Is the Battleship Maintained So That It Can Be Brought Back? 

Being the negative Nellie as usual

Yup. I want to hear how it CAN be done, not why it CAN'T be. No excuses, only results! I just want to keep the dream alive man.

@@Synergy7Studios He did say how. The Navy takes it back and does roughly 2 years of work on it but thats never gonna happen because it doesnt belong to the Navy. Ryan keeps notes just incase but i think its really for future curators and volunteers.

@@michaelkennedy272 The contract says that the Navy can terminate the contract and repossess the ship at any time if deemed necessary. So yeah, they can take it back if they want to. Read the Iowa's contract here. I'm sure it's about identical: www.navsea.navy.mil/Portals/103/Documents/TeamShips/SEA21/InactiveShips/Donation/museum_transfer_contracts/Iowa_Transfer_Contract.pdf

Is it that hard to believe that ten people can get a battleship out to sea, under its own power, in an hour, after sitting 20 years?

We don't actually. We've read our contract pretty thoroughly. We have many rules, but keeping them in fighting shape is not one of them. Thats what mothballed ships are, we've been removed from the register and are considered disposed of.

Battleship New Jersey my point was if they need it, things have gone sideways in a big way. In wartime the govt seized machine shops and tooling for the effort.

I think there was another comment from someone else in this thread that got deleted, sorry!

@@BattleshipNewJersey Yeah. In the movie, they had absolutely no other option than to reactivate that ship (well... if they wanted a ship with weapons). It was literally the only ship with weapons available in that area with no possibility for backup. If you decide to watch it, please record yourself. You could make that a reaction video for the scenes where they get that ship running again. XD

In truth, if they need an Iowa-class type battleship again, they're just better off building a brand new one from scratch and use 21st Century technology like what's in a nuclear submarine or Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier.

Me too. I cry sometimes wishing they would sail again

@@ffandrewd2986 🚣 Sail. It's sale only if you're selling it 💰

Its to prevent a massive explosion of some kind, or steam cutting stuff.. Ever see them light a boiler lol. Much less the old pipes they could forget one that happens to not be on a schematic and flash boil an entire section of the ship, or worse.. All that has to stand up to Xray examination before signed off on... now anyway. if all of them were burning for an extended period, pop. it would take so much work out of water to bring her back to ability to move. things will have to be cut open on the hull ect. its so much effort a staff of volunteers could never manage it on a capital ship. Unfortunately. Smaller ships, heckin yeah man all day they got a couple that run at least electrical under their own power in the DD class and the like unless im mistaken..

@@jeffjr84 I remember there being an old cargo ship that could run under its own power. The only load it carries, however, is some fuel and a pallet of water bottles.

While these ships are some of the most massive war machines ever built, and certainly fascinating in terms of their time, by the time Iowas were built they were already close to obsolescence or past it. War isn't fought with thick armor and direct fire anymore. While it's neat to see these, if the navy recommissioned a battleship I would shake my head in utter disbelief, unless some set of circumstances meant that air and missile power no longer worked...and in that weird case, how is a battleship going to shoot miles out? There's just no use for these anymore, outside of a teaching history environment. This is where they belong, not at sea or underway. They'd just become a massive tomb for thousands if we ever got desperate enough to reactivate them anyways.

Yes!

I would say only in a worst case scenario, & then maybe not even then.

@@sphinxrising1129 In a worst case scenario there is less reason to reactivate them since then you don't have resources to waste.

Who wouldn't want to see one of these operating? If they weren't so expensive to operate...... I remember when Jimmy Carter wanted to scrap them ! We are lucky to have these four dormant volcanoes.

@@daleeasternbrat816 anyone who understands the needs of the Navy and the military would not want to see them operating.

Blink if you're a hostage! ;) 😂

Trust me the cables are much longer and heavier than a Stephen King book...

Quickly! We must save them all! you guys take jersey, me and my lot will take Iowa and drag texas' cold steel ass through the ocean to a tropical island to repairs and a comfy life of lounging around the bay!

