Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

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TrashMan
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by TrashMan »

Trantor wrote: a) by 2kn in sunny weather. In harsh conditions she lost a lot of speed, also her slender hull made her roll. In sept. ´53 NATO exercise 'Mariner' (North Atlantic only, not even Arctic Ocean) she performed poorly in comparison to HMS Vanguard. In every aspect, even in speed, although Vanguard was 4kn slower "by the nummbaas". Her forward turret1 failed repeatedly ´cause of severe wash. That leaves only 6 guns...
Failed repeatedly? There was only 1 incident with the Iowas turrets I can recall.
and it's more than 2kn..Iowas can reach up to 35 knots

c) by 1"/Yes, marginally. But SK34 was the most accurate big gun. It also fired more rapidly. Especially in harsh conditions.
Sez you. I've seen the Mark7 lauded as the better one repeatedly.

d) Only if it worked. But Mk. 38 radar was flawed in many ways, which is not uncommon for early stages of tech. Also Gun stabilization was sub par. The US navy had nowhere nothing like the german balance trim system "Askania". (The whole company was rounded up after war in Operation Paperclip, guess why...)
I guess that is why it can repeatedly hit within 100 meters at almost max range....

f) Armoured Belt: Iowa 307mm, Bismarck 320mm (up to 370mm RHA-equivalent).
Armor distribution is better in the Iowa.
And don´t forget: Iowas didn´t carry torpedoes. Tirpitz did.
You'd have to get in range to use those....not bloody likely.
e) doesn´t matter in an environment where you can´t rely on aircraft or have to face them.
Air defense is part of a battleship design. I'd say it's very important, especially given that how many BB's were sunk by aircraft.


TrashMan wrote:And I really don't see how Bismarck could hope to win. Iowa outranges her and is faster, with more accurate guns. This means that it dictates the battle. If Iowa decides to keep outside Bismarcks range, and pepper it with long-range fire, what can the Bismarck do? It can't close the distance, since Iowa is faster. It can't escape either, for the same reason. It can't outgun her. It can't outlast her.
Your conclusion is flawed.
Look, if the germans were such suckers in all aspects, why didn´t you just end the war earlier?

In combat there are things like "manouvers". Sully little thingys like "zigzag-course" and others. The range gap would have been easily closed by the germans, and then the rapid precise fire would have been very uncomfortable for the Iowas. Cripple one ship a time, then finish it off. Next one.
Yes, because closing a distance to a enemy that outguns you, outranges you, outpaces you and is more accurate is super-easy. Why didn't the US just surrender to glorious Germany? :roll:


- Given that the Iowa has the best AA defense of any battleship ever...you're gonna need a bit more than that.
- Try again. Remember: It was a lucky punch from that swordfish. ;)
- A lucky puch that did what?
- Crippling the rudder. Please at least pretend to have read the history books. ;)
Of the Iowa? Whaaaaaa????

Nah, the Bismarck's rudder was shot. And that's because it didn't have as awesome AAA.

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bunnyboy
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by bunnyboy »

:?: For clarity, are you comparing best battleship on...
...today?
...their own time?
...end of WW2?
...during WW2?

How I had seen it, German didn't lose it because of inferior technology or quality, but production capacity.
And also, it don't help in long way if your factories are leveled, teachers cremated, bankers robbed, most scientists escaped, fuel consumed and leader is a madman.
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Aygar
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by Aygar »

At one time I did a lot of research into capital ship design. My conclusion from my research is that the only reliable way to tell if one design was better then another is to have 10 or so on engagements where one ship sinks the other. The ship that is the most successful is the better design. Anything else is speculation.

Because there are so many design variables that directly and significantly affect the combat performance of a design. Many of these design variables are also idiosyncratic to the specific ship design. The interactions between 2 ship's design variables also tends to be unique per ship(as built) pairing, let alone between ship(as designed) pairings.

