Talk:SMS Niobe

Name
Just a question, why is this ship referred-to by its least-common and least-held name? Instead of Yugoslav cruiser Dalmacija? -- Director  ( talk )  06:11, 21 January 2014 (UTC)
 * WP:SHIPNAME is the relevant guideline. I would not be making that call, firstly she saw 25 years service with the Germans 1900-1925, and less than twenty with the Royal Yugoslav Navy, Italian Navy and German Navy combined over the period 1925-43. Neither of her two world war service periods was particularly exciting, so that wouldn't be the basis on which a decision would be made on the name. My Google books search had Niobe on 57 hits, Dalmacija on 38, but quite a few of the Dalmacija hits weren't about the ship. I'd say Niobe is the most appropriate name given the guideline. Peacemaker67 (send... over) 11:28, 21 January 2014 (UTC)
 * That's the long and the short of it&mdash;this ship served for a longer period as Niobe and so that's what we name the article. If the ship's service was particularly notable under both (or all three) flags, then we could split the article (for instance, like USS Phoenix (CL-46) and ARA General Belgrano). But that's not the case with this ship. Parsecboy (talk) 13:44, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

Conflicting information about service after Italian capitulation
Conways p. 357 says that she was captured by the Germans and renamed Niobe on 11 September 1943, was soon turned over to Croatia as Zniam, was stranded on 19 December and torpedoed by British MTBs two days later, and on p. 359 it says that Cattaro was handed over to the Croats and renamed Zniam. Lenton p. 380 states that it served successively in the Italian and Croatian navies before returning to German service. It appears that she may have been in Croatian hands when stranded and torpedoed. Anyone got other sources on this aspect? Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 09:34, 12 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Hildebrand et. al. confirm that the ship did serve briefly as Zniam - I might get to translating the material on Niobe soonish and expand the article. Parsecboy (talk) 11:26, 14 March 2016 (UTC)


 * - went through Hildebrand and expanded the article. There's still some question over who had the ship and when, and Hildebrand unfortunately does not provide dates for when she served as Znaim.
 * If you have any material we could use to expand the ship's Yugoslav career, that'd be great. If there's much you can add and you'd be interested, we could think about taking the article to ACR/FAC. Parsecboy (talk) 18:27, 25 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately most of the sources I have are for her (pretty boring) interwar career rather than her more interesting time under Italian or German/Croat command, but I'll go through them again to see if there is anything that helps. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 22:45, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

Gardiner and Gray
Could someone clarify which reference this is? Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:55, 22 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Thanks for catching that - I've added it. Parsecboy (talk) 18:07, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

please check
I feel rather improbable that the germans changed the guns; I feel more probable that they renamed them according to a convention different from the jugoslavian one. For instance, the WW I ex-german WW II italian