Bismarck

[ReynoldsXD2]

The only question regarding the bismarck i have is:

 

When can i drive the thing.

[Deamon93]

The only question regarding the bismarck i have is:

 

When can i drive the thing.

 

I'm sure WG will say something about her during Gamescom but that's a personal assumption. It would make sense though since a lot of people will ask about her.

[ThEGr33kXII]

Some fun stuff in here. One thing no Bismark fan can claim is that its armour was the best.

[Thonar]

Some fun stuff in here. One thing no Bismark fan can claim is that its armour was the best.

 

 

Please, feed you statement with more information...

[Exozen]

Was it the best ship to sail during the war?, no. 

 

Was it the most feared ship in the war ? yes. 

 

Was it because ships like the Yamato was made in secret ? probably. 

 

 

Was the Bishmark and the Tirpitz over estimated because of war propaganda and churchils fear of someting that actually challanged their biggest ship ? yes, the man was known of being an absolute coward. * Dont jump on me , you can read about it your self if you google it *. 

[TheCinC]

1) No

 

2) ??? What is a 'battle navy'?

 

Bismarck was a poor design, based on the WW1 Bayern class because that was all the Germans had access to at the time. Updated, but not by much, not a very advanced design at all.

If you read the evaluation in books like Garzke and Dulin they rightly point out that just by designing the ship with three triple turrets they would have saved so much weight they could have seriously improved protection.

In addition, her side armour was vertical instead of diagonal, which decreased the effective protection and by using a single type of dual purpose secondary armament they could have saved even more weight in favour of additional protection.

Propulsion was all right, but her steering gear, as Bismarck found out, unprotected and rudders too large for her to be steered by her engines alone.

Their fifteen inch guns were on a par with the KGV's armament as their fourteen inch guns were quite potent, but certainly not better and they had only eight versus KGV's ten.

Any of the other new European battleships would also have been their equal, but they were inferior in range and fire power and probably protection to anything the US or Japan had under construction at the time or would produce during WW2.

Richelieu could have chased her and pounded her into the ground by virtue of having all her armament in front, but be in big trouble if the situation was reversed.

The Italian ships would probably have depended upon scoring an early lucky hit or superiority in numbers as I think (without checking) that their armour was inferior.

I could go on.

 

Bismarck is very much over-hyped, not the best battleship of anything except the Kriegsmarine/German navy, but it is a marketing thing, I guess, to sell more Bismarck-books and models and stuff.

Or possibly a justification to defend the loss of Hood, that it was inevitable because Bismarck was far superior, even though in terms of armament, they were equals and in terms of protection, I think Bismarck only had better deck protection.

That said, I am -thrilled- that we can probably/hopefully expect her and her sister ship soon, judging by the way it only took a few weeks for the Japanese higher tier carriers to go from being encountered in battle to being available in the tech tree.

I will be extremely disappointed if they show these ships off and not make them available until much later.

 

Bismarck and Tirpitz were very interesting ships, with an eventful (and in case of Tirpitz) long career, they are icons of their time and I want them.

I fully expect at least one of them to be a premium, why else would they present both of them?

I am guessing Tirpitz and would be especially thrilled if she had her historical torpedo tubes, but that is probably not going to happen.

Most likely I will buy the premium one, unless she has horrible stats and is very, very expensive.

On the other hand, I bought Warspite and don't regret it, just because of her looks.

 

I will be quite happy to meet both ships in battle until that time.

 

Although I would have preferred the Royal Navy being introduced first, I will settle for the stronk Soviet papernavy (although I hope they don't overdo it) and the Kriegsmarine until then.

I really hope some new ships come out soon, even though I am still grinding even towards Colorado, if just to give me something to look forward to, to know I am not grinding away in vain.

Fortunately I really like playing cruisers and destroyers right now, as the early US battleships are slow, short ranged, lumbering battle wagons.

A premium has the advantage of skipping all that grinding, but the disadvantage of taking money out of my wallet.

[TheCinC]

ThEGr33kXII, on 24 July 2015 - 02:15 PM, said:

Some fun stuff in here. One thing no Bismark fan can claim is that its armour was the best.

