I placed a scaled image of KGV over Krishima, and centred it on the waterline, and fore and aft. I then used Lundgrens diagram showing the hit locations.Bgile wrote:
A 16" AP shell would be unlikely to explode on contact with the water. It would arm the fuze and explode .035 seconds later. That might do significant damage to the ship, depending on where it hit. If it travelled a short distance underwater and then passed through armor before exploding, it would probably not be seen by washington as a hit. I imagine most hits are seen by the bright flash caused by kinetic enerygy of impact and the actual explosion behind armor wouldn't be seen. I get this from my experience with tank gunnery where we would fire sabot at old tank hulks and even though there was no explosive involved there would be a flash on impact easily seen in bright sunlight.
According to Lundgren the most damaging hits were the ones that fell short, dived and penetrated into the machinery spaces, hits 6, 7, 16 and 19. However, the effect the hitting the water is to fuse the shells and decap the shells, and decapped, they probably will not penetrate the belt, and if they do they probably won't be effective, and the SPS armoured bulkhead will probably contain what ever does get through. For example at if we assume a 1900fps SV upon entering the water, and a 1850 SV after being decapped and striking the belt, and a 5d inclination, we get a partial penetration and broken, ineffective projectile. Hits 2, 3, 4, 5, 9, 10, 12, 13, and 14 will strike the unarmoured hull above the MAD except 5 which strikes at the base of the superstructure abaft B turret. Some will not detonate and will pass through, some may detonate but the thick MAD will prevent the massive damage that occurred on Kirishima. Hit 1 would strike the bridge, at almost the same spot as per Bismarck on May 24, 1941. Hits 8 and 17 would hit A and B barbettes respectively , at their forward edges. There is a probability that the barbette will prevent penetration, depending on the effective obliquity. Hit 18 would be a direct hit on A turret's face plate which would knock out the turret. Hit 11 would dive but strike the forward belt extension, and would probably penetrate it and detonate forward. Hit 15 would strike the turtle deck aft, forward of the steering compartment, while hit 20 would strike the after, starboard, prop.
The summary is that KGV would have A turret gone, and have quite a bit of damage above the MAD. There would be flooding forward and maybe some aft. B turret may be inoperable. One prop shaft would be damaged, but the steering and propulsion are intact, and she would steam away at ~25 knots to fight another day.