Danton vs Nassau

Inspired by a recente thread on Dreadnough vs Pre Dreadnought one on one fights that died too quickly, I took a look at specs for the Danton vs Nassau Classes and I think the Danton would have have the upper hand in a one vs one engament.
The crucial element is designed elevation. The Dantons (And I'm using data from the very reliable http://www.navweaps.com/ site) could have been conceptually obsolete, but their turrets allowed proper elevation and gave their guns excelent range. The 12'' could fire up to 26.300m, and the 9.4'' up to 23.800m
The Nassaus, on the other hand, having been designed for line of battle work, were given very limited elevation, and in 1914 their 11'' could only fire up to 18.900, a situation that was sligthly improved in 1915 but only up to 20.400.
And the German ship lacks any useful speed advantage, being capable only of 19,5 vs 19.25 knots.
So let's imagine that a Nassau class BB, having been out in the Med on a good will tour on a Goeben style situation, is intercepted by a Danton class BB on a clear weather day in 1914.
The French vessel can open up at maximun range, and has a full 7.400 meters of range safety advantage. Ideally it can try and keep the action in the 20 to 22 km range, staying out of german range until it hits the German BB with both 12'' and plunging 9.4'' shells.
I think the French "obsolete" vessel would have a clear advantage over the more "modern" german one...
 
Inspired by a recente thread on Dreadnough vs Pre Dreadnought one on one fights that died too quickly, I took a look at specs for the Danton vs Nassau Classes and I think the Danton would have have the upper hand in a one vs one engament.
The crucial element is designed elevation. The Dantons (And I'm using data from the very reliable http://www.navweaps.com/ site) could have been conceptually obsolete, but their turrets allowed proper elevation and gave their guns excelent range. The 12'' could fire up to 26.300m, and the 9.4'' up to 23.800m
The Nassaus, on the other hand, having been designed for line of battle work, were given very limited elevation, and in 1914 their 11'' could only fire up to 18.900, a situation that was sligthly improved in 1915 but only up to 20.400.
And the German ship lacks any useful speed advantage, being capable only of 19,5 vs 19.25 knots.
So let's imagine that a Nassau class BB, having been out in the Med on a good will tour on a Goeben style situation, is intercepted by a Danton class BB on a clear weather day in 1914.
The French vessel can open up at maximun range, and has a full 7.400 meters of range safety advantage. Ideally it can try and keep the action in the 20 to 22 km range, staying out of german range until it hits the German BB with both 12'' and plunging 9.4'' shells.
I think the French "obsolete" vessel would have a clear advantage over the more "modern" german one...
But how do you hit a target at 20+ km? In the days befoore spotter planes and radar.
 

sharlin

Banned
The Danton would not stand a chance against a Nassau, due to primitive gunnery controls the French ship would have to get within 10k yards to be able to pelt her accurately with her guns and the German would then have 8 x 11 inch guns firing at the Frenchman. Two Danton's might stand a chance if they want one of their number to get mauled to buggery or sunk whilst they blast away.

The 9.4s would have issues penetrating the Germans vitals but they could cause lots of damage on her upper works. Whilst plunging fire might work the French guns actually had teribad elevation on their gun turrets which severely restricted the range of their guns. Although they could shoot much further, the elevation of French 12 inch guns allowed them to fire out to 13000 yards at the very most, same with the 9.4s.

And even if the Frenchman could fire out to max range its going to be sheer luck that they hit. At that range you'll be hard done to spot any fall of shot with the optics of the time.
 
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The Danton would not stand a chance against a Nassau, due to primitive gunnery controls the French ship would have to get within 10k yards to be able to pelt her accurately with her guns and the German would then have 8 x 11 inch guns firing at the Frenchman. Two Danton's might stand a chance if they want one of their number to get mauled to buggery or sunk whilst they blast away.

The 9.4s would have issues penetrating the Germans vitals but they could cause lots of damage on her upper works.

