Wright writes.....

[robertcwp]

I think HMS Hood is the most stylish of all the battle cruisers/battle ships ever made

John Pertwee, later of Doctor Who amongst other things, had been a crew member on Hood but was transferred away for officer training just before she was sunk.

[The Johnster]

John Pertwee, later of Doctor Who amongst other things, had been a crew member on Hood but was transferred away for officer training just before she was sunk.

 

He was of course also the CPO on HMS Troutbridge...

 

Left hand down a bit it is, sir.

[Hroth]

I think HMS Hood is the most stylish of all the battle cruisers/battle ships ever made

Stylish, yes (she did a good job showing the flag through the inter-war years), but a bit of an "Oxford Dean Goods" when push came to shove.....

 

Seriously, the story is that the plunging fire from Bismark and Prinz Eugen tore through (relatively) lightly armoured decks into the magazines, but perhaps she was perpetuating a Battlecruiser trick* to up her rate of fire and suffered the penalty.

 

*  Keeping stocks of cordite in the hoist chambers and the flash doors open to speed up delivery to the turrets, a trick that put paid to a number of her near contemporaries at Jutland.

[jwealleans]

That's a can of worms almost akin to Gresley v Thompson. It's almost universally accepted that a 4" magazine aft detonated and in turn set off the 15" magazines, but the cause has never been definitively determined. What does seem to be generally believed is that the angle of descent of the German fire was such that it could not penetrate decks without encountering belt armour at some point. A shell falling short and entering the hull below the waterline before exploding is my personal inclination, but no doubt the discussion will continue as long as the action is studied.

[grob1234]

I was just going purely on looks.

[Hroth]

Gulp.

 

Not Gresley vs Thompson!  Nooooooooooooooooo......  Lets not go there!

 

I feel that a shortfall shell entering the hull below the waterline would have exploded shortly after entering the hull if it had passed through water before doing so, hitting the water would have set off the fuse which would have been set to explode a little while after the shell had penetrated something hard.

 

The only way that might have worked is if the shell had struck whilst Hood was turning, exposing the bilges as she rolled.  Its mentioned that the rudder was found set to port as if she were turning to bring more guns to bear, though I've NO idea if the turn would have rolled Hood away from her attackers (exposing the bilge) or rolled her towards them (thus exposing the deck to more perpendicular fire!).  I suppose its more likely that she would have rolled away as otherwise all her guns would have been pointing more or less into the sea through the manoeuver.

 

Oh well, enough bilge......

[grob1234]

How about some models?

 

Sorry for awful camera phone pics, it's night here, and couldn't be bothered with extra lighting and SLR!

 

The J3 is cleaned, just need to fit a few whitemetal and plastic parts:

 

 

How about this though? The lever in the cab looks gigantic to me. I'm not sure if I should keep it? Any thoughts?

 

[jwealleans]

This is the passage I recalled reading, linked from Wikipedia because I can't now find it on the HMS Hood Association site.

"A shell, falling short and travelling underwater, struck below the armoured belt and penetrated to a magazine. During the same action, Prince of Wales received a hit of this type from a 15-inch shell, which travelled underwater for about 80 feet (25 m), struck about 28 feet (8 m) below the waterline, penetrated several light bulkheads and fetched up, without exploding, against the torpedo bulkhead. The second board considered this theory improbable, arguing that the fuse, had it worked at all, would have detonated the shell before it reached the ship. According to Jurens's calculations, one of Bismarck's shells that fell approximately 20 feet (6.1 m) short of Hood could have penetrated the side of the ship beneath the armour belt and would have detonated in the vicinity of the ship's magazines if the fuse worked."

 

We are now well OT (and beyond my area of expertise), but I know this is something Tony's interested in as well.

[The Stationmaster]

Stylish, yes (she did a good job showing the flag through the inter-war years), but a bit of an "Oxford Dean Goods" when push came to shove.....

 

Seriously, the story is that the plunging fire from Bismark and Prinz Eugen tore through (relatively) lightly armoured decks into the magazines, but perhaps she was perpetuating a Battlecruiser trick* to up her rate of fire and suffered the penalty.

 

*  Keeping stocks of cordite in the hoist chambers and the flash doors open to speed up delivery to the turrets, a trick that put paid to a number of her near contemporaries at Jutland.

