The Drydock - Episode 249 (Part 1)

00:00:00 - Intro

00:00:30 - When did the RN become the dominant naval power?

00:03:54 - Kongo-class impact on WW2

00:07:35 - In your opinion which of the free Navies and minor power navies were the most successful based on overall impact on the war, on both sides, in World War Two?

00:10:31 - What is the rank of the officer in charge of a WWII Royal Navy destroyer and what would be the average of age of one at the start of WWII?

00:12:24 - Turret hits on battleships?

00:15:54 - Battle of Campeche, sail vs steam?

00:19:10 - Did the USN have doctrine worked out how the standards, fast battleships, and very fast battleships would engage the enemy if all three types of battleships were present in a Jutland-style engagement with the enemy line of battle?

00:24:41 - How common was it to have warships named after the same person in different navies during the period the channel covers?

00:27:52 - Was Tsingtao the only naval base Germany had outside Germany in WW1? How did they support ships in African colonies colliers? How many bases did the RN have outside the UK in WW1?

00:31:07 - Why were the Iowa's, Essex's and Fletcher's so succuessful?

00:36:10 - Royal Navy officers on half-pay who did interesting things and aren't named Cochrane?

00:38:30 - Pick any ship you visited on the April 2022 US tour. Where would the shells land if its main battery fired?

00:40:29 - Did age-of-sail navies experiment with powder formulations at all, or was it all just standard black-powder charges of varying sizes and weight?

00:42:39 - Slopes in gun turret floors?

00:46:30 - Were the interwar naval treaties signed assuming there would be a successor treaty?

00:49:42 - Which is the greater disaster, Mary Rose, Indefatigable, or the Courageous class?

00:55:48 - Would the German surface raiders of early WW2 have been more effective/caused more damage if they had completely ignored prize rules from the outset of the war?

01:00:19 - What determines barbette size? Weight of the guns/turret? Physical dimensions of the turret? Secret third thing?

01:02:40 - Is it common for AP bombs to penetrate so deep into a ship (aside from Tallboys), and does it have to penetrate somewhere such as a funnel to do so? Has a bomb alone ever caused a ship to sink from flooding?

01:06:51 - Rubber as armour instead of iron?

01:10:45 - The Battle of the Beta (or Duisburg) Convoy in November 1941

01:17:03 - What are the weird things attached to this turret?

01:20:24 - Section 22 and the date of USS Darter

01:29:40 - Would skip bombing have had any effect on warships bigger than a destroyer?

01:32:29 - Peacetime recruitment/retention issues in history?

01:36:49 - Are there any good colour photos of dye-equipped shells exploding?

01:38:40 - Russian ships in the American Civil War?

01:41:23 - When did aircraft carriers start to be considered as capital ships?

01:43:54 - Anti-torpedo gun?

01:52:54 - How close did the Germans come to the conclusion that there likely might be something wrong with Enigma and that they need to take action?

01:55:16 - What made the Mark 38 fire control system so effective?

02:01:09 - Why did Graf Spee offload crew twice?

02:03:15 - Shackles on a ships stern?

02:04:50 - Advantages/Disadvantages of catapult placement on ships?

02:13:34 - What are your top 3 wins and top 3 sins in terms of impact on the war for ship hulls that were converted to aircraft carriers from WW1 to Korea?

02:23:02 - Tennesse / Colorado class effectiveness?

02:26:40 - Kriegsmarine fleet-in-being vs raiding?

02:31:59 - The Mount Hood detonation, is there no known cause? Is that still accurate? What are your thoughts on what happened?

02:37:00 - Was it common for small colonial shipyards the size of H.W. Stone to build vessels for the Royal Navy and if so, were the vessels built similar in dimension and role as the ones built by H.W. Stone?

02:39:39 - How did the invention of Morse code effect ship communications and when did ships start using signal lamps to relay complex communications in real time?

02:42:53 - Theoretical inter-war carrier conversions?

02:47:34 - Were there any other instances of kamikaze (divine wind) in naval history?

02:53:20 - What do you feel is the most historically significant naval engagement/campaign?

