RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (Full Version)

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rtrapasso -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/14/2005 4:55:05 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: rhohltjr

What about the smaller ships? How fast could WW2 era CA & CL & DDs get steam up?




Somewhat faster, i think - on the order of 2-3 hours, iirc (depending on the ship type, engineering plant, number/type of boilers, etc.)

I don't know the engineering dispositions of the ships at PH on the morning of Dec 7 - but i would think that many would have some "housekeeping" boilers lit for generating electricity, etc., They wouldn't if were overhauling/repairing all the boilers (but with a war alert on, if you were Captain, would you do this unless absolutely necessary?)

So, as noted, having some boilers lit would cut down on the "under way" time considerably.



dereck -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/14/2005 5:11:51 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: rtrapasso


quote:

ORIGINAL: rhohltjr

What about the smaller ships? How fast could WW2 era CA & CL & DDs get steam up?




Somewhat faster, i think - on the order of 2-3 hours, iirc (depending on the ship type, engineering plant, number/type of boilers, etc.)

I don't know the engineering dispositions of the ships at PH on the morning of Dec 7 - but i would think that many would have some "housekeeping" boilers lit for generating electricity, etc., They wouldn't if were overhauling/repairing all the boilers (but with a war alert on, if you were Captain, would you do this unless absolutely necessary?)

So, as noted, having some boilers lit would cut down on the "under way" time considerably.



Not being an engineer or boiler tech when I was in the navy I don't know the exact numbers but I do remember when the Midway was in port that we got a substantial portion of our power (electricity) from the shore. I don't know how they did it back in the 40s though so I could be just muddying the waters here.

One thought about the battleship losses the US suffered at Pearl Harbor. It could have, ironically, been the BEST thing for the US Navy in the long run. It forced the US to adopt a carrier mentality since they were the only ships capable of offensive actions left to the US Navy. By the time more battleships did get to the Pacific the carrier admirals had control and they've never given up the reins to this day. The Japanese on the other hand (and I know this is open to argument) never really let go of the battleship mentality. To the end of the war they tried to force a major surface action to use their battleships and never really succeeded to any great degree.



cassius44 -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/14/2005 6:30:17 PM)

Hi, since I was an EOOW, though admittedly nuc, I did some searching on light off times. Traditionally, the black gang would light off at least 24 hours in advance prior to underway. I believe normal warm up time is 5-6 hours for a CV-sized oil-fired boiler, perhaps only 2-3 hours for a tincan boiler. Of course, it can be done much faster, especially if you don't care what you do to the boiler (sudden hot on cold = fracture and damage).

Intersting quote from a WW2 DD history:
http://www.geocities.com/Pentagon/Base/1250/dd615smith.html

"Something that might prove interesting to some of the Engineering rates that read this. Just prior to the air attack I was on watch in #1 fireroom. Steaming with just one boiler lit off in each fireroom, I got the message from the engineroom to light off the other boiler which was cold and hadn't been used for a period of time. Was told to ignore all procedures and to have it on the main line as soon as possible. Her operating pressure was 600 lbs, superheater temp 850 degress. Now keep in mind normally it takes at least an hour to bring the boiler up to temp and pressure and have it on line. It took me 12 minutes. Boilers weren't designed for that sort of treatment and if this were done again I'm sure it would have melted on the floor plates and into the bilges. Kidding of course. Again I ask myself "WHAT IF"."

* Note, this is already underway, so rest of the plant completely ready.*

For a more interesting case, here's the AAR from the USS Helena for Dec. 7th, 1941.
http://www.ibiblio.org/phha/HelenaAR.html

Looks like they lost all power with the first hit, then lit off a cold boiler in the same space (* again, plant hot, which made things easy *), but had to abandon as water flooded in, meanwhile using that boiler to warm up the rest of the engineering plant for light-off, which they maanged to get up to operating pressure by 0830. Glad I was NOT there!

Hope you find this of interest!
[:)]



spence -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/14/2005 6:38:11 PM)

I served on two ship's whose histories began before Pearl Harbor (one of their sisters was there that morning in fact) and which had steam plants. Once when on "Ocean Weather Station Bravo" we were running on one boiler and one shaft when the weather picked up really suddenly. From a dead calm the wind went to a steady 50 kts in around 30 minutes and the seas went up to 10-12 ft. As OOD I called for the 2nd boiler and engine to come on line: the boiler was on 6 hr standby and the engine on 2 I think. During the next half hour or so the wind rose another 30 kts and the seas kept getting bigger and bigger. It became very difficult to keep the bow to the wind with only one shaft. I asked the snipes if maybe they could hurry the #2 engine along a bit and shortly received a call from the EO. He said "No, (%#& NO!, and explained in graphic detail using some truly amazing and sometimes hard to visualize analogies (he was a mustang LCDR with a billion years service) just how badly it would screw up the main turbines to warm them up to fast.