 

Very good at showing the flag and even better at washing the quarterdeck as the extra armour added to the design post Jutland had a deleterious effect on her weight distribution with the consequence that she had a reputation for being a very wet ship aft, especially in any kind of  a nasty sea.  As to her end all we know is that she exploded as a result of enemy gunfire - at which point the various theories and different conclusions as to the exact cause begin.

 

     Possibly a couple of years ago now - more or less - Stationmaster answered my question about this model's location by stating that it had been moved north to York. 

  If I remember aright, and when on display in Paddington Station,  one could put a shilling in the slot provided and an electric motor would rotate the coupled wheels and the inside motion would function.

  Wasn't that model built by a South African admirer of KGV.?

 

        

.

 

 That long ago - probably even longer!

 

There were two KGV models in the late 1950s at paddington  The aforementioned large scale KGVm, definitely larger than = Gauge 1and accompanying coach were static display models and in what was probably their final years on display at paddington were sited in teh new first floor level Enquiry and reservation Office on the Eastbourne Terrace side which was part of the area rebuilt following the wartime bomb damage which removed part of the General Offices and station areas directly beneath them ( and which was never rebuilt above first/second floor level).  Those are the ones which went to York.

 

There was also a second model of KGV, coin operated, and probably 7mm scale or a bit larger which in the late 1950s was situated over on the left hand side (as you left the platforms) of The Lawn.  That one disappeared much earlier - probably when that area was redeveloped to include a revised buffet in the corner near where the RTO's office had been.   Good long time ok and i think it had gone by the time I was doing my regular trips round London sheds c.1960/61 and that buffet was always my first stop after getting off the train.  Why was the buffet the first stop - not what you might think - there was a machine outside it which gave change.  And I remember that if you put whatever it was into it - 4 sixpences to get a 2 bob bit,  or was it a 2 bob bit to get 4 sixpences?  - and then pressed the button rather vigorously and frequently you invariably made a profit on the deal which more than covered the cost of a child single to Willesden Jcn on the Bakerloo Line.  Must be way past the Statute of Limitations date surely?

[New Haven Neil]

Hood would have looked a lot better if they had built the rest of it....the truncated stern isn't the best for a balanced look.

[Northroader]

As ever, there were defence cuts, and only the front half was built as intended. My understanding is that the ship steered different to everything else as a result? Takes some swallowing, I know.

[BR(W)]

S

 

Hood would have looked a lot better if they had built the rest of it....the truncated stern isn't the best for a balanced look.

Surely that was the 'Nelson' class? Nicknamed 'Nelsol' and 'Rodnol' after the fashion of the fleet oilers (refuelers) which had a very truncated rears. 'Nelson' and 'Rodney' were so compromised to comply with the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922.

 

Personally, I believe 'Hood' to be a beautifully balanced design.

 

Cheers,

 

BR(W).

[allan downes]

Meanwhile on land some some 10  years ( ? ) later, a yard shunter at the Cricklewood yards went about its own path of destruction after the driver had left it simmering down the  coal siding whilst he went to the canteen. The regulator had somehow shook itself free thus sending the loco on  a steady path of destruction where it reduced a rake of empty coal wagons to matchwood that stood up against the stops at the end of the siding. Nothing to do with Hitler of course for by then, he was well out of the running, but who needs enemies when we can cause destruction like that without them ! 

 

Then there was the mysterious Beyer Garrat that appeared out of nowhere, derailed over a diamond crossing yet the crew were nowhere to be seen from that day to this. So where did THAT come from !!

 

Allan ( who had absolutely nothing to do with it whatsoever, I swear it ! )

[Nelson Jackson]

 

How about this though? The lever in the cab looks gigantic to me. I'm not sure if I should keep it? Any thoughts?

 

Pardon me if I am wrong, but should the reverser be the other way round? So the handle is on the other side, making it easier to use.

[Hroth]

Meanwhile on land some some 10  years ( ? ) later, a yard shunter at the Cricklewood yards went about its own path of destruction after the driver had left it simmering down the  coal siding whilst he went to the canteen. The regulator had somehow shook itself free thus sending the loco on  a steady path of destruction where it reduced a rake of empty coal wagons to matchwood that stood up against the stops at the end of the siding. Nothing to do with Hitler of course for by then, he was well out of the running, but who needs enemies when we can cause destruction like that without them ! 

