Fire Control of Pre-Dreadnoughts

[Byron Angel]

For reference, John Brooks’ PhD thesis (upon which his first book was based) is available for free PDF download vie the British Library ETHos digital archive.

FWIW

Byron

[wadinga]

Hi Marcelo,

The book had an outrageous high price at the time of publishing

You highlight a problem alluded to in another thread. Populist books, a description given to Guns at Sea elsewhere, get enough volume sales to keep the unit price down, but Brooks' book is unfortunately considered to be of such limited interest that it is priced as short print-run academic volumes are. £42.99 from the publisher's website in softback or a stunning £140 in hardback. Outrageous for a small 321 page paperback.

It is assumed only academic and public libraries will purchase such works and bear the cost. As you say, 2nd hand is the way to go for the enthusiast.

For AThompson David Brown's "Warrior to Dreadnought" points out the results of the Sino-Japanese naval battles of 1894-5 showed ranges were 2-2500 yds and the Japanese scored about 10% hits to the Chinese 5%. Hit rates for the USN actions at Manila and in Santiago were apparently even worse but at somewhat longer ranges, so it was clear practices at 1000 yds only were unrealistic.

He reports the HMS Bellisle trials of 1900 where HMS Majestic fired at this large static hulk at ranges varying from 1700yds with CPA at 1000yds opening back out to 1700yds ie 10kts on a straight course past the target. The score of 40% hits sounds good but then it is clearly totally unrealistic. Of course, part of the dual purpose trial was to assess the damage hits caused and a trial with no hits would not help this assessment. John Fisher, C-in-C Mediterranean at this time said his heavy guns with telescopic sights would engage at 3-4000yds but without them would be limited to 2000yds. In the Russo-Japanese battles 1904-5 ships were engaged at ranges 12,000 down to 6500yds.

R A Burt British Battleships 1889-1904 points out that a form of "director firing" was used even before Scott's time. A master gun would be designated and all others adjusted to its elevation and bearing, but the communication of firing instant would be verbal. Scott had a home-brew remote indicator director system in his cruiser HMS Good Hope by 1908. Dreadnought HMS Neptune tried out a prototype director Scott/Vickers system in 1911 but it suffered from too many faults and breakdowns. An improved system was installed in HMS Thunderer the following year and she beat sister HMS Orion (a crack gunnery ship) in a careful trial. However, even though this was firing at a towed target at 9,000 yds range, speed was only 12 knots, change of rate was low and Orion claimed smoke conditions were poor for her turret sighted independent gunners. In better conditions a year later against the static target HMS Empress of India HMS Orion's independent gunlaying beat HMS Thunderer but arguably conditions were even easier than previously and totally unlike the actual high speed, poor visibility and manoeuvring actions which wartime would require. According to Brooks the problem was that the director design was evolving so that slowed the ramp up of production and only another six ships had them installed by August 1914. By Jutland, all the Dreadnoughts except the oddballs, HMS Erin and HMS Agincourt had them fitted. (Brooks)

Great info from Byron as always

All the best

wadinga

[marcelo_malara]

R A Burt British Battleships 1889-1904 points out that a form of "director firing" was used even before Scott's time. A master gun would be designated and all others adjusted to its elevation and bearing, but the communication of firing instant would be verbal.

Well, I think that Douglas did the same about 150 years earlier. The gun´s deck was marked with angles so that all the guns were pointed to the same direction.

Regards

[marcelo_malara]

R A Burt British Battleships 1889-1904 points out that a form of "director firing" was used even before Scott's time. A master gun would be designated and all others adjusted to its elevation and bearing, but the communication of firing instant would be verbal.

Well, I think that Douglas did the same about 150 years earlier. The gun´s deck was marked with angles so that all the guns were pointed to the same direction.

Regards

[Byron Angel]

R A Burt British Battleships 1889-1904 points out that a form of "director firing" was used even before Scott's time. A master gun would be designated and all others adjusted to its elevation and bearing, but the communication of firing instant would be verbal.