Can't they use incremental corrections to get the range right? Remember it's a clear day and the target is unable to shoot back at anything farther than 19Km. Once you bracket the target you're going to start getting hits sonner or later.
Even if your range estimate is way off you can observe the fall of shoot and make adjustments.
At max range the 9.4'' would hit the deck, not the belt. Would't they penetrate? those shell were modified into aircraft antiship bombs for WW2...
 
The Danton would not stand a chance against a Nassau, due to primitive gunnery controls the French ship would have to get within 10k yards to be able to pelt her accurately with her guns and the German would then have 8 x 11 inch guns firing at the Frenchman. Two Danton's might stand a chance if they want one of their number to get mauled to buggery or sunk whilst they blast away.

The 9.4s would have issues penetrating the Germans vitals but they could cause lots of damage on her upper works. Whilst plunging fire might work the French guns actually had teribad elevation on their gun turrets which severely restricted the range of their guns. Although they could shoot much further, the elevation of French 12 inch guns allowed them to fire out to 13000 yards at the very most, same with the 9.4s.

And even if the Frenchman could fire out to max range its going to be sheer luck that they hit. At that range you'll be hard done to spot any fall of shot with the optics of the time.

Nav weapons gives 23º elevation for the 12'' turrets. Unless they are wrong, that was excelent for the day and would justify the longer range
 
The range issues in a period of time predating long range firecontroll is troublesome at best, if not quite impossible. Short range fights are more likely, as both the French and Germans designed their ships to do so, as their armored schemes suggest. The Germans have the upperhand in this, as their heavier 5.9 inch secondary gun is more hard hitting then their french counterpart's light 75mm guns, which were already becomming a bit too small to stop a destroyer. The two ships were designed in a time incorporating the lessons of the Tushima Battle, where it was primarily the Quick Fireing guns that knocked out the Russians, as the smaller and faster guns smashed the superstructures of the Russian Fleet, knocking out crew and controlls.
 
Bad intel

I belive it was 23* after about 1916 but 13 degrees to begin with.

Three books later I am now convinced NavWeapons is wrong on this one. Their data for elevation for the 12'' turrets is wrong, even after the 1918 refit. The data for the 9.4s is probably also wrong. Not only that but they used Moltke data for Nassau ( the Nassau actually had 20 degrees of elevation and the Moltke regressed to 13.
So I've been fooled by bad data, and I will now forever look suspiciously at a Site I had learned to trust for ages...

Nassau would win this one, and the value of Danton as a fire support ship is also reduced. Why they build five of them is now more of a puzzle. Maybe they just liked their looks...
 

sharlin

Banned
They were laid down before the Dreadnought burst onto the scene and made them all obsolete at the drop of a hat. The French laid all 5 down within a few weeks of each other and were working hard on completing what would be a very good pre-dreadnought. Only for them to be rendered utterly obsolete when the Dreadnoughts came along.
 
They were laid down before the Dreadnought burst onto the scene and made them all obsolete at the drop of a hat. The French laid all 5 down within a few weeks of each other and were working hard on completing what would be a very good pre-dreadnought. Only for them to be rendered utterly obsolete when the Dreadnoughts came along.
Assuming that wikipedia got the dates right, all but Danton were laid down after Dreadnought was commissioned, two were even laid down as late as 1908. So the French should have stopped after 2-4 ships, rather than 6. They probably thought that they needed more battleships ASAP and that the yards needed to churn out something while they were designing the Courbet.
 
Assuming that wikipedia got the dates right, all but Danton were laid down after Dreadnought was commissioned, two were even laid down as late as 1908. So the French should have stopped after 2-4 ships, rather than 6. They probably thought that they needed more battleships ASAP and that the yards needed to churn out something while they were designing the Courbet.

They had planned three and added an extra two. Given events in other countries, they had to have a reason to like the design. The ships actually had turbines and were fast, and there were suggestions that they should be rearmed, either replacing the 9.4 twins with 12'' singles or going for an all 9.4 armement, making them a sort of super cruisers.
I think Warspite might have a point in saying they were designe for short range fights, but the 9.4 don't have the rate of fire to give them the edge on a close fight with a dreadnought.
 
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