[popuptarget]

I am aways astounded that i see a 3 hour video and end up engrossed through to the end. Hell, I was Army and usually don't think too much of ships (a blind spot i admit) but these talks are a great and entertaining learning experience.

[nathanokun]

It is an amazing thing that the British actually made a decision to end the era of slavery by actual military force, regardless of the basic reasons behind this decision. The effect was one of an honorable use of their power for the advancement of human civilization. Bravo!

[TheAsh]

When Drach thinks your question is "interesting" and can't think of an answer... Great way to start the weekend

[nathanokun]

The US Navy "splinter-proof plating" WAS FULL-STRNGTH ARMOR being made of BuC&R/BuSHIPS STS. The US had a very tight control on the use of the term "armor" and only BuORD could use that term, here for its equivalent Class "B" armor. The highest-strength construction steel, BuC&R/BuSHIPS High-Tensile Steel (HTS) was allowed to be used against explosion blast pressure, as in anti-torpedo bulkheads in large warships, but NEVER for protection against any kind of impact, shell or fragment. This was always only required to be STS or Class "B" armor, depending on the part of the ship being protected. The thick armored decks of US WWII battleships and cruisers was always STS, not Class "B" armor, due to this "rice-bowl" thing, but the protection was identical in either case. STS was made only by Carnegie, while Class "B" armor was made by Carnegie (to a different but identical spec to STS), Bethlehem Steel, and The Midvale Company. US Navy politics turns out to be complex.

[glennricafrente]

"God blew and they were scattered." Literally a "divine wind"! I like that.

[PaulfromChicago]

25:25 Unless you are Neptune. If you are Neptune, there will be three sides and three and a half ships named after you at Trafalgar.

[alexandersteel]

Thanks Drach, perfect timing. I have 6 hours left of my layover and just finished my prepared media.

[richardanderson]

The implications of the battle of the Virginia Capes (aka battle of the Chesapeake) going the other way cannot be underestimated. The exhaustion of the 3rd Continental Army in the South was at a critical level (similar to the UK and France in 1918) and if Cornwallis had been reinforced and supplied indefinitely, a negotiated peace would be the likely outcome with the US remaining a colony. If that was the result it would receive the continued suppression of non-British immigration and interference with attempts to industrialize, similar to Canada, Australia and New Zealand in the 19th Century. Insofar that the primary thing that the US brought to the 20th Century was its large population, wealth and massive industrial capacity, its role in winning two world wars and rebuilding war ravaged Europe would be a complete impossibility. One could readily argue that all three participants at the battles of the Chesapeake and subsequently Yorktown were ultimately winners…..it just took a little over a century for them to realize it.

[AC-SlaUkr]

A really enjoyable cruise. On Millennium on the 12th October around Japan and your film has really increased the sense of anticipation. 👍🏻

[cleverpete]

The problem with Indefatigable (and Australia) is that they were fitted for, but not with, magic armor.

[porpoise]

2:00:00 That last comment on the human factor of the Mark 38 FIre Control System reminds me a lot of the famed Norden bombsight (which was built around a fire control computer). In theory it was so accurate that it was considered a critical secret and expanded the capabilities of US bombers significantly.

But, in practice, it wasn't any better than the systems others were using because they were all limited by the quality of input data in a combat situation.

[Zarcondeegrissom]

That carrier conversion question at 2:13:34 has me thinking with all the popular hype over the Yorktown and Essex class carriers, how did the design authorization and building funding for the escort carriers ever happen at all (rhetorical question). some of the lesser-known ships are almost like plot contrivances that appear out of nowhere for the story and then just vanish when they're no longer needed for the story arch, or so-called quantum “virtual particles” that constantly wink into and out of existence, "quantum-virtual escort-carriers", lol. I know Drach had at least one good vid on the escort carriers (USS Sangamon - Guide 279), I've simply been a tad busy of late, so probably missed a lot of videos. good stuff Drach and crew. B)

[tombuchanan]

When you are an idiot with sliding breech blocks. That's why we love you Drach. Understand sometimes it has to be done but please stop spending so much time on rebuttals for morons in the comments section. Been with you since robo voice.