Well, I think that Douglas did the same about 150 years earlier. The gun´s deck was marked with angles so that all the guns were pointed to the same direction.

Regards

I seem to recall also the involvement of a large below-deck pendulum to measure ship’s heel/roll versus true vertical. It is interesting to see that the fundamental theory was correct, but had to wait a very long time for the necessary technology to catch up.

B

[Byron Angel]

These excerpts from the 1905 USN fire control and gunnery paper I mentioned discuss some of the less appreciated challenges encountered in the pursuit of accurate fire control and gunnery. It was NOT a simple issue and the USN was just coming to grips with the issue. Salvo fire ("bunching the shots") was just being recognized as a desirable method, but they first had to confront the vexing problem of inconsistent propellant. Even First Sea Lord Fisher, when expounding upon the revolutionary virtues of HMS Dreadnought was speaking in terms of 6,000 yard engagement ranges in 1906!

>>>>> This is a small extract only. Anyone interested in the entire document need only email me a request at - byronangel@verizon.net -
and I will be happy to send the entire Word document by return email.


Pg.22
FIRE CONTROL – COLLECTIVE FIRE
Though more recent ordnance material will prove superior to the old, the long-range practice of 1904 demonstrated that, with the material then supplied, if all guns of a ship’s battery used the same sight-bar range (say 4,000 yards) the dispersion (in range) of the projectiles would vary for different ships from 250 to 1,700 yards. As the errors of gun-pointing have been largely eliminated from these figures, these variations were caused by differences in powder, guns, gun-mounts, etc.
With such great dispersion in range, a high percentage of hits with a ship’s battery is impossible: hence, before efficiency can be attained, the shots of each caliber must be bunched by calibrating the guns, and the calibers must be controlled separately.

- - - - -
Pg. 108
The mean vertical error of our 13-inch, and 50-caliber 6-inch guns, as determined by the practice of September, 1904, was about 12 feet, while that of the 6-inch 40-caliber was 14.7 feet, but these errors will doubtless be reduced as improvements in practice and appliances are introduced.

- - - - -
Pg. 169
Guns do not shoot alike – In some instances an appreciable angle was discovered between the guns in the same turret, causing lateral errors; in others there was a difference in elevations required of the two guns in order to hit the target.

- - - - -
Pg. 313
NOTES ON ERRORS OF GUNFIRE

Note – The following notes on errors of gun-fire, which were compiled from a memorandum prepared by Lieut. S. P. Fullinwider, U. S. Navy, are embodied herein for the information of the service.

The principal sources of error in long-range firing may be grouped under four heads, as follows:

1. Personal errors of gun-pointers and sight-setters.

2. Variations in ammunition.
(1) Difference in indexes of powder.
(2) Variation in temperature of powder.
(3) Variation in hygroscopic condition of powder.
(4) Variation in density of loading.
(5) Variation in density of charge.
(6) Variation in ignition charge and its distribution.
(7) Incorrect weight of charge.
(8) Age of powder.
(9) Imperfect blend of powder in making up an index.
(10) Incorrect weight of projectile.
(11) Inefficient loading – shell not home.
(12) Variation in dimensions of shell-bands.
(13) Variation in type of mouth-cup or in the fitting of same.

3. Imperfections of gun, mount, sights, gun-platform, etc.
(1) Jump, vertical and lateral.
(2) Inaccurate compensation for drift.
(3) Inaccurate sight graduations.
(4) Constant errors, vertical and lateral.

4. Sources of error outside the ship.
(1) Inexact knowledge of range.
(2) Inexact knowledge of effect of wind.
(3) Inexact knowledge of relative course and speed.
(4) State of barometer and thermometer.
- - - - -

[paul.mercer]

With all that paraphernalia needed about re-loading, I'm not surprised it took so long - if a 13'5" needed that time to reload, heaven knows what a16" would take!

