with the word "Dark".
Modern journalist:
is it ship ? yes
is it supposed to go into battle ? yes
=battleship :D
@@crichtonbruce4329 What, even the news that USS Texas and New Jersey were going into drydock?
@3:52 Woah woah! I thought this was a family friendly podcast! But here's Drach dropping the B word at the drop of a hat.
Pre-Atomic steel from HMS Vanguard was used in the radiation monitor of a UK civilian nuclear reactor
2:16:32 This is actually why only IJN capital ships (both battleships and carriers) and cruisers had the imperial seal: everything below that *weren’t even considered warships.* That included even the destroyers and submarines.
Sir, I applaud your restraint, commenting on the apparently sad state of the UK's news sources ablity to think as simply "balderdash"...which is ALSO the first time I've heard that turn of phrase in a long time!
Battleship armor was used as radiation shielding at Brookhaven National Lab on Long Island. The lab had particle accelerators (like those at CERN, but much smaller) back in the early 1970s when I visited as a physics undergraduate. The accelerators smashed elementary particles together and generated quite a bit of dangerous radiation. Big thick slabs of steel made excellent shielding, stopping the radiation before it got to sensitive instruments (or curious undergraduates!).
00:36:02 Believe it or not the base design of the Napier Deltic motor - a single cylinder with two opposed pistons, was the same for the vertically opposed 6 cylinder 12 piston diesel (multi-fuel) L-60 Leyland motor of the Chieftain tank, and it was a complete dog. The BHP output was lower than that of the R/R Meteor, in the Centurion. The Deltic motor was used in the Dark Class fast attack craft, the Ton class and the Hunt Class Mine Sweeper of the 1950s.
The Napier Deltic was based on Napier investigating the use of a diesel engine in aircraft. They bought the rights for a Junkers Jumo engine. it was unsuccessful in aircraft. After the war a Deltic was fitted in an E Boat, it weighed a third of the previous German petrol engine. There have been many opposed piston engines due to there weight to power ratio. The largest I am aware of was the Doxford Maine Engine
01:13:44 A triple 8 inch turret from the Northampton class cruiser Louisville CA 28 was used at Nevada Test Site and converted into a rotating radiation detector test facility, Pretty sure it is still there.
I have a ask: Could you tell us the history of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania Navy in the 13th century? Would be wonderful.
2:37:30 Concerning radar and separating closely spaced targets, one of the biggest challenge you face is the radars beam width. With the (relatively) low frequency of WWII radars, beam width tends to be quite wide, even with physically relatively large antennas. Due to this, several closely spaced targets will tend to show as a slightly larger blob on the PPI in stead of as separate targets. This problem persists to this day with even the most modern radars struggling to separate targets flying in close formation, particularly at range. This is however not really a very large problem when directing heavy AA-guns (5-inch etc.) as the combination of the guns dispersion pattern, slight variation in the timed fuses and other inaccuracies usually means that you have a reasonable change of hitting pretty much any aircraft covered by said blob by simply aiming for the middle.
Thanks! I learn so much. Anything on obsolete battleships (well, I suppose they are all obsolete now).
To be more clear, I found it surprising to learn that the U.S., were it in the war at the time, almost realistically would not have had available the ships capable of catching and sinking the Bismarck.
I just watched Operations Room/Intel Report talk about this yesterday on their Desert Storm video.
It is unfortunate that you have taken a hit. Just as long as you don't make this series or the 5 minute guide disappear
wrt the question about ships being scrapped by a nation other than the one who built and operated her, I went through the list of Essex class carriers as an example. Bennington was scrapped in India. Shangri-La was scrapped in Taiwan. I remember seeing a photo in a newspaper, probably in the 60s, of a couple of carriers under tow. The caption said they were being towed to Japan for scrapping. I did not see any Essex or Independence class ships listed as scrapped in Japan. I don't have time at the moment to wade through all the CVEs.
Last night, I found a pic of two CVEs, Guadalcanal, of U-505 fame, and Mission Bay, under tow, bound for Japan, as scrap, in 1959. I think that is the pic I remember seeing, years ago.
The Brazilian battleship Sao Paulo (commissioned 1910) was built in Britain and was also sent back to Britain for scrapping (1951), though she never actually got there as she broke her tow and sank in a storm.
