# Could the Hood \*possibly\* Have Whipped the Bismarck? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 17, 2020, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754 "2020-11-17T01:22:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Gray\_Ghost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c0e974/32.png) [@Gray\_Ghost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gray_Ghost)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2020, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/41 "2020-11-22T19:17:35Z")
Brief gunnery chart for the 16 inch, Mark 8 AP shell. [USA 16"/50 (40.6 cm) Mark 7 - NavWeaps](http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_16-50_mk7.php) Your WAG looks pretty close, LSLGuy. Surprising that the AP shell had a lower MV than the HE shell. Speed is really helpful in defeating armor. OTOH, more speed means more wear, and it’s not like these guns had great barrel life anyway. Also surprising how much velocity the AP shell lost, in such a ‘short’ range, considering the maximum range of those shells. I wonder if modifying the geometry of the projectile, like adding or extending a boat tail, or incorporating a base-bleed, would lower drag appreciably? ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2020, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/42 "2020-11-22T20:13:44Z")
> [@Gray\_Ghost](#): > > Surprising that the AP shell had a lower MV than the HE shell. Speed is really helpful in defeating armor. OTOH, more speed means more wear, and it’s not like these guns had great barrel life anyway Ref your cite, the AP round weighed 2700#. The HE weighed 1900#. Assuming each could be fired with the same propellant charge that’s most of the difference right there. > [@Gray\_Ghost](#): > > Also surprising how much velocity the AP shell lost, in such a ‘short’ range, considering the maximum range of those shells. I wonder if modifying the geometry of the projectile, like adding or extending a boat tail, or incorporating a base-bleed, would lower drag appreciably? I can’t figure out which specific numbers you’re referring to so can’t speak to velocity loss. Agree that the flat base of the shells both AP & HC is poor aerodynamics. By the 1980s they’d invented discarding sabot rounds and those shells did have a boat tail. ---
**Author:** ![Gray\_Ghost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c0e974/32.png) [@Gray\_Ghost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gray_Ghost)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2020, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/43 "2020-11-22T20:35:09Z")
Sorry. Referring to this specific part of the reference: [USA 16"/50 (40.6 cm) Mark 7 - NavWeaps](http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_16-50_mk7.php#Armor_Penetration_with_AP_Mark_8) Losing 20 percent of velocity in the first 10,000 yards struck me as not good at first. Though with further looking, it’s better than the performance of e.g., the faster 8"/55 Mark 19 AP shells. (MV 2800 fps, yet down to 2166 at 6,000 yds, an over 20 percent loss. From here: [USA 8"/55 (20.3 cm) Marks 9, 10, 11, 13 and 14 - NavWeaps](http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_8-55_mk9.php#Range)) They really did need better projectiles. And eventually got some. That 8"/55 version on the _Newport News_ class cruiser _St. Paul_, eventually had ~4 inch subprojectiles built for it, enabling it to conduct shore bombardment at ranges exceeding 70,000 yards, during the Vietnam War. [USA 8"/55 (20.3 cm) Marks 12 and 15 - NavWeaps](http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_8-55_mk12-15.php#ammonote3.1back) ---
**Author:** ![Sepp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@Sepp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sepp)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2020, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/44 "2020-11-23T01:01:03Z")
[Capn\_Carl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capn_Carl)[Guest](https://boards.straightdope.com/g/Registered) I’ll 2nd what DesertDog said, a 10” gun would not penetrate the main armor of any WW2-era battleship. After the war, the USN tested a turret faceplate intended for the 3rd Yamato class BB. They determined that the USN 16”, firing a 2700 pound shell at 2500fps, would not penetrate the Japanese plate _at any range._ While I believe the 10" bore assertion is a bit stretched, the above paragraph can’t be used as a counter-argument. It’s implying that not even a 16-inch shell is adequate to kill Yamato. ---
**Author:** ![Capn\_Carl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/838e76/32.png) [@Capn\_Carl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capn_Carl)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2020, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/45 "2020-11-23T01:49:36Z")
You’re right, I didn’t make that clear. Only the turret faceplates are completely immune to penetration from the USN 16” 50. ---
**Author:** ![Brayne\_Ded](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Brayne\_Ded](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brayne_Ded)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2020, 10:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/46 "2020-11-24T10:39:48Z")
[Sepp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sepp) > I don’t believe an admiral will sacrifice a capital ship and more than 1,000 lives to throw them into a battle they are sure to lose. We know of suicide attacks during the war and Denmark Strait wasn’t one of them.\< I did not say “sacrifice.” I said that the RN considered that it might cost at least one capital ship to take out the Bismarck. Hood was not the ideal choice to face the Bismarck, nor was the brand new PoW, but they were available and also fast enough. The RN knew that battlecuisers were vulnerable, that was why Hood got extra armor on the basis of the lessons of the battle of Jutland. As always, you fight a war with what you have, and not what you would like to have. > To answer your question, the Hood and the POW should have immediately ganged up on Bismarck…" Yes, of course, and the fact that Hood mistook the Prinz Eugen for the Bismarck cost it valuable time in getting the range. “How could Holland have deployed his ships?” You can argue what you want with hindsight, but at the time the RN did not know much about the Bismarck, or that it had been constructed for another battle of Jutland, with strong side armor at the cost of deck armor. Obviously, it would have been good if the British ships could have delayed B and PE until another cruiser or two came up and could have dealt with PE by themselves. ---
**Author:** ![Sepp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@Sepp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sepp)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2020, 8:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/47 "2020-11-25T08:57:13Z")
I don’t think there was ever any satisfactory deck armoring for any warship in WWII. The all-or-nothing concept was limited to the main magazines and the “citadel” of the ship. All other parts of the battleship were vulnerable even to secondary battery fire. Deck armor of 3.5 inches were just meant to detonate the explosive charge of the shell while subsequent thinner armor below the main deck was meant to withstand splintering. Well this didn’t work very well for the South Dakota, the Yamato and the Musashi. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stafford\_Cripps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stafford_cripps/32/7167_2.png) [@The\_Stafford\_Cripps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stafford_Cripps)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2020, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/48 "2020-11-25T19:42:01Z")
