Best World war two warships?

[Glider]

Not the best vessel but I think one with possibly the most remarkable record of combat, the IJN Yukikaze, a Kegero Class Destroyer. She served in nearly all the major battles of the Pacific war including Midway, Guadalcanal, Eastern Solomons, Battle of the Bismark Sea, Battle of the Philippine Sea, Leyte Gulf and an escort to the Yamato on her last voyage. Despite all this action, with the exception of hitting a mine that did little damage, she was never hit. Not surprisingly, she was seen as a lucky ship.

A most remarkable record.

[carpenoctem1689]

I was just reading about those ships. They were fast, well armed and amroured and were great destroyers. In company with the japanese torpedoes of the ear, they were good ships, and lucky for us more werent built. I believe them to be of the best destroyers built during the second world war.

I also like though the Hipper class cruisers of the kreigsmarine. The Prinz eugen escorted the bismarck on her maiden/final voyage, participated in the channel dash, and finsihed the war AND survived both a-bomb tests. Now thats one lucky ship. She also slugged it out with two british BB along with bismarck on her voyage, and lived!

[Henk]

I promise this is the last thing about this but I would just like to thank you guys for helping me even more with my hobby.

Now lets get on with the topic. I love the Hipper class too. Great ships and it is a shame the Prinz Eugen are now a wreck, I would have love to see her intact and to see how she functions. The fact that she survived the A bomb tests just show you how great she were build. German engineering.

Henk

[syscom3]

Originally Posted by Glider

...... the IJN Yukikaze, a Kegero Class Destroyer. She served in nearly all the major battles of the Pacific war including Midway, Guadalcanal, Eastern Solomons, Battle of the Bismark Sea, Battle of the Philippine Sea, Leyte Gulf and an escort to the Yamato on her last voyage. Despite all this action, with the exception of hitting a mine that did little damage, she was never hit. Not surprisingly, she was seen as a lucky ship.

A most remarkable record.

Heres the TROM for this ship. Its an interesting war record.

http://www.combinedfleet.com/yukika_t.htm

[carpenoctem1689]

Damn that ship does have one interesting service record. It lasted all the way until 1970! WOW. Though the chinese level of quality was somewhat dpwn compared to western nations, and one can assume it wasnt modernized too much, but thats just an assumption. Based mostly on that the chinese navy, until very recently, wasnt a blue water navy at all, and had no aspirations to be.

Ive always liked japanese destroyers, but they didnt make enough of them, and they were squandered sometims in duties they shouldnt have been (moving troops and supplies in makeshift convoys at night). While they saw some success, they could have been better applied to trade protection against the ever lurking US submarines.

Many people argue the baltimore class as the best CA of the second world war, but could it really be, lacking torpedoes? That seriously limited combat effectiveness in my opinion. I would go with Hipper or Mogami for sure. good combination of guns, speed, armor, range and torpedoes/AA armament all rolled up in one package.

Favorite cruisers (CA) base on my opinion of best:
1.) Hipper class-has everything a CA should have.
2.) Baltimore class (very, very close second). Lacks torpedoes, otherwise superb.
3.) Mogami or chokai class (somewha distant thrid). Top heavy, but fast, well armed and has torpedoes...AA armament and armor of concern.

[delcyros]

The Blatimore´s are good. As was the Hipper-class. But Prinz Eugen, the first ship of the second lot (Seydlitz beeing unfinished and Lutzow given to Stalin) had improvements in hull design and firecontroll (By 1945 PE had the most advanced german Radar/firecontroll set (FuM-Berlin-0), equal to the best allied sets). Nethertheless they weren´t intended to be CA. They should be CL in design stage (with 4 5.9"/60 triple turrets, 35kts), hence they had comparably light armour for a CA and low range for a german CA. This puts the Baltimore class more in advantage but these ships while being excellent protected were sensible to underwater hits. The Mogami-class with it´s centerline bulkhead seems to me the most reasonable choice. Probably better would be Lutzow/Scheer/Graf-Spee, but these ships -while being CA in nomenclature- are better known as pocket battleships. I believe they are BC in original sense (speed and firepower for protection).

[carpenoctem1689]

Do you have a site that has the specs. for Mogami class? I have some very basic references but am always wanting to expand my knowledge of heavy cruisers.

Lutzow, sheer and Graf-spee were all awesome ships, but they were more suited to the Commerce raiding roles, and i wouldnt use them in CA roles, and with the 11in. guns, would also classify them as BC.

