Whats the Difference Between the Armor Types on the Iowas?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 4 ส.ค. 2021
- In this episode we're taking a look at the differences between Classes and A and B armor, as well as STS and HTS steel.
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I would love to see BSNJ talk about Yamato's armor layout and quality. In a way that is informative and neutral and compare it to New Jersey's. Great video as always! Liked!
I doubt they can. Most of Yamato's records were deliberately destroyed by the Japanese near the war's end to prevent the information from falling into enemy hands.
I'd love to hear him make any kind of comparison though, because I suspect he has more informational access than most anyone else.
@@tyree9055
They actually have plating at Nav Weps Dahlgren from IJN Shinano (planned 3rd Yamato class turned carrier) that is identical to Yamato’s armour plate.
@@james23p That's the one with the point-blank hit from one of the U.S.'s 16" guns isn't it?
That is only a partial example, though I do wonder if it's the equivalent of Class A or B plate.
@@tyree9055
Yes when I was stationed at Pax River I went to see it. They shot point blank but used reduced charge to simulate I think 12,000 yard shot( might have the range wrong that was 30 years ago lol 😝). My understanding is they had a few plates but I don’t remember what class it was my guess was B but that’s a guess.
But the hole 🕳 and Armor was impressive.
All I know the Yamatos have All Or Nothing scheme with citadels/armored box protecting the engines and magazines. What I know (dunno if it's true) they have 16" belt with 20 degrees angled belt armor, which have immunity zone against 18" shells from 22,000-32,800 yards. The deck armor is the most jaw dropping armor a Battleship could have, they could resist momentum from a 1000lb bomb dropped from 3000 meters. I might also add the Yamatos have the best TDS of any Battleships in the world with torpedo belts stretching to 5 meters deep from waterline.
I love how he has to explain the hashtag is actually a pound sign
There was an additional joke too but we're going to save that for the blooper reel. It was real corny
You mean the "octolthorpe"? ;)
I had a story about steel rebar and numbers, but meh.
Also can be referred to as the "number" sign, like: #1 . . . (Oh come on, you've all seen the foam fingers at the sports venues! lol. :-) Also important in identifying some US screw sizes, #10-24. Leading or trailing can be significant though. Trailing is usually the weight measure of pound! (Is the horse dead yet? No he's not, he's just sleeping!)
# Octothorp....it's an octothorp
Comparing national armors would be awesome!
Drachinifel has a good video that goes through some of the differences between countries. Might be worth a look. Don't remember the exact name unfortunately.
@@Lucas12v Already watched it; however, the more sources/perspectives, the better!
I wonder if there is any Shore battery locations that would have different armor types still
@Steve Wolcott Actually, there must be plenty of samples in the Armories, where thy have use it for shooting-trials. I have seen a few samples in the Museum in Wilhelmshafen. But no capital ship of the historic German navies left - other than those rusting in the depth of Scapa Flow.
@@wolffhagen8673 the Bismarck‘s hull is in quite good condition. Just difficult to visit😁
The use of class B armor reminds me of what The Chieftain (Nicholas Moran) mentioned about medium tank M4 armor being of a grade to prevent excess spalling.
Back before they could make kevlar spall protection or developed spaced armour that sort of thing would be fairly important. Of course they need to be hardened to some degree and HESH could still exploit that and produce severe spalling. This is something the Iraqis found out when they constructed their own T-72 frontal armour replacements after Russia refused to send replacement armour. Their production failed to harden properly and performed shockingly bad in combat. I've heard even the 25mm Bradley could penetrate the unhardened T-72 frontal armour, but I haven't been able to confirm. It would be consistent with other tales of unhardened armour, however.
@@olivialambert4124 yes kevlar is not only for body armor but works for armored vehicles protection i.e. Warships, AFVs or MBTs. It's not only light but also could resist kinetic energy or force.
Plus in Arleigh Burke class DDGs, the USN decided to move back from Aluminium to steel hull (double spaced steel) to prevent quick fire spreading/damage if the ship take missile or explosive damage then behind it they added the kevlar spall. Taken a lesson from USS Belknap fire when the fire easily gutted the top superstructure away.