THEY WERE ON LINE ANSWERING AHEAD STANDARD ABOUT 15 MINS LATER.



dtravel -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/14/2005 8:31:45 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: spence

THEY WERE ON LINE ANSWERING AHEAD STANDARD ABOUT 15 MINS LATER.


Ah, one of Scotty's ancestors I see. [;)]



spence -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/14/2005 8:43:35 PM)

Think he'd been a MM1 on the ARK![:D]



Cmdrcain -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/14/2005 9:11:57 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: waynec

i mentioned this last year and will toot my own horn again this year. i wrote an alternate history of the attack on pearl harbor for a writing class. article. i agree almost anything other than what happen would have been worse.

[image]local://upfiles/6704/6BB3C1F715264E1E97BFEB1A96AAE338.jpg[/image]



Turtle Dove has an interesting series out, PH still is surprised but IJN doesn't hit and run but it invades Hawaii..

The separate Carrier groups race in and of course get sunk...

"Days of Infamy"




Cmdrcain -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/14/2005 9:51:07 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: waynec

i mentioned this last year and will toot my own horn again this year. i wrote an alternate history of the attack on pearl harbor for a writing class. article. i agree almost anything other than what happen would have been worse.

[image]local://upfiles/6704/6BB3C1F715264E1E97BFEB1A96AAE338.jpg[/image]




Good Article..




Cmdrcain -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/14/2005 10:00:16 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Kwik E Mart

this is all very interesting, but now let's imagine a Nimitz class nuclear air craft carrier somehow teleports back to 1941 "Philadelphia Experiment" style and.....er.....nevermind [8|]


"December 9.... After the Nuclear bombing of Tokyo, and 4 other Citys of Japan and the sinking of their Main fleet by the USN Carrier Nimitz, Japan had no choice but to totally surrender or face nuclear Annihilition from remaining Nuclear arms unused.."

The Shortest modern war is recorded...

[:D] [8D][:D]



Cmdrcain -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/14/2005 10:04:00 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Oldsweat

True, an Alpha strike would have seriously dented the KB's day.


Ahhh one Nuke on top of the KB and poof...

Then The Carrier launchs vs Tokyo and several other industrial citys and Bam bam Bam Bam and its over... Ahhh I really hated that they sent Nimitz back before they could nuke Japan on Dec 9 (tokyo time)




waynec -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/15/2005 8:19:04 AM)

quote:

Turtle Dove has an interesting series out, PH still is surprised but IJN doesn't hit and run but it invades Hawaii..

The separate Carrier groups race in and of course get sunk...


yeah i got it but wasn't impressed. not up to his usual standards.

[image]local://upfiles/6704/9E5E45709797415EB044021540760794.jpg[/image]



Feinder -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/15/2005 6:11:49 PM)

I'm kinda suprised that nobody has mentioned this yet, but there's that issue of SPEED.

Weren't the WW1 vintage BBs at Pearl, mostly in the 19 - 24 kt range? If they had sortied, I'm thinking KB would have just sailed in the other direction, and still bombed 'em.

Even the fast-BBs in KB, could easily make 25 kts (I think it was closer to 29 actually).

But doesn't the fact that USN BBs were so slow, sort of mean they would never have cought KB.

-F-



rtrapasso -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/15/2005 6:25:07 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Feinder

I'm kinda suprised that nobody has mentioned this yet, but there's that issue of SPEED.

Weren't the WW1 vintage BBs at Pearl, mostly in the 19 - 24 kt range? If they had sortied, I'm thinking KB would have just sailed in the other direction, and still bombed 'em.

Even the fast-BBs in KB, could easily make 25 kts (I think it was closer to 29 actually).

But doesn't the fact that USN BBs were so slow, sort of mean they would never have cought KB.

