Bismarck Myths

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

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RF
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Post by RF »

Tiornu wrote:I don't think we can go with the idea of the Bismarcks as a stepping stone. They were designed to equal the most powerful units in the prospective enemy's arsenal, the Richelieus. Design inflation became an inescapable fact early in the Dreadnough Era--Dreadnought herself was an example of it--but I don't think we want to label each class as simply a stepping stone to the next, larger class.
I was going on the envisaged Z Plan progression: Scharnhorst classe to Bismarck classe to H-classe etc.
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Post by Karl Heidenreich »

RF:
I was going on the envisaged Z Plan progression: Scharnhorst classe to Bismarck classe to H-classe etc.
This makes sense, even if each class has to be considered not as a prototype but as effective combat units. The Bismarck Class could very well engage rival combat vessels as Hood (which she did succesfully), KGV (very succesfull too), the Richelieus (likely), and maybe the Nelsons.
Bismarck Class problems would begin with the North Carolinas and so on superior BBs.

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Post by Tiornu »

"I was going on the envisaged Z Plan progression: Scharnhorst classe to Bismarck classe to H-classe etc."
Then "H" is simply a stepping stone to the "R" class? Each class comes before or after another, so they're all stepping stones.
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Post by RF »

Tiornu wrote:I don't think we can go with the idea of the Bismarcks as a stepping stone.
This ''stepping stone'' view was expressed by Richard Humble in his book ''Hitler's High Seas Fleet'' published back in the 1970's.
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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by healthycoffee »

the newjersey is a strange design, the hull has always made me wonder what designers had in mind. i wish she would have fought bismarck and tirpitz at once. those two ships would be out ranged, out gunned, and could never catch up to her to even fire back in 41. bismarck and tirpitz are useless in combat by themselves. if only they had support of somekind from the air and sea. glad they didnt. hands down.
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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by lwd »

healthycoffee wrote:the newjersey is a strange design, the hull has always made me wonder what designers had in mind.
I suspect how to get the desing speed in the most efficient mannor without compromising any of the other design characteristics.
.. those two ships would be out ranged, out gunned, and could never catch up to her to even fire back in 41....
They would have had no trouble destroying an Iowa in 41 if they could get one in range. Hint the Iowas were still under construction at that time.
bismarck and tirpitz are useless in combat by themselves. if only they had support of somekind from the air and sea. ....
Hardly useless. Maybe not the best investment Germany could have made but not useless. Oh and they got support both air and sea at times during their carreers.
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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by Bgile »

Myth: Bismarck's AA couldn't hit Swordfish aircraft because the latter were too slow.

Myth: Swordfish are invulnerable to flak because they are covered with fabric skins.
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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by Vic Dale »

Percy Gick, one of Victorious' Swordfish pilots stated that he had discovered that Bismarck's AA tracking predictor was set to planes which could do 150 mph sometime after the war's end, so I doubt that this was anything to do with propaganda.

I believe the planes did take a number of light flak rounds but that, as Percy himself said, the barrage was bursting ahead the whole time and though it smelled awful they were not getting hit.

Scheer seems to have had little problem downing a faster plane from a squadron which attacked her at Whilhelmshaven in 1939, so the flak C30 was functioning OK then.

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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by lwd »

taking the stats of the 37mm from the navweapons site. It's shells would take ~8.5 seconds to reach max range (8.5km) if muzzle velocity was maintained. So about 10 seconds sounds reasonable. During that time the difference moved between 90mph and 150mph is 88 feet. If the timeing was perfect that would be resulting in the rounds detonating far enough in front that the damage should be minimal. The 105 has a slightly lower MV but should maintain it's velocity a bit better. IF they miss set the predictor by that amount then indeed at ranges over a few km the P(H) would be very low. Within 2km how ever the delta drops to around 20 feet or less. Throw in some timing variaitons and that's getting close enough I would think.