16" HESH rounds? 9 shell salvo? That is going to have me thinking going right to enginurd mode
@@olivialambert4124 Marry me
@@russellknight26 As cool as it sounds, it unfortunately wouldn't work too well. The only thing spalling would be whatever it hits. So any outer armour (eg torpedo protection) would take all the damage. That continues to the poor damage. Assuming there even was no torpedo defences, no spaced armour, nothing all warships use of that nature, we still have problems. The critical components are always held very deep inside the ship. Namely the propulsion and the ammo. Most other areas are of limited importance beyond perhaps flooding. The citadel protects the critical components - a second set of armour layers.
The spalling disables a tank by essentially blasting small fragments of steel around the insides shredding crew and hardware. For a battleship those tiny fragments are very easily stopped by any material in the way - steel bulkheads, walls, frankly anything. There will be no damage very quickly from HESH. It wouldn't make it anywhere near the center of the ship past two separate armoured layers and tens of bulkheads. We would expect maybe crew sleeping areas to be damaged whilst the crew are at battlestations, a minor inconvenience. Traditional shells get past this by having a thick hardened penetrating outer layer and a timed delay activating when it reaches deep enough into the ship.
Finally HESH is difficult to scale up. We need the plastic explosive to splat in a consistent way at the right diameter and thickness on the armour, and the shell to explode at just the right time before the splat becomes too spread out. That can be pretty difficult to do in the best situation, but it becomes far more difficult with different ranges (and shell speeds), different angles of impact, different target angles. A battleship then has a ton of protrusions on the surface which completely ruins that effect, as well as a lot of unhardened layers on the superstructure for which there would be minimal damage. As the HESH becomes larger the splat becomes far more difficult to control and more likely to get out of shape, get an inconsistent thickness, have the outer edges separating, any number of issues.
With that I'm not even sure a 16 inch HESH could be made at all, but assuming it could its effect would be very small against warships. However it is the premier shell for use against buildings, essentially a remote delivered C4 charge for that purpose (which is precisely why the British Army maintains their use). Used against very specific ground targets it could be useful, but I would expect the 16 inch HE shell to be sufficient whilst also having far better effect on non-building targets and other warships (which is why the American Army uses HEAT-DP instead of HESH for their tanks).
This is my favorite new channel, you do an absolutely fantastic job hosting and explaining everything , thank you,
I can't wait to take my trip to go see this ship next month. I plan on seeing as many of the remaining battleships as I can.
from what I've studied on armor, on classes of armor: all horizontal armor is CLASS A, all vertical armor is CLASS B. the reason for the two classes is for production reasons, class B doesn't always have just one side face hardened.
The process for making class A armor is mostly casting, or pouring the metal onto a rectangular mold. then the slab is sprayed with carbon-dioxide water on it under pressure, then dragging the giant slab back thru a horizontal heat treatment, then repeated treatment to drive the carbon into the "face" of the slab, then the slab is dragged into a giant pile of burning charcoal and peat and covered with sand for months to drive even more carbon into the slab. CLASS B starts out the same way for the most part but before it gets the full time in the peat and charcoal pile they take it out and shape it--usually rolling it to thin it or to add a taper, but they often reheat it, sometimes fold it to thicken it, and sometimes forge it. STUCTURAL STEEL is made the same as class B but used for different purposes.
Note: there isn't cement used in armor. You've mistaken a process called CEMENTATION of STEEL and what is meant by this term is: 2 slabs of steel are heated to a prescribed temperature and the one slab is put on top of the other and allowed to cool very slowly (at least weeks when discussing battleship armor). the sandwich is usually put in a charcoal and peat pile as above to face harden at least one side.
Battleship New Jersey, thank you for fixing the video. I always enjoy your videos, and learn something.
Hey @Battleship New Jersey, I have recently gotten into naval vessels after visiting Pearl Harbor. I first toured a submarine before seeing the Arizona Memorial and Mighty Mo. SBX also happened to be in port at the time which was cool to see, but the sheer scale of these ships is still unfathomable to me as an engineer about to graduate. I grew up in Colorado and was from an Air Force family (just north of the academy) so I never really saw big ships or understood their scale. Because of my limited time there and my now extreme interest, I have found your videos incredibly helpful in understanding the history and science of naval ship design. I hope this channel continues to grow and help fund the museum! I will be donating as soon as I graduate in May!