If the Hipper class had light armor (which it did) it was arranged in the correct spots to be econmical, a sturdy warship, strong enough to take some punishment, and fast as well.

[delcyros]

Try www.world-war.co.uk
It´s a good source for basic cruiser specs. You may source the net as I do (Google is great if you check the groups) but the best is still the good old book.
Multilingual reading may help here ( I always recommend to read the french gazette naval histoire).

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Cool have not been to that site before. I get most of my specs from the old Janes books from that time.

[reddragon]

Originally Posted by carpenoctem1689

1.)

Aircraft carriers, well i always loved Lexington, Akagi and shinano. Shinano had the brilliant idea of being moved from one yard to another, before completion, with US submarines patrolling everywhere....brilliant right? I like lexington, because she was fast, could carry many aircraft (ninety?) and had some decent damage control. The decks were too thin though, and made out of wood if i remember correctly. Akagi is a close contender, but im gonna go american on this one.

Damage control was far better on the U. S. ships than the Japanese.

I may be mistaken but I believe they had wooden decks because it was much easier to repair after battle damage had been incurred.

[syscom3]

Ive heard the same thing too about the wooden decks of the aircraft carriers. Plus wood had a lower weight thus contributed to the stability of the ship.

In order to make a flight deck thick enough to stop a 500 lbs bomb from penetrating to the hanger, it would take quite some armour, all of which translates into more weight that either slows down the ship, or decreases its munitions and av-gas stores for the air groups.

Some naval historians have pointed out that the USS Enterprise was able to get its flight deck operational fairly quickly after taking some bomb hits in the battle of the Santa Cruz. If it was armoured deck, the bomb would have penetrated anyway and buckled the deck, making it imperative that it reach a large shipyard to repair the damage.

[Glider]

I think its a question of balance. A wooden deck will not stop a bomb and any bomb that penetrates to the hanger below is guaranteed to cause significant damage. As a result almost any hit is going to put the ship out of action for some time. I don't see how having a wooden deck is going to help with repairs because of all the damage below deck and the amount of wood that woull be needed to repair such damage.

The armoured deck will reduce the potential for damage and in many cases stop the ship from receiving any damage at all. I think the Enterprise was hit by 2 x 500LB bombs from Vals and knocked out of action for the rest of the battle. It is quite possible that these would have caused little if any damage to an armoured deck.

This may seem an extravagant claim but in the Med the Illustrious was hit by 6-8 (depending on source) 1100 and 2200lb bombs which would have sunk any other carrier, in any other Navy. She was greviously hurt but sailed around 10 days later from Malta with a flightdeck capable of limited operations.
In the Pacific in April/May all the RN carriers were hit by suicide planes. Illustrious was hit by two but continued to operate aircraft as did the Indomitable that was hit by one. The Formidable was out of action for four hours. The other three were all repaired within a month. An impressive record

However it isn't all good news. Armoured decks weigh a lot and the first three carriers only had one hanger deck as the hanger walls were also fully armoured with four and a half inches of armour. As a result they carried roughly half the aircraft of an American Fleet carrier.
The fourth carrier had one and a half hangers with the hanger walls reduced in armour to one and a half inches. The armoured deck remained.
The last two carriers were redesigned internally and had two full hanger decks and carried more aircraft.
RN carriers also carried and operated more aircraft than their 'book' values indicate and this should be remembered when considering the value of these carriers. for example
The Illustrious has a 'book' load of 36 aircraft but operated 52
The Implacable has a 'book' load of 54 but operated 81.

Hope this helps

[delcyros]

Both design philosophys have advantages and disadvantages. I do believe that the armoured box of british carriers contributed a lot to their protection. A 500 lbs GP bomb can be stopped by around 2 " of homogenious deck armour. However, the extra weight that high in the ship made them quite very unstable once flooding occured. This isn´t a problem in the Med but in the Atlantic. US carriers could take some flooding and still kept on beeing afloat. Flooding was a thread but fire was the real problem, I think.
In the end I think US carriers with "soft" decks would be very exposed had they deployed in the med (and faced significant opposition) to bomb hits. And in the Pac numbers counted more so maybe both nations adopted the best design for their specific thread scenario.

[Glider]

I would go with that.

[102first_hussars]

Im not real big on navy, but I will say those Corvettes earned a respectable reputation for Anti-sub warfare.