 

Bismarck, but true that. I think even the quality of her armour was inferior to British steel and in terms of thickness and armour scheme (the layout/positioning/tilt) ships like the Iowa were way better protected.

The Germans had little experience making armour during the interwar period, so the way they made armour probably hadn't improved much until WW2.

 

KMS_Tirpitz, on 21 July 2015 - 10:06 PM, said:

 

The Tirpitz had just as good a set of radar equipment as the Iowa by 1944, infact the latest German FCR was slightly more accurate in range and the same in bearing accuracy.

 

 

 

 

 

I actually took the trouble of trying to look it up, in Norman Friedman's Naval Radar among others. So far, I have found no evidence of this, although I am a bit disappointed in the level of detail of especially that source. Nevertheless, it seems to be quite the contrary, as I had expected. The Germans had a slight advantage in radar design at the start of the war, but all long-term research was stopped after war broke out. The Germans expected a Blitzkrieg (short war) instead of a Materialschlacht (war of attrition) and changed their research priorities accordingly. The Allies invested huge amounts of time, resources, manpower and money in research and came up with the magnetron, which worked on much shorter wavelengths. They ended up with radar small enough to be used for proximity fuzes, a secret that was kept in part by not using them in close proximity to land. Garzke and Dulin go so far as to say that "Bismarck could not use her radar for rangefinding." (Axis and Neutral, p 290) As far as I can tell Tirpitz didn't have vastly superior equipment, but I am having trouble finding specifics that quickly. Even though her equipment was upgraded, the same source (same page) is dismissive about it and, while an improvement, I highly doubt it would be on a par with what the Allies had at that stage. At close to medium range, in reasonable visibility it probably would not have mattered much, as long as the German optical rangefinders were intact, but during a night engagement, I'd choose almost any Allied ship over almost any Axis warship, with possible exception of the Japanese during the early stages of the war.

 

[LeeQuid]

 every time when i hear Bismarck was based on WW1 Bayern class.

Literally the only thing those 2 battleship classes had in common was the main battery layout and caliber.

You might as well say the Vanguard was nothing more then a WW2 queen elizabeth class

 

And the weight saving from switching the 4x2 turrets to 3x3 would had been minimal and at the expense of shot dispersion and greater percentage of guns disabled if a turret was knocked out.

Bismarck class wasnt the best, but ppl. here are acting like it was a failure 

[Vanhal]

Voted "no" on both:

1. It's obvious.

2. Since first question was about Bismarck, i assumed by "German Navy" OP meant Kriegsmarine. So also no, no one thought of it as the force that was able and should challenge the Royal Navy in decisive battle.

[Thoddyx]

I think even the quality of her armour was inferior to British steel....The Germans had little experience making armour during the interwar period, so the way they made armour probably hadn't improved much until WW2.

obviously no

SUPP 22-58 CHARACTERISTICS OF GERMAN ARMOUR ACCURACY OF INFORMATION OBTAINED DURING THE WAR

there are several comparative tests of german armor.

Flamecutted fragments from cemented armour of Tirpitz fullfilled the ballistic requirements for cemented armour of Vanguard, only most modern post war plates from 1947 possesses better ballistic properties compared to these german plates from 1939/40.

Shortly after the war the british research stated, that german FH armour was gernerally inferior to british armor of same thickness in 1947/48 this assessment was revised

 

ADM 281-127 ATC Meeting held at the E.S.C Ltd. Sheffield 22nd July 1948

"...The meeting noted the results of the American tests of German armour and the conclusion that American armour, in certain cases was inferior to that of the Germans. They noted that on very limited evidence British plates of cemented quality appeared to have greater resistance than german plate....German cemented armour did not seem to be as good as the best armour produced in this country. ...German non cemented armour, however, proved to be superior to corresponding thicknesses of British plate.(comment in thicknesses 3 1/2" and 4 3/4)"

 

regarding the tests of cemented armor . As noted abov they compared small flamecutted fragments of 1939/40  with the best british plate from 1947.

