High Guard: fighting hull-to-hull

[Anonymous]

Naval disasters are replete with examples of what happens when two ships collide.

I am having trouble finding many examples of this for armored ships.

There was HMS Glowworm and Admiral Hipper; and USS Indiana and USS Washington. In the second I am still trying to discover the impact points on the 2 ships and the exact damage. Seems to be under the aft turret, resulting in a bent propeller shaft, but I don't know how deep the armor belt goes under the waterline.

 

[phavoc]

Here's a video of two container ships colliding in the suez canal - https://gcaptain.com/the-real-story-behind-youtubes-most-epic-ship-collision-video/ - done at relatively slow speed, but the article shows how much damage was caused.

Two US Battleships colliding - https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/OnlineLibrary/photos/events/wwii-pac/marshals/wash-ind.htm

HMS Camperdown colliding and sinking HMS Victoria - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Victoria_(1887)

Article listing some other collisions - https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/collision-sea

Kennedy striking the Belknap - https://www.warhistoryonline.com/instant-articles/uss-belknap-collided-aircraft-carrier.html

 

[Anonymous]

Spacecraft will probably survive a lot more hull damage than watercraft as they don't fill with water and sink. They can lose air but you can make air and wear a vaccsuit while the autopilot flies it. Theoretically you can fly the ship without a hull, if the parts are mounted to a chassis.

Thanks for the links. However only 2 of those incidents involve armored ships (in the Traveller sense - the camperdown/victoria, and the indiana/washington), and the armor in those doesn't extend far beneath the water-line. Because the bows stick out under the water, the ship can be struck in a lightly armored location. It's therefore difficult to determine the effect of armor in a collision, as you don't know if the armor was hit. Anti-torpedo protection (not present on camperdown/victoria) is designed to withstand explosions rather than kinetic impact.

 

[Condottiere]

The Camperdown had a ram, possibly only the second time that weapon system worked as intended in the "modern" era.

A lot has to do with the energy created, the strength of the hull(s), and internal structural support, and the ability to absorb the resulting damage that wasn't nullified by the armour plating.

If it doesn't cripple the ship, it can only make it faster, since less volume.

 

[phavoc]

They are illustrative of ship collisions. And agreed sinking isn't the same as in space. But since you speak of armor, and space craft, they will probably be more massive, for their size, and have higher velocities when colliding. Which will increase their overall destructive power. And with no water to work against the effect will also be more pronounced.

Those links were found in about ten minutes. If you wish to pay my normal billing rate I'll happily investigate further and provide a detailed summary!

 

[Condottiere]

Instead, a spar torpedo—a copper cylinder containing 135 pounds (61 kilograms) of black powder—was attached to a 22-foot (6.7 m)-long wooden spar, as seen in illustrations made at this time. Mounted on Hunleys' bow, the spar was to be used when the submarine was 6 feet (1.8 m) or more below the surface. Previous spar torpedoes had been designed with a barbed point: the spar torpedo would be jammed in the target's side by ramming, and then detonated by a mechanical trigger attached to the submarine by a line, so that as she backed away from her target, the torpedo would set off. However, archaeologists working on Hunley discovered evidence, including a spool of copper wire and components of a battery, that it may actually have been electrically detonated. In the configuration used in the attack on Housatonic, it appears Hunley's torpedo had no barbs, and was designed to explode on contact as it was pushed against an enemy vessel at close range.[9] After Horace Hunley's death, General Beauregard ordered that the submarine should no longer be used to attack underwater. An iron pipe was then attached to her bow, angled downwards so the explosive charge would be delivered sufficiently under water to make it effective. This was the same method developed for the earlier "David" surface attack craft used successfully against the USS New Ironsides. The Confederate Veteran of 1902 printed a reminiscence authored by an engineer stationed at Battery Marshall who, with another engineer, made adjustments to the iron pipe mechanism before Hunley left on her last fatal mission on February 17, 1864. A drawing of the iron pipe spar, confirming her "David" type configuration, was published in early histories of submarine warfare.

Could be shape charged, and not necessarily kamikaze.

 

[steve98052]

Remember those Roadrunner cartoons where Roadrunner said, "beep beep", and zoomed through a wall, leaving a Roadrunner-shaped hole in the wall? Then Wile E Coyote ran into the wall, flattened, and peeled off the wall?

The question here is whether a small ship crashing into a big ship is Roadrunner or Wile E Coyote.

At space velocities, the small ship is always Roadrunner, except that the hole it leaves behind is full of plasma, and the small ship and the former contents of the hole through the big ship are a jet of plasma that stretches out for thousands of meters in the direction that the small ship had traveled through the big ship.

To determine damage, get a deck plan of the big ship, randomly determine the path the small ship took through it, and mark everything on the path vaporized. If desired for dramatic effect, also get a deck plan of the small ship, printed on nitrated paper, determine the point of first contact, and set it on fire.

 

[Anonymous]

So where are the 100-dton missiles?

 

[AnotherDilbert]

So where are the 100-dton missiles?

In T5 they are called "Kinetic Kill Missiles". See e.g. T5.09, p369.

 

[Condottiere]

Also known as solid shot.

First you have hit the target dead on, and then pierce the hull.

Structural integrity might hold the ship together long enough for it to leave an exit wound.