 

Then there was the mysterious Beyer Garrat that appeared out of nowhere, derailed over a diamond crossing yet the crew were nowhere to be seen from that day to this. So where did THAT come from !!

 

Allan ( who had absolutely nothing to do with it whatsoever, I swear it ! )

Odd!

 

Perhaps an investigative series should be made about it called say, "Mysteries of the Rail", and shot at night in image intensified green with lots of over-egged suspense?

 

Anyhow, I suspect that 9/10 of "runaway locos in sidings" were the work of spotty little oiks in short trousers who had moved on from ring the bell and run away.....

 

Nahh Allan, not you!

[thegreenhowards]

G'Day Gents

 

Going back to the disappearance of model shops, E-Bay will be the main culprit, in 2005 the '00' section had on average 50-60,000 items on sale daily, today it's around 110,000, so it's doubled, and 50% of model shops have disappeared, coincidence, I don't think so, but it dose mean that we have a fairly healthy model railway industry. Just my thoughts.

 

manna 

 

Ebay is certainly part of the issue - although I find it very tempting and wallet emptying on occasion! I also think that while there have always been box shifters, the ease of dealing with them on the internet and the ability of email etc. to promote their wares is bound to have made a dent in model shop's share of the new market.

 

Andy

[Focalplane]

The family left France a week ago tomorrow and I have just got round to cleaning up after them in order to get the workbench out.

 

It, the workbench, is therefore reasonably clear of junk.  I have a portable bench made from a 45cm wide kitchen cabinet door with a tempered glass kitchen surface "helper" costing ten euros in the local hyper market:

 

 

I have just given up for the day on building some Sidelines coach bogies.  They are not the easiest assemblies and I finally lost my temper with a brake shoe that would not stay in the right place while being soldered.  So the next on the go project is displayed (along with its excellent instructions!) a BR brake van by Jim McGeown of Connoisseur Models.  This was abandoned just before the tribe arrived and picking up the project shows that I first need to go over it with the Dremel and small wire brush - see back right.

 

Another, more exciting project is also in the photo (back left), the David Andrews Castle kit chassis which has been a delight to put together - all nickel silver so far.  The next part of the project will be the outside cylinders and motion, for which I plan to add a simple mechanism to drive the valve linkage at the front of the valve chest.  I found details of how to do this on RMweb, once again proving the value of this community.

 

By the way, these are all 7mm Gauge O projects.

 

I finally received my copy of the Middleton Press Ruabon to Barmouth book today.  I had searched for it online before but only under the Country Railway Routes heading.  It is in fact a volume in their Western Main Lines series.  Quite why this should be so I am not sure, for the Birmingham-Stratford and Stratford-Cheltenham books are in the Country Railway Routes series and they were a part of a double track Western Main Line which also carried the Cornishman named train!  The photos are a bit disappointing for research purposes with a lot of Standard Class 4s that post-date my era of interest.  But one detail is made clear - the position of the stove chimney on the corrugated sheet roof of the shed office/mess at Penmaenpool. These somewhat trivial findings can make one's day!

 

But a disappointment also occurred today.  Chris Gordon of Severn Mills Nameplates advised me that etching companies are no longer keen to do high quality etching he demands and so no new numbers/names will be added to his stocks for the time being.  He says there is no need to panic.  I had hoped for a specific number plate for a 74XX kit but I will now have to substitute another Croes Newydd number.  This was a shed I never "did" which is not surprising as I think it was contained within  a triple junction just south of Wrexham and therefore not easy to sneak into.  Penmaenpool was an 84J sub-shed with one pannier allocated to it for local passenger services.

 

Well, enough rambling, it's good to be soldering again.

 

Paul

[thegreenhowards]

Regarding that earlier suggestion that we need some sort of "hub" seller of loco and other kit-building / scratch-building parts, should this idea not be considered against the collapse (in the 1990's?) of W & H models who were, at the time, close to being a universal stockist? I know that times have moved on, but has the market and the potential for profit improved? It doesn't sound to me that it has. Dave Cleal's Mainly Trains was once a fairly comprehensive supplier too, but it would seem that nobody fancied taking up the challenge when he wanted to retire.

 

H&A Models provide a sort of Hub service for plastic kits, but they don't seem to offer any of the more esoteric stuff. Also with Peco buying out Parkside Dundas, they are increasing becoming a hub in their own right.

