KGV and PoW v Bismarck at the Denmark Strait

If Both ships are hitting Bismarck and PE does a torpedo charge then they might switch targets and engage her with the 14" main guns - it would not take that many hits to cripple PE!

Personally I think Holland should have stayed in touch and waited for KGV + whatever else was available and even then allowed a torpedo strike or 2 to take some wind out of Bismarck's sails before moving in with 4 Capital ships and multiple Cruisers and DDs

Never ever fight fair if you can help it

I think Oldendorf said that after Surigao Strait...
 
If you ever find yourself in a fair fight, your tactics sucked
Didn't seem like a fair fight.
Two Battleships (whatever you want to call Hood, WW1 era fast BB, WW2 era battlecruiser is the general consensus) v 1 battleship and a cruiser.
Hood on paper seems to compare well with Bismarck, especially for a ship some 20 yesrs older. With her a brand new and powerful battleship, Surely Bismarck doesn't stand a chance...
Of course, the fatal events that followed showed that it doesn't always work out on paper, but it does lead one to wonder, whst damage would Hood have done if both ships fired on Bismarck outright? Considering Hood's first salvo on PE straddled, and Bismarck is a much larger ship...
 
If you ever find yourself in a fair fight, your tactics sucked

Yeah agreed - so does anyone see a reason why Holland cannot simply 'Stay in touch' and allow the other capital ships to regroup as well as allowing Victorious (with only 11 AC - 2 Fulmar and 9 String Bags) a chance to get in a few licks with her air group before the combined force closes for a classic 'fleet action'?

He was after all aware of the condition of Hood as well as that of POW so what was the reason that he engaged with such haste as he did with a fraction of the potential firepower that could have been brought to bear?
 
If Both ships are hitting Bismarck and PE does a torpedo charge then they might switch targets and engage her with the 14" main guns - it would not take that many hits to cripple PE!

Personally I think Holland should have stayed in touch and waited for KGV + whatever else was available and even then allowed a torpedo strike or 2 to take some wind out of Bismarck's sails before moving in with 4 Capital ships and multiple Cruisers and DDs

Never ever fight fair if you can help it
That's time the British don't have.
On top of that, the torpedo bombers are still going to have at least one run before they figure out there is something wrong with their torpedoes. Victorious doesn't have her full air group yet, if I recall correctly.
Considering Holland was already out of position on the morning of the 24th, waiting for KGV may well be what let's Bismarck break through.
 
Was there anything wrong with Victorious Torpedos?

The first strike by her ac did hit Bismarck with a single fish - although it did very little damage as it hit the main torpedo belt

My understanding was that it was Ark Royals 1st strike that attacked Sheffield used the magnetic detectors?
 
Some clarification.

ITTL Lancelot Holland will still be flying his flag in Hood in his capacity as Vice Admiral Commanding the Battle Cruiser Squadron. However, he will be in the Iceland-UK Gap with Victorious and the Second Cruiser Squadron.

ITTL Tovey will be in personal command when King George V and Prince of Wales meet Bismarck and Prinz Eugen in the Denmark Strait on 24th May 1941 and he will be flying his flag in King George V. If not Tovery the flag officer in command of the Second Battle Squadron would have been in command.
 
The linked gunnery tables was a method where two ships could fire at the same target, the two ships sail 8nn line ahead and the lead ship radios her range estimates to the tail ship. both ships fire together at a signal from the lead ship Achilles and Ajax did it against the Graff Spee

Having had a career in the artillery I understand what a slick trick this is. Its not mega difficult, just requires some confidence, and rigorous training to make it work to best effect. To put it another way your ships gunnery officers need to be on top of their game.
 

hipper

Banned
Having had a career in the artillery I understand what a slick trick this is. Its not mega difficult, just requires some confidence, and rigorous training to make it work to best effect. To put it another way your ships gunnery officers need to be on top of their game.

I thought it was one of those things that sound simple and is practically difficult,nice to get an expert opinion.
 
It's not in the OP, but if they had stuck to twelve 14", both ships might have been completed a few months earlier, which would have given more time for PoW to work up and both ships time to sort out their turrets, because AFAIK designing the twin 14" turret took 6 months.
AFAIK the KGV class had a riveted hull and a DC electric systems while the contemporary American North Carolina and South Dakota classes had welded hulls and AC electrical systems, both of which were lighter.

Would a welded hull and AC electrics have saved enough weight for the KGV class to keep twelve 14-inch guns in three quadruple mountings?
 
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AFAIK the KGV class had a riveted hull and a DC electric systems while the contemporary American North Carolina and South Dakota classes had welded hulls and AC electrical systems, both of which were lighter.

Would a welded hull and AC electrics have saved enough weight for the KGV class to keep twelve 14-inch guns in three triple mountings?