Thank you, great presentation as always, look forward to the comparison between various navy's battleship armour.
I really enjoy listening to your videos while working and am really happy that your audio quality has so vastly improved. I really look forward to seeing this channel grow and learning much from such a knowledgable host
Except for that entire section where the sound and video were not synced. :-)
Your video quality just keeps getting better, good work guys!
Ryan, great job on all your videos. This channel is one of the few I subscribe to. Thank you. My dad didn't serve on a battleship, he was on the USS Duxbury Bay.
I thank this man for educating us on these ships. It's impressing how much thinking and ingeneering went into them.
Really nice video. Very informative and interesting. This is one of my favorites, and I've seen most of them.
I had wondered how armor was made. Thanks for explaining that, Ryan!
These videos are great. Thank you for making them.
"battleships aren't going to sneak up on other battleships" - USS Washington eyes Kirishima - "challenge accepted"
Ching Lee approves this comment
Entire Japanese force at 2nd Guadalcanal eyes South Dakota… “deaf, dumb and blind”.
Yup doesn’t hurt the IJN Adm Kondo originally thought they were cruisers 🤦🏻♂️
Adm Lee best gunner in the Navy sad he died so young! Loved his comment “stand aside I’m coming thru!” I bet the crew of the Washington had their chest stuck out with him in command! True surface warrior RIP Admiral
@@james23p yeh he was a sharpshooter and realised naval guns are literally just HUGE rifles lol, guy sounded like a beast!
Or HMS Duke of York sneaking up on Scharnhorst, catching her with guns still trained fore and aft
I believe the consensus, among people who've spent decades studying this very question for fun and profit, is that British Class A armor was fractionally better than anyone else's; German, Italian, and Japanese Class A armor was all so close together (for a given thickness) as to make no difference; and American Class A armor was fractionally worse than anyone else's. I don't think I've ever seen an explanation of why the British armor was so good, but IIRC the problem with the US stuff was that someone had a very clever idea that _looked_ like it worked in small-scale testing but didn't hold up at capital ship scale. (Specifically, they manufactured it with a relatively thicker hardened layer compared to everyone else - it made 6"(?) plates a bit tougher against cruiser-scale projectiles, but left 12" plates roughly 10% less resistant to 14" and 16" projectiles. But before they tested the thicker plates Congress ordered 17 brand-new fast battleships and set everyone scrambling.)
US Class B armor, OTOH, is supposed to have been the gold standard. And nobody else could _afford_ to use it as structural material throughout their ships, so advantage America on that.
One of the important questions becomes _when_ the armour plate in question was made. Germany, particularly, suffered from being cut off from supplies of the materials they wanted to use - even _Bismarck_ with her new welding techniques and weird electrodes suffered from this pre-war. Late-War German tank armour, particularly, really suffered from Germany just not having the right material to alloy with and would crack or shatter under impact.
I've read similar on the US armour, by the way. The heavy cruiser-size plates are simply _phenomenal_ but the performance didn't carry through to the battleship-size stuff.
@@Kias1dad To clarify - the thick battleship plate US steelworks turned out seems to have been on a par with the best of that produced by other nations - British plate, German plate when they weren't suffering under material shortages. It's simply that they weren't able to repeat the _very_ good cruiser plate they'd found the knack for. Regards the rest of it ... one of the things the US did uncommonly well during WWII was to identify a need and meet that need. Sure, there were moments when it didn't perform at it's best, but, generally, if the US military identified a requirement, they found a way to meet it.
@@Kias1dad
Steel manufacture is down to the methods so much so that I would expect to find variation by yard, ship, and plate - though to what appreciable degree, one could only test on irreplaceable historical artifacts.
The U.S. had major advantages in terms of supplies and having nearly completely unmolested manufacturing, so methods could be honed and improved in response to testing. Further complicating research is how things were done back then as compared to now. Many things were still trade arts and process documentation was just different. Kind of like the problems with trying to rebuild a saturn v rocket. The companies and people who did it moved on and scattered to the winds, taking what wasn't specifically chosen for preservation with them.