 

For me the best 'hub' retailer is a good model railway show, of which the EMGS show at Bracknell is the best that I've been to (for retail). At these (nearly) all the main retailers are present, allowing one to source a full range of the necessary components as well as talk to their creators. A good excuse for a day out.

 

Andy

[Focalplane]

I agree with you, Andy, there is nothing like a good show for retail therapy!  I shall wend my way over 1200 kilometers to Telford for the Big Gauge O Show on September 2nd, armed with a long list.

[New Haven Neil]

S

 

Surely that was the 'Nelson' class? Nicknamed 'Nelsol' and 'Rodnol' after the fashion of the fleet oilers (refuelers) which had a very truncated rears. 'Nelson' and 'Rodney' were so compromised to comply with the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922.

 

Personally, I believe 'Hood' to be a beautifully balanced design.

 

Cheers,

 

BR(W).

 

You're quite right of course - brain fade.  Grey Funnel Line- they all look the same to a Merch officer!

[Andy Hayter]

H&A Models provide a sort of Hub service for plastic kits, but they don't seem to offer any of the more esoteric stuff. Also with Peco buying out Parkside Dundas, they are increasing becoming a hub in their own right.

 

For me the best 'hub' retailer is a good model railway show, of which the EMGS show at Bracknell is the best that I've been to (for retail). At these (nearly) all the main retailers are present, allowing one to source a full range of the necessary components as well as talk to their creators. A good excuse for a day out.

 

Andy

 

 

 

I think Peco can only be a hub if they accept direct sales on line and by post.  Last I looked that was not the case.  

 

The problem is that taking over and keeping ranges running is great and very laudable, but if your sales outlets are only via retailers and they chose (for reasons I fully understand) to focus on track and a limited range (if you are lucky) of the kit ranges, then your chance of getting a PA10 underframe kit becomes vanishingly small.

 

I do agree about exhibitions, but with a 2 night overnight hotel plus air fares, this becomes quite challenging for some of us - and I only live next door.  For our colleagues in NZ, Australia and the US this is essentially ruled out except by making a mega commitment.

[jjb1970]

You're quite right of course - brain fade.  Grey Funnel Line- they all look the same to a Merch officer!

 

Funnily enough, Rodney and Nelson are two of the battleships I find most interesting as despite their quirky looks there was a lot of innovative and rather clever ideas in their design which was based on war time experience and analysis of how ships had performed. Particularly in terms of armour protection.

 

On Hood, we'll never really know what sent her to the bottom beyond it having been the result of enemy fire. She was a fine looking ship but underneath those handsome looks she was a rather troubled ship with an overstressed hull and some serious machinery issues. Sadly she was never rebuilt between the wars as planned, although whether the planned rebuild would have addressed the fundamental issues is debatable.

 

In terms of looks, I have always thought that the best looking of any of the RN battleships or battlecruisers was the last of them, HMS Vanguard.

[Tony Wright]

Just the usual thanks for all the fascinating recent comments. 

 

Though off topic, with regards to the destruction of the (beautiful - if a weapon of war could ever be described as beautiful) HOOD, I don't think there's a book been published which I've not read about her (my naval library is second only to my railway one). She was the apotheosis of Jackie Fisher's 'big gun' policy regarding the battle cruiser, namely faster than anything stronger and stronger than anything faster. The true value of these magnificent-looking ships was epitomised by the Falklands Battle of WW1 where Sturdee pursued and destroyed Spee's armoured cruisers in the South Atlantic. 

 

The action in the Denmark Strait in May 1941 resulting in HOOD's destruction still raises many questions. Not so much what caused her to blow up, but rather the complete mishandling on the British part of the whole engagement. The learned books I've read ask questions such as......

 

With the position of the ships of Operation Rhine discovered, why did HOOD and PRINCE OF WALES leave their destroyers behind? 

 

Why did Holland not put the much-better-armoured PRINCE OF WALES in the van? Despite her being brand new and not fully worked-up, even several hits from the BISMARK would not have caused her to explode. 

 

Why did Holland not allow independent action? 

 

Why did HOOD shoot at the PRINZ EUGEN? Though the German ships' silhouettes were very similar, the PRINCE OF WALES shot at the right target - the BISMARK. 

