Picture of the day

big bear said:
Probably a dumb question, but I've never been on a battleship... would the above ship have rocked a bit when the cannons fired? That must have been an awesome noise, I really can't imagine.
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the guns would often fire in succession to mitigate the effect, as well as being absorbed some by the recoil system, but the boat would rock a bit as well

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTetKxtmI9c
 
Jon. said:
Probably built that way to save the weight of Armour plating, and weight of one section of powder/projectile stores instead of two. Maybe?
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The design was laid down when they Brit's where still hoping for another naval treaty to limit the size of battleships. The gun caliber, and sighting on the hull where chosen because they hoped that the other parties would agree to a caliber restriction, and a weight restriction...and this design gave the greatest number of guns, of the chosen caliber, at the target displacement. While smaller then the american big guns, they penetrated the Bismark's heavy Armour repeatedly, so where fully adequate to the job.

As pointed out, the design was a heavy compromise to keep the weight down to the levels they hoped to achieve in treaty...unfortunately war was looming, and no one else was interested in treaties...That said, they had a long service life so they turned out to be a decent investment.
 
From the grand to the tiny:

Germaneboat.jpg


s30cla10.jpg


The S-Boot - fast and pretty, like most attractive girls.

There's still one afloat. Boat 130 is under restoration:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/defence/4045221/Nazi-E-boat-saved-by-military-enthusiast.html
http://www.rovcom.co.uk/s130_ww2_schnellboot.htm
 
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The French Dunkerque-class battleship 2 x(4 330mm) (~13") and the Richelieu-class battleships 2x(4 380mm) (~15"), both had their main armament forward of the bridge like the Rodney and Nelson.

They all had two turrets with four guns in each.
 
sail32 said:
The French Dunkerque-class battleship 2 x(4 330mm) (~13") and the Richelieu-class battleships 2x(4 380mm) (~15"), both had their main armament forward of the bridge like the Rodney and Nelson.

They all had two turrets with four guns in each.
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Cheeky bastards ... build just wide enough to squeeze through the Panama Canal ... as if!!
 
The Lürssens boats were an excellent design. They weren't faster than the Thornycroft CMBs of WWI, but were better sea boats, even at speed. Max speed of this class was 38.5 knots from 7500hp, so the article quoting 55 knots is nonsense. Most of the Italian MAS boats and many others were faster than the S-boats, but not as long range or as good sea-keepers, nor were the MTBs and MGBs of the Royal Navy. The Soviet G5 class torpedo boats got up to 55 knots. S-130 was one of 35 S-boats surrendered to the British in 1945, she served with the RN as FPB 5130. 261 S-boats were in service in WWII.

The new owner says he wants to get a Kalotte armoured bridge from one of the S-boots sunk off Denmark; hopefully he won't try and retrofit it the S-130 which never had one.

A little internet sniffing reveals the rest of the story: ht tp://www.bmpt.org.uk/boats/S130/index6.htm
 
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Post WWI Dutch troops on the frozen canals with Lewis Guns and M95 Mannlichers. The officer in the bottom pic might have a pistol in his right hand.
 
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