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Bismarck water line

Posted: Wed Oct 14, 2020 3:14 am
by boby34
Hello I am building a 1/200 scale model of the Bismark. I am painting the hull can any body tell me where to locate the water line. I mean can any body give a measurment from the bottom of the hull. Thank you Paul

Re: water line

Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2020 1:40 am
by José M. Rico
Hello and welcome to the forums!
The waterline is located between 8.0 and 10.45 meters from the keel.
Color RAL 7016.

Re: water line

Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2020 2:12 am
by boby34
Thank you very much for the information.

Re: water line

Posted: Sat Oct 17, 2020 8:52 am
by Herr Nilsson
José M. Rico wrote: Thu Oct 15, 2020 1:40 am Hello and welcome to the forums!
The waterline is located between 8.0 and 10.45 meters from the keel.
Color RAL 7016.
Eh?
What’s the source of these figures? The lower bound is officially 8.5 meters (but that is debatable, IMHO it‘s the lower edge of the belt armor) and the upper bound is 10.52 meters.

Re: water line

Posted: Sat Oct 17, 2020 3:46 pm
by José M. Rico
Herr Nilsson wrote: Sat Oct 17, 2020 8:52 am What’s the source of these figures?
Photos of the ship in Hamburg, August 1940.
The lower edge is certainly below 8.5 m, and the top edge is closer to the 10.4 mark than 10.6.
Did they change the position of the waterline when the ship was repainted in early 1941?

Re: water line

Posted: Sat Oct 17, 2020 8:07 pm
by Herr Nilsson
José,

each number of the draught marks is 10 cm high. The 4 represents 40-50 cm. The 6 represents 60-70 cm. The empty space between 4 and 6 represents 50-60 cm. The top edge of the waterline is very close to the top edge of the 4. That means it‘s about 52 cm. This would approximately correlate to the draught of 9.522+1 meters.
As I said the lower edge is debatable, but why exactly 8 meters?

Re: water line

Posted: Sun Oct 18, 2020 6:54 pm
by José M. Rico
My mistake! I read the draft marks wrong.
You are correct, the top edge of the waterline is more between 10.50-10.55 m. I had no idea there was an "official" 10.52 figure, so that should be fine.
As for the bottom edge, I just made a guess assuming the draft marks go from 8 to 13 meters, but since the seawater obscures the lower hull in the photos, I can't say for sure.
It could be that the waterline goes as deep as the Upper Platform deck, 7.9 meters over the keel. Wasn't the lower riveted edge of the 60mm splinter belt at the same height as the U.P. deck?

Re: water line

Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2020 2:29 pm
by Herr Nilsson
Well, the November 1941 paint job instruction orders 1 m above and below CWL. CWL is 9.50 m. Obviously the waterline ends slightly above 10.5 m. It's just my speculation that the draught on construction displacement (9.522 m) could possibly explain the difference.

In regard of the lower edge I wouldn't rule out 8.5 m definitely. There is a straight line visible in better quality pictures.
Waterline 2.jpg
Waterline 2.jpg (64.18 KiB) Viewed 4266 times
However, IMHO the lower edge of the waterlinie is possibly derived from the imperial instructions which means the waterline is equivalent to the lower edge of the armor belt. Wreck pictures seem to confirm this.

Re: water line

Posted: Wed Oct 21, 2020 12:19 am
by José M. Rico
That straight line at 8.5 m is interesting.
It is not a plate weld, and it is not the lower edge of the 60mm belt either since that was located at 7.9 meters and was riveted.
The color seems to be the same as the upper part but darker, so perhaps is just an optical effect due to surface being wet?

Re: water line

Posted: Wed Oct 21, 2020 2:02 am
by Steve Crandell
The surface would be wet in a perfectly straight line? I think it must be a plate overlap of some kind, if it isn't armor maybe just skin plating.

Re: water line

Posted: Sun May 02, 2021 3:10 am
by José M. Rico
Herr Nilsson wrote: Mon Oct 19, 2020 2:29 pm CWL is 9.50 m. Obviously the waterline ends slightly above 10.5 m. It's just my speculation that the draught on construction displacement (9.522 m) could possibly explain the difference.
Marc,

Why the difference of 22 mm between the Construction Waterline and the Construction Draft? Is that because the KWL does not include the thickness of the bottom skin plates (moulded draft)? I can not think of any other reason.
The 9.5 meter Konstruktionswasserlinie (KWL) corresponds to "WL 12" in Bismarck half-breadth plan, and that gives us a distance between waterlines of 0.7916 m. "WL 11" would then be located at 8.7 meters which is given as "Standard draft" by Breyer/Koop. "WL 19" would be located at 15 meters which corresponds to the depth of the hull.

Also, Breyer/Koop give a "Construction draft" of 9.3 meters. The same 9.3 m. figure is given in the Bismarck/Richelieu comparison document. Other sources have 9.3 m as "design draft". So the question is, if 9.3 is not construction draft, then what is it?

Re: Bismarck water line

Posted: Sun May 02, 2021 1:38 pm
by Herr Nilsson
José,

we have to distinguish between "Konstruktionstiefe" (construction depth) = 9.5 m and "Konstruktionstiefgang" (construction draft) = 9.522 m. Construction depth (as well as "Seitenhöhe" (side height) = 15 m) is measured without hull plating. The bottom plating is 22 mm. Construction draft is construction depth + bottom plating.

9.5 m and 9.3 m are both correct values.
9.5 m is the construction depth and corresponds to the CWL, which is WL 12.
9.3 m (actually 9.302 m) ist the draft at the (calculated) construction weight.

Construction displacement and CWL do not belong together! There was a reserve of 937.5 tonnes between these two waterlines.

Re: Bismarck water line

Posted: Mon May 03, 2021 4:39 pm
by José M. Rico
Ok, I see. Thanks! :ok:

Re: Bismarck water line

Posted: Mon May 03, 2021 4:57 pm
by José M. Rico
Herr Nilsson wrote: Sun May 02, 2021 1:38 pm "Seitenhöhe" (side height) = 15 m) is measured without hull plating.
The maximum side height of the hull should then be:
22 mm (bottom plating) + 15,000 mm + 50 mm (upper deck) = 15.072 m., right?

Re: Bismarck water line

Posted: Tue May 04, 2021 10:16 am
by Herr Nilsson
Generally yes. However, the hull plating exceeded some centimeters above upper deck.