 

 

[KMS_Tirpitz]

The Bismarck & Tirpitz have on the contrary been underestimated for a long time due to the lack of knowledge on German wartime radars, esp. by the British who mistakenly thought that the Germans hardly used any radar. Only rather recently has research revealed that not only did the Germans extensively use radar on their surface vessels, but for a good while they were also ahead in this area (being the only ones capable of blindfire for a long time) and actually only lacked behind periodically in 1943 until they catched up and matched the Allies in radar again in 1944.

 

For more information: http://forum.worldofwarships.com/index.php?/topic/4125-german-ww2-radarfcs-better-than-believed/

 

 

 

TheCinC, on 25 July 2015 - 03:06 PM, said:

 

I actually took the trouble of trying to look it up, in Norman Friedman's Naval Radar among others. So far, I have found no evidence of this, although I am a bit disappointed in the level of detail of especially that source. Nevertheless, it seems to be quite the contrary, as I had expected. The Germans had a slight advantage in radar design at the start of the war, but all long-term research was stopped after war broke out. The Germans expected a Blitzkrieg (short war) instead of a Materialschlacht (war of attrition) and changed their research priorities accordingly. The Allies invested huge amounts of time, resources, manpower and money in research and came up with the magnetron, which worked on much shorter wavelengths. They ended up with radar small enough to be used for proximity fuzes, a secret that was kept in part by not using them in close proximity to land. Garzke and Dulin go so far as to say that "Bismarck could not use her radar for rangefinding." (Axis and Neutral, p 290) As far as I can tell Tirpitz didn't have vastly superior equipment, but I am having trouble finding specifics that quickly. Even though her equipment was upgraded, the same source (same page) is dismissive about it and, while an improvement, I highly doubt it would be on a par with what the Allies had at that stage. At close to medium range, in reasonable visibility it probably would not have mattered much, as long as the German optical rangefinders were intact, but during a night engagement, I'd choose almost any Allied ship over almost any Axis warship, with possible exception of the Japanese during the early stages of the war.

 

Old book with a lot of outdated and wrong information.

 

For an update:

http://www.kbismarck.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=6685

http://www.kbismarck.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=6757&start=15

http://www.kbismarck.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=1724

http://www.kbismarck.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=6680

 

 

 

[Thoddyx]

 

Bismarck, but true that... was inferior  armour scheme (the layout/positioning/tilt) ships like the Iowa were way better protected.

 

 

based on what information the german scheme appears as inferior?

The germans made a comparison for the french Richelieu (comparision of the original scheme and adapting the german scheme to R.) their conclusion was the german scheme offers better protection.

[daedricbob]

Straight up one-on-one the Bismark was a superior ship. It bloody well should be considering it was a much, much newer. In terms of it's actual design though the Bismark was quite conservative, if very well put together, but it was certainly not some kind of 'supership' as has been suggested.

 

As a little story related to HMS Hood, one of my elderly clients in Brighton served on her, notably through her attachment to Force H. When she went in for a refit he was on shore leave and took part in a box barrage against incoming bombers during which he unluckily exposed to blast effects and rendered completely deaf for the rest of his life. He was judged unfit to serve on board the Hood and relegated to motor boat duties in port. If he hadn't lost his hearing that day I guess he would be long dead at the bottom of the Denmark Strait right now. 

One's luck can be quite subjective in the grand scheme of things...

[UKOGBN]

You are aware that the British and Germans used radar in different ways

 

[UKOGBN]

Most part yes but in speed and manuverability and armament no,Bismarck was newer and so she surpassed Hood not by a a large margain in armamenet and the main difference between them is armour and HOOD loses her by a large  margain(mostly because the british were to cocky and arrogant to get her a refit but no matter -.-) and Hood could have engaged Bismarck she would have lost most likely yes but her firepower was the same and she could have also inflicted trumendeous damage to the Bismarck and HOOD and POW together against BISMARCK and PRINCE EUGEN they had even advantage(Eugen is a heavy cruiser she could have done something but nothing remarkable) and in the end Germans got lucky with her magazine and so did the british with swordfishes .And yes i may be overglorifying Hood but i am simply trying to prove that she wasn't as weak as everybody is saying,she was without a doubt weaker than BIsmarck but not that weaker.I think the main reason for Hood's sinking was that the british were so arrogant and confident about themselves that they didn't give Hood the refit she desperately needed.In the end the biggest enemy to the british ships is the britain herself[Warspite(scrap),Vanguard(scrap),Hood(refit -.-)etc etc].

