Note that I suggested the that the shell might hit one of Bismarck's shells. I agree that Bismarck's powder magazine were one deck up and behind the main belt and scarp. However, I suspect that an explosion in the shell room might easily send a flash into the powder magazines. Another possible disaster for Bismarck at Denmark Straits would be if a diving shell entered one of the forward engine rooms. That might either cause huge off centre flooding, probably disabling the armament until the list could be corrected, or take out two thirds of Bismarck's power. The point is that Bismarck would have been vulnerable to the shells that hit Tosa or Aki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_battleship_Tosa. Admittedly, that shell misfunctioned by not initiating when it hit the water but a functioning Type 91 shell was designed to give that performance.alecsandros wrote: ... Bismarck's powder magazines were not located in the same positions as US and Japanese battleships. The theoretical shell you are presenting would not hit the magazines.
Not to mention there were only 1 or 2 Type91 shells in the entire war that actualy worked as designed...
We don't know from WW2 battles how well the Type 91 shells were designed. The only time that an IJN battleship fired at a target on a near parallel course was off Guadalcanal and the range may have been too short for those shells to dive. At least one 8 inch seems to have hit after skipping.
I specified the secondary magazines. My Google foo was not sufficient to find a diagram of South Dakota but http://hnsa.org/doc/plans/ has plans of USS New Jersey and page 10 shows the powder magazines on the third deck.alecsandros wrote: South Dakota's powder magazines were deep inside the ship and could not be reached by 8" or 14" APC shells at the ranges in existence during the second battle for Guadalcanal, even if they would perforate the main armored belt.