Imagine- you go through all the trouble to steal and repair a battleship- just to have it sunk minutes after leaving port, because you neglected to steal an aircraft carrier to get air support.

Boutta take the USS Iowa for a spin tonight

I've said the same thing about if the Navy were to ever bring back the Tomcat. Though in the 0.001% chance that would ever happen I wouldn't be able to fly since I dont have 20/20 vision. Oh well... We have our own dreams. 😉

@@SOU6900 Supposedly we sold some f-14's to Iran when they were an ally. Those were never returned and whereabouts unknown. Since they could technically now be in the hands or our enemies, to ensure that no f-14 air-frame could ever be used to get one of the missing ones flying, they cut thru the Titanium wing pivot mechanism. I have read that every single one was cut so that if it ever flew, the wings would not pivot and would break off as soon as they created lift. So if all of this is true (Reasonably sure it is) you will never see another F-14 fly.

Well, you are quite safe. You will never join.

@@FlyingAl2006 😆 like I said we can all dream.

@@FlyingAl2006 The F-14s Iran has are more or less operational but an F-18 is more then capable of dealing with F-14s.

Looks like she's in safe hands for sure.

looking at the planks there , not so.. wow are they bad.

We're in the middle of a $10million restoration of the teak, theres a link in the description where you can support that project

@John Stauffer>>>> He should hire my ex wife she was so anal she'd count the water spots on her car and let me know where each one is so I can wax it again ...

@@thekingsilverado9004 with my ex it was spots on the shower door and/or the bathroom faucet. I simply refused to clean the bathroom for about a year and left it for her.. After that, if she had complaints, I never heard about them.

Or you have some ridiculously specific conditions. About the only real reason to do it would be if somebody seriously fortified some beaches. Any other conditions would render the BB moot. For example, if the target is more than ~15 miles inland, it is out of realistic bombardment range (considering accuracy and sea keeping).

@@timberwolf1575 the new rail guns that are coming online are designed in part to do the shore bombardment mission with much smaller and lighter hardware and ammo iirc. Also more accurate; I think the projectiles might be able to steer in flight. If not they're still going much faster so the wind and gravity will have less of an effect.

@@Synergy7Studios That's why you take a battleship hull, stick a nuclear reactor in it and replace the 16 inchers with rail guns. It'll have the power to run the rail guns and hte size to mount big ones with plenty of ammo storage capability.

@@Riceball01 You’ve just created a multi-billion dollar target/source of radioactive waste when hit by an enemy railgun projectile or tactical nuclear weapon. No need for a specialized battleship hull. Build something based on a supertanker; it would be much cheaper and no less useful.

@@mebsrea no iowa class battleship was ever sunk. The armor on the hull was so thick it could not be penetrated by conventional means torpedo or projectile including its own 16 inch guns. It would be much less of a target than you think. If uou are going to use nukes, a battleship is a much lesser target than what you would use it for ie a city or an infrastructure target

"historical documentary "Braveheart." " Quite witty actually. Thou art a man of class and style! I admit to enjoying classy humor as there's not so much of it on RU-vid LOL.

The staff are volunteers from what I understand. I don't think that you can "require" much of them. Just be happy that they just show up.

We are a mix of volunteers and staff but uh yeah, we aren't anticipating an alien attack.

@@BattleshipNewJersey And that's exactly the kind of complacency the alien invaders are counting upon. Write to your Congressional represenatives today!

I hate battleship, literally 2 minutes on google will tell you that dropping the anchor while answering a high bell is a good way to lose the forecastle or the anchor

they did have 2 modern destroyer's crew, and the vets, and there is no way the museum staff wouldn't want in. so they likely had at lest 500-600 people, but there is still no way they would get her running so fast. (also they had the people who where still at pearl harbor to help, so the ship was likely fully crewed)

That movie is about as plausible as "Space Battleship Yamato".

I enjoyed the 2010 live action Space Battleship Yamato. You mean that's not a historical documentary?

