Forum: Yamato

[chuck]

Anyway, thanks for the correction there, chuck. Makes things so much clearer !

You're welcome.



But allow me to make it even clearer. Iowas did not carry 1920 vintage 16"/50guns. They carried throughly modern 16"/50 guns.

With the possible exception of the 16"/47 (rifle length of german guns are measured differently) guns designed for the H-39 class, Iowa 16" guns were the most modern heavy naval guns anywhere on earth in 1940.

[RNfanDan]

Iowas did not carry 1920 vintage 16"/50guns. They carried throughly modern 16"/50 guns.

I never said they carried them. I said they were DESIGNED for them, at least as far as that being initial plan. You confirmed this EXACTLY in your post, so why the argument? What's "not true"?

Only after they found out the barbettes were too small to work with those weapons---the 1920's vintage, that is---were they forced to select other alternatives. Again, your own words confirm this, so why the argument? What's "not true"?

If what I said wasn't right, then why did the designers and builders have a proverbial cow over what to do to fix the problem? They couldn't change the barbettes, nor the hull at that point, to fit them (confirmed by your own words)---what's "not true"? They discussed down-grading to the SoDak/NC-type 16"/45cal, but this was rejected.

They were really bogged-up at this juncture. Again, you confirmed this in your post! What's "not true" (I see NOTHING, so far, so I am puzzled even more about what you found "not true")?

Just to make MY post crystal-clear, the idea that the Iowas were uncompromised advances upon the previous two classes, their main armament fiasco puts this notion immediately to rest. As an answer to a design flaw---a very serious one, at that---the new turrets and mountings were a spectacular success. But so severely screwing-up their design in the first place, created a totally new and unforeseen challenge.

Hardly a great advancement, and certainly not something that qualifies as a utilization of previous experience! Finally, it doesn't change what I originally stated. Had these screw-ups not been made, those 1920's 50-cal weapons would be there, to this day.

Note: If I am wrong or proven wrong, I'll be the first to admit to/correct/apologize for it. But I'm having a hard time finding what you've called "not true", especially after you've CONFIRMED my words!

Now, back to the recipe....

[RNfanDan]

Are we making soda bread or Bisquick muffins?

If you add butter, nuts and morsels to this, you can make chocolate chip cookies---that is, unless Chuck claims they're not real chocolate!

[Werner]

About the guns, you're both right. The 16-inch/50s (lined down from 18-inches) were probably the best guns ever designed up to 1940. The "failure to communicate" between BuOrd and C&R which led up to the debacle under discussion here was a "panic moment" for both agencies. The 16-inch/50s of the Iowa was a "cut to fit" design to allow BuOrd to tell the General Board that they had the characteristics of the 1920s gun in a mount roughly the size of the 1940 /45 caliber gun. If they had started with a blank sheet of paper, who knows what would have happened. As it was, the new 50 calibre gun was horrible for it's first year.

This mistake caused the reorganization of BuOrd and C&R into one bureau. This combined with the engineering weight errors in the Sims class destroyers to create the new BuShips out of the three separate bureaus of Steam Engineering, Ordinance and Construction & Repair (which was responsible for hull design and the very many areas which are obviously not engines or guns).

[chuck]

About the guns, you're both right. The 16-inch/50s (lined down from 18-inches) were probably the best guns ever designed up to 1940. The "failure to communicate" between BuOrd and C&R which led up to the debacle under discussion here was a "panic moment" for both agencies. The 16-inch/50s of the Iowa was a "cut to fit" design to allow BuOrd to tell the General Board that they had the characteristics of the 1920s gun in a mount roughly the size of the 1940 /45 caliber gun. If they had started with a blank sheet of paper, who knows what would have happened. As it was, the new 50 calibre gun was horrible for it's first year.

This mistake caused the reorganization of BuOrd and C&R into one bureau. This combined with the engineering weight errors in the Sims class destroyers to create the new BuShips out of the three separate bureaus of Steam Engineering, Ordinance and Construction & Repair (which was responsible for hull design and the very many areas which are obviously not engines or guns).

I don't think the original 16"/50 MKII guns were lined down from 18"/45, they were designed from scratch as 16"/50. They were thinner and weighted considerably less than the 18" guns designed in 1919. A very limited numbers of 18" experimental barrels were made. A very large number of these MKII barrels, 100+ if I recall, had been made for the 6 Lexingtons and 6 South Dakotas cancelled under Washington.
Unfortunately, they were not really outstandingly good even for 1920s. They were about competitive with the 16"/50 barrels planned for the Tosa and other Japanese 8-8 ships.

Besides being readily available and hanging around in storage doing nothing, the MKIIs offered no performancem durability and accuracy advantages when compared to the new MKVIII. But being quite behind the times, the MKIIs weighed almost 30% more than the new MKVIIs.

This fact is highlighted by the fact that no consideration was ever given to using them in the Montanas, although there were enough of them to outfit each of the Montanas.

The MKVIIs were probably the best 16" ballistic barrels ever made. They certainly outperforms British 16" planned for the Lions. They probably would also have outperformed the Soviet 16" guns designed for the Sovietski class. The only possible contender would have been the German H-39 guns.

[Werner]

Again, my memory is inaccurate. Maybe I need a PET scan.

The 18-inch/48 was lined down to 16-inch/56 at the same time the 16-inch/50 Mk.II was being manufactured in quantity for the 1919 ships.

In 1938 Admiral Thomas C. Hart requested Preliminary Design consider this weapon for the pending 45,000 ton battleship because the barrel life at any fixed muzzle velocity was much longer than the Mk.II's. That was probably the last time the gun was considered for anything, and it's only connection to Iowa.

One has to wonder why (other than economy) BuOrd would consider these old guns when the new generation of weapons implied a new 16-inch gun could be (and was) designed which would be more effective and lighter at the same time.

Certainly in the face of the new "superheavy" shell designs and effective long-range fire proven in the late 1930s, BuOrd had a new resume of gun designs fit to allow them the choice of how to proceed. Maybe the turret design error was our good luck.

[Werner]

On another note, does anybody have the accurate western spelling for the new Yamato movie? I'd like to see if I can find it on one of the Bittorrent directories and download it, so better yet if anyone has a pointer to it, that would be much appreciated.