Comments by "Steve Valley" (@stevevalley7835) on "The Drydock - Episode 199" video.
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wrt the undersized British BBs, iirc, during the 1930 London conference, the UK did make a proposal to reduce both the tonnage limit and gun size limit for BBs. I have read that the Dunkerques were built undersized, in part, due to British pressure to build smaller ships. Italy considered smaller designs in the late 20s, before deciding on a treaty-max design with Littorio. If the UK has won the day in 1930, and everyone was limited to smaller ships, 25,000t with 12" guns, would that not give the treaty parties incentive to heavily modernize their older 15"-16" armed ships, instead of building new, but weaker, ships?
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@kemarisite The 5.25" had semi-fixed ammo. The shell alone weighed about 80 lbs. The 4.5", prior to the Mk 4, had fixed ammo, which contributed to a higher rate of fire, 12 rpm vs only 7-8 rpm for the 5.25, but the fixed round weighed 87lbs, which slowed rate of fire due to crew fatigue, just like the 5.25. In the back of my mind is the thought that designing a gun to fire the heaviest shell a man can lift does not work out in practice. The 4"/45 Mk 16 was designed as a DP weapon. It fired fixed ammo, so featured a rof of about 15-20 rpm, and the round only weighted 65lbs. Unfortunately, seems that Jackie Fisher was the only Admiralty honcho that figured a 4" was large enough for a capital ship secondary, so, when Warspite was rebuilt, and Jackie long gone, she retained most of her obsolete 6" casemate guns, and received only four twin 4"/45 Mk 16 mounts. Speculating, had they replaced all the 6" with twin 4"/45s Mk 16s, (the single 6" and twin 4" weigh almost the same, about 21,000kg) Warspite may not have been so banged up by aircraft on so many occasions, meanwhile, thin skinned DDs and treaty cruisers at Narvik and Matapan, instead of facing several 6" shells, would face a hail of 4" fire from nearly twice as many guns with triple the rate of fire.
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@kemarisite in retrospect, being able to throw more steel at aircraft would have been beneficial to Bismark. On the other hand, were the 150s better for Graff Spee? Theoretically, Ajax and Achilles could have stayed out of range of the 105, and, with Graff having only two 11" turrets, one of the cruisers would not take any return fire. The range issue is more interesting on Warspite. The 6" PIX mounts could elevate, at best, to 17.5 degrees, which would give a range of less than 15,000yds, while the 4" could manage over 19,000. Fisher certainly seemed to think that 4" quick fire guns were preferable, as the two WWI classes where he dictated the design, the Renowns and Courageouses, had the triple 4" secondaries. Yes, the triple mount didn't work out so well, but it's clear where his thinking was going: throw a lot more shells and increase the probability of a hit. Even in a better protected ship than a DD, a hail of 4" may not penetrate the belt, but they'll make a mess of the upper works, gun directors, command staff on the bridge.
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@kemarisite I was looking at the range tables on Navweaps when I wrote that. The 150 was about the equal of the British 6" wrt range, so Ajax and Achilles would be expected to give as well as they got, regardless of range. The somewhat shorter range of the 105 opens the possibility of engaging beyond it's range, at least in theory. Whether the Brits could hit anything at 20,000 is another matter. If the light cruisers closed to 12-16,000, and Graff had an all 105 armament, twice as many guns with twice the rate of fire, the cruisers would be pretty badly chewed up. Once the hail of small caliber fire has taken out the gun directors, radio antennas, Morse lamps, signal flag halyards, and command officers on the bridge, the effectiveness of the light cruisers would have been sharply reduced.
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