Confusing all of this issue may also be what various nations could do in testing or may have slated for production on one ship, but the natural chaos that unfolds during wartime production leaves questions as to whether this was able to be maintained. It is true that Germany and Britain were, prior to World War 2, ahead of America in terms of steel processing. Or, at the very least, had the better documentation to show they did a thing. Maybe America had a more advanced process in someone's company, somewhere - but it wasn't regarded as the standard.
The sciences to change the hardness of metals is incredibly complex, try heating metals in ovens filled with pure Hydrogen.............
@@Kias1dad Unfortunately Dunnigan & Nofi don't provide a source (or indeed any basis) for their claim - a claim I've never seen made elsewhere. Even more unfortunately, just a few pages later in the same chapter they also state that the Japanese battlecruiser _Kirishima_ was sunk by scuttling the morning after her fight with USS _South Dakota_ and _Washington,_ which appears to be Just Wrong despite actually being a much simpler thing to get right.
Meanwhile actual records of actual penetration tests, with different sizes and types of shells fired against different types and thicknesses of armor from different sources, report that US "Class A" armor of the mid-30s on - which was, uniquely, face-hardened to 55% of its total thickness - was excessively brittle. As a result, while it was by far the best in the world at rejecting hits from 8" and smaller shells, it shattered too easily when struck by 14" and 16" armor-piercing shells.
Very interesting, and well-explained, thank you.
Kind of enjoying the enhanced camera work. Y’all are doing great.
Absolutely wonderful video!!!
You are a wealth of information sir! Love your videos.
Most definitely would like to see a Nation comparative armor vid ... I know most nations adopted the Krupp process by WWI, but over time and technological advances I would venture nation specific variances occurred ... Love all your vids
Would love that video of different nations armor
th-cam.com/video/BoEFjl0buiM/w-d-xo.html
Nice camera work. Feels like a step up. The 2 camera shoot and more interesting framing are nice choices
"Battleships aren't gonna sneak up on other battleships..."
Scharnhorst circa Boxing Day, 1943 would like a word.
LOL! That's for sure.
Great videos, thanks!
Good video. The specifics of manufacturing those huge pieces of armor and guns is fascinating. Perhaps someday you can make a video about it in detail.
I was thinking the same
drachinifel (a ship history channel) has a vid on it
Not just manufacturing the pieces but how you made a ship out of them. How can you weld a plate that is 6 inches thick?
@@airplanes42 I believe that most of the large pieces are bolted on but a more detailed video would be great.
*Thanks for posting this video!!!*
Commented on earlier version that didn't play for me. That version apparently worked full length for some because it had lots of comments about different steels.
Also no go for me. Only 1:30 long with no sound.... This version fine..
Love this educational trip around/thu BB62. I have made donations in the past. YES I would like to hear an armor comparison. Also, again, I want more of anything you can find about MY favorite computer: Hannibal's Mark 1. I'm a retired mechanic, any computer with gears has my name all over it.
When you make structural repairs or when a battleship goes into drydock, is mild steel used? Would you choose replacement steel more for it's anti-corrosion properties today?
Mild steel is the most likely choice. Choosing a different alloy of steel would result in dissimilar metal corrosion, for example stainless on regular steel, so you just get the same alloy but not necessarily hardened.
yea that would be a great video comparing different country's armor!
*Great Video*
I remember on old robert Ballard film on Bismarck where he visited the shipyard where she was built. They still had a section of the armor belt and it was truly massive.
The section is still displayed at the Blohm&Voss shipyard here in Hamburg/Germany
Yes please, I would love to see a video comparison of armor from various nations.
Having walked down the ladder into the Citadel on the Missouri and walking broadway, that hatch there and the armor you're inside is INCREDIBLE! As far as the best battleship armor would be US armor, everything I've read, from Friedman to online accounts as well as talking to Dick Landgraff when he was working on my 1st ship (USS Essex) and played Santa on her in 1994.
