• How accurate were naval battleships in combat?

    From a425couple@21:1/5 to All on Mon Aug 12 10:21:30 2024
    XPost: sci.military.naval, aalt.war.world-war-two

    Rocky Fargher
    ·
    Follow
    I have studied many sources of ww2 naval battles.Wed
    How accurate were naval battleships in combat?

    Common myth is that battleships were these cross sighted bad shooters
    that almost always scored less than 1% hit rates. This could sometimes
    be the case, heavy seas and fog did often mess up their shooting, but
    when given the opportunity, such as in clear-ish weather, battleships
    could aim very well.


    HMS Indefatigable sinking after excellent gunnery from SMS Von Der Tann.

    Jutland battleships and battlecruisers

    The first example would be a number of the battleships and
    battlecruisers at the battle of Jutland, starting with SMS Von Der Tann,
    which quickly won a gunfight with the battlecruiser HMS Indefatigable.
    As she found the range, she hit Indefatigable with one shell ever salvo,
    before two shells in a single salvo ignited her magazines and sank the
    British ship, landing 5 shells out of 52 fired from 15,000 yards.


    SMS Von Der Tann anchored before WW1.

    Battlecruisers SMS Derfflinger and Seydlitz then targeted the
    battlecruiser HMS Queen Mary at 15,000 yards, together landing hits at
    nearly every salvo. Derfflinger then hit Queen Mary with three shells
    out of four fired, while Seydlitz followed up with two hits in a single
    salvo, sending Queen Mary to the sea bed. Afterwards, Derfflinger and
    her sistership Lutzow targeted the battlecruiser HMS Invincible at 9,000
    yards, and with three salvos each sank her in 90 seconds, but not before Invincible in her own feat of accuracy hit Lutzow eight times, damage
    that sank her to progressive flooding.


    SMS Derfflinger underway.

    As for the battleships, the british took the win on this one. HMS Barham
    and HMS Valiant combined fire to score at least one hit, but usually
    more on SMS Von Der Tann, Derfflinger, Seydlitz, Lutzow, Molke,
    Markgraf, Konig, Grosser Kurfurst, and Helgoland. Meanwhile, HMS Iron
    Duke targeted the battleship SMS Konig at 26,000 yards, and hit her
    seven times, scoring one hit with every salvo after the first few.


    HMS Iron Duke at anchor.

    IJN Yamato off Samar

    Another example would be the Japanese battleship Yamato’s shooting at
    the battle off Samar, particularly her takedown of the destroyer USS
    Johnston. With a main armament of nine 18.1-inch (46 cm) guns, the
    largest and most powerful naval rifles ever built, these on paper were
    the most accurate battleship guns ever built, though in practice this
    would be extremely debatable. However, these guns displayed an ink drop
    of their power engaging the escort carriers and destroyers of Taffy 3.
    At 34,500 yards, a shell from Yamato exploded mere feet underneath the
    keel of the escort carrier White Plains, knocking out a boiler and
    electrical power for 3 minutes. Many sources list this off as an
    impressive near miss, but others say the 18.1-inch (46 cm) shell scraped
    off her hull before exploding underneath, thus counting as the longest
    ranged naval hit.


    Yamato on sea trials in October of 1941.

    Afterwards, Yamato spotted the destroyer USS Johnston at 20,300 yards,
    and fired a single full broadside. Simultaneously, three 18.1-inch (46
    cm) shells hit the ship, followed by three 6.1-inch (155 mm) shells from
    her secondary battery. The damage cut her speed to 17 knots, destroyed
    three of her five 5-inch (127 mm) guns, and shredded her bridge.
    Eventually, Johnston split in two where she was hit by one of Yamato’s 18.1-inch (46 cm) shells while under fire from IJN destroyers. She later targeted the escort carrier USS Gambier Bay, blasting that thing to
    smithereens with excellent long range gunnery, including a first salvo
    hit at 22,000 yards, and with her secondary guns helped to smite the
    destroyer USS Hoel.


    Model of Yamato training her guns.

    6.4K views
    View 91 upvotes
    1 of 1 answer
    6 comments from


    Profile photo for SB
    SB
    · Wed
    During Ten-go, Spruance’s plan was to take nine Standard-type
    battleships and duke it out with the Yamato (probably because the US
    believed it to be an inferior version of the Iowa) - he was beaten to it
    by Mitscher, who took matters into his own hands and launched the
    386-plane wave.