Missouri vet here. The term you're searching for is "willing suspension of disbelief." I'm willing to suspend disbelief enough to grant that, given an all-night surge of 'round the clock effort by Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard, the battleship could have been physically ready to light off in the morning. I'm willing to grant that enough veterans could be found on Oahu to crew her. I'm willing to grant that, on a base like Pearl, enough obsolete ammo could be found for at least a partial combat loadout. But I'm NOT willing to grant that, with all the active and retired captains and admirals on the beach, they would let a new lieutenant command her! (Oh, and when that 16" shell was HAND-CARRIED down Broadway, when there's a monorail RIGHT THERE intended for JUST that purpose, I really lost it!)

@@ericbowen650 But weren't those broadsides beautiful?

Respectfully, I'd disagree. The New Jersey RU-vid presence helps make it unique, and must help to drive footfall / sponsorship money towards the ship. Missouri and Wisconsin both get many times the number of visitors New Jersey gets (they don't need that boost) - leaving RU-vid to New Jersey helps a sister museum raise cash.

How many of the same ship need a RU-vid presence? I was aboard Wisconsin and visited the huge museum facility it was amazing.

Texas is doing the best they can with a ship that's far older than ours and decommissioned 50 years before us. They also were the first to do much of this work and didn't have others to learn from, as we do.

Seriously, go look at any nozel that comes out of a pressure vessle. Weld a repad around the pipe and then weld the pipe to it. You can instal the repad in two pieces so it fits past the flange.

@@amirlach I've seen that on merchant vessels for sure. Didnt know what it was called.

@@BattleshipNewJersey If this valve was an electrical hookup for the same purpose, it would be called "hotel power". This is the same idea and how commuter trains are ready to occupy first thing in the morning. Actually pausing for a thought, your steam valve is more or less the same thing railroads did in the steam days for bringing an engine back around and preheating passenger trains from station platforms. Not everywhere of course but it was one method.

@@BattleshipNewJersey Agreed. It's very easy to criticize other people if you've never walked a mile in their shoes. I'm sure they would love to maintain the ship in perfect condition, but there are only so many dollars to go around. Folks should talk to their elected officials about providing funding. These ships are most definitely a benefit to the economy of their areas.

Why? So that it can get sunk by carrier based aircraft or cruise missiles? The battleship died for a reason.

@@turdferguson3803 god forbid someone makes a light hearted comment about a fantasy scenario. Thank you for clarifying.

@@turdferguson3803 you must be fun at parties

@@turdferguson3803 Because it couldn’t be fitted with CIWIS and even more missile systems than they had in the Gulf? Yeah right.

@@whackyjinak4978 If you're going to do that then why not just use a modern missile cruiser like a Kirov lol, you can fit modern equipment to any obsolete ship that doesn't make it practical.

No it wouldn't. In combat, one missile could cripple maybe even sink the whole ship. İt would be a very expensive and old shooting Practice for any enemy.

@@MisterCaprisun The same missile would take a Zumwalt to the bottom just the same as an Iowa class. And the Zumwalt have less space and less spare buoyancy to mount anti-missile defenses.

@@aaronp3411 of Course it would. The thing is, zumwalt(s) are so much harder to detect,(I hate zumwalt Class btw) and they have so much higher chance of fighting back

@@MisterCaprisun While your point of stealth is more than valid, I wish to point out- 16” guns > stealth lol

@@aaronp3411 except, 16 inch guns are not as accurate as an anti ship missile and wont do as much damage (plus, good luck finding 16" shells in 2k20)

1000% sad but true.

Britain after WW2: -If it was not a museum, it would be- scrap metal.

They have already sent ships away to scrap since the whole CCP coronavirus crap started

@@markusz4447 Like they have any choice. When Britain is still on rationing programs up until the early 1950's while Germany and Japan lifted their even before the 1940's ended...