>>>>> In the 1870s, Armstrong-Elswick built eight 17.7-inch 100-ton rifled muzzle-loading guns for the Italian navy - to be mounted in its two new ironclad battleships Dandolo and Duilio. This gun fired a 2,000 lb projectile at a MV of 1548 ft/sec using a charge of ~450 lbs of black prismatic powder.

Range was about 6,000 yards @ 10.5 degrees elevation.

Rate of fire was stated as one round every six minutes .....

Byron

Hi Byron,
Just re-reading some of the correspondence, I would think that when 450 pounds of black powder went off it would be like a destroyer laying a smoke screen!
I'm not surprised that the RoF was one round every 6 minutes

[Byron Angel]

Hi Byron,
Just re-reading some of the correspondence, I would think that when 450 pounds of black powder went off it would be like a destroyer laying a smoke screen!
I'm not surprised that the RoF was one round every 6 minutes

Go here !!!
https://www.reddit.com/r/WarshipPorn/co ... _with_one/


Byron

[paul.mercer]

Thanks Byron,
Re the pic - WOW!
As for reloading taking 6 minutes, an enemy ship travelling at around 20 knots would be roughly 2 miles further on by the time a second shot was fired, I'm not surprised that they didn't hit each other very often.
It makes me wonder what it was like at Trafalgar with a 100 gunship firing a broadside!

[wadinga]

Hi All,

It is likely there was rangefinding in the Spanish-American War. Quintin Barry, writing in his book "Disputed Victory" says

Soon after this, however, the Brooklyn suffered her only fatal casualty, when Chief Yeoman Ellis was killed while taking the range of the Viscaya. As two men prepared to throw the body overboard.... [Commodore Schley intervened] "Don't throw that body overboard. Take it below and we'll give it a Christian burial."

This ranging may have involved a stadimeter, which uses the measured angle subtended by the masthead to waterline to estimate range. Exact height was very useful but at the relatively short ranges involved an estimate would suffice. Bradley A Fiske was a direct parallel as an antagonistic innovator in gunnery in the USN, to Percy Scott in the RN, and was awarded an academic medal for a rangefinder design in 1891.

This USNI article www.usni.org/magazines/naval-history-ma ... sformation

Fiske called for a central shipboard gunfire control station aloft that would permit continuous-aim salvo fire. In addition, with his technical skill, he did what gunfire innovator Vice Admiral William S. Sims never could have done: he designed a gunnery range finder and, more important, an electric remote range transmitter to centralize range-finding from high in a ship, all to fulfill his own vision.

These innovative ideas were popping up in various nations' navies but the problem came when people like Arthur Pollen tried to patent concepts rather than actual mechanical solutions. Consequently there was a fair amount of unseemly "argy-bargy" over who had "stolen" whose ideas.

As expected fighting ranges got longer and longer the stadimeter became useless, but was retained in warship inventory for measuring range to ships in one's own formation to assist in station-keeping.

All the best

wadinga

[Byron Angel]

These innovative ideas were popping up in various nations' navies but the problem came when people like Arthur Pollen tried to patent concepts rather than actual mechanical solutions. Consequently there was a fair amount of unseemly "argy-bargy" over who had "stolen" whose ideas.

>>>>> Do not sell Pollen short. He was a brilliant mathematician and was responsible for important advances in integrated fire control system design; his colleague Harold Isherwood was a brilliant mechanical engineer.

Pollen was to be sure commercially aggressive, some might say greedy - which IMO is most likely why the Admiralty saw fit to cast its lot with Dreyer. Dreyer was a highly intelligent, popular (and well-connected) RN officer of great mechanical aptitude and no overweening commercial ambitions. But (at least so far as I can glean from studying John Brooks book) the Argo and Dreyer systems were not developed in separate vacuums. Each "borrowed" certain approaches and solutions from the other. In fact, after the war, Pollen was awarded (IIRC) 60,000 Pounds Sterling by the British government for the Admiralty's use of technology developed and patented by Pollen.