This isn’t particularly relevant, but it’s something I thought should be recorded for posterity, having failed to do take the opportunity on a previous WW2 ship thread. In 2014 I met a man who’d joined the Royal Navy in WW2 aged 15, which was the style at the time. He served in the Pacific, I don’t remember what kind of ship but it might have been an aircraft carrier. He was telling me about how the US ships had wooden decks and the British ships had steel covered decks. He said that the joke was that when a Kamakaze hit the decks, on an American ship it would cause a lot of damage, but on a British ship they would just sweep the wreckage over the side. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2020, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/49 "2020-11-25T23:23:34Z")
That was a conscious design decision. The armored deck in the UK CVs was also the strength deck, and not part of the superstructure. This meant that the air groups had to be smaller. The US went with the wooden decks and open hangars, which allowed a larger air group. The Japanese CVs were similar to the UK ones in structure, but didn’t have armored flight decks, tho they had large air groups by virtue of having two hangar levels. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2020, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/50 "2020-11-26T15:34:26Z")
That was the “we can always make more” philosophy the USN had, especially regarding the _Essex_-class CVs – they went with the larger air groups rather than smaller but better protected ones. [Here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iC6LN3U5ELk) is an hour-long analysis by Drach comparing USN and IJN damage control practices. Executive summary: Both were very good at what they did but in the IJN there were special, highly trained DC teams and if they happened to get wiped out, your typical Japanese sailor with a rigid, do-what-your-told mindset was not nearly as effective as a more flexible US sailor in the same situation. ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2020, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/51 "2020-11-26T20:00:04Z")
The armoured flight deck (actually the hanger deck, but it covered most of the flight deck) also limited the overhead height and made these carriers extremely difficult and expensive to modernise after the war - and only one, _Victorious_, was so modernised, and the cost (poorly project-managed) deterred them from doing any more. Compare with the _Essex/Ticonderoga_-class hulls which remained useful into the 1970s. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2020, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/52 "2020-11-26T21:31:21Z")
And IIRC only one of the _Essex_-class carriers was so badly damaged (none sunk) that it was a total loss - USS _Franklin_. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2020, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/53 "2020-11-27T02:41:16Z")
> [@casdave](#): > > Also worth noting, there is more than one way to cripple the ability of a major warship, if this battle had lasted any appreciable time - which was a likely outcome, Bismark would have used up most of her main armanent ammo, which would have effectively have neutered her. IIRC the Bismarck was meant as a commerce raider and her smaller armament was more than sufficient for that. In theory she was fast enough to out-run most other trouble (which she nearly did except for the lucky shot to her rudder). You can argue that she was not of much use but let’s face it…when she got out to the Atlantic she made everyone lose their shit. For one ship she tied up a LOT of enemy (her enemy) resources. That has a value all its own. ---
**Author:** ![Sepp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@Sepp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sepp)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2020, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/54 "2020-11-27T06:38:20Z")
If not ammo, fuel. Unlike in WWI wherein the cruiser Emden could stop by and buy (or steal) coal from various coaling stations in the Indian Ocean. She could also just get the coal from captured steamers. Not the case with WWII raiders. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2020, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/55 "2020-11-27T07:53:18Z")
True but the Germans knew her fuel limits which would not change a whole lot on a mission (battle damage caused her to lose fuel). She had plenty to cause mayhem though. Imagine her in the middle of supply runs from the US to the UK. Bismarck was worth loads of submarines. There is good reason why the Allies went ape shit trying to sink her. Imagine trying the same thing in the Pacific. In the Atlantic throwing every ship they had at Bismarck could work…and it did…but Bismarck almost got away. Imagine the scene if Bismarck could pop out of France at any time and not need to squeeze out through the Denmark Strait and past the UK before air cover could protect everything. She’d tie up loads of Allied resources even if she never left port. ---
**Author:** ![Quercus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/7ab992/32.png) [@Quercus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quercus)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2020, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/56 "2020-11-27T14:45:10Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Bismarck was worth loads of submarines. Sure, but also cost loads of submarines. Just making a rough estimate: Bismark grossed 41,000 tons; a Type VII U-boat grossed 770 tons. So for the steel in Bismark, you could have made 53 submarines. Which would have been more useful? ---
**Author:** ![Gray\_Ghost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c0e974/32.png) [@Gray\_Ghost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gray_Ghost)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2020, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/57 "2020-11-27T20:40:03Z")
Another apples to apples comparison, in line with @Quercus: _[Bismarck](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_battleship_Bismarck)_ had a ship’s complement of 2,065 officers and seamen. A [Type VII had 45](http://uboataces.com/ref-crew.shtml). You could crew (in theory) over 45 U-Boats with the sailors on _Bismarck_. ---
**Author:** ![Capn\_Carl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/838e76/32.png) [@Capn\_Carl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capn_Carl)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2020, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/58 "2020-11-28T01:09:34Z")
A note to no one in particular: _Bismarck_ has a ‘c’ in it. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2020, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/59 "2020-11-28T04:52:38Z")
And now a lot of sea in it. ---
**Author:** ![Capn\_Carl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/838e76/32.png) [@Capn\_Carl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capn_Carl)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2020, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754/60 "2020-11-28T07:30:31Z")
Nailed it! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-hood-possibly-have-whipped-the-bismarck/925754.md?page=4)