In the Battle of Dadonggou in 1894, the "Dingyuan" class ironclad ship of the Beiyang Naval Division was attacked by the Japanese Combined Fleet, and although hundreds of shells were hit, none of the shells could penetrate its protective armor. Even a seriously wounded third-class sailor (Torajiro Miura) on the "Matsushima," the flagship of the Japanese Combined Fleet, held a cannonball and cried out before his death: "Why can't Dingyuan be sunk......?" The commander of the British Far East Fleet, who was watching the battle, also came to the conclusion that the reason why the Japanese ships "could not completely sweep away the Chinese troops was that there were two towering ironclad ships." Therefore, in the eyes of many netizens, there was no naval gun in Asia that could penetrate the armor of the "Dingyuan" class ironclad ship, is this the real situation?
The scarred "Dingyuan" ship is just unsinkable
Let's first take a look at the armor protection of the "Dingyuan" class ironclad ships. The armor protection of the "Dingyuan" class ironclad ship adopts the ironclad fort design, that is, the ironclad is used in the center of the warship to enclose a protective area to protect the main gun, ammunition depot and other important parts. Specifically, it is surrounded by 305~356 mm thick steel surface iron armor, and the entire area is 43.5 meters long and 18 meters wide. In addition, the main gun cover is 51 mm thick, the conning tower armor is 203 mm thick, and there is dome armor protection under the waterline, and the thickness of the dome armor is 76 mm. On the whole, such an armored defense is very good, and small and medium-caliber naval guns simply can't gnaw.
Next, let's take a look at the armor-piercing capabilities of the large-caliber naval guns equipped by the Japanese Combined Fleet. Although the naval guns of the Japanese Combined Fleet are mainly small and medium-caliber rapid-fire guns, there are still large-caliber naval guns, but there are only a small number of them. First of all, the "Sankei" ("Matsushima", "Itsukushima", and "Hashidate") are each equipped with a Ghanaian 320-mm main gun, which is larger than the caliber of the Krupp 305-mm main gun of the "Dingyuan" class ironclad ship. The gun is 38 times the diameter, the muzzle velocity is 671 m / s, and the effective range is 8600 m. In contrast, the Krupp 305 mm main gun of the "Dingyuan" class is only 25 times the diameter, the muzzle velocity is 500 m / s, and the effective firing range is 7800 m. For naval guns, the larger the double diameter and the faster the muzzle velocity, the stronger the armor-piercing ability.
Looking at the armor-piercing data of the Krupp 305-mm main gun of the "Dingyuan" class, it is possible to penetrate wrought iron 494 mm thick at a distance of 1000 meters, and wrought iron 433 mm thick at a distance of 2000 meters. The armor-piercing ability of the more powerful Ghanaian 320 mm main gun is still higher than that of the Krupp 305 mm main gun of the "Dingyuan" class, and the maximum armor thickness of the "Dingyuan" class is only 356 mm, how can it be prevented?
The flagship of the Japanese Combined Fleet "Matsushima".
According to the British Navy's artillery manual issued in 1915, 15 inches of wrought iron = 12 inches of steel armor = 12 inches of steel armor = 7.5 inches of Harvey hardened armor = 5.75 inches of Krupp hardened armor when facing armor-piercing shells without caps. The maximum armor thickness of the "Dingyuan" class is only 356 mm, which is only equivalent to 445 mm thick wrought iron!
There are also Krupp 260 mm guns equipped with the "Naniwa" class protective cruisers of the Japanese Combined Fleet, which are also very powerful, with a diameter of 35 times, a muzzle velocity of 550 m / s, and an effective firing range of 12,200 meters. The gun can penetrate 574 mm thick wrought iron at a distance of 1000 meters and 512 mm thick at a distance of 2000 meters. There are two ships in the "Naniwa" class, "Naniwa" and "Takachiho", each equipped with two Krupp 260-mm guns. The Krupp 260 mm gun of the "Naniwa" class is stronger than the Krupp 305 mm gun of the "Dingyuan" class in terms of range and armor piercing ability.
Since the Japanese ships have such strong artillery, why can't they sink the "Dingyuan"-class ironclad ships? In the First Sino-Japanese Naval Battle, the "Dingyuan" was hit in 159 places, and the "Zhenyuan" was hit in 220 places. Don't look at the hundreds of shells that hit, but there were only two large-caliber shells, one 260-mm armor-piercing shell hit the armor belt of the "Dingyuan", and a 260-mm grenade hit the left battery of the "Dingyuan", causing some damage to the main gun. The 260 mm armor-piercing projectile may be a problem with the firing angle, leaving only 100~140 mm deep bullet marks on the armor belt and not causing much damage. It is unlikely that the firing distance was too long, and the Japanese Navy at that time required the gunners to fire at a distance of 3,000 meters as far as possible to ensure a hit rate.
Japanese Naniwa-class protective cruiser
During the entire naval battle, the Japanese ships "Naniwa" and "Takachiho" fired a total of 55 rounds of 260-mm shells, including 18 armor-piercing shells, 36 grenades, and 1 shotgun. In contrast, the Krupp 260 mm main gun of the Beiyang Naval Division, which is equipped with the armored cruiser "Pingyuan", has two hits out of ten shots and a 20% hit rate, which can be called a magic gun!
As for the Ghana's 320-mm guns, on which the Japanese Navy had high hopes, the performance was very poor, with only 12 shells fired in total, and not a single one hit. Among them, there were 3 rounds of "Matsushima", 4 rounds of "Hashidate", and 5 rounds of "Itsukushima". On average, it took more than an hour to fire a shell, and the rate of fire was too slow. This situation occurs because of the "Sanjing Ship" and "Small Ship Carrying Cannon" (a warship of more than 4,000 tons is actually equipped with a 320 mm/38 times diameter naval gun), which leads to unstable shooting; The second was that the Japanese Navy at that time lacked training and had to reduce the rate of fire. The barrel of large-caliber naval guns is expensive, and the barrel life of the Ghana 320mm gun is only more than 100 rounds, and the total reserve barrel is only one, so the Japanese Navy rarely conducts live-fire training.
Therefore, it is not that the armor of the "Dingyuan" class ironclad ship cannot penetrate, but that the large-caliber naval guns of the Japanese Navy have a slow rate of fire and a low hit rate. If you can't hit, no matter how powerful the naval guns are, they are useless. On the contrary, the hit rate of the large-caliber guns of the Beiyang Naval Division was much higher, and the 305-mm shells fired by the "Dingyuan" class hit many Japanese ships. It is a pity that the quality of the 305-mm shells equipped with the "Dingyuan" class is not good, and if there were enough high-explosive grenades, the losses of the Japanese combined fleet would be great.