Definitely, please do a series about armor with comparisons of different countries.
good audio, nice change of pace compared to some other videos x,D
Would love to see the comparison between various countries steelmaking
Look forward to a comparison. I remember reading somewhere that the US was the only country who could afford to use STS, I few comments about the cost would be nice. Also how armor interacts to Decap shells. And lets see. Slope, and the New Jersey having internal armor vs traditional external armor. Almost identical to SD class. those guys were tough as nails in a small for factor. 10,000 tons is a lot to pay for a few knots of speed.
Ryan forgot to mention the strongest armor ever invented - plot armor
Mmmm, plot armor, never heard of this!!!
Very tough armor indeed. Worked well on the battlecarrier HMS MaRey Sueeeee.
The last Video was all about that!
IJN Kira Yamato for aimbot and plot armor.
I really dislike “gamers” indulging in serious factual discussions of reality, not fantasy.
This video just made me realize that the ship doesn’t have guns, the guns have a ship.
That's correct. Battleships are basically a floating version of the A-10 Warthog, a gun that has a plane attached.
I'd say it's more like a floating version of an AC-130. Sure the A-10 has the GAU-8, but the AC-130 has a 105mm cannon along with 40mm Bofors along with an assortment of 20mm or 25 mms battling guns.
@@bobmartin4942 The Spectre is definitely a beast of a plane, however the C-130 was adapted to carry all that firepower. The A-10, on the other hand, started out as a GAU and they built the plane around it as a delivery vehicle, much in the same way that battleships are purpose-built for getting their guns to the battlefield.
Thats the same realization I had after watching a video about the F4U-Corsair. The engine had 1800 hp, the prop was 13 feet tall, had to purpose build the plane for that engine. I thought to myself, the engine wasn't attached to the plane, the plane was attached to the engine! It still amazes me how I can really get into the appeal of a great Battleship, when in reality all it is, is just a way of floating those big guns around on the water.
Thanks very much for the armor study on the Iowa's.
I developed armor for the U.S. military some years ago.
It was great entertainment to blow vehicles up in the testing phase.
My issue with virtually every study of armored vehicles and vessel's was the lack of armor explanations in nearly everyone of the tutorials.
This is by far the best study I've ever seen, for Battlships.
My favorite battleship is the USS Oregon.
Yes, I would like to see a video comparing nations' armor!
Very educational.
Best battleship armor? Probably the UK. German face-hardened steel was really good but their armor schemes were a bit iffy; Japanese steel stunk on ice but they knew that and used a lot of it to compensate. American Class A was only OK, though American Class B/STS was awesome and the fact that we used STS everywhere helped a lot. That said, pretty much all British armor was best in the world or near to. Italian and French armor I know less about, but IIRC it's pretty good too - better homogeneous armor than Germany but not as good face-hardened IIRC.
Of course, there are reasonable arguments to be made about this. All in all I'd probably rather be on a KGV if I had to be on a ship taking hits from BB shells, but I'd rather be on an Iowa if being deluged with DD/CL shells.
LOVE this channel! 🏆🏆🏆🏆😎🇺🇸
Your lectures are really impressing me with the complexity of these beasts! And, how quickly they were able to build them in spite of the complexity. We absolutely could not do that today.
Question: was all that armor plate ever put to the test? We're any of our BB's ever hit by any large munitions?
South Dakota was hit on the Babette of number 3 turret by a 14" AP projectile...it failed to penetrate the barbette and rotated 90 degrees and came to rest between the shell plating and the barrette armor; not that it did Kirishima any good...
I've seen this video like 10 times to understand it well :)
In old Navy Bureau of Ordnance pubs, armor plate was referred to as "jewelry steel." It was the most expensive kind of steel that the Navy purchased for ships, and the reference was to the great expense and complexity of manufacture.
Great video
The Best video...thanks Ryan......Class B / STS #1 for homogenous.....for face hardened armor none can beat ......Italian Terni armor
Love your videos!
It would be great to have a video comparing different nations armor.
Comparing other armors would be awesome!
Having some discussions here about how much it would cost to fully refurbish and update an Iowa to full working condition, and recommision it again, could you maybe provide some insights on how much you think it would cost, including fitting new CIWS, radars, electronics, some launch cells, and some new gunpowder and shells... It would be great to hear!
