Best WW2 heavy cruiser = Prinz Eugen ?

[alecsandros]

Gentlemen,
I don't know if she was the best heavy cruiser of WW2 but I do think she was the best looking!

Clearly :)

What I meant by "the best" was in very simple terms "to destroy any likely adversary of the same category"...

[paul.mercer]

Gentlemen,
I don't know if she was the best heavy cruiser of WW2 but I do think she was the best looking!

Clearly :)

What I meant by "the best" was in very simple terms "to destroy any likely adversary of the same category"...

Thanks Alecsandros, I know what you mean, I just think she was a beautiful ship, but probably not a match for the later American cruisers, do you think she was better fighting ship than the RN County class? Certainly more modern looking!

[alecsandros]

Gentlemen,
Thanks Alecsandros, I know what you mean, I just think she was a beautiful ship, but probably not a match for the later American cruisers, do you think she was better fighting ship than the RN County class? Certainly more modern looking!

Well, I think so.
At Denmark Strait, she straddled Hood and Prince of Wales at ranges of 16-18km, and hit them both multiple times. This is very rare for a heavy cruiser.
At Barents Sea, her sister ship Hipper managed at least 4 direct hits on DD Achates, situated at 18km distance.
In another engagment, off the Canaries islands, Hipper fought it out with HMS Berwick (a County class cruiser). Berwick received 4 shells and suffered moderate damage, repairs lasting 6 months, while Hipper wasn't hit.

The gunnery system and fire control systems were similar to the German battleships. They also benefitted from the newest gunnery radars.

Thus, all in all I guess they were the best shooting heavy cruisers.

[Ersatz Yorck]

In the foreword to the ship history of Admiral Hipper, "Eismeer, Atlantik, Ostsee", one of the commanders of the Hipper complains about the unreliable engines and, somewhat abbreviated, says that no nation should send its sailors to war in a ship whith such crappy machinery. Prinz Eugen was no better.

[richtea]

Alecsandros posted;

The gunnery system and fire control systems were similar to the German battleships. They also benefitted from the newest gunnery radars.

The German gunnery radar was not even on the same ballpark as the allies, for example The Battle of the North Cape.

The Scharnhorst from the start of the patrol used their radar sparingly, while the allies used radar from the start of the hunt to the
final salvo.

It is the type 273 radar on Belfast that first picked up Scharnhorst at a range of 35,000 yards ( approx 32km )
While the Seetakt radar had an approximate range of 10 km.

Add to that the radar suite on the Duke of York and as Admiral Bruce Fraser stated " It was like waiting for an execution"

[Dave Saxton]

Your completely wrong richtea.

The German gunnery radar was not even on the same ballpark as the allies,.

Actually they were, even late war. PG's FuMO26 had a range accuracy of 25 meters regardless of the range to the target, and a brearing accuracy within 0.10*. The large common mode antenna provided a range increase of 30% over the previous model Seetakt sets, which was established at about 30km battleship to battleship. It compares quite well with USN Mk8 and it could out perform the British Type284M of the Duke of York. Scharnhorst was also equipped with a FuMO26 but it was destroyed by a direct hit early in the day of North Cape.

[Francis Marliere]

Gentlemen,

There is a good essay on the subject (ie if Prinz Eugen was the best WW2 heavy cruiser) :" In The Shadow Of The Battleship: Considering The Cruisers Of World War II" by Richard Worth (aka Tiornu on forums). A very good little book IMHO.

Best regards,

Francis Marliere

[alecsandros]

In the foreword to the ship history of Admiral Hipper, "Eismeer, Atlantik, Ostsee", one of the commanders of the Hipper complains about the unreliable engines and, somewhat abbreviated, says that no nation should send its sailors to war in a ship whith such crappy machinery. Prinz Eugen was no better.

I know...

But in a 1 vs 1 confrontation, I would consider them to be the finest, don't you think ?

[MikeBrough]

alecsandros, I think I'd rather have the ship that made it to the fight.

[Ersatz Yorck]

Your completely wrong richtea.