That's rubbish , to assume the British didn't refit a ship due to some kind of misguided arrogant pride is stupid 

 

[Cryhavoc101]

Bismarck was a poor design 

 

Britain, France and America and even Italy got more out of the same sort of tonnage than Germany did.

 

Certainly of the 'Treaty Battleships' the KGVs had the best armour scheme - and it would take the post Treaty design of the much heavier Iowa class to better it. 

 

This is simply due to the fact that both Britain and the US benefited from post Jutland experience, experience from working over the captured German ships at the end of the first world war and continued to build ships from 1919 where as Germany pretty much stopped building the ships and had relatively little in the way of retained knowledge from WW1.

 

Bismarck was intended to be a North Sea short range slugger (her armour scheme is very similar to Beyern and Revenge who where built for the same thing) while the British and Americans moved on to build their ships around plunging fire from longer ranges with more efficient all or nothing armour layouts.

 

As for Bismarck "wasn't sunk it was scuttled" - parts of her deck were already awash and given that rounds had penetrated her Engineering spaces I find it hard to believe that what scuttling charges where used did little more than hastened her end

 

We know that 14" shells from POW penetrated her below the water line and damaged fuel tanks as well as hitting part of her Engineering spaces.

 

 

[Cryhavoc101]

Most part yes but in speed and manuverability and armament no,Bismarck was newer and so she surpassed Hood not by a a large margain in armamenet and the main difference between them is armour and HOOD loses her by a large  margain(mostly because the british were to cocky and arrogant to get her a refit but no matter -.-) and Hood could have engaged Bismarck she would have lost most likely yes but her firepower was the same and she could have also inflicted trumendeous damage to the Bismarck and HOOD and POW together against BISMARCK and PRINCE EUGEN they had even advantage(Eugen is a heavy cruiser she could have done something but nothing remarkable) and in the end Germans got lucky with her magazine and so did the british with swordfishes .And yes i may be overglorifying Hood but i am simply trying to prove that she wasn't as weak as everybody is saying,she was without a doubt weaker than BIsmarck but not that weaker.I think the main reason for Hood's sinking was that the british were so arrogant and confident about themselves that they didn't give Hood the refit she desperately needed.In the end the biggest enemy to the british ships is the britain herself[Warspite(scrap),Vanguard(scrap),Hood(refit -.-)etc etc].

 

A very poor post and exposes your limited understanding of the situation

 

There was no arrogance or over confidence or cockiness involved in Hood's lack of a deep Warspite / Renown style deep refit - it was needed, the British had known pretty much from her launch that she was obsolete but in the 20s and early 30s very little could challenge her no one was building new fast Battleships at the time.

 

The British wanted to give Hood a deep refit in the late 30s (they wanted to give all of their old ships a deep refit) but this was continuously delayed due to the need to have her at sea - i.e. the Neutrality patrol around Spain (its a tough job being the worlds policeman) and then as things went south in 39 she and the other Battle Cruisers Repulse / Renown were needed to respond to the Twins and the impending launch of the Bismarck until such a time as the KGVs could replace her and guarantee a 2 : 1 advantage as the existing 12 British Battleships QEs, Revenges and Nelrods, would have been too slow to catch them.