You have an incredible knowledge of battleships for a younger person.
Sleep < battleship New Jersey videos
You could make an approximation spalling with and without backing,. Using a high speed camera, capture the moment of impact of a piece of glass. Then repeat the process with a thin piece of lexan attached to the back of the glass with adhesive.
I would very much like to see a description of the different types of armor used by the nations that constructed battleships.
You're flippin great. Also, now I know what the word, "obliquity" means.
Ryan, this video was very educational. My grandfather and some Uncles worked in the production of making steel for the Detroit auto industry in the 1930 until 1960’s . Using Concrete as a filler was something I didn’t know. Are there other areas that a filler like concrete is used on the NJ?
Thank you.
I've said this before but these are incredibly well thought out balanced ships
British belt armour was specified in pounds, a true square ft of inch thick plate is around 40.8 pounds which is why the 600lb belt sections on KGV were 14.7 inch not 15 inch. Seems like the US use weight specified plates up to 240 lb plate and thickness specified over that whilst the British used weight specified at all thickness.
In a previous video, you mentioned a naval exercise where an Iowa was able to sneak away during the night and the next day took out the entire Nimitz carrier group.
I would love to see a detailed video on that story.
Edit: I guess this video is a re-upload from the big 1 min pause?
As, I can see history of my post with same request but video is grey on thumbnail. So the old vid was deleted?
Comparing the armor from our county and others would be great
I would like to see the armor comparisons
Ryan, I know that Drachinifel has heavily criticized the "turtle-back" armor scheme of the German Kriegsmarine. But you have to admit, the Krupp Cemented and Krupp face hardened armor allowed both BISMARCK and SCHARNHORST to absorb a lot of gunfire before they sank. Thanks for uploading the he new video. The earlier one kept stopping.
Ehh, the turtleback armour did what it was supposed to - provide good staying power in short-range slugging matches, which is was _Bismarck's_ final battle was. That's what the North Sea favours a lot of the time. Has _Bismarck_ been facing off against the USN and their preference for long-range gunnery I suspect she'd have sunk rather quicker.
if I recall correctly, there was even a survey done on the Bismarck in the early 2000s - it came to the conclusion that although it has sustained extensive damage and would have sunk on its own eventually, the damage sustained was nowhere near enough to sink it as "quickly" as it did. Meaning that even after the prolonged shelling it did sustain, the armor was still effective enough to render the short-range bombardment largely ineffective.
@@AdamSmith-kq6ys I see your point. As a matter of fact, didn't IJN KIRISHIMA lose to U.S.S. WASHINGTON in such the long range duel that you describe?
@@lloydknighten5071 Umm, I'm not sure what our point of comparison is here. Is an uprated battlecruiser as tough as a genuine battleship? No. Did _Kirishima_ have a turtleback armour scheme? I don't believe so. Would seem a little academic on a 230mm belt, anyway. I'm not sure if the _Washington_ thing is a bit of a derp moment or a bit of sass - _Washington_ took apart _Kirishima_ at ranges less than 10,000 yards, once the IJN had managed to distinguish themselves from the USN by the field expedient of setting all of the other USN ships on fire.
@@ranekeisenkralle8265 not really ineffective. The damage sustained by Bismarck was huge - all turrets were inoperable, crews dead or otherwise incapacitated. Meaning: The ship ceased to be an operation threat so whether it sank quickly from gunfire or nor is moot.
This was before double spaced steel armor with kevlar spall liners became popular for warship builders
Would love to see a vid comparing other nations battleship armour especially Italy Germany and Japan.
It’s here ... it’s gone... it’s back. Now it’s watched too. How can I sponsor the comparison video between the various nations? And can it be at the level of (1) types of armor, (2) steel composition for types, (3) ideas of where each was used on their battleship/heavy cruisers and (4) effectiveness?
I’ll even help with the research 😇.
Not trying to steal time, but th-cam.com/video/BoEFjl0buiM/w-d-xo.html for a history of different armors.
I would very much like to see a comparison video to other countries. I knew a little bit about ours before this vid but nothing to speak of from others.