For example the way a certain armor formulation reacted to different AP hard cap shell designs could be wildly different. This has bearing because pretty much each country had a different AP hard cap shell designs. So the exact same piece of armor could be extremely effective against shells of one navy while being marginally effective against shells of another, causing the exact same ship to be very effective against ships of one navy while being ineffective against ships another navy.


--Aygar
--Aygar

dfacto
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by dfacto »

bunnyboy wrote:How I had seen it, German didn't lose it because of inferior technology or quality, but production capacity.
Actually no. Germany lost because of bad planning and lack of manpower. They were actually at peak production at the end of the war (at least the factories around Essen), but nobody was there to use the gear.

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Trantor
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by Trantor »

@ TrashMan: It´s all answered in the Fred. ;)

bunnyboy wrote::?: For clarity, are you comparing best battleship on...
...today?
...their own time?
...end of WW2?
...during WW2?
Yup. Let´s say autumn 1943. In the arctic sea theater, two ships each.
bunnyboy wrote:How I had seen it, German didn't lose it because of inferior technology or quality, but production capacity.
And fuel.
And lousy overall strategy. You cannot simply put it up with the whole world.
bunnyboy wrote:And also, it don't help in long way if your factories are leveled, teachers cremated, bankers robbed, most scientists escaped, fuel consumed and leader is a madman.
Exactly.
sapere aude.

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bunnyboy
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by bunnyboy »

dfacto wrote:They were actually at peak production at the end of the war (at least the factories around Essen), but nobody was there to use the gear.
Oh. I thought germany was bombed to edge of stone age and marshal help was given to overcome that.
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Trantor
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by Trantor »

bunnyboy wrote:
dfacto wrote:They were actually at peak production at the end of the war (at least the factories around Essen), but nobody was there to use the gear.
Oh. I thought germany was bombed to edge of stone age and marshal help was given to overcome that.
That´s correct. At least for the western part. The eastern part was totally robbed out by soviet union. You could still see this in the 90ies after reunification.

Overall peak production in germany was somewhere in ´43.
sapere aude.

dfacto
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by dfacto »

bunnyboy wrote:Oh. I thought germany was bombed to edge of stone age and marshal help was given to overcome that.
No, the "reap the whirlwind" doctrine was more or less revenge. It destroyed priceless architecture, killed people, and didn't really do anything to stop the war.

TrashMan
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by TrashMan »

Trantor wrote:@ TrashMan: It´s all answered in the Fred. ;)
Nothing is answered.
Waht exactly are we comparign here?

Production quality? Hard to judge, given that Bismarck is sunk. I can't really take a close look at it's welding. The only somewhat reliable info on it's construction comes from Okun, where the materials used seem to be inferior.

Performance? Again hard to judge. Citing the military excercise doesn't really help your case much as:
a) it's an excercise, so it's unlikely the ship was pushed to it's limits.
b) Bismarck is sunk, so we can't see how it would fare in such an excercise.

Iowas has 5-6 knot speed advantage. Do you really think that bad weather woudl result in it loosing all that extra speed, and the Bismarck loosing none?

If Iowa is faster in that scenario too, Bismarck stands no chance.

Even if we assume their speed in bad weather ends up the same, the Iowa can still keep the distance and shell it from afar. Bismarck is again, in a huge disadvantage.

The only scenario where Bismarck has some chance, is if the Iowa is slower (bloody unlikely) and even then, it would still be at an disadvantage (range, guns). Bismarck would have to zig-zag to reduce chances of getting hit, which would drasticly increase the time needed to close range (and hence, increase the time in which the Iowa can pummel it with impunity).

Speed and range, as well as firepower are rather big tactical factors.

Also on the Panamax thing. It means the Iowa can go where the Bismarck can't follow. It gives the Iowa greater tactical flexibility.

This is all very common sense stuff.

