Torpedoes on Bismarck???

Discussions about the history of the ship, technical details, etc.

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miro777
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Post by miro777 »

hey
hmmm so i will take it as that no one knows
why the British BB had TT on them????


kk
adios
miro
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marcelo_malara
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Post by marcelo_malara »

Ok, I ´ve got the full picture now. But if you can´t disable the mines directly in the path, there is no much use in having the paravanes on board.
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Ulrich Rudofsky
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Post by Ulrich Rudofsky »

The question of head-on collision avoidance goes back to at least the US Civil War. Ships had some sort of below the waterline long "bowsprit", I think called cow catchers. The telescoping bow boom of the Bismarck is another interesting subject.

http://kbismarck.com/books/kafbook.html
“Kriegsmarine am Feind” [The Kriegsmarine engaging the Enemy] with original text and translation can be obtained from Jose Rico. There is a chapter of a whole sequence of minesweeping action photos, as shown below.

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b138/ ... y/p103.jpg

... the bow protector [Bugschutz] is deployed....I think that may have changed the bow wave pattern and also served as a harness for the cables rather than being protection against explosions.
Ulrich
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tommy303
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Post by tommy303 »

A ship encountering a mine directly in its path will usually take the hit not dead on the bow but farther aft along the side. This is because a ship moving through the water creates a pressure wave which will swing a tethered mine outwards, and as the bow wave pressure lessens, the mine swings back in striking the ship. Paravane cables rigged from the bow will generally catch any mine directly in the ships path even though they are well out board.

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miro777
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Post by miro777 »

hello

kk no one is listening to me????

NO ONE can tell me wat>?
Die See ruft....
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wadinga
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Post by wadinga »

Miro,

Keep your hair on!!!!!

I expect you are right, I don't think anybody knows as it made no sense at all. With main armament capable of firing 30,000 yds, torpedoes with a real maximum effective range of c.5000 yds (I mean hitting a target not just how far the engine keeps running) are pointless.

Here are two wildcard possibilities:

Old fashioned pre WW1 battleships used to have steam picket boats and a really "off the Wall" idea was that they would use them to take torpedoes to attack enemy vessels in harbour. Since the battleship would have to store and maintain torpedoes they might as well have tubes to launch them as well .

British officers who were frightened to open fire at German ships at night at close range at Jutland and give away their own position might have wished for stealth weapons like torpedoes and convinced designers to install them. If Cunningham's battleships had launched torpedoes at point blank range at Matapan, they might have proved useful.

http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WTBR_PreWWII.htm shows a pile of wrecked torpedoes landed from the damaged Nelson.

Is that an answer?

All the Best
wadinga
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miro777
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Post by miro777 »

hey

yeah those answers seem reasoable...
thanx

miro
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RF
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Post by RF »

miro777 wrote:hey

another dangerous things on ships, although not exactly concerning battleships or the Bismarck, were mines!!!

The HK Pinguin had a ship load of mines in store and in her final battle a shell from HMS Cornwall hit that store room and u can all imagine wat happened?
she Blowed Up!!!

miro
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