Hello everybody,
thanks to Byron Angel for the above posted turning data for British ships.
However, the turn to avoid Hood wreckage was anyway irrelevant in terms of course alteration:
at open fire, on course 300°, bearing was 335° and it was an impossible one for Y turret that had 45° blind angle fore on each side. On course 280° bearing 335° was possible by only 10° but the bearing was slowly diminishing during the battle due to the geometry of the approach, at 6:00 PoW was firing at Bismarck her guns (including Y turret) at a true bearing 330°-329°. Thus at 6:00 the turret was almost wooded again (5° margin only, that explains Holland decision for a further turn, the one never executed).
The "avoiding" maneuver cannot have been but a simple hard turn of the helm to starboard and few seconds later a hard counter-turn (perfectly logical as PoW was already around 300 meters to the right of Hood and did not strictly need to turn away from the wreckage). Such a "maneuver" would have made PoW rolling violently (full speed + full rudder), but actually changing course by 5°- 10° only (as per Rowell map, but less emphasized), not even wooding Y turret for more than 20 seconds, as the RoF was one salvo every 20 seconds at that point in time and Y turret lost no shot at all, as proven by the PoW GAR (see
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=8335&start=135#p81455).
Therefore the "avoiding maneuver" was actually just a rolling movement, with a minimum course change that is not even depicted in the PoW salvo plot.
Byron Angel wrote: "The portrayal of the Hood/PoW track as possessing a gentle curvature to port does nicely address the issue of PoW's Y turret "wooding". Based upon the McMullen PoW salvo plot, with its assumed steady course of 280deg throughout the period from 0555 up to 0600 hrs and the recorded target bearings over that span of time, it is impossible to make any geometrical sense as to how Y turret could have been "wooded" up until 0557:30 and able to bear thereafter."
It maybe addresses the above "issue" but it's a "curvature" imagined by PG officers who were totally unable to tactically read the situation that day and who even imagined that PoW ("King George" in the map) was coming from North, together with Norfolk (see PG map detail here below), instead of coming from South together with Hood.
- PG_map_detail.jpg (54.73 KiB) Viewed 1601 times
The fact that PoW was on course 280° from 05:38, then on course 300° from 05:50, then back on 280° from 5:55 is on her map (
http://www.hmshood.com/history/denmarks ... Wtrack.jpg) and all her turns "
by blue pendant" are clearly described in Leach narrative (attached to Tovey despatches), matching perfectly with the PoW map. The turns may have been executed very smoothly instead of the depicted angles, but the course is well defined and not questionable.
The "issue" why, after having turned 20° to port to 280°, the Y turret did not fire immediately at 05:55, opening fire only after 05:57 has been discussed and several answers are possible: 1) the map is slightly wrong, depicting the turn at 05:55 when it was ordered at 05:55 and actually executed only at 05:57; 2) the turn execution was started at 05:55 but in such a slow way (resulting in a "gentle curvature" as per PG map) that it took almost two minutes to open arcs, in order not to disrupt gunnery with a hard turn; 3) due to the proximity of the aft superstructure to the Y turret, fire was not open immediately, at high elevation, to avoid damages to personnel/material while the fore turret were still looking for the range. Only when elevation was lower, fire was opened, still on extreme fore bearing, as range had just been acquired and maximum output was required, despite possible self-inflicted damages.
For sure the solution is not in trying to use the PG track for the British ships in reconstructing the battle, because it is totally wrong and "
useless" in this regard.
@all:
I still see neither anyone willing to accept the Antonio's proposal for the 06:00 starting point" to reconstruct the battle and try to draw a battlemap (
download/file.php?id=3311), nor an alternative one...
Bye, Alberto