So, who else read the title of the "dumbest take" article and thought Drach was being a little petty about a writer complaining about ~$240 million on a single gun?
Thanks for the highlights, they were very helpful after I already listened to what you had to say.
I will push back a bit, and say that there were undoubtedly some extraordinary dumb takes on ships back in the day, but those articles have probably been lost to time.
Who wants to bet that some journalists were praising the superiority of the early American Navy's Mosquito Fleet?
Great content as always Drach. Further to the piece about spotters for warships offshore, I know I have mentioned my Grandfather before at Gallipoli where he was part of a Naval Gunfire Support Team. His job was to relay the positions of the Turkish soldiers back to two or three Royal Navy vessels offshore. Obviously in 1915, he did this with semophore flags as apart from Aldis lamp this was the only form of real time communication possible given the technology at the time. Do we know when this practice started and when did it end (if it has?).
On the scientific reuse of warship parts I can immediately think of two.
The first is more general -- reuse of warship hull plating or armor as low-background steel within particle detectors, because pre-war steel wasn't contaminated with atmospheric radioactive elements from the bomb blasts ( and later nuclear testing) and so wouldn't interfere with the experimental results like newer steel could (though I believe we can now make new low-background steel and so the pre-war stuff isn't as needed)
The second is Project HARP, which used a couple of 16" gun barrels to make an IIRC around 90 caliber long barrel for launching scientific payloads into the upper atmosphere.
The intro is lovely
Re ship size vs ship numbers: at some point there's a maximum number of ships that can be controlled, if the force required for a task exceeds that, cleverness in mitigation becomes important. An obvious strategy is to have fewer, stronger ships - more power per controlled unit.
Intangibles matter more
Nelson had a fleet that understood its task and how it was to be accomplished, a subordinate as capable as he was (less 0.0001%). He split his fleet into two and clobbered an opponent whose fleet lacked vision of how to win, or even what winning was. It helped not at all that the fleet was split on nationalistic lines. The English crews had a statement of function thy could believe, understand and achieve. Paraphrasing Collingwood "if you get off three broadsides in the first five minutes, we'll win." So did the officers. Paraphrasing Nelson "when the SHTF, you can't go wrong by seizing an enemy and beating the crap out of him."
Jellicoe complained about the difficulty of managing the number of battleships he had (ISTR he put the maximum controllable at 24) and the physical effort of command (delegating routine operations like taking the fleet to sea was not in the cards, neither was stripping some of his obsolescent junk of crew to man Tiger). He did not win at Jutland, but he did win.
At Leyte, the USN had overpowering force in the two engagements that didn't matter, but the IJN was mission capable in the one that mattered (they'd have been in a run but can't hide engagement after). The USN was comparatively well rested, very well trained and well lead in the South and centre. Their crews knew what their jobs were, and the morale was sufficient to keep them going.
I think that knowing your job, believing in your mission, and trusting your leaders matters.
If I could subscribe a second time I would. Drachinefel is the only reason I still have TH-cam. I've been subscribed since before the transition from Robo voice.
Drach......as for the end bit.WE WILL ALWAYS SUPPORT YOU SIR! youtube hating on our history stuffs pffff
So, about hilariously-bad takes in the media, I have two. A little outside the scope of the channel, but still funny. A few years ago, there was a big to-do about Donald Trump ordering a Carrier Battle Group to deploy to the Sea of Japan to confront China. First, the story itself was bunk, as it was a routine deployment that had been planned months in advance, without any involvement from the President. But the really funny bit was a supermarket tabloid I saw propping up the story, with a full-color picture of a warship. By the rounded turret and angled missile launchers on the foredeck, the warship was obviously built by the Soviet Union.
The second I didn't personally see, but it's a funny story and I wouldn't be a bit surprised if it was true. One of the aircraft at the National Air and Space Museum is the B-29 _Enola Gay_ which dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. The plane's unusual name comes from the mother of the pilot, Col. Paul Tibbets. Then as now, the atomic bombing is the subject of much debate: Was it necessary, was there a way to avoid it, could it have been detonated on a small island as a warning, and so forth. That debate extends to the presentation and information about the airplane at the museum. So cue at least one newspaper headline along the lines of "Air and Space Museum Confronts Enola Homosexual Controversy".