The RN used far heavier and less efficient boilers out of a preference for them being easier to repair and clean compared to the USN's ones which were lighter and far more efficient. The saving of welded hulls might save some tonnage but it wouldn't be enough for the weight of the turret, you'd probably need to look at her machinery and either get the UK to adopt the USN's style boilers (which the RN thought were too delicate and finicky) to save the needed tonnage. Also you'd probably have to adopt the USN's habit of obeying naval treaties in spirit rather than letter when it comes to the tonnage of a ship to again 'save' weight (IE cheat).
 
++Snip++

Would a welded hull and AC electrics have saved enough weight for the KGV class to keep twelve 14-inch guns in three triple mountings?
Twelve 14" in three triple mountings don't add up.

You either have 4 x triple 14" or 3 x quad 14". I suspect you mean the latter?

Navweaps tells me that the twin mountings weighed 915 tons and the quads 1582 tons, or 667 tons more. If you are replacing the superfiring twin with a quad, then you are talking about finding 667 tons saving on the hull and sticking it in an elevated position on the ship. That isn't an insignificant weight, so I would hate to think what it would do to her stability (Note, that is TURRET weight only). There will also be additional barbette weight and the hull will require strengthening around 'B' turret as well to take the extra weight. All up you are looking at over 1,000 tons saving to find on the hull etc. to swap the twin for a quad.
 
Twelve 14" in three triple mountings don't add up.

*snip*.

Oh good point, the KGV's were also already rather hunkered down and that much weight would need to be re-balanced and there would be boyancy concerns, you'd probably have to give up something to remain in treaty limits or do the USN's book fudging spirit of the law outlook. The KGV's get a LOT of stick as a class, but really they were pretty much better protected than any ship afloat than the Yamato in terms of armour thickness and layout. Really the 14-inch gun was perfectly fine, it was accurate and hard hitting and didn't have the accuracy issues of the Nelrods 16-inchers. The class obviously had their problems but far too many folks jump on them for their 'small' guns, which when working did perfectly fine against an armoured target, see Bismark and Scharnhorst for those results. And of course the performance of the PoW and the fact that she was then sunk in an air attack. But the hit that killed her was a VERY lucky hit, on the scale of the hit on the Bis' rudder. The effect of her own propeller against her hull is like ramming an angle grinder into your achillies heel and nothing afloat would have survived damage like that, not a USN ship, not a German or Japanese one.
 
I know one way of saving some serious tonnage . By swapping the 5.25 in mounts (77.5 ton) with 4.5 inch guns . 8 twin mounts at 50 ton each , saves 27.5 ton per mount . This weight saving is ok but not enough . Well simply go for the best RN large calibre AA gun of ww2 the 4 inch Mark XIX . with a twin mounting being 17 ton , even if armour is added you can mount 12 twins per side and still save weight . Obviously this is overkill but I personally would go for 5 twin 4.5 per side , lose the aircraft hangar and see how that goes .
 
You'd also be able to factor in the weight difference of the ammo and that's going to save some pounds. Really the KGV basically wasn't bad and its mostly marred by two incidents that would have been terrible for any other ship afloat.
 
Afaik the KGV class was a very wet ship due to the design

All the Treaty battleships got wetter and slower when they lost freeboard as weight was added. Its noticeable as soon as the war was over both the RN and USN stripped a lot of the extra wartime weight out of their vessels. If the KGVs had ever got a major refit they would probably have had the bow altered to be more like the HMS Vangaurd.
 
Would a welded hull and AC electrics have saved enough weight for the KGV class to keep twelve 14-inch guns in three triple mountings?
Twelve 14" in three triple mountings don't add up.

You either have 4 x triple 14" or 3 x quad 14". I suspect you mean the latter?

Navweaps tells me that the twin mountings weighed 915 tons and the quads 1582 tons, or 667 tons more. If you are replacing the superfiring twin with a quad, then you are talking about finding 667 tons saving on the hull and sticking it in an elevated position on the ship. That isn't an insignificant weight, so I would hate to think what it would do to her stability (Note, that is TURRET weight only). There will also be additional barbette weight and the hull will require strengthening around 'B' turret as well to take the extra weight. All up you are looking at over 1,000 tons saving to find on the hull etc. to swap the twin for a quad.
Yes. I did mean three quadruple 14".

Writing three triple mountings was the result of what is known scientifically as a cockup.

Said cockup was the result of not having time to read it properly before posting due to having to go to work.

An additional result of the cockup was that I didn't write about the difference that high pressure boilers might make. The post should effectively have asked:

Does AC Electrics + Welded Hull + High Pressure Boilers = three quadruple turrets instead of two quadruple turrets and one twin turret?
 
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