That happens in every triple turret, and is solved by putting a delay coil in the firing circuitry so that when the triple turret is commanded to fire all its guns simultanously, the actual electric pulse arrives at the propellant charge in individual guns of the turret are staggered by several thousandth of a second. There is a famous picture of USS Missouri firing her triple turret, and you can see the shells in flight in a staggered pattern just beyond the muzzle.
I don’t know who did the equations, but the numbers still are not there. I spent two months doing FDC, and I can’t see it. Maybe 35 kilometers or with a RAP round. Guess I better dig out my math books to see just what it takes to push a 17.6 pound dart 35 miles. The hottest gunpowder used by the western allies in the sixties and seventies was what they used in a 175 gun. And this was a charge (zone three) that was 5’7" long and over a foot in diameter with a special priming tube right up thru the middle to get a complete powder burn. If they used that same powder in the 8" guns on that cruiser, it would have been about equal to two of the shown charges. But that’s not the problem. It’s the round itself. Lighter(in weight) rounds tend to dissapate the energy needed to move them thru the air ( a basic inverse proportion equation), and this is why very long distance bullets are heavy and very long. For that SABOT to be effective I’d guess it tobe at least six feet long if not closer to eight feet (the longer rounds tend to have a better ballistic coefficent assuming that they are of course shaped right). The 7" diamter round in the 175 had a B/C of nearly .500, where the average round was below a .300. It also had a very pronounced “boattail” (over twice as much as a 155 round), and used a “secant ogive” in front. If they’d used a conventional bullet design the round would have lost about 30% in range.
I’m still a doubting Thomas
gary
The reason must be that they are Navy shells and not Army shells. Everyone knows that the Navy is better than the Army…
& the food is supposedly better too!
'Tis a lie!
Better food, better showers, and they get to see the world (or at least the wet part of it!)… But the Airforce gets all the best girls, the Army gets all the best beer, the Marines get a cool uniform, and the Coasties get to stay home… So it’s all good, really!
well they sure are bigger! I blew a 16" dud round once, and kinda looked like to top portion of the Washington Monument to me. You could still read the writing on the round with a 1944 date on it.
gary
you also got a mattress!!! Hot water! But we got to have an insect collection as well as a prestine reptile collection as well. Add the above to the fact the we also got to meet new neighbors on a regular basis which helped to make up for not having any movie to watch. Still I’m not at all sure about the uniform styles you guys felt belonged in GQ Magazine.
gary
Well, as a former soldier, I also recall getting a splendid education in geology via the extensive use of an entrenching tool, not to mention fine dining from whatever it was in a plastic MRE bag… The benefits were endless!
well after the “great sargent major incident” I’d guess I filled (and stacked) more sandbags than any ten people combined! I dug enough sand and gravel out of river bottoms that you probably could have drove a heavy cruiser up there for a true in country shore leave. I well remember filling sandbags all day long (know how many sand bags a fully loaded five ton will hold), and then stacking them till well after midnight. At seven in the morning we were headed back to the river bottom again for another lesson in basic shovel 101 (do they have an MOS for that?). And of course you just gotta get mortared and rocketed to bust up a few hundred so you get to do all those over again (I often felt that the NVA were on the Sargent Majors payroll).
I remember when the SF guys started using MRE’s! What a wonderfull invention! No more putting all the good stuff out of a C-Rat box in a pile and then fighting till the last man for a can of beans and wennies (think bloody noses and fat lips here for one small can of fruit coctail and pound cake. I remember once on a two week op that I drew chopped ham and eggs for seven days strait!! Only to be broken up with a can of ham & beans. No wonder I lost 15 pounds!
Back to basic shovel 101; I remember digging trenches deep enough to stand 55 gallon steel drums in vertically. Just as soon as we started, it started to rain cats and dogs. If you stood still you couldn’t get out, so somebody had to help you. But the digging couldn’t stop as the piece was called out. The NVA were setting up there on the Hiep Duc Ridge just laughing their butts off at us!! They must have felt sorry for us cause they brought out rain jackets after everything we had to wear was soaked. The rain jackets just made you sweat, but at least held in some heat. Just about as soon as we got done it quit raining. This episode lasted for about a week. No fat boys out in the field!
gary
And don’t forget the A/C and ice cream.
(ex-army) knew I should have gone navy…grrr [banghead]
Hindsight 20/20!!
And I wonder why I keep building ship models to put beside my 1/35 armor models…[%-)]
Love that navy and USCG too!!
60
well I came from a family of Navy guys on one side (each and every one of them by the way), and “jarheads” on the otherside. When I wound up in the Army I think they all wore black arm bands. My time in the Army was precious (19 months, 2 days, 23 hours, 35 minutes, and 35 seconds) as it was when I learned to be a man. Or as the guy in the song said “some of it’s tragic, some of it’s magic, but it’s been a good life all the way!” Well except for maybe the shovel part.
gary
I like this class:
Just shy of 13 years for me… And three wars was plenty enough for me! I figured I had pretty much used up that particular rabbit’s foot, so I got married and got out instead, and a good thing too!
Anyone else like the Furutaka class???
Handsome ship, Manstein!
60
My favorite Heavy Cruiser is the USS Quincy (CA-39). My uncle served on this cruiser during the later part of WWII. The stories he would tell about this ship was pretty neat. As a Marine stationed on this ship he got to meet the King of Egypt and Prsident Roosevelt. When they were on board the ship for secret meetings he was there personal bodyguards. I have done extensive research on this ship. It was the second ship to carry the name. After the battle near Savoy Island where a bunch of heavy cruisers were sunk or badly damaged there were a lot of shuffling of ship names to confuse the enemy. I have a book that was published by the Defense Department back in the forties listing how the names were switched around. It is fascinating to see how we would try and fool the enemy to have them think a ship that sunk did not really sink etc. I just wish there were more heavy cruiser models out there. I Trumpeter has one and there have been a couple of resin ships that are too expensive and I am not experienced enough to attempt the build.
G.I. Grits and G.I. Gravy, Gee I wish I’d joined the Navy…[(-D]
My stomach just churned, and I almost had to puke! To this very day I will not touch the stuff, and will not sit at a table where it’s being eaten. I can’t even stand the smell! I’d eat powdered eggs before I’d touch that stuff again!
gary