[funpolice]

While it’s not the same thing as black powder by any means, from my handloading experience, very small changes can lead to changes in bullet velocity, accuracy, point of impact, etc.
it seems completely logical that slight differences in powder composition might very well lead to different performance characteristics. But better QC could absolutely explain it too, like you said.
42:10

[kennethdeanmiller]

At 31:10 you are asked about the success of the design of the Essex's, the Fletcher's & the Iowa's. And one thing that you didn't think about was the fact that the USA also incorporated CIC's. And that way all the ships involved in an action know more about everything that is going on and can act accordingly better with all ships involved!

[Elkarlo]

Some Germans had a suspicion that after some U-Boat losses in 1941 the british had a full set of Enigma M3 Codes. They didn't knew where they have got them, but Vizeadmiral Dönitz had the suspicion and he was confirmed when the Kriegsmarine switched to the Enigma M4 the U-Boat losses of the Kriegsmarine dropped.
But he had the wrong conclusion, he thought that the Key (Rotor interconnections ) was out, not that the Chiffre was broken.
So with a new key, the bleshley park only had to regain the Key for Enigma.
And as a German myself, they guy which connected Rotor 1 for the M3 should be shot, severals times over. Or get the Anti-Nazi Service Cross for Sabotage.

[stevevalley]

As Drac said, wrt the 14" armed Tennessees vs 16" armed Colorados, the question came down to USN expectations of engagement range. Head of BuOrd Strauss insisted that engagements would always be fought at 12, 000 yards, or less. The 14" could penetrate well enough at that range, and, being smaller and lighter, more could be carried. Jutland drove the final nail in that theory. In the summer of 1916, the General Board, and SecNav Daniels, agreed 16" was the way to go, and overrode Strauss' recommendation. In his annual report that year, Daniels discussed the switch to 16", and said the change was made over the objections of "some officers". Strauss was very proud of the 14"/50, ordering it into production off the drawing board, with no testing. Can't help but wonder, if testing had been done, and the dispersion problems these guns experienced been discovered, would the 16" been selected for the Tennessees, by virtue of the fact the 16" can actually hit what it is aimed at?

[bghyst]

Re: which non-major power’s navy had the greatest impact on WWII, wouldn’t that have to be the Royal Australian Navy? Larger than any of the free European fleets it was able to take on whole duties, like responsibility for the sea lanes between Australia and the Mediterranean in the first 2+ years of the war, freeing up Royal Navy vessels to concentrate on priorities in Europe/Atlantic, while also contributing ships to the RN’s head-to-head struggle against Italy in the Mediterranean, a critical theater but decidedly undecided from 1939-41. RAN ships were part of the “Scrap Iron Flotilla” at Malta, took part in Cape Mattapan and evacuation of Greece, took leading roles escorting 138 badly-needed convoys to Tobruk, while still having ships to spare to sink the German merchant raider Kormorant in the Indian Ocean. Most of this before the bulk of the RAN relocated post-Dec. 1941 to face the Japanese, protecting >1000 convoys, taking part in major battles like Savo Island Leyte and Surigao Strait. Surely all that outdistances the Dutch.

[saltyroe]

In early part of WW2 the US had a fuel supply problem. Battle ships as big fuel consumers were deployed sparingly. Until the fuel problem was solved and the exception of Solomon campaign, battle ships were rarely used in a prime attack role.

[jayfrank]

About color film: Kodachrome 8 and 16mm color movie film was made available to the public in the US by 1938. However it wasn't cheap and needed good lighting to get a decent image. There are a lot of daytime baseball games filmed in color in the late 30's. However, I believe the US military mainly used B&W film in WWII and when the used color, the films were often printed in B&W for mass distribution to save costs. Many of the film originally shot in color only exist in B&W in the archives. Also, very little color footage exists of actual ship-to-ship combat, which would show the Japanese use of dye packs during T he Battle off Samar.
I think I remember reading that the explosion of the USS Arizona was shot with color film, but no existing color copies are still extant.