Re: Natural disasters impacting navy yards.
Even if the yard itself comes through in decent shape, damage to the surrounding area could have a significant impact. Transportation infrastructure and worker housing both strike me a highly vulnerable. Workers need somewhere to live and a way to get to and from work.
In terms of dumb takes on naval matters, there is a video clip of an Australian senator having a full 20 minute merry-go-round with an admiral, as to why submarines need propellers. The admiral in question deserves the VC for not losing the will to live.
~@2:34:07 I on a consultant team looking at privatization of certain military bases and one of the bases was the Washington Naval Yard near WDC. Looking at the old base plans, the yard once had a foundry for casting battleship guns, but i don't recall if it was for 14" or 16", nor the caliber(length).
Thanks Drach.
I know some folks that work in TV news, and one of our local stations had a reporter do a story about a LCS with a local city's name being commissioned, and in the story they called it the Navy's newest battleship. After the story aired, some more educated folks had to explain to them that a littoral combat ship is not a battleship, even though combat and battle are similar words...
Feel I comment nit picky stuff too often and don't admire the breadth and depth of knowledge displayed so often we take it for granted. Age of Sail components and Industrialization?
Thanks for doing these drac
Boooo youtube, commenting for the algorithm. Already a patron, thanks for a great video again Drach!
I have seen a book call Bismarck a pocket battleship in a section that criticized the existence of the Kriegsmarine surface fleet.
Yeah…
Dang big pocket!
In the 3x12 vs 4x9 gun ships, good account, but forgot to mention that the skilled manpower per gun, given more ships, would be a greater burden for the smaller navy
wrt the question about a 12 gun KGV, from what I have read, in both engagements with Bismark. Prince of Wales' and KGV's B turrets functioned perfectly. All the faults were experienced in the quad turrets. If the twin B turret was replaced by a quad, on paper they gain two guns, but how much unreliability would they gain? With increased unreliability, would there be any net increase in rounds fired, or would there be a reduction of the number of rounds fired?
Indeed. The more attractive alternate history scenario is for the RN to double down on the excellent 15" gun post-Washington naval treaty. Build the Nelrods with 3x3 15" guns (the F3 design), then build the KGV's with (slightly improved versions of) the same 3x3 15" turrets, and chances are they have functioning turrets during Denmark Strait.
Outside the channels time frame but FYI. The SR71 Blackbird was retired and 2 birds went to NASA as high Altitude research aircraft.
I just heard about this in "Nimitz At awar" today.
There’s Project HARP which repurposed spare 16inch gun barrels to create a “Supergun” to study the viability of firing shells filled with Satellite payloads into orbit as a cost effective replacement for rocketry.
Pity Canada didn't preserve the HMCS Bonaventure (A Majestic Class carrier).
Saturday night and it's raining Drach, just the 5 Minute Guide to go.
Wish you would do an episode on the ‘Sino American Cooperative Organization (SACO) that operated behind Japanese lines. This was a US Navy operation working w/the. Hines’s Nationalists, Communists, & OSS. It was commanded by Captain Milton ‘Mary’ Miles. It was my late Fathers WW2 outfit that not a lot of people know or aware abt.
The US Navy had three operational carriers in the Atlantic in May of 1941, two of which had torpedo bombers aboard. Assuming the worst case scenario of Ranger and Yorkrown the US carrier force had a reasonable chance of outright sinking Bismarck. The ability to do would depend on whetner the Mk 13s decided to work that day. Even so, multiple attacks by close to 100 dive bombers would almost certainly mission kill Bismarck at which point the surface engagement would be a mop up. The New Mexico class was in the Atlantic in 1941. Notyh Carolima plus one Mew Mexico seems to be enough to finish the job.
Neither North Carolina nor Bismarck could stand up to the other's guns at practical battle ranges so who hit something vital first would likely win the engagement.
Regarding the reuse of military ship parts for scientific purposes at about 1:14: while not a "system part" but rather a "structural part", there is of course the example of pre-atomic steel from such sources as the High Seas fleet at Scapa Floe being used in scientific (and medical) instruments where having minimal radiation from the metal matters.
