What's Wrong with this Picture?

[mlees]

It appears that the upper left of the photo is daytime, and the bottom left is night time. I suppose they cropped the photo because the gun flashes show up with more contrast that way.

[aletoledo]

whats that aerial for in the front? (sorry bow)

[rtrapasso]

It might be helpful to know when the photo was taken...

There is a photo of the Wisconsin from 1988 - it shows a smaller antenna just aft of the sat antenna on the bow - i don't see that antenna in this pic.

Also, there is a cylindrical object seen on the deck, just to the stern on the port side of the sat antenna which at first i thought was some sort of capstan, but it doesn't seem to be in the other photos i see from the same time. Possibly some sort of test equipment???[&:]


EDIT: The more i look at it, the more i think it IS a capstan.

However, there appears to be something on top of #2 turret that i can't identify...

[treespider]

Here's another view of "that thing"

[m10bob]

Funny place for an outhouse?

[Terminus]

It does sort of look like a Porta-Head, doesn't it?[:D]

[RevRick]

Well.. the only thing I can notice is that she's venting some stack gas, which most CO's would find rather... ah.. unsightly.. at least it's not black... Then the old man would have roasted haunch of engineering officer on the bridge.

[06 Maestro]

It seems there should be a visible sign in the water of the ship moving sideways due to the main guns fireing.

[barbarrossa]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

Has the Fire Control Radar been "blacked out"?

That's real close[:)]

[barbarrossa]

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

It looks like the anchors aren't symmetric? Perhaps someone forgot to put enough duct tape on one?

Nope. Duct tape is what holds a Patriot missile system together[:D].

[barbarrossa]

ORIGINAL: mlees

It appears that the upper left of the photo is daytime, and the bottom left is night time. I suppose they cropped the photo because the gun flashes show up with more contrast that way.

Nope this was all one very, loong day in the Gulf of Mexico during the shakedown cruise 1988. Turret one took 6 hours to put their first round downrange.

[barbarrossa]

ORIGINAL: dtravel

This ship is level? Shouldn't it be listing at least a little with multiple barrels firing at once like that? For that matter did they ever fire all those barrels at once?

The guns fired sequentially during the "9 gun salvo" at one second intervals. Center guns on each turret would fire together, then right, then left guns.

They did this one second delay to keep accuracy higher because the turret tends to shake quite a bit when the guns were fired.

[barbarrossa]

ORIGINAL: treespider

Here's another view of "that thing"

The 40 mm gun tubs forward of turret one were removed in the '80's configuration so this is probably an old pic of the Jersey.

And there was no "outhouse" on turret 2 in the '80's configuration[:D].

[barbarrossa]

ORIGINAL: String

The first turret doesn't seem to have the directors on it? Or whatever those nice boxes on the sides are at the back end fo the turret.

Those "boxes", or "ears" on the turrets are where the turret rangefinder optics are housed. You'd have to crank shutters open on each side and it took forever because of the number of revolutions you'd have to crank.

The rangefinder was about 40 ft long and I took an entire Saturday painting the one inside Turret 2. Thanks FC1 Epperson[:D]

[barbarrossa]

ORIGINAL: aletoledo

whats that aerial for in the front? (sorry bow)

That I think was the old NTDS array, but I'm not sure. Pretty standard issue though for the day. Just about every combatant ship had one if memory serves.

[barbarrossa]

ORIGINAL: rtrapasso

It might be helpful to know when the photo was taken...

There is a photo of the Wisconsin from 1988 - it shows a smaller antenna just aft of the sat antenna on the bow - i don't see that antenna in this pic.

Also, there is a cylindrical object seen on the deck, just to the stern on the port side of the sat antenna which at first i thought was some sort of capstan, but it doesn't seem to be in the other photos i see from the same time. Possibly some sort of test equipment???[&:]


EDIT: The more i look at it, the more i think it IS a capstan.

However, there appears to be something on top of #2 turret that i can't identify...

This is a photo from the '88 shakedown, before recommisioning in October.

Look a little higher on the superstructure[:D]

[barbarrossa]

ORIGINAL: RevRick

Well.. the only thing I can notice is that she's venting some stack gas, which most CO's would find rather... ah.. unsightly.. at least it's not black... Then the old man would have roasted haunch of engineering officer on the bridge.

We always smoked, and those damn fumes could run you out of Spot One real quick especially on navigation detal when ship's speed was low and the wind was up and blowing in a certain direction!

There's a HINT in there!!

[barbarrossa]

ORIGINAL: 06 Maestro

It seems there should be a visible sign in the water of the ship moving sideways due to the main guns fireing.

That's just a "sea story". The ship never moved horizontally. That's shock waves hitting the water.[:)]

[barbarrossa]

I'll give some hint here.

This being a big promo shot that was sold as a poster was really embarrassing to main battery fire control types (like me) because all the other Iowa class main battery types would look at this picture and laugh.

But not having the original photo makes it less obvious than it was in reality.

[Mike Solli]

Well, it's pretty obvious that you're talking to a bunch of main battery fire control morons.[:D]