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Post by bradshaw on Aug 23, 2013 8:09:02 GMT -5
Not sure how this fits under "single action".... Eyeballed----at an interstate rest stop near Mobile, Alabama----a shell on display, which revives my curiosity about battleship "rifles" and projectiles. The steel 16-inch shell, with a copper or bronze driving band near the heal, stands nearly 6-feet tall and weights 2,700 lbs. Velocity is listed at 2,300 fps, with an accurate range just under 21 miles. Someone on this forum have the dope on this round and its stupendous ballistics? Always considered the Iowa Class battleship a monument of marine architecture.
David Bradshaw
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Post by oldschool on Aug 23, 2013 8:39:19 GMT -5
Love those old battleships. Have you toured the USS Alabama? Been quite a number of years for me. Need to go back.
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Post by bradshaw on Aug 23, 2013 10:04:45 GMT -5
oldschool.... Swung by Mobile couple of weeks ago, wanting badly to visit the Alabama. Fahrenheit at 100 degrees under blazing sun. that, and in mind of making it through Baton Rouge before Friday afternoon rush hour, had me put off a tour. Made me wonder what it was like under cramped battle stations in the Pacific barbeque furnace of WW II, a ship full of muzzle blasts sucking the oxygen you need to breathe. Somewhere resides ballistic data for the 16" guns: chamber pressure, barrel life, ballistic coefficient, trajectory, wind drift, time of flight, velocity at target, penetration through various materials, Taylor Knockdown factor, etc.
Apparently the Japanese had two battleships with 18" guns, which AP shells completely penetrated U.S. decoy ships without detonating. According to the jungle drums, bunker-buster bombs are made from recycled 16" shells.
David Bradshaw
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steve
.375 Atomic
Posts: 1,505
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Post by steve on Aug 23, 2013 10:46:26 GMT -5
That was one of my favorite parts of long haul trucking..............I-10 west bound, coming over that bridge, then you see the mighty Alabama!! Such a beautiful sight to see.
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Post by doroteo on Aug 24, 2013 13:30:16 GMT -5
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Post by TERRY MURBACH on Aug 24, 2013 16:00:47 GMT -5
WAY BACK WHEN RONNIE REAGON was a real President we were having problems in Lebenon. A sniper in a hotel was causing all sorts of havoc and could not be removed conventionaly as it were. SO, the correct positioning information from a satillite was given to the USS IOWA sitting about 20 miles off shore. The first ranging shot took out him and the top half of the hotel wing he'd been operating in. People watching thought that 2000LB shell entered the very window where he was operating.
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Post by CraigC on Aug 24, 2013 16:18:33 GMT -5
That's why the Marine Corps still wants them to be re-fitted. I think one or two are still in good enough shape for it.
I think the one sitting in Mobile is a WWI vintage ship though.
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Post by oldschool on Aug 25, 2013 9:09:30 GMT -5
CraigC, the USS Alabama (BB-60) in Mobile was commissioned 16 August 1942.
David, you're right about those sweltering conditions in the Pacific. I can't imagine being in one of those gun turrets in 100+ temps and 100% humidity! Had to be like a oven. I think claustrophobia would quickly set in.
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