I video about the nations armor and how they set it up and why would be great.
Examples
IJN went with a softer plate because they were concerned about shells hitting water 1st and getting a water hammer effect.
Or KM ships like Bismarck had armor and guns for north sea and Atlantic engagement s that would be shorter ranged in a choppy sea. But IJN and US expected big swells of the Pacific and longer ranges.
Fun stuff when looking at what kind of fight the planners were armoring for.
Im very curious as to where the Iowa class battleships steel was made at. Not the Navy yard where the ship was constructed, but where the actual steel was made for these ships.
a comparison of armor would be interesting.
but I think it would be more interesting to know if the combination of different armor qualities and the different shell capabilities led to any sorts of emergent qualitative differences between ship classes of different navies.
like, If its true that everyone was always building ships that protect against their own guns, could the relatively weaker shell and fuzes of the brits, combined with their high armor quality have led to the reputation of their ships having relatively light plating?
or conversely, could the US's very good shell/gun/fuzing combined with decent but not world beating armor quality have led to their reputation for building thicc well defended heavy and slow ships.
Typical analysis is that these differences were from distinctly different design priorities, but its not obvious to me that the largest differences were not from technological imperative if a rule like "everyone was always building ships that protect against their own guns" is true.
I would love to see a video comparing the steal of all the major WWII combatants.
Howdy, I would love to know if the navy ever made any considerations toward using smoothe bore guns on warships? Like on tanks and similar weapon systems?
Probably not as the rounds are designed for different things. Tank rounds are designed to be small enough for lots to be carried in a rather confined space and be man-portable. They need to go really really fast to hit fast moving targets and get through feet of armor. Most of the targets will be destroyed or rendered inopperable by a single hit. Im speaking of tank on tank combat APFSDS rounds which require smooth bores.
Battleship rounds can be massive because they are moved by machinery. They are also essentially big bombs that fall to their targets. They can penetrate but by being so massive can generally do that pretty well. (I think there is some armor at some ranges that will stop a 16 in ap round, but its sparse and heavy) even so many many rounds will often be needed to hit a battleship to dissable or destroy it.
So function dictates form. It would be cool to see a 15 foot long apfsds round being fired from one of these guns though. But it would only drive a relatively small hole through whatever it hits. Less penetration is traded for an explosion in reality.
I'd really like to see the manufacturing process for the armored steel and how those extremely thick plates for the torpedo belt were shipped and installed.
They folded them up and mailed them in a large yellow envelope.
When they arrived at the shipyard, the builders just had to hammer a couple wrinkles out before installing them.
Ryan, how do they attach the armor plate to the ship, and is it full penetration welds if welded? Thank you so much. Really enjoyed this Video.....Paul
Good question
I've always been curious about that myself, like are the plates beveled back and filled with built up welds or are they evenly spaced from each other and filled like a slot weld.
Drachinifel has addressed this in one of his Drydock Q&A videos. Basically, the softer back of the armor plate is drilled and tapped for massive bolts in huge numbers.
@@kemarisite Thank You so much Sir.....Cheers
one question, was there muggings on the new jersey
Would like to see a video on other nations battleship armor
What sort of corrosion protection did the various armored and unarmored parts of the ship have? Is class A or B armor or STS more or less susceptible to corrosion than mild steel or HTS? Did any of the armor plating ever have to be replaced due to corrosion damage?
Please make video comparing diffrent nations armor.
Hahahhahahha “a pound sign”.
Hilarious! I love it.
What thickness of armor was on the top of the turrets ? Remember plunging shell fire could be worse than a bomb, especially armor piercing shells from an enemy battleship.
A related topic to this theme is “scrap”. Consider why there is little economic incentive to scrap major war ships. They are proverbial elephants.
And how do you eat an elephant? One bit at a time of course. But how and where to take that first bite? And every bite there after? Thats the rub. So an obsolete aircraft carrier sells quite well. An old battleship? Well lets make it a museum because few really want to chew up that tough old elephant.
