Comments by "Steve Valley" (@stevevalley7835) on "The Drydock - Episode 233" video.

  1.  @jbepsilon  some British ships mounted a quad Vickers .303 machine gun. Pretty useless, apparently. I did a bit of comparison on Navweaps, the 37mm M4 actually had a longer range than the Oerlikon. The Oerlikon cycled at 450 rounds/minute. The M4 cycled at 125rpm. The Oerlikon mag held 60 rounds. The M4 mag held 30. The M4 can fire longer than the Oerlikon, between reloads. The Oerlikon throws more rounds, but the M4's rounds could do a lot more damage. I have read that the old Vickers PomPom had something of a renaissance when the Brits ran into Kamikazes. The Oerlikon rounds were too puny to really stop a plane, while the old PomPom would shoot a Kamikaze to bits.
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  2. wrt the question about AA gun alternatives to the Bofors and Oerlikon: sticks in my mind I read that one of the issues with the Vickers PomPom was that it would not run satisfactorily using USN smokeless propellant, and no-one in the US made cordite. My favorite for medium AA, in the absence of the Bofors, is the Browning 37mm, which was used by the US Army. It had the advantages of already being in production, using US materials and propellant, and offered significantly greater range than the Vickers. Modify it for proper water cooling, and implement the mods later introduced on the Army version: feed by metal link belt, from either side, and I envision a quad mount along the lines of that used with the Vickers. A replacement for the Oerlikon is a problem, because, for a close in weapon, I would want the responsiveness of a pintle mount. The Bofors 25mm that the 40mm was based on was too heavy. iirc There was a pintle mount version of the Vickers, but then the propellant problem resurfaces. The Hisso, in US service, was horrible unreliable. I'm thinking of the M4 version of the US 37mm, as it was significantly lighter than the M1 version, and was used successfully on a free mount on PT boats. The 37mm has a lower rate of fire than the Oerlikon, and a lower muzzle velocity, but, if it does hit, the 37mm shell will do a lot more damage than a 20mm.
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  3.  @RedXlV  even if the ship designers were careless enough to put M1 and M4 ammo in the same magazine, mixed from rack to rack, seems the way the ammo is mounted would be enough of a signal to the ammo passers. The M1 originally used a 9 round rigid clip, but, I am assuming the mod to metal link belt is implemented for shipboard quad mounts. The M4's loop magazine was intended for aircraft use and had to be bolted in place, with cartridges loaded into the mag one at a time, after the mag was mounted on the gun. That is so awkward I wonder why it wasn't changed when the M4 was mounted on PT boats. The M4 would probably be converted to rigid clips, like the M1 originally used. So, even in a carelessly design magazine on a ship, the passers would know, if the ammo is in a metal link belt, it is for an M1, and if it is in a rigid clip, it is for an M4. In the magazines, the loading tables for the belts and clips would be designed to make it obvious if the loader was trying to load the wrong size round. You are correct that the M4 had a lower muzzle velocity than the M1, but in this context, compare to the Vickers PomPom and the Oerlikon. The Vickers and Oerlikon have very nearly the same range, while the M4 appears to top both of them, with a maximum range of 8,875 yards, vs 3,800 to 5,000 for the Vickers LV/HV respectively, and about 4,800 yards for the Oerlikon.
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  4.  @rupertboleyn3885  yes, the Vickers range is quite close to that of an Oerlikon. My only concern is the weight of the gun and ammo reducing the responsiveness of the mount to the gunners efforts to aim the thing.249kg, vs 97kg for the M4, and 68kg for the Oerlikon.
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  5. wrt the Force Z aircraft carrier question and Churchill trying to cover himself. I doubt that the Admiralty had a clue, when PoW set sail for the far east on October 24th, that all six large IJN carriers would be off on the Pearl Harbor op by the time PoW arrived in the far east. Seems that the reasonable assumption would be that if the Japanese made a move on Malaya, they would have air cover. Second point, assuming the range of a G3M or G4M with a torpedo load was unknown, and most bombs could not hurt PoW critically, bombs could hurt Repulse. So, seems irresponsible that the possibility of airborne attack on Force Z could be handwaved away. Hermes was finishing repair in Simonstown on November 16th. Hermes' usual air wing was a handful of Swordfish. The RN was starting to receive Martlets, but the early Martlets did not have folding wings, and, iirc, the wingspan of an F4F is too wide to fit on Hermes' elevators. At that time, it seems all the Martlets were in the UK anyway. The Buffalo had a slightly smaller wingspan, just small enough to fit on Hermes's elevators, and there were plenty of Buffalos in Singapore. So the only practicable way to get a credible CAP for Force Z would be to send Hermes. Meanwhile, get the information from Brewster to fabricate tailhooks in Singapore, and train the RAF pilots in carrier ops. When Hermes arrives, put the Swordfish ashore and load as many Buffalos as would fit on the ship. Bottom line, given the gyrations that would be needed to give Force Z a CAP, if that Hermes/Buffalo scenario even occurred to anyone, I figure Winny rolled the dice, then tried to cover his rear when it went wrong.
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  6.  @gregorywright4918  iirc, a flight of Buffalos did arrive at the scene of the battle, too late. Apparently Philips, or someone, did finally send a signal, when they realized how deep in the kimchee they were.
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