@@axelpatrickb.pingol3228 I can understand why they had to do it. But for THE navy nation to not at least keep 1 like the Warspite i.e. is a bit of a shame really

They just don't want us touching anything associated with the steam system

@@BattleshipNewJersey there is always the expression about there "being a waiver for everything." Although trying to find a way to make the galley operational without using steam, and preserving the appearance as the design constraints pretty much makes it a project that would likely need an eccentric willing to blow a lot of money. Money that could be better spent on other projects inside the ship.

@@BattleshipNewJersey Before turning it on just make sure no 16" shells were accidently stored in the oven.

Short of loading munitions on board, there aren't many things more dangerous than live steam. The "steam" you see rising from your teapot or pasta water is NOT steam, it it water vapor...basically hot fog. Live steam is the gaseous phase of water (solid/liquid/gas) and contains a LOT of heat energy. The heat, pressure, and steam flow will degrade piping from the inside out, requiring regular inspections of the entire steam system to maintain safety. On the high-pressure side at 600 PSI the temperature of the steam is about 850 degrees F. A standard broom with a wooden handle is used to search for leaks, as live steam is invisible. Basically, when half the broom disappears, you've found your leak. If you find it first, half of you disappears. A HP steam leak can literally cut a man in half. Low pressure steam such as found in the galley for the steam-jacket kettles is around 50 PSI and about 300 degrees F. A good leak could almost instantly cook whatever body part it came in contact with, then remove the cooked meat from the bone. A failure of a safety valve on a boiler could result in a burst boiler, generally called a "boiler explosion" for good reason. If people are in the boiler room at the time, they will not survive. Chances of survival in the neighboring spaces is iffy at best. So, I guess your "nightmare scenario" would be a burst pipe turning a group of visitors into a pile of dismembered, de-boned, well done stew meat. Sorry for being so graphic, but you only get to screw up with live steam once. Chances are that a screwup will either kill you or leave you wishing that it had. Welcome to my world for 2 1/2 years of service on a US Navy vessel with a 600-PSI plant. You just try to be as safe as possible, be aware, and don't think of the many things around you that could be instantly lethal.

So the galley equipment runs on steam! I would have expected electricity.

You might want to look at 'Normandy/Overlord' and how USAAF units were given Spitfires to do the artillery spotting for the navy.

The youtube comments talk about this stuff. Guys in trouble get on the radio, they get patched to the con tower on the battleship. They give coordinates and get outta dodge (at least 1/4 mile away) 9x 2000-lb bombs screaming faster than the speed of sound blow the enemy to kingdom come. Alternatively, the ship can fire one at a time for effect and the ground troops give guidance for where to walk the next shell.

The presence of the curator cannot be completely described by shapes. Simply due to experimental error in trying to measure it, his position can never be known with certainty. It can, at best, be approximated, in this case with an uncertainty of a deck and a half lol.

@@greentland So you're saying that Ryan respects the Heisenberg Principle?

@@ghost307 I can't be certain... lol.

quick googling told me it took 3-4years to build those ships, its weird to think it would now take 2-3 years get them back working but i understand why, most of the time its simple easier to build new than fix old

@@kiiiisu Yeah having to try and gut a fully built ship is a lot harder than piecing one together before everything is welded, bolted and riveted into place.

The Iowa class, South Dakota class, Bismarck class and King George V class battleships were some of the best looking in the world. But I as a Canadian, am partial to the Tribal class destroyers because HMCS Haida is our pride and joy. *And the last tribal class on earth*

It would be easier to start over from scratch. I've been reading what a lot of the old crewmen from the Nineties had to say about the IOWAs, that yardbirds were having to make spare parts for them by hand because the original manufacturers are no longer in business. They've been gone since the 1950s. And that was thirty years ago.

I'd suspect it was not just rain water, etc infiltrating from above, but water condensing on that cold pipe within as well.

Simplest option would have been to empty the system of water but removing the pipe is an effective option.

one will bring the other

He was supposed to come to the ship last spring. One day we will.

