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Post by yanmacca on Feb 20, 2017 14:31:40 GMT
Chuck I have read on some of the other military sites I frequent, that those pom-poms were prone to jams and this was down to a faulty batch of ammo, I have read that jams had occurred on the POW, and if this is true then they took quite some time to clear, which is not good during a battle.
Apparently the pom-pom was developed to use up large stocks of 2 pdr shells which dated from WW1. Another account states that before she was sunk, the commissioned gunner on the Repulse spent the whole action running from one pom-pom mount to another in an effort to keep them operational, and this was down to faulty ammunition.
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Post by quincannon on Feb 20, 2017 14:54:38 GMT
Your pompoms were about like our 1.1 inch quads often called Chicago Pianos. They were first generation weapons that were prone to jams and stoppages. We realized that very early about our 1.1's and got rid of them as soon as we could, replaced by 40mm quads and twins.
You mentioned volume of fire. You can fire as fast as you want, and long as you want, until doomsday if that suits your fancy, but if those fire units are not served by and adequate number of directors, then you just wasted a lot of ammo for nothing. Fire directors that were mounted were grossly insufficient to serve the amount of automatic guns that were mounted, and that would ultimately be mounted.
It was as late as 1945 with the anti-kamikaze refit that our Fletchers receive an adequate number of directors to serve the guns they had mounted.
Now take this mornings conversation and see how all of your strategic thinking about what you can do and what you can't is impacted, then look at all that carefully laid out strategic thinking about what, and where we will manufacture for the war effort and what priority it will have had to be thrown partially in the waste can and then start over.
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Post by yanmacca on Feb 20, 2017 15:00:03 GMT
The Price of Wales not only had problems with faulty 2 pdr ammo, but lost the use of eight of the 5.25in Anti-Aircraft guns too, this was down to a single torpedo hit which dislocated the port shaft, the ship soon filled with water cause electrical failure and a 11 degree list, so not one of the eight 5.25in guns on one side could be trained due to the loss of electricity needed to move them and the list was so bad their guns could not elevate high enough to fire.
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Post by yanmacca on Feb 20, 2017 15:03:16 GMT
Chuck I thought they were called "Chicago Organs"
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dave
Brigadier General
Posts: 1,679
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Post by dave on Feb 20, 2017 16:00:50 GMT
In an oddly similar way, the anti-air tactics in 1941 were as poorly designed and understood as were the infantry tactics against the riffled minie ball in 1861. The placement of naval vessels in combat against bombers and torpedo bombers with inadequate defensive weaponry and tactics was a death sentence. In fact naval vessels in WW II were continually lost against air attacks despite better weaponry and defensive fighter protection.
Now today we have missiles which can launched against America's super carriers with the question? Can we protect the flattops? Regards Dave
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Post by quincannon on Feb 20, 2017 17:15:42 GMT
John Paul Jones once remarked, "Give me a fast ship (Ranger), for I intend going in harms way"
You cannot go in harms way ever with 100 percent certainty that you will survive Dave. What you do is give your force the best protection you can, but still expect damage or loss, depending upon the enemies capability and will. It is foolish to think otherwise.
Post 1943 we lost one light fleet carrier (Princeton) and three escort carriers (Saint Lo - Ommaney Bay - Bismarck Sea) to air attacks. None of our fleet carriers were lost, although many suffered a great deal of damage, and a few a couple of times.
If you look at the table of war losses though you will find that the majority of surface ships lost were destroyers, and a very large portion of them were lost on the Okinawa picket line where they operated on the far perimeter of the fleet, and operated alone, which itself did not give them the integrated force protection I eluded to a couple of posts ago.
If you look at the attack profile of the Kamikaze of 44-45 it is very similar to the cruise missile of today, particularly as it relates to saturation attacks. Fire enough missiles concentrated at one target, just like launching enough Kamikazes, and you are going to hit what you go after.
One book I can highly recommend to you Dave, that touches greatly on the subject at hand is "Destroyer Operations In World War II" by Theodore Roscoe. Pay particular attention to the portion that covers Okinawa. Try and get the hardbound edition though, probably at a library. The paperback editions of both of Roscoe's work (the other covering submarines) are highly abridged, and as such not nearly as informative.
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dave
Brigadier General
Posts: 1,679
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Post by dave on Feb 20, 2017 23:45:06 GMT
QC I do have a hard copy of Roscoe's work and have read it many times and continually find real nuggets which have added greatly to my education. I especially like the maps as it is so difficult to visualize how large the Pacific Ocean is. The incredible distances between islands is incredible. I ma fortunate to be near the USS Kidd (DD-661) a museum ship in Baton Rouge on the Mississippi River which is only 6 hours or so from home. I have visited her several times and often thing of my dad who served in 2 destroyers. Both the Kidd and the USS Laffey (DD-724), located in Charleston, SC are open to the public and veterans of being hit by kamikazes off of Okinawa in April of 1944 a week apart. Regards Dave
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Post by Beth on Feb 21, 2017 0:08:39 GMT
Okay this is going to be a dumb question but last night I was watching a recording of Mr. Roberts. In the opening credits they show a convoy of ships but one caught my eye because it was so low in the water that I wondered how it survived rough weather. Hubby thought it was destroyer but I want to confirm it.
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Post by quincannon on Feb 21, 2017 1:19:48 GMT
Flush deck destroyers are very low in the water, especially at speed, or when turning.
I have not seen Mr.Roberts in years and don't recall the scene, but there is a scene of a flush decker, a Gearing, in the closing shot of Caine Mutiny which shows her at speed, and you readily notice how low she is.
Some of them did not survive rough weather, Spence for instance.
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Post by Beth on Feb 21, 2017 1:28:33 GMT
Thank you. I knew someone here would know the answer. I looked up pictures of a flush deck destroyers and it appears similar to what I saw.
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Post by quincannon on Feb 21, 2017 4:43:48 GMT
The Fletchers, our mainstay destroyer in the Pacific, of which we built 175, were the first US flush deck destroyers since the Wickes and Clemson Class flush deck four pipers built during WWI.
The flush deck design was much easier to build and that being so it could be built in the traditional destroyer yards like Bath Iron Words, and Federal Kearney, but also in some of the quickie wartime yards like on the west coast and Orange,Texas.
The broken decks were a little better rough sea boats.
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Post by Beth on Feb 21, 2017 22:32:59 GMT
I admit I don't know a whole lot about ships but when I saw that boat in profile I realized that it would be the last place I would want to be on in very rough seas someplace in the Pacific.
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Post by quincannon on Feb 21, 2017 23:54:36 GMT
All destroyers are wet. Flush deck destroyers are very wet.
Note to Ian. I started on Wisconsin today, and just for your enlightenment I counted the number of 20mm nd 40mm barrels she carried in 1945:
40 Millimeter quadruple mounts: 24 for a total of 96 barrels.
20 Millimeter mounts: 56 gun stations, and a good portion of those were 20mm twins. Cant tell exactly for the scale is much too small
In addition to that were twenty five inch 38 caliber weapons capable of firing proximity fused rounds in the anti-air role.
Compare all that to the average 1941 battleship fit for anti-air weaponry, and the difference is stounding.
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Post by yanmacca on Feb 22, 2017 0:07:32 GMT
That's some fire power Chuck, I think the 40mm Bofors was a much better weapon then the 40mm pom pom.
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Post by quincannon on Feb 22, 2017 1:02:03 GMT
So do I.
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