The German gunnery radar was not even on the same ballpark as the allies,.

Actually they were, even late war. PG's FuMO26 had a range accuracy of 25 meters regardless of the range to the target, and a brearing accuracy within 0.10*. The large common mode antenna provided a range increase of 30% over the previous model Seetakt sets, which was established at about 30km battleship to battleship. It compares quite well with USN Mk8 and it could out perform the British Type284M of the Duke of York. Scharnhorst was also equipped with a FuMO26 but it was destroyed by a direct hit early in the day of North Cape.

Not to derail the thread, but I am interested. I have seen in various forums people state that German radar and radar fire control was on par with allied systems. Why then did German ships consistently come off second best in late war encounters where radar was decisive, like North Cape?

[alecsandros]

alecsandros, I think I'd rather have the ship that made it to the fight.

[Dave Saxton]

Not to derail the thread, but I am interested. I have seen in various forums people state that German radar and radar fire control was on par with allied systems. Why then did German ships consistently come off second best in late war encounters where radar was decisive, like North Cape?

The overiding factor in the loss of the Scharnhorst was the loss of the Scharnhorst's forward radar to a direct hit at 0930 hours on the 26th. After this event Scharnhorst was at a severe disadvantage. That's simply the fortunes of war and would be fundemental error of attribution to draw broad conclusions based on N. Cape.

Another factor in some of these cases was how their radar assets were used by the various commanders. However, the British didn't always use their radars better than the Germans in every case. The loss of the Charybdis in the Channel on Oct 23 1943 is one example of the Germans using their radars better than the British used theirs.

A British group constisting of six destroyers supported by a light cruiser under the command of Capt Voelcker, and acting upon Ultra Intel, was attempting to ambush the blockade runner Munsterland. 5 German T-boats (these were = to small destroyers) under the command of Kk Franz Kohlauf instead ambushed the British force. Coastal radar detected Voelcker's approach and vectored Kohlauf into a good attack position. Voelcker had ordered all radars and sonars except the 10cm Type 273 and Type 271 sets switched off. At 0130 Charybdis detected the German T boats with Type 273 radar at 14,000 yards. 15 minutes later Voelcker thinking he still had the drop on the Germans orderd the firing of star shell. What the star shell revealed instead was torpedo tracks converging on the Charybdis. The Germans using radar had already launched torpedoes and were already turning away. Charybdis was hard hit and the destroyer Limbourne was also hit. The remaining British destroyers were badly confused, with their radars being foxed by land returns, and fled the scene. They returned a couple of hours later when it was reported that Limbourne was still afloat but adrift to pickup survivors. Kohlauf saw them cominging back with his radar but did not attack. Instead he allowed Munsterland to pass by unoticed by the British and let the British rescue work go on uninterrupted. Attempts to tow Limbourne failed so the British scuttled it with torpedoes.

[Byron Angel]

Dear Dave,

Re the Munsterland engagement which you described above, is my impression correct that Kohlauf's ships also remained radar silent and that their torpedo attack was set up using data from the coastal radar?

Byron

[Dave Saxton]

Accounts are ambiguous on that point. It is known that Kohlauf used his own ship board radar later and it is likely he switched on his own radars to initiate the torpedo attack. It is most likely that he practiced radar silence prior to the torpedo attack to avoid giving away his position.

The British were practicing radar silence except for the 10cm sets. By Oct 1943 it is possible that Kohlauf had centimetric radar detectors though. The British use of radar silence except for 10cm sets would have precluded using the 50cm gunnery sets, because of the long warmup periods required. Perhaps this was part of Voelcker's fatal delay. German radar on the other hand could be switched on and off at will.

[Ersatz Yorck]

Thanks for the reply! There is a good account of the action at http://www.naval-history.net/WW2Ships-CharybdisAsr.htm

Apparently British bad C&C contributed to the result. The above mentioned account mentions the Germans using "asdic" to locate the British. We do know that German sound location was used in other cases, notably by the PE at Denmark Straits. Could there be something to it that German sound location complemented radar in this engagement?