@@BattleshipNewJersey Apparently he lost his employment. Maybe he can be sponsored to come over as he probably has a lot more time!

Yes!!

@@lawdawg1942 it sounds like he may be doing youtube full time now. I have no idea how he can work a full time job and put out so much quality content. It's superhuman

@@lawdawg1942 I would definitely contribute to that gofundme or similar fundraiser.

Many years after your comment, as the drydocking has just finished, it’s great that the “keep the water on the outside” is still a common and funny phrase. It’s so hilariously obvious. Dare I say, it’s a slightly British humour.

Seems reasonable for the govt. to have a stipulation that, although we will give you this battleship, we don't want you to actually activate it and terrorize the eastern seaboard :-)

Even if the ship was not maintained, just berthing it is a money pit.

Could you imagine being able to sail the NJ again? Oh man. Set up a few day cruise.

That was true for a time, however that clause was repealed when the ships were stricken from the Naval Register

@@NFSgadzooks Its still true regardless what clause was repealed . Until that ship is cut up and melted down into new steel , the US govt can take it back at their leisure .

@@NFSgadzooks Iowa's contract was signed after she had already been stricken. So no, that clause is still in effect. The Navy can always come take the ships back if they want. They actually thought about taking back the Massachusetts and the North Carolina back in the 80s but ultimately just decided to strip parts off of them

These vessels are completely obsolete, no use re-activating them.

Why not just build a new ship with modern technologies but with a big gun and armour battleship concept?...a long range auto loading gun firing a couple hundred pounds of "fuck you buddy" at even longer ranges than the old ones...probably more accurate with GPS guided rounds like they use in land based artillery..and with metallurgy being more advanced...why not some chobram armour like the Abrams tank 🤔....why not scale up a Abrams tank gun to 10in or so and put it on a ship shooting kinetic rods, hesh or canister shot 🤷‍♂️

And I think that's what they did in the 80's. They had only been in mothballs for not incredibly long.

@@nickriley4609 because missles are so much better lol

Indeed 😥

We use the parts of the galley that don't rely on steam.

And died The galley was often used as a makeshift sickbay during battle.

If my ship had been in port rather than at sea, I would have been someplace between NAS Alameda and Treasure Island when the quake hit.

That is a 150 psi shore steam line to supply steam to ships services like water heaters, galley steam kettles, steam heat and most importantly the boiler steam blanket. The steam blanket is to keep the boilers with steam to keep air (oxygen)out of the boilers to prevent corrosion inside the 1" boiler tubes leading to a ruptured tube and loss of the boiler till repairs can be made.

Could you use steam from other ship's boilers to start?

@@microsoftword213 No, the shore steam would just go to the auxiliary equipment, heaters, galley equipment. There would be check valves to prevent shore steam to be routed into the main steam lines.

Actually the main steam was superheated to 800 degrees F at a pressure of 600+ psig this is considered low pressure as newer steam powered vessels operated at 1200 psig which greatly increases fuel efficiency but can lower reliability of the overall system without proper and constant PM. Look up 'Making Steam:The Life and Times of a US Navy Chief Engineer".

Maybe the four could be rebuilt with modern engines better deck and replace the main guns with more modern main guns

@@KaiserStormTracking No.

@@KB4QAA How so? A 155mm howitzers could be put on there and they could be able to rotate giving them better cover range

Propulsion machinery destined for USS Kentucky was divided up ad used in USS Sacremento (AOE 1) and USS Camden (AOE 2) built at Puget sound naval shipyard in the early 60s

@@KaiserStormTracking While gunfire support could have a role, the costs of re-activiating an Iowa would be immense, much less refitting it like that. There's a reason the Navy doesn't even have a heavy-cruiser or similar, they're better off with air support and smaller vessels.

Technically, the Navy could use eminent domain to take them back, although they would have to pay something for them (barring a repo clause in the contract). Probably scrap value plus lost income, not the value of a warship. But as cool as it would be to see these bad boys sailing again, it’s not gonna happen.