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Trantor
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by Trantor »

TrashMan wrote:Iowas has 5-6 knot speed advantage.
Jaja. On the next page we´ll sure reach ten or more... :roll:
TrashMan wrote:Also on the Panamax thing. It means the Iowa can go where the Bismarck can't follow. It gives the Iowa greater tactical flexibility.
First of all it gives her a narrow beam and a higher center of gravity. And that makes her roll.
TrashMan wrote:this is all very common sense stuff.
Again a semantic trick. You trick yourself, so this is useless. EOD for me.
sapere aude.

GOULimitingFactor
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by GOULimitingFactor »

The quality of a weapons system has relatively little to do with engineering specs, except insofar as those specs satisfy the needs of the operator. Let's pretend the two battleships are roughly equal (they aren't, for all the reasons laid out above by other posters and more).

By that standard, Bismarck can lay claim to the coveted title of Worst Battleship Ever (Yamato gives it a run for its money). It contributed nothing to the already incredibly tenuous security of the Nazi state, and sucked up resources that would have been better spent on more and better U-boats, more tanks, more land-based AAA, and replacing their god-awful horse-drawn supply train. Just like the Japanese should have invested in sane methods of pilot training, ASW systems, and better AA for their ships, rather than finishing a humongous obsolete boondoggle like Yamato.

There's also the issue that the United States Navy had extensive experience and training in blue-water fleet actions and the Kriegsmarine did not, nor did Kriegsmarine vessels generally have the kind of strategic endurance that USN vessels did - they really were just a glorified brown-water navy with a lot of subs. The 40's USN could afford to replace ship losses, even battleship losses, on a scale that boggles the mind, and an Iowa is going to be a lot less shy about taking damage, which the USN can repair at harbor facilities outside the range of enemy bombers - which means that a USN commander can afford to be a lot bolder in a winner-takes-all engagement than his Kriegsmarine counterpart, and that gives him one hell of an edge.

War is not a meticulously balanced accounting exercise, it's a toilet stall knife-fight with shit-covered* switchblades. There are no hard rules, especially once you get into the kind of hardcore total strategic warfare that defined the Second World War. The hardware might be nice on paper, but it did nothing to fill the very real operational needs of the Kriegsmarine - it was just another flaccid Nazi prestige project to compensate for Hitler's insecurity about his deformed testicle**.

To bring this back around to Outsider: Terran ships are probably armed the way they are to engage multiple small targets simultaneously, to compensate for inferior accuracy by volume fire, and because they may face hard tech limits on the size and power of their weapons and compensate by simply mounting more of them. Mass drivers, in particular, are less like main guns and more like deck-mounted autocannons - you use them to brutalize small craft and boarders, not to fight it out with another ship.

* I can moderate my language here if needed, but I have always liked the way that phrase sounds unmodified.
** Totally not kidding. Look it up.

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Ktrain
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by Ktrain »

Ok, Ok, to settle this debate I suggest we get some participants to play a game of Hearts of Iron III and load up either the 1940/1941 scenario and take the Iowa and the Bismark to battle.
OUTSIDER UPDATE => HALF LIFE 3 CONFIRMED?

TrashMan
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by TrashMan »

Trantor wrote:
TrashMan wrote:Iowas has 5-6 knot speed advantage.
Jaja. On the next page we´ll sure reach ten or more... :roll:
Impossible.the highest reported speed of hte Iowa is in the 35-36knt range, and for the Bismarck is it's 30-31 (IIRC)

TrashMan wrote:this is all very common sense stuff.
Again a semantic trick. You trick yourself, so this is useless. EOD for me.
If you wish to simply dismiss or ignore any (serious) advantages other ships have over the Bismarck, then it is indeed uselesss.



@Ktrain;
O.k. ...hold on.
*runs a few battles*
10 out of 10 times, the Iowa won. :mrgreen:

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Arioch
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Re: Physiological/psychological effects on Ship Design.

Post by Arioch »

I think this mine has no more gold to offer, so let's board up the entrance before someone else gets buried by a cave-in.

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