But some have. Argentina salvaged portions of the Graf Spree superstructure in the early war years. Why? They had domestic industry but were dependent on imported steel. This was cut off when war were declared. Then the GS was scuttled right there in the Plate River. With portions of the superstructure above water. They went out and cut great chunks off with considerable difficulty. Carted it home and made stuff, with great difficulty. So. For example the Ballister Molina pistol, a variation of the 1911 pistol made in Argentina. Those made in the early 1940’s are highly prized today because they were machined from GS armour plate. Not because it was “better”, but because it was all they could get. As soon as they could get mild steel thats what they used.
Now today there is a cottage industry salvaging pre-1945 naval wrecks. Much to the frustration of those who view them as war memorials, or the testing place of the crews. Why are they so desirable?
All steel smelted or re-smelted after 1945 has traces of radioactive elements from the atonic bombs used and tested. Not such as to pose a risk to human health, but note than enough to mess up an xray or MRI. These highly sensitive medical and industrial machines must be built of “low background” materials. And the best source is the steel in pre-1945 ships. Ideally steel that is not too thick, nor too deep to salvage. So the Bismarck, Graf Spree and New Jersey are off the table. Too deep, and too hard to cut up economically. What is ideal is a destroyer or light cruiser, in shallow water, in a small country that welcomes the income over remembrance of the dead of another nation.
Once a cottage industry, the speciality salvage is now established. And the low hanging fruit is now gone. They now look at larger ships in deeper water....and eye the museum ships as potential future fare. They are again nibbling at the Graf Spree as price of “clean old steel” goes up. Salvage becomes economically viable.
So. A slightly different perspective for consideration in your discussion.
So here is our video on pre-nuclear steel: th-cam.com/video/tQTk3Y3EOWs/w-d-xo.html
As far as scrapping these ships go, separating all of the things apart and removing the toxic components and paint and insulation is so expensive that it eats up most of the profits from scrapping it.
@@BattleshipNewJersey Excellent! I have not seen it. Your a jump ahead.
Yes. Economically it makes no sense to scrap them. They make great museums.
@@BattleshipNewJersey I watched your referenced video. Very good! You asked one question. Contact with air has no effect. But smelting does. Thus pre-atomic steel can be collected from surface or subsurface sources. No matter. It can be cut mechanically but not torched. Any melting introduces contaminated air. Nor can that steel be smelted or forged. But it can be sheared and machined. Even cold rolled.
Rest easy. While New jersey steel is “clean” the chunks are too big. Keep it a museum. All good.
I think you're looking for two different words:
Splinters that are formed at the back of an armor plate are called spall (eg. the the shell that hits the armour causes spalling)
Splinters that are created during an explosion (bomb, explosive shell) are called shrapnel.
Hello, i just discovered your channel and i apreciate it very much. But as an European it's fearly difficult to translate imperial units to metric system in my mind to realise what size we talked about. And a vidéo like this with lot of numbers on a non linear scale is really confusing. It's perfectly normal you use it this as american but it can be great, and i think not so time consuming, for your international viewers to add on screen post-prod metric conversion. Thanks and good work.
Yes to armor comparison
During construction and early service were these armor numbers classified?
How about telling us about the structure of the Bismarck?
I think the armor design (i.e. placement, angling, internal structure) would have been more significant than the armor's metallurgy, except perhaps for properties like the "type A and B" concept described here. In actual history, there's probably not enough good data to compare the performance of any battleship armor designs, even in ships that fought at Jutland.
I'd like to see a video comparing the various nation's armor. That would be really cool.
I've heard that the UK and Germany had the best all-around face hardened armor, but the US and Italians had face-hardened armor that could surpass them at specific thicknesses.
could you talk about how the hardened class A armor plates are connected to each other to form a continuous belt. I assume class A can't be welded due to its heat treat being diminished/damaged.
How do you weld different class steel together?
How did they join all these thick plates? How does the class A in the front of the turret physically connect to the class B on the sides? There's no way a weld to penetrate that deep. Thank you!!!
I beleive these plates were riveted/bolted onto a structural framework. Welding is great for structural work, but yes it is difficult to mount a heavy armor plate using a weld.
I'm here!
It's still amazing to think that mankind knew he wouldn't be considered the pentacle of all species until he made tens of thousands of tons of steel float.