    The realist in me is thankful that thousands of lives were saved, but
    the battleship enthusiast in me keeps wondering what might have been…

    Profile photo for Rocky Fargher
    Profile photo for Dennis Vella
    Dennis Vella
    · Thu
    What about HMS Warspite hit on an Italian battleship at a range of
    26000yds which is considered the longest shot ever!

    Profile photo for Rocky Fargher
    Rocky Fargher
    · Thu
    I’d consider that more luck than a consistent streak of good shooting.
    Same with Bismarck’s hit that sank Hood.

    Profile photo for Malcolm Rutherford
    Malcolm Rutherford
    · Thu
    How is the hit by Warspite, or the almost identically ranged hit by
    Sharnhorst on HMS Glorious different from the near miss from Yamato on
    White Plains?

    Profile photo for Rocky Fargher
    Rocky Fargher
    · Thu
    Because Yamato continued to achieve great accuracy throughout the
    battle, and she wasn’t a one hit wonder like Warspite. Since Scharnhorst continued to hit her mark and sink Glorious after that initial hit, she
    would be a great contender for best battleship accuracy, I just didn’t
    want to make my answer too long

    Profile photo for Malcolm Rutherford
    Malcolm Rutherford
    · Fri
    Yamato “continued to achieve great accuracy” while continuing not to hit much other than Gambier Bay, at much closer range in excellent
    conditions of visibility.

    But she achieved this being faster than her opponents ( in terms of the
    Easxort carriers) who couldn't run away.

    We actually have no idea if Warspite would have continued to hit,
    because she was slower than her opponent, who did make off. After all
    Warspite shot pretty accurately at Jutland.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Peter Stickney@21:1/5 to Jim Wilkins on Fri Aug 16 06:56:23 2024
    XPost: sci.military.naval, alt.war.world-war-two

    On Thu, 15 Aug 2024 12:47:01 -0400, Jim Wilkins wrote:

    "a425couple" wrote in message news:vwruO.348359$qO%5.170771@fx16.iad...

    Common myth is that battleships were these cross sighted bad shooters
    that almost always scored less than 1% hit rates. This could sometimes
    be the case, heavy seas and fog did often mess up their shooting, but
    when given the opportunity, such as in clear-ish weather, battleships
    could aim very well.
    ------------------------

    This claims 20 hits from 75 16" shells fired by USS Washington in a
    night battle with IJN Kirishima:

    http://www.navweaps.com/index_lundgren/kirishimaDamageAnalysis.php

    "Washington's first salvo was a straddle."

    Or the Pearl Harbor Survivors, back in the line after being raised and repaired, fitted with 1944 era U.S. Navy Radar and Fire Control Systems, plastering the IJN Yamashiro with first-salvo hits at Surigao Straight.

    US Fire Control Systems in the late 1930s and 1940s on were fierce - Electromechanical Analog Computers automatically fed target range, azimuth (And, in the case of AA and Dual Purpose Guns, elevation) from the radars
    and rangefinders, using these inputs plus Own Ship's Speed, Heading, Orientation (A Stable Vertical System using Gyroscopes to measure roll,
    pitch and yaw for automatic Cross Leveling) to drive the Directors and
    Optical Rangefinders by Remote Power Control (So that when the Computer
    was tracking properly, having derived Target Bearing, Speed, Instantaneous Range and Bearing and Range Rates) the director automatically slewed on
    target, (Adjusted if necessary by the Director Operators - a Rate-Aided Tracking System) that was also driving the guns via Remote Power Control,
    using set ballistic data. The entire data chain was automated - after the initial setup, no manual inputs, with firing controlled by 1 Officer at
    the Computer with a firing trigger (Which was actually Permission to Fire
    - Ship's Roll and motion had to be allowed for).
    During the War, nobody else had this - the Japanese came close, but relied
    on manual data transmission and inputs, and cross levelling was done
    manually by optical means, with all the delays and potential garbling of information.
    The Brits started to get into that level of sophistication toward the end
    of the War, the Germans and Italians never came close.

    --
    Peter Stickney
    Java Man knew nothing about coffee

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)