 

Why did Wake-Walker not bring his pair of heavy cruisers into the action? 

 

The fact remains that there were four British ships in the vicinity - two capital ships and two heavy cruisers - against two German warships; one capital ship and one heavy cruiser. 

 

Reading Tovey's memoirs, it crossed his mind to advise Holland on the best tactics, but thought him experienced enough to make up his own mind. There's evidence that Churchill wanted courts martial to be conducted against some of the British commanders. 

 

Though the Germans 'won' the Battle of the Denmark Strait, in the event the sinking of the BISMARK by (principally) the KING GEORGE THE FIFTH and RODNEY three days later was a disaster for the German navy. The Nazi's lost 50% of their battleships at a stroke and from that day no German surface ship (by direct action) caused the destruction of any allied shipping. 

 

Anyway, enough of that..............

 

May I please thank, once again, all those who've contributed most-generously to Cancer Research UK? Through Mo's and my 'loco doctoring', by generous donations made by those I help with their modelling and by a percentage from the sales of the locomotives and books on behalf of bereaved families, with what I posted off today to CRUK, we've (you've) donated over £1,000 this year. That was our target at the beginning of 2017. That's now been altered to £1,500 by Christmas. 

 

Edited because I missed out a very important group. 

Edited August 11, 2017 by Tony Wright

[asmay2002]

Seriously, the story is that the plunging fire from Bismark and Prinz Eugen tore through (relatively) lightly armoured decks into the magazines, but perhaps she was perpetuating a Battlecruiser trick* to up her rate of fire and suffered the penalty.

 

*  Keeping stocks of cordite in the hoist chambers and the flash doors open to speed up delivery to the turrets, a trick that put paid to a number of her near contemporaries at Jutland.

 

There is one key factor that is always overlooked when discussing both the battle cruisers and Hood and that is the stability of the ammunition.  At Dogger bank the German battle cruiser Seydlitz was hit and had a magazine fire in both of her rear turrets because like the British battlecruisers at Jutland her magazine doors were open but she didn't have an explosion and sink.  The reason for this was that the propellant used by the Germans was MUCH more stable than that used by the RN so it burned rather than exploded.  The RN propellant was so unstable that HMS Vanguard blew up and sank at Scarpa Flow in 1917 with no enemy action involved at all! This produced a scramble of action and a safer propellant was quickly introduced. At the end of WW2 the US Navy did some experiments with their flashless propellant and compared it with there own existing stuff and the improved RN propellant.  They found that compared with their own stuff the RN propellant (which had been much improved in safety terms since WW1) was stiill way, way more dangerous.  It is very likely that Hood would have survived if she had not been using such dangerous ammunition.

 

In 1945, a test was conducted by the U.S.N. Bureau of Ordnance (Bulletin of Ordnance Information, No.245, pp. 54–60)[139] testing the sensitivity of cordite to then-current U.S. Naval propellant powders against a measurable and repeatable flash source. It found that RN cordite would ignite at 530 mm/22" from the flash and the current U.S. powder at 120 mm, /5" the U.S. flashless powder at 25 mm./1" This meant that about 75 times the propellant would immediately ignite when exposed to flash, as compared to the U.S. powder.

Edited August 11, 2017 by asmay2002

[jjb1970]

Everything about the Rhine exercise seems a bit questionable in hindsight.

 

On the RN side, Holland's decisions during the engagement were rather poor on several levels as highlighted by Tony Wright. Nominally, a force consisting of Hood and Prince of Wales was superior to the German squadron but the shortcomings of Hood were recognised and the Prince of Wales was unfinished and not ready for action (it is a point seldom explored in naval histories that British yards had a habit of handing over ships with numerous "teething problems" and defects which were just accepted as part of the process of commissioning a new ship). Wake-Walker was blamed by some and almost court martialled as a scape goat but his cruisers had to shadow the German squadron and maintain contact in appalling conditions and the key decisions were made by Holland.

 

On the German side the big question is why? The Rhine exercise was supposed to be a major fleet sorties but technical problems with ships and delays in working up meant it was reduced to a single capital ship accompanied by a heavy cruiser. Why risk their most powerful ship in a sortie that was unlikely to achieve that much (and which couldn't be achieved at lower risk to the KM by the U boat arm)? And Lutjens made some terrible decisions too.

 

All in all a sorry story which claimed a lot of lives.