Naval History Forums

Hi All, Leafing through Siegfried Breyer's Battleships and Battlecruisers there are a number of speculative plans from 1939 onwards for the battleships to come after Bismarck/Tirpitz . He notes these were more design exercises, given the state of the war and resources, than ships to be actually buil...

Hi All, If you are looking for a Christmas Bargain this site https://www.naval-military-press.com/product-category/world-war-ii/war-at-sea/ are selling these huge format reproductions of these hand drawn guides at the knockdown price of £9.99 each, list price £60.00! I got the seven volume set last ...

Hi Marc, In principle gunnery officers would surely like to have as many long baseline rangefinders as possible. The theoreticians at AVKS may say the low mounts have limitations, but Dora in both Bismarck and Tirpitz actually retained theirs and, as we know there was no new construction completed a...

Hi Duncan et al, Indeed the KGV design did conform to the requirement for low elevation dead ahead fire. The action examples you raise are interesting cases but based on WWI experience are IMHO unusual. As a result of its aggressive tradition the RN expected to be chasing a fleeing enemy, but the wh...

Hi All, This is an interesting thread with enlightening contributions from all. :clap: It is of course true that pretty much all major German warships (including Bismarck ) had their prows rebuilt with the so-called Atlantic Clipper bow to minimise spray and waves over the foredeck to address the sh...

Hi All, There are two significant phrases here: HMS Vanguard proved to be a much better seaboat for rough North Atlantic conditions excellent [indifferent? :shock: ] seagoing vessels with calm, flat pitching and low rolling movements Herr Nilsson can you clarify whether the contradiction in the latt...

Hi Marcelo, Agreed, once you have achieved 4 in your list above and secured fuel for an escorting Italian Fleet there is no need to travel overland. "Rommel of the Afrika Corps" would never have existed if he had needed to drive all the way to Libya from southern Europe. (No ADAC breakdown...

Hi All, The spanker sail (or jigger) was a useful additional control device to assist the rudder in steering the vessel, but it did tend to "shadow" the lower square sail on the mizzen (mizen) deployed from the cross jack yard. For this reason this lowest square sail was often not deployed...

Hi Marcelo, Over the years Herr Nilsson has proved he has original source material beyond our widest dreams, and he releases a quantum every now and then for our amazement and enjoyment. :clap: :clap: :clap: Even more enigmatically, sometimes he hints that he is constrained from allowing some of the...

Hi Fatboy, H T Lenton's mammoth effort British and Empire Warships of the Second World War says they were HA weapons, which could obviously be used for low angle fire as well. It says nothing about the disposition of the Lewis guns. Naval Weapons of WWII by Campbell mentions both 3" and 12 pdr ...

Hi All, There was, of course, a huge glut of scrap steel immediately after WW1 and it might well have been the cost of scrapping was more than the value. As Byron pointed out, the ships were in extremely poor condition when they sailed to the UK, with maintenance having been non-existent for months ...

Hello Michael L, You make some very valid points,but....... Bismarck would have turned broadside-on and steered the opposite direction to Rodney Good, just when Lutjens needs to make the speediest progress towards safety, he is forced to turn at right angles to his desired course. This allows Tovey,...

Hi Michael L, I do not think you have been either "squirreled" or "rabbited" certainly not intentionally, whatever those terms mean. What has come out of your excellent calculation is that Repulse cannot be at such a showdown, and even PoW may be too far astern to catch up. KGV w...

Hi All, Hi Marcelo, a great deal of effort goes into achieving neutral buoyancy so those tiny little up and down thrusters can move it vertically. The people carrying out the extended search pattern were covering all bases. Accounts of Titanic missions say they have to use thrusters to stay in posit...

Hi All, I'm a great fan of James Cameron's movies but his comment Not only did he condemn the "prolonged" search for the sub after it lost contact, but he also said he "knew" the sub was sitting exactly under its last known position. is not helpful. He displays extreme hindsight ...