I cant see it ever happening, they don't make the ammo or have any trained crew that would be able to run it

I honestly can’t imagine what it would take to get them back in service. Complete engine replacement and electronics, wiring all fuel and water systems. Plus like mentioned above, we don’t even have shells for them anymore. Could we? Yes. Could we build 5 other ships cheaper? Probably. If we need the destructive power that bad, there are other ways to get it done faster and cheaper.

@@danielharnden516 Honestly, most of the engine equipment is probably still in good condition. The boilers and steam piping is where you blow through the money. Lots of certifications for pressurized vessels and steam pipe inspections.

@pearlsnaredrummer77 I totally agree. We know how to work current ships just need gun technology and rail guns make more sense than 16 inch turrets now

@@TheJimyyy That was 30 years ago and it was a pain to do then. Would be even more so now. Not saying that it's totally *impossible*, but it would at best be a questionable use of resources.

@@minarchist1776 you’re right on the money here. And to be Frank, it’s only because of one thing: electronics. Think of how far we came between the 40’s & 80’s right? Like decent improvements. But computers were kinda bulky and shitty, and you could do anything a computer could do by hand so it wasn’t that necessary. Now think of how far we’ve come with electronics between 1980 and 2020. It’s been a massive leap not seen anywhere else in history. From 8 tracs to iPhones; reel to reel video recorders to iPhones; wired coms and sensors to iPhones; physical switches to wireless switches (only making the iPhone point to say that we all literally have more processing power in our pockets, than is combined on an Iowa class battleship. The leap is just unreal). So taking all that into consideration, holy hell. You’d have to literally gut the whole thing just to modernise it and bring it up to today’s standards. It’s truly wild to think about.

@@thJune Among my other claims to infamy I was a mustang line officer in the U.S. Navy. One of the ships I was stationed on was the USS BLUE RIDGE (LCC-19). I was on her from 1990-1992. She had been designed and built in the early to mid 1960's. She had 4 computers that she used to maintain a tactical data link. Each of them was roughly the size of a vending machine; 64 bit, 64 K, iron core memory systems. They could have been replaced by a laptop and it would have been a massive increase in the level of computing power available. But the old systems did their job and were rugged, so they were kept. And that's only using roughly 30 year old systems.

@@TheJimyyy As been explained, it takes ENORMOUS amounts of money and effort to reactivate them, if it's even possible (which is doubtful). The engines alone probably need to be completely replaced, and you can't do that without literally sawing the back half of the ship apart. Keeping them in museum-quality is practical, because that's just upkeep and display, not operational. They're all just museum pieces now - there's no hope of ever reactivating them.

@@TheJimyyy Last time was almost 2 decades ago. And read the other posts about how and why it's virtually impossible without major overhauls, and almost certainly massive replacement of parts that (1) we don't have, and (2) we can't make.

New battleships should be named the Second Amendments Right class

@@duckykaze9557 I agree to this statement

Likely cheaper and MUCH faster too.

@@SilvaDreams Not necessarily faster. You only need so much speed. If we were to build new battleships, they would almost certainly play the same role as the old ones. Accompany carriers and bombard shore targets. You don't need to do 50 knots for that job. The upgrades would be a modern armor design and to have modern air defense built in. The Iowa's couldn't have too many missiles because the overpressure from the guns destroyed them. A new build could have dedicated protected areas for SAM's. The other thing is this, imagine how much better an inch of armor on a modern tank is compared to a ww2 tank. Now translate that to 16+ inch armor belt of a battleship. Imagine that same ship if we get directed energy weapons in business. A battleship with anti-missile lasers would be a tough out. It likely won't happen though unless we actually get railguns to a functional level. A battleship just can't project power like a carrier, even today. For the expense to be viable, it would need to get a lot of range out of it's main guns. Personally, I like the idea of a conventionally powered capital ship in the fleet just because some of our allies have rules preventing nuclear ships in their water.

That is the same fact the clueless types that talk about "restarting" F-22 production decide to ignore.