The Admiralty was really (IMO) fiscally compelled to go with the "low bidder"; the low bidder also turned out to be by far the most cooperative and comfortable business partner

[wadinga]

Hi Byron,

I hope do not denigrate Pollen at all, like the other luminaries he was a highly motivated individual, who wanted the best for his country and was determined to push his case forward against what he saw as dangerously dull-minded conservative opposition. Such men undoubtedly deserve our admiration, but we must also remember that their personal accounts are unlikely to be even handed. They all have some Messianic element in their character. Brooks coolly describes this p301

Without the distorting influence of the self-serving accounts of Pollen and Scott, (reminiscent of those by other disappointed engineers or disgruntled officers from the Victorian period......)

I think Brooks' book is very fair-handed and chapter 9 "An exceptional Case" details the wrangling set before the Royal Commission for the Awards to Inventors" in the 1920s. Unlike Sims, Fiske, Scott and others, Pollen was not a naval officer and as an outsider he faced greater problems than the others in getting his ideas trialled and accepted and even funding his research. He was attempting to pull together formerly isolated elements, rangefinders, gyros, mechanical computers and electrical communication into an integrated whole, an enormous technical challenge as the requirement changed rapidly with expected ranges increasing from 2000yds in 1900 to 6000yds in 1906 to 20,000yds in 1914.

I don't think it was solely a fiscal decision, but a concern over complexity and reliability in wartime operational conditions.

All the best

wadinga

[AThompson]

Thanks for all the info, chaps. Really interesting reading here. Some good book recommendations too.

[Byron Angel]

I hope do not denigrate Pollen at all, like the other luminaries he was a highly motivated individual, who wanted the best for his country and was determined to push his case forward against what he saw as dangerously dull-minded conservative opposition. Such men undoubtedly deserve our admiration, but we must also remember that their personal accounts are unlikely to be even handed. They all have some Messianic element in their character. Brooks coolly describes this p301 - "Without the distorting influence of the self-serving accounts of Pollen and Scott, (reminiscent of those by other disappointed engineers or disgruntled officers from the Victorian period......"

I think Brooks' book is very fair-handed and chapter 9 "An exceptional Case" details the wrangling set before the Royal Commission for the Awards to Inventors" in the 1920s. Unlike Sims, Fiske, Scott and others, Pollen was not a naval officer and as an outsider he faced greater problems than the others in getting his ideas trialled and accepted and even funding his research. He was attempting to pull together formerly isolated elements, rangefinders, gyros, mechanical computers and electrical communication into an integrated whole, an enormous technical challenge as the requirement changed rapidly with expected ranges increasing from 2000yds in 1900 to 6000yds in 1906 to 20,000yds in 1914.

>>>>> One distinction I observe in Pollen's efforts that I fail to see in Dreyer's approach is Pollen's view of the solution to the challenge as requiring an altogether fully integrated system - data acquisition, data processing, data transmission

>>>>> In passing, Brooks mentions in DG&BJ another factor that might have influenced Pollen's "tactical position" with the Admiralty; it seems that he had a fairly close relationship with Beresford - something that might not have been seen as appealing by the fellow occupying the position of First Sea Lord, 1905-1910.


I don't think it was solely a fiscal decision, but a concern over complexity and reliability in wartime operational conditions.

>>>>> I sense influences of organizational insularity and perhaps a certain degree of xenophobia ("He's not one of us") in play with respect to the competition between Dreyer, the Navy Man, and Pollen, the crass and arrogant civilian intruder. With respect to matters of complexity and reliability, I see relatively little to choose between the two systems; in the bureaucratic eyes of a fundamentally 19th century Admiralty organization, both Dreyer and Pollen effectively must have represented, for better or worse, an unavoidable "paradigm shift" (yes, I hate that phrase) in the technology of naval warfare.

[tone]

"British Battleships 1889-1904" by R A Burt (pp 44-51) reproduces a fairly lengthy segment of commentary contained from a 1902 report on the state of RN gunnery written by Lt A V Vyoyan (yes "Vyoyan"). Well worth reading.

This would be Arthur Vyell Vyvyan.

tone