 

As for scrapping Warspite - the successful Deep refit she got was subsequently used on 2 of her Sisters and HMS Renown - making them very effective ships so Im not sure what your point is?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Thoddyx]

Bismarck was a poor design 

 

 

It appears to me the USN probably didnt share your assessment

some general remarks on ships capabilites given by the

USNTME Technical Report No. 224-45 Latest German Battleships put into Service - Bismarck - Tirpitz Hull Construction

maybe some gets bored but another repetition

 

 

 

[Sub_Eleven]

ship model thinghy:

 

http://worldofwarships.eu/en/news/common/Italeri-Bismarck/

[KMS_Tirpitz]

The Bismarck and her sister ship Tirpitz were the best battleships in the world until the Iowa was launched, and with its added modifications the Tirpitz was arguably the 2nd best battleship in the world in 1944, again only bested by the Iowa.  The Yamato, whilst most certainly the most powerful battleship of WW2, lagged behind in FC to be considered the best, limiting it to daylight operations.

 

Had the Japanese developed their radar tech further the Yamato would've arguably been the best, but fortunately for the US they didn't, which is surprising considering that they had developed the cavity magnetron even before the British. That having been said the latest radar on the Yamato could be used for accurate range keeping, however bearing was still an issue and thus she was limited to accurate fire during the day.

 

[BlueMoon51]

As Otto von Bismarck said "If the British Army landed in Europe, I'd get the Belgian police to arrest them" in that sentence summed up the whole arms race in Europe from the end of the 19th Cent until the end of World War 2. The British couldn't hope to compete with the great land armies of Europe because they couldn't allow them to match them at sea, Germany's goal for most of that time was to keep the British spending the majority of its defense budget on maintaining their trade routes, so the answer to the 2nd poll question is no and it wasn't expected to be.

 

In terms of a raider the Bismarck was undoubtedly a failure in terms of the threat they caused and the cost in return by the way it shaped British ship design spending and tactics its much harder to judge, although 100 more U-Boats or Armed merchantman would no doubt have had more direct impact on the war 

 

[Frosty]

As the cryhavoc mentioned a lot would depend on circumstances: bismarck had good vertical armor with slopes of the deck behind the belt so at short to med ranges it was well protected indeed. On the other hand on long distances it's deck armor wouldn't be much problem - especially to US guns. Even Jean Barts much thicker deck didn't stop a US 16" shell that went directly into magazine of secondary guns (luckily empty at the time). Also bismarck guns had very flat trajectory optimized for short to med range combat. On the other hand let's remember that it got defeated by Rodney whose guns couldn't hit a barn from the inside and KGV whose guns were jammin all the time so I'd call it's performance dissapointing... All the legends about it come from the lukcy shot it scored on hood rather than from it's design.

[Thonar]

As the cryhavoc mentioned a lot would depend on circumstances: bismarck had good vertical armor with slopes of the deck behind the belt so at short to med ranges it was well protected indeed. On the other hand on long distances it's deck armor wouldn't be much problem - especially to US guns. Even Jean Barts much thicker deck didn't stop a US 16" shell that went directly into magazine of secondary guns (luckily empty at the time). Also bismarck guns had very flat trajectory optimized for short to med range combat. On the other hand let's remember that it got defeated by Rodney whose guns couldn't hit a barn from the inside and KGV whose guns were jammin all the time so I'd call it's performance dissapointing... All the legends about it come from the lukcy shot it scored on hood rather than from it's design.

 

You mean the same Rodney that was unable to penetrate vital areas of the ship?

You mean the same Rodney that was unable to penetrate the "citadel"?

€: You mean the same Rodney, that was unable to penetrate vital parts of the Bismarck with its massive Torpedos?

[Frosty]

 

You mean the same Rodney that was unable to penetrate vital areas of the ship?

You mean the same Rodney that was unable to penetrate the "citadel"?

€: You mean the same Rodney, that was unable to penetrate vital parts of the Bismarck with its massive Torpedos?

 

im not surf ab citadel penetration as I don't have my books around atm but if I remember correctly Rodney's fire was inaccurate almost to the point of usefulness.  If memory serves me right it only scored a couple of hits and that happened when Bismarck was already rly close and defenseless 

[Thonar]

 

im not surf ab citadel penetration as I don't have my books around atm but if I remember correctly Rodney's fire was inaccurate almost to the point of usefulness.  If memory serves me right it only scored a couple of hits and that happened when Bismarck was already rly close and defenseless 

 

Well your wording "defeated by Rodney" is simply ... interessting not to say arguable.