For this one were on the main deck, outside. Were right under the you are here sign

@@BattleshipNewJersey If you are doing a long monologue, like in this video, overlaying with a red dot while you are talking would be really cool! Since most of us aren't intimately familiar with the ship, showing a "we are here" sign without a dot still seems a little imprecise/ambiguous

The 90s weren't that long ago yet, there are still people who could train people. It's still an awful idea, and maybe even an impossible one, but that's not due to lost knowledge. Not yet anyway.

Lmao that's like suggesting young people can't operate a Model T.

@@breckfoster767 Most of them would have to put in a fair bit of work before they could.

@@breckfoster767 That’s right, I bet most young people can’t

@@notmenotme614 You don't know very many young people then

Shit man that's still a full time job on Navy ships today.

Fiber-fix it...

and sham wows for leak control

Omg... So glad they do things properly and don't resort to half-assery LOL!!!

3M 5200

Ot duct tape!

RA: The navy takes extremely good care of its ships. However, the battleships were in deteriorated condition, and were never budgeted the full amount of money needed to fully refurbish their systems and keep them in top condition. In truth they were political statements that served little purpose in a modern navy. (old salt from the era).

Proper work of what? Extremely outdated materials that probably nobody manufacturers any longer?

@@joshuabaker5712 Huh? Metals and standards for general mechanical engineering have not changed that much since WWII. Not an issue in my experience. Electrical can be problematic if you want to be exact and correct. But metal parts.....thats what machine tools are for

In 1990 it costed $1 million a day to operate the ship. A little steep for a primitive war machine. Still, the Iowas bad-ass factor cannot be overstated. Beautiful, majestic vessels!

There is a new Enterprise under construction.

@@zxej6879 Aircraft Carrier? (I hope!)

@@tomo9126 Yes, it is another aircraft carrier. CVN-80. Started August 2017. Expected date of service, 2028. Being built at Huntington Ingalls Industries, Newport News, VA.

We can use the parts of the galley that don't use steam. And we do! Fortunately, thats most of what we could need.

I totally agree. Build 21st Century warships for 21st Century naval warfare. In the age of hypersonic weapons, the Iowas would be smoked.

The only really useful thing reactivating them would do is to limit the idiots ramming our ships to damage them.

That wasn't even science fiction. That was fantasy, and not particularly well thought out fantasy. :P

@@josephstevens9888 I agree it’s outdated and it’d be much wiser to build 21st century ships. But I wonder if modern anti-ship missiles would have difficulty penetrating the armor? After all, modern missiles are designed for modern thinner-skinned ships. But even if the armor is up to the task, the very structure of the old ship would likely make it difficult to properly integrate modern missiles, radars, communications, etc.

@@M60E3MG I mean tbh, whether it be an anti ship missile or 16in shell, if one of these boats gets hit, even if it doesn’t penetrate, it’ll have its bell rung so hard that the vibrations from the impact alone will cause multiple triage points all over the ship. Baffles, pipes, nuts, screws, bolts... you’ll have so much rattle loose you’d be knocked to 50% or crippled rather quickly. That’s why the navy went wild with spending all the money on the phalanx systems (which work pretty awesomely I might add).

Just ordered some teak? Then you've some idea of just flippin' expensive it was to redo her decks. :D

I think he means the small pieces we sell in our giftshop. Starts at $10!

@@BattleshipNewJersey I do mean the small pieces!

Yeah. We never will.

@@BattleshipNewJersey It's stupid fun but you are far to close to the source material to turn off your brain and laugh at it. It was worth watching though just to see the Missouri at sea. They also used a bunch of legitimate Iowa class veterans and wounded warriors in the cast.

Fun fact, her "at sea" time in that movie was part of her trip to drydock for repairs.

@@BattleshipNewJersey I know. She was getting pulled by tugs. It was still glorious to see. Nothing looks like a battleship underway.

The movie is absolute trash but to be honest it's kind of fun anyway. There's basically nothing good about it, but it's still entertaining in a way.