The only WW2 tank to use diesel electric was the Porshe Tiger which became the Elephant/Ferdinand tank destroyer, which was prone to over heating and unreliable. I believe that the U.S. navy adopted diesel electric technology developed by U.S. railways for their locomotives, for submarines.
2:25
I was in mid-high school during the 1990-91 Gulf War, and frequently felt compelled to calm those of my classmates who had read analyses and projections that the land combat would last months or longer and that dozens, perhaps hundreds, of US / Allied tanks and warplanes would be destroyed and 1000s++ soldiers would be killed, by “non-WMD” means.
Completely separate from discussion of the reasons for it, there was never a chance the Iraqi forces would cause that much damage without some form of WMD.
Ranger's Island is about the same size as those found on Japanese carriers and she had dispersed stacks.
The Prince of Wales scenario naturally could go the wrong way too - Bismark takes more damage after Hood blows up, making the Atlantic raid impossible, so Bismark either goes after PoW or at minimum makes a beeline for Norway aircover and survives. By the time she is repaired Tirpitz is in service ...
The historical damage inflicted by PoW on Bismarck reduced tne ships maximum speed to 27 knots and was incapable of catching the British battleship. Additional damage may have further reduced Bismafck's maximum attainable speed.
36:00 yea, those butterflies might also cause Bismark to hit Hood sooner
Would you do a video about pre dreadnaughts in WW2? I think there's enough content for a short video about it
On the subject of Deltic engines in tanks, I thought there might be a cruel joke there about WW2 Nazi tank design. 'We have a super-cool design with amazing power-to-weight that is technically, cool but tricky, resource-intensive, horribly expensive and insanely difficult to maintain, you want it?'. To which the Soviet tank designer would say 'Hell, no' and the Nazi tank designer would say 'Hell, yes!'.
02:23:33 Far more complex, some calibres relate to full length of bore, some nations it relates to rifled bore length - length shell moves, some rate of twist of rifling is constant and some is progressive, again my favourite type the 155 mm L Mle 1877 De Bange had a progressive twist in the original 1877 iteration and a constant twist in the Mle 1877/16 which replacement barrels manufactured in 1916 for still in service artillery pieces.
Thanks for answering my question!
Reading the messages I have to agree on the unhinged part and I find it quite surprising they were willing to send such messages via telegram, especially since the whole Zimmermann telegram situation had occurred by this point.
Have, or are, floating dry docks used for ship construction?
1:13:44 there was some pre nuke age low background warship steel harvesting for scientific and medical equipment right?
If PoW had 3 quads, she could have half salvoed her forward turrets and have better firing solution earlier, either lucking out on the turrets like Nelson almost did, or force Bismark to focus on her instead of Hood.
Well on the 1941 USN vs Bismarck id like to point out that for sure the Big 5 (CO and TN classes) the PA Class and the NV class where all most definitely in the Pacific in 1941 so if the USN was deployed as historically until the hunt starts you are looking at the NY class and AR as North Carolina's backup.
The New Mexicos were in the Atlantic.
00:52:18 Some premature detonation of British shells were down to the accelerant being oversensitive.
While Luxburg was apparently mostly a raving nutbar, he might not have been *utterly* wrong about Chile - the Chilean army had been modernised and equipped along German lines in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, to the point that as late as 1910 the commander of the Chilean army was a German officer called Emil Korner. So there might have been a bit of an angle (to be prised open with a bayonet, if needed)...or at least, Luxburg might have thought there was.
What ignites the charge in a battleship gun and how (the mechanism)?
8:13 omg did you almost answer my drum question????? Eeeeeeek
1:40:40 Drach is back on the Christmas card list.
01:13:44 Other examples of battleship parts being used in scientific equipment are from steel taken from the German ww1 High seas fleet that was scuttled in Scotland after the war. Pieces of the steel were salvaged for use in the voyager space craft that are now exiting our solar system. Another example for use of this steel is in the construction of radiography detectors used inside nuclear power stations. These pieces of equipment check the radiation exposure of people and equipment passing in and out of the facility to make sure no radiation is leaking. The necessity of using this steel is that post ww2 ALL steel produced since is contaminated by low levels or radiation produced by the first nuclear weapons used. Not exposure that will cause any harm to anyone but contaminated enough to make it useless in this type of testing equipment. No matter where on earth the steel is made it will be contaminated doe to the radioactive particles in the air. Steel produced pre ww2 and located submerged is protected from this contamination due to waters ability to dampen radiation absorption and so is clean so can be used to make accurate testing equipment that mustn't be radioactive itself while testing for radiation.
