Just to keep on my thought, is the difference in outcome not a lot to do with simply the lack of RN repair resources due to battles of the Atlantic?
I'm trying to cite damages that were done underway vs their ability to continue with their action or being forced to return home. Some of those British battleships could have returned to service if they had the chance to refit. With the two still in service by the end, plus
Rodney (undamaged but just worn out from constant use) plus some number of the others (I'd say all the ones that retired/were to retire in 1945, making it 4.) which would give you 7 of the 15 that could still serve. (plus one in Soviet service).
Again, compared to 12 of the 15 US interwar battleships still in service at war's end (although, if we're counting the British ones as repairable if the desire was there, then we have to count
Pennsylvania as her lack of repair can be attributed to the war's end). And, as before, the only two losses were done in harbor under peacetime conditions.
Did Warspite not steam herself home after the action, 38 killed is bad but was the decision to sail her to US not due to lack of repair facilities rather than how badly damaged she was?
Oh, she certainly did. Much better than in later instances. And that is the reason she went to the US.
Was more putting the US reference to point out the
Warspite received repairs from a similar source as the US ships.
Regarding Fritz X is it not more like 1,362 kg (3,000 lb) and moving much faster than any Japanese bomb due to the high it was dropped from?
Was citing the actual explosive warhead, not the total weight. Though, the 500 lb bomb should be listed as with a warhead of about 1/4 its size (I can't find the exact weight). Makes the previous incident a bit worse if it caused flooding.
Malaya was LD/Commissioned in 1913/1916 v Maryland in 1917/1921 I think that's a significant different generation of torpedo protection?
As the damage to
Maryland wasn't to the torpedo protection, but rather to the very extreme bow, compared to the
Malaya's damage either to the torpedo protection or part of it on the port side, the torpedo that hit
Maryland didn't hit the torpedo protection at all vs
Malaya (which did receive two refits, one in 27 and one in 34, but they weren't as comprehensive as the others).
Although,
Maryland was damaged so badly that she had to back all the way to Pearl to make repairs. Sailing forward would have torn off the bow it was so badly damage (though she could make 10 knots in reverse, so nothing too shabby).
I see the point you're trying to make, but keep in mind, this isn't the days of sailing wooden warships where, outside of details, they were all constructed using the same basic methods. Repairing a foreign warship is no easy task. Since the US would have literally NONE of the materials needed to fix her. So that more than likely accounted for Malaya's extended repair period. Whereas the US has literally everything it needs to repair one of it's own ships sitting in a warehouse. And at any rate, Britain was sending it's ships to the US to be repaired due to the threat of air attack in the Home Isles.
Then what of
Barham? Took a torpedo on December 28 of 1919 in her torpedo bulge, heavily flooded with and listing, but did eventually make it back to port in England. There, she was laid up until April of 1940, roughly the same 4 month timespan as
Malaya. And
Barham was one of the
Queen Elizabeths to actually receive the extensive 34 refit, unlike
Malaya.
Although, the latter would explain why she was practically retired when she came back, only to be brought back out for the Normandy landings. Her lack of a comprehensive refit likely doomed her later on, as she wasn't worth that much after being damaged.