Agreed. With rail guns and substantially better armor. A battleship built to similar specs and weight of an Iowa would be able to take on a Yamato with trivial ease. Let alone a modern fleet of tin cans.

The cost would be extreme, not billions of dollars more like tens of billions of dollars. ALL of the heavy industry that existed that built these ships is gone. No foundry is able to make the 17" turret face armor anymore let alone the belt armor. Just look at how expensive a Ford class CV is. And it has armor equal to aluminum foil. These ships are the last of a noble breed, let them rest in a job well done.

That was the idea of the Zumwalt class Destroyer. Which is really a cruiser. A ship with large guns to do shore bombardment.

@@terrydouglas5008 Yeah, too bad they where designed around a gun that will never fire.

@@Predator42ID this. I want rail gun battleships so badly. Give them VLS cells and CIWS guns and they'll basically be like a modern Iowa with all the Tomahawk tubes and stuff they added by the end.

He could but I don’t think he would be alive to board it. Think of it this way: the Iowa’s were the penultimate (the Montana’s were the ultimate) development of 40 years of Battleship designs and constant building, sailing and improving. All of that knowledge, machinery, tooling and most of all the building expertise is gone and would have to be recreated. So sad but they served a mighty purpose in their day but that day is gone 🙁. Drachinefel on his RU-vid channel said we could get the USS constitution back to sea faster than an Iowa and I have no doubt he is right.

@Daniel Harnden I'm pretty sure he said we could get the HMS victory back to sea faster. The Constitution is currently in the water, sea worthy, and practically combat capable as it is now. In fact the Constitution goes on a cruise once every year.

@@micfail2 my apologies, you are right.

@@danielharnden516 No need to apologize, I'm glad to stumble across a fellow drach fan :-)

@@micfail2 oh yes, i absolutely love his videos. So much information and Tremendous humor. Between he and Mark Felton, RU-vid has become my favorite source of history detail. I will admit I only understand maybe 1/2 his detail lol.

LOL, that would give a whole new meaning to the term "Spigot Mortar"

That's.....a really good question.

because once you light the fires then the boilers need to be watched over 24/7 they are incredibly labor intensive and the technical knowledge to run them is dying off.....and its ridiculously expensive

@@neckbroke2x Yes, that's a good reason not to do it, but if the Navy's not the one in charge of monitoring the systems and paying for them, what's it to them?

@@rrice1705 Boilers = steam, steam = power, power = ship moving, ship moving = huge liabilities and getting run up onto a shoal lol

@@rrice1705 Probably a combination of factors. The Navy *does* have a duty of care when handing over a decom warship to civilians to make sure they don't do anything stupid to hurt themselves or anyone else, a boiler explosion causes similar destruction to a main magazine explosion. Look up HMS Barham to see what that looks like. It would also be a bad look for the Navy if these warships were improperly maintained and something bad happened to one of them. Finally, there is simply no reason to keep a static museum piece in a functional state, it is pretty standard procedure to immobilize something like this when turning it into a museum.

The remaining 16” ammunition was stored at an Army depot in Indiana (don’t ask me why). They started the process of destroying the last of more than 15,000 rounds in 2016. I suppose it’s all gone by now.

@@jacksons1010 Crane is Navy but the Army does have a presence there. It was set up in 1941 I assume as someplace that would be reasonably out of range from enemy aircraft, in a lower populated area that was not too low populated and with good rail connections.

@@jacksons1010 NSWC Crane - My uncle was with the on-base fire department, said he felt true jealousy first time he saw the 16in rounds up close compared to the field artillery he used in the Army. Why Indiana though? The base itself is geographically isolated, Bureau of Ordnance established it as the Naval Ammunition Depot for production, testing, and storage in 41.

@@NiceGuyEddie1030 well if it is in nowhere no Cives can get hurt if it goes up

@@8vantor8 Right. Thought I implied that with 'geographically isolated'.

Whaaa???? I love the movie for the realism!!!!😁