Model Boat Mayhem
Mess Deck: General Section => Chit-Chat => Topic started by: polaris on February 25, 2008, 12:13:08 pm
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Dear All,
Just something I found by accident last week. Superb footage, interesting to see the hull markings as they don't look this way on models of the vessel very often.
Regards, Bernard
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Are we going to be told what you found Bernard ? :-\
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Dear Dicky,
Ooops! Serves me right for trying to fit sending the post in between work! Here is the 'Missing Link'!!! There are a few other Bismack things there, some rubbish, some good, but this one is worth a look. If by chance the Link doesn't work, just do a Utube search for Bismack and you will find it all.
Regards, Bernard
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFch5063EDo
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I always thought that compaired to other battleships the Bismark looked very low on the water. Is it me or was that the case ???.
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Dear Bigfella,
As Shipmate pointed out to me quite a while ago, such things are dependent on whether a warship was carrying a 'war loading' or not. Basically Bismarck was a heavy cruiser (Pocket Battleship), built to get around the Washington Treaty limitations (quite a few of the RN Town Class RN Cruisers were built to this of course), but the Germans did as quietly as possible 'tweak' these ships clever and very effective design (they cleverly designed the turrets so that the initial as built calibre could easily be replaced by up to 14"). To answer your question directly I don't know, but Graf Spee and other Pocket Battleships did seem to have a lowish waterline, and certainly did seem 'wet'. I am sure there are others on the Forum that will know more about Pocket Battleships than I, so you will get more substantial info. from them I'm sure.
Regards, Bernard
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A lot of ships of the period, and earlier, exceeded their design displacement through initial poor management of weights going into the ship and because of later additions. This was a problem for battleships in particular as the thickest part of the armour belt could become almost submerged at full load which meant it wasn't doing anything very useful!
Actually, Polaris, I think you are confusing Bismark with the Hipper class cruisers which were supposed to conform to the 10,000 ton treaty limit but actually weighed in at around 13,000 tons. I don't think they were ever designed to carry more than 8 inch main armament but the battlecruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were certainly designed to have their 11 inch gun turrets replaced by 15 inch ones although I think these would have been twins which would have made the ships equivalent to the rebuilt HMS Renown. Under wartime conditions the upgrade never went ahead.
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Very interesting. Makes me wonder why British naval architects were so slow in adopting the bulbous bow. The Americans and Germans obviously saw an advantage there.
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So did the French. The liner Normandie featured a bulbous bow whereas the contemporary Queen Mary had a conventional one. Mind you, the Normandie cost a heck of a lot more to build than the Queen Mary which was in some ways an evolutionary stage from the earlier Aquitania. To some extent British naval architects preferred to develop the tried and tested but the battleships Nelson and Rodney, and the G3 design from which they were derived was actually very innovative and well ahead of both German and American designs of the time. The Americans were well ahead on high pressure steam machinery though which gave them much lighter powerplants and spare weight to put into guns and armour. Although Bismarck has the reputation of being a "supership" she was in many ways just a development of the WW1 Baden/Bayern design and carried over some of their flaws such as running vital communication links above the armour deck.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGcPYPbmBe0
watch this series, there is another one too.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lYrc084Phs
here. this one is the best on the tube i think. It has interviews with one of the three remaining crew members from HMS hood.