2:43:58 I mean, you've *got* to stop all those vital cargoes of rubber, coffee, BEEF, and min-rals.🤖😁
Salt Lake City really out dueled two newer Japanese heavy cruisers at Komandorski.
wonder if hood gets so much attention because she went out so fast. she never got to show what it was capable of through literally no fault in design or the crew, it was a lucky/unlucky hit depending on which side you were on, they happen. they were floating bombs and still are if they're carry ammunition for anything. one hit to the wrong/right place can send everything to the bottom, why navies have been trying find better alternatives to carrying their own demise with them and tons of safety until they do. she was a good ship, good crew, she just got the worst hits possible.
RE: Bismarck chase
Wasp was also in the Atlantic at this point, wasn't she? Admittedly, off the east coast.
Yorktown was also in or near Bermuda, as well.
And wasn't Washington just commissioned earlier in the month as well?
Seems like no need to have N Carolina take her on alone with these other assets around, as well as the New Mexico-class BB in Iceland.
Bismarck is toast even if the RN wasn't available.
@@princedetenebres Washington commissioned only a few days before Bismarck sailed, so without even a shakedown voyage under her belt I wouldn't describe her as combat ready.
I was essentially going with the assets the USN would either plausibly have in interception range or which could shape a course there.
@@Drachinifel oh of course, I was just adding that there were assets beyond those in theater. I am always annoyed by the amateurs who for some inexplicable reason regard the Bismarck as though it were some unstoppable force that only through the collective effort of the RN and a healthy dose of luck were they able to compel the KM to scuttle her.
I was just trying to articulate that if one removed the RN from the scenario, the US itself had ample forces in the Atlantic to put Bismarck down as well.
I do understand Washington was just commissioned, but I wonder if the USN would prefer to have N Carolina take on Bismarck in a 1:1 or wouldn't rather have even a brand new ship there to make it 2:1, much as PoW was sent out with civilian workers still aboard, obviously ideally they wouldn't be put in harm's way but of the two options, the risk of a fair fight seems to me to outweigh the risk of sending in a new untried ship, but I don't know if the USN brass would see it that way.
As I said though, probably wouldn't have been necessary as both Ranger and Wasp were out there as well.
Was Yorktown not in a position that she'd be of use? I thought she had left Bermuda at that point and wouldve been potentially involved if it came to it (in the scenario the question posed). And Wasp was also. In theater and depending on how long the chase went on, surely would have been a factor as well, no?
@@princedetenebres The US had at least two carriers with enough punch to put down Bismsrck if the TBDs had a Shoho kind of day and the Mk 13 torpedoes worked. The SBDs/SB2Us probably could have done enough damage to make a New Mexico sufficient to finish her off
Hood sank because it was removed from the head and draped down the nave of the neck. It’s quite easy to raise the hood in inclement weather…
The media that will call just about any ship with a gun from gunboat size on up a battleship is the same media that calls just about every plane a fighter. For example just saw a Su-25 called a jet fighter
2:24:50 Like Germans. Scharnhorst's gun was norminally 54.5 caliber.
Nothing dumber than some Fleet street editors....see Piers Morgan as the prime example as "dumber than a box of soapy frogs"
Hey, don't insult the frogs like that.
My heavyweight champion of longevity has to be "The Queen of the Seven Seas:" USS Midway.
⚓
Margi Murphy....who wrote the daft article about the 5 inch gun...has gone up in the world and is now Bloombergs Cybersecurity reporter.....rather worrying...
Sometimes I wonder if TH-cam has a dislike for anything factual.
I forget now which channel i was watching, but the host listed off things that TH-cam didnt like, and it was clear that a rules-lawyer could easily bend the guidelines to classify a historical program as breaking the rules by telling the truth about historical events.
Don't be too hard on the media. Remember, gentle reader, that to anyone with a degree in journalism, anything in the water that is painted grey is automatically a battleship.