anyone have data on the lethal radius of the German AA shells? Or better ballistics data? This might be worth its own thread.
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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by Bgile »

lwd wrote:taking the stats of the 37mm from the navweapons site. It's shells would take ~8.5 seconds to reach max range (8.5km) if muzzle velocity was maintained. So about 10 seconds sounds reasonable. During that time the difference moved between 90mph and 150mph is 88 feet. If the timeing was perfect that would be resulting in the rounds detonating far enough in front that the damage should be minimal. The 105 has a slightly lower MV but should maintain it's velocity a bit better. IF they miss set the predictor by that amount then indeed at ranges over a few km the P(H) would be very low. Within 2km how ever the delta drops to around 20 feet or less. Throw in some timing variaitons and that's getting close enough I would think.

anyone have data on the lethal radius of the German AA shells? Or better ballistics data? This might be worth its own thread.
37mm doesn't "burst". It has to hit the target. It would be effective from about 4,000 yds at the most, and in the case of such a low rate of fire probably much closer. US 5"/38 with Mk37 FC was the most effective shipborne heavy flak, and still most US AA kills were due to light flak, so the range calculation for the German heavy flak is probably irrelevant. Chances are it was way off in any case.

Tirpitz was attacked in 1939?
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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by tommy303 »

With all deference to the NavWeapons site, the 3,7cm SK30 was equipped with a simple direct action impact fuze having a self-destruct mechanism to keep it from coming down in a populated area or endangering other ships in formation. Two types of self-destruct were used with this shell. An earlier one utilized a powder train fired when the shell was fired, but this proved unreliable and was replaced by one with a centrifugal striker working on a spin decay principle. As long as the shell was spinning at a rate above a certain point, the striker was held back, but when it began to slow down, the striker spring would overcome the centrifugal force of the spin and detonate the fuze. While an inert shell or shot might reach the range quoted, the self destruct in a fuzed shell would normally fire the fuze at about 4000m.

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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by lwd »

My initial feeling was that the inability of the Bismarck's fire control to hit the Swordfish was a myth. As a result when I started making my calculations I made assumptions that tended to favor the other side of the issue. If you are firing impact fuzed ammo at 4,000 yards with an initial velocity of 1,000 m/s then you are looking at the planes only being about 40 feet further out than targeted then I would expect to see little affect of on the P(H) or P(K) of these weapons. One of the quotes above however mentions the Swordfish pilots talking about the flak bursting ahead of them (although they may not notice flak burst behind them). Since the 37mm wasn't time fuzed that implies they were talking about the larger AA guns. I suspect a flak burst 40 feet away from a 105mm AA gun would not normally be close enough to knock down a Swordfish on the other hand there would be some variation in the fuze settings. I'm not at all sure that it would be all that obvious to the gun crews what was happening either if the planes were that close to the bursts. Did the Bismarks predictors have a lower setting? or was that just the one used? In one case it's a problem with the hardware in the other it's a crew issue.
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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by Vic Dale »

According to what Percy Gick discovered and in subsequent discussions in some detail, I got the impression that 150 MPH was the lower limit and that this was adjusted after the operational wash-up.

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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by Lutscha »

The reasons for Bismarck's inability to hit were:

1) inadequate training

2) poor light and mediocre heavy AA Weapons

3) problems with the directors for the 10,5cm guns which made half of them miss due to a problem with the older mounts which half of the guns had

Her AA suite was simply terrible, but try to find a ship with a decent AA battery in 1941...


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Re: Bismarck Myths

Post by tommy303 »

3) problems with the directors for the 10,5cm guns which made half of them miss due to a problem with the older mounts which half of the guns had
Other way around probably. The two operational directors were alright, but the fact that the forward guns were in the older, slower mounts meant the mounts themselves could not keep up with the director. The four forward mounts were thus not fully integrated into the fire control system. There was also the matter of the two after directors not having been installed yet; the places were occupied by two twin axis range finders and rudimentary equipment that was not up to the task. Bismarck was really not, in my opinion, ready for front line operations yet as far as her Flak outfit was concerned.

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