-F-


Hah! The Nimitz can go MUCH faster than 29 kts!![:D][:'(]



Przemcio231 -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/15/2005 6:41:32 PM)

Hmm actualy the Kongo Class BC could make 30 kts and when they forced the engines they could make more then 30 kts



Distiller -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/15/2005 11:40:56 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Feinder
...
But doesn't the fact that USN BBs were so slow, sort of mean they would never have cought KB.
..



i thought the purpose was to save, not sink them by 5 full strikes courtesy of KB, or was i wrong?!?



waynec -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/16/2005 2:56:10 AM)

quote:

quote:

ORIGINAL: Honda

A few months ago, I saw a documentery on Discovery, I think, about a what-if scenario regarding PH. The idea was to see what would've happened if USN took the warning before the daybreak (and took it seriously) and came out to play. The conclusions were that it would've been a catstrophe for USN. The main reasons were:
1. The old doctrine that BB was the queen of the seas was still hard-coded in Kimmel and BB fleet would have probably been sent out to engage the KB
2. After being hit, US vessels would suffer much more from flooding and after sinking they would stay sunk on the ocean floor
3. USN AAA was not as deadly as later in the war
..




there are 2 things to consider:

some Kates carried 800kg bombs instead of torps, which have to be dropped from 9000ft or more to reliably penetrate, the rest had torps modified for shallow waters ie. not very good vs maneuvering targets. level bombing against moving targets sucks, as you know and Vals can't hurt BB armor. that's IF they can find the fleet.


agree the level bombers would have a problem against moving ships. AAA was standard for the time ie arizona has 8 open mount 5"/25 manual feed aa guns (4 per side) and 8 .50cal HMG which were found to be useless. some BBs had four quad AA guns additionally which were not very good either. i think there was only 1 aa fire director per side which meant they could only engage 2 targets simultaneously. as we saw in later battles, this would be totally inadequate against a multiple targets at multiple attack directions. the DDs would be concerned with the large number of japanese submarines patrolling in the area.
if the fleet sortied, the first recon planes over the harbor (which reported the carriers being gone) would have reported this. the first wave had 40 KATEs with torpedoes and 51 VALs. granted the VALs would not cause significant damage to the BBs but could beat up the cruisers and escorts and take out the airfields. the second wave had 54 KATEs that would have to be reconfigured (different munition racks had to be installed for the torpedoes) and 80 VALs. this reconfiguration would take abut 1 hour and they could get the second wave off before the first returned.
let's say the recon plane sends back to KB (at 0615) the US fleet is getting up steam (on orders from the reaction to the WARD report). the japs still launch the first wave (0615) and lets say the ships get up to speed quickly and start to sortie by 0700 which is probably unreasonable for the BBs. that means the channel is clogged with ships, the BBs may be starting to move when the first wave hits at 0745. if the japanese do NOT rearm the second wave, they may catch ships stacked up do to sinking ships in the channel. these could be CAs, CLs and DDs which could be taken out in the first wave. it's not a very wide channel.

bottom line (and i have studied this quite a bit) by 0600 on 07dec41 it was inevitable that what happen happen. arizona probably would not have blown up but OTOH pearl harbor could have been blocked for a month or more by sunken ships. and, most important and empasized about nagumo at midway (SHATTERED SWORD), kimmel was a product of his training and tactics and he stated he would not sortie the fleet without air escort from his carriers. he could not trust the army to provide air cover once the fleet sailed. it was the army job to defend the fleet IN PORT and defend the installations on oahu.

now if the fleet had advance warning and was at sea on the morning of 07dec41 well...

[image]local://upfiles/6704/635E9CF5F7EB4F3C8DD7437FD6445493.jpg[/image]



Bobthehatchit -> RE: Pearl Harbor Alerted (12/16/2005 2:11:31 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Feinder

I'm kinda suprised that nobody has mentioned this yet, but there's that issue of SPEED.

Weren't the WW1 vintage BBs at Pearl, mostly in the 19 - 24 kt range? If they had sortied, I'm thinking KB would have just sailed in the other direction, and still bombed 'em.

Even the fast-BBs in KB, could easily make 25 kts (I think it was closer to 29 actually).

But doesn't the fact that USN BBs were so slow, sort of mean they would never have cought KB.

-F-


Add to that the fact that they didn't have a exact possition for Kb and a 6-8 knot speed dis-advantage they have no chance in hell of catching them. Even if the US fleet had got out in any sort of order and started to close with KB they'd of been, vall'd and kate'd to hell and back before they got anywere near KB. If they did start to get too close the escorts would have broken off and turned to engage whilst the carriers made good there escape, the chance's of a USN BB getting within 14" rifle range would have been a million to one.



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