"About SMS von der Tann" Topic

"SMS von der Tann was the first German battlecruiser, and is widely accepted to have been a much more successful design than her British equivalents. She carried 50% more armour than the Indefatigable class battlecruisers (5,693 tons compared to 3,735 tons) without sacrificing speed. At the battle of Jutland she destroyed the British battlecruiser Indefatigable, while herself taking four serious hits.

Contrary to popular believe, the von der Tann did not sacrifice firepower to gain her extra armour protection. Eight German 12in guns would have only added 80 tons to the weight of her guns. Partly because of her battery of 5.9in guns, the armaments of the von der Tann actually weighed more than those of the British Indefatigable class. The 1,958 tons for the extra armour on von der Tann came from a combination of a lighter hull (1,000 tons), lighter machinery (600t) and an overall increase of 350 tons in weight. Her design would suggest that the British did not need to sacrifice quite so much armour to achieve the desired combination of firepower and speed.

The real motivation for the choice of 11.1in guns for von der Tann would appear to have been cost. The Naval budget was already stretched close to the limit by the need to build a fleet of dreadnoughts and so plans to use 12in or 13.8in guns were abandoned. The 11.1in guns proved to be perfectly capable of taking on the more lightly armed British battlecruisers, but they gave the von der Tann a broadside weight of 5,238lbs, compared to the 6,800lbs of the Invincible and Indefatigable class battlecruisers or the 7,144lbs offered by the main German 12in guns…"
Full review here
link

Are there any miniature model of this ship you can recomended?

Thanks in advance for your guidance.

Amicalement
Armand

It depends on the scale you're looking for. In 1/2400, the GHQ one is very nice:
link
and also $16.95 USD before shipping. Also in 1/2400 the Panzerschiffe model is much less expensive ($5.00) and less detailed:

For 1/1200 there is both Navis and Superior, both of which are available from the Alnavco.com website. The Navis model is $69.50 USD and the Superior model is $21.50 USD. Clearly, one of those is a collector's model :-).

In 1/6000 there is Hallmark, but those are small enough that they will come as all the German BCs in a set. Don't know enough about 1/3000 scale to comment.
BWW

There's my VdT 1/2400 GHQ lovely model.

I like the GHQ and C-in-C models about equally (GHQ models are overdetailed and C-in-C models slightly underdetailed), but C-in-C capitol ships like the Von der Tann are only $7. USD

The 11.1in guns proved to be perfectly capable of taking on the more lightly armed British battlecruisers, but they gave the von der Tann a broadside weight of 5,238lbs, compared to the 6,800lbs of the Invincible and Indefatigable class battlecruisers or the 7,144lbs offered by the main German 12in guns.

<sigh> There's that reference to "broadside weight" again. Why do writers keep bringing it up? It's an almost completely irrelevant statistic in WWI. A shore battery with a single Mark X 12"/50 gun has a "broadside weight" of 850 lbs, but I'd give it the nod any day in a fight against a cruiser like Scharnhorst, Gneisenau or Blücher with a broadside weight of 1900 lbs from 8 x 8" guns. There are a LOT of factors influencing the effectiveness of rifled artillery, but the aggregated weight of all shells in a volley is not one of them. It's not like they're all going to land on the same point and overwhelm the defensive surface with a high PSI value…

- Ix

Yellow Admiral,
Oops. I forgot about C-in-C. They used to sell packs of lifeboats and British tripod masts that really went a long ways in dressing up their models.
BWW

C-in-C still sells the boats and tripod masts, you just have to know where to look.

The tripod masts are a nice addition, but are a right royal pain to get onto a model. The lead tripod legs bend every direction except the one I want… *&^%$#@!

I bought a zillion of the CinC boats and add them to all my C-in-C and Panzerschiffe models, but I recommend mixing them with the boats from WTJ. The C-in-C boats are all the same size and come in only two types (steam launch and open lifeboat). The WTJ boats are a smaller quantity on a sprue, but come in a variety of types and sizes, and if you order the sprues in different scales you can get even more sizes.

I also recommend adding wire masts and tops. Only the GHQ brand comes with masts, and I find them unacceptably flimsy for gaming, so I pretty much add wire masts to all my 1/2400 ships, regardless of brand.

Speaking of WTJ, there's still no WTJ Von der Tann, but I'm sure there will be eventually. The WTJ models are really nice – almost as detailed as GHQ, but cheaper, cleaner and with better proportions. The plastic is also a lot easier to drill than lead.

- Ix

Many thanks for your guidance boys!. (smile)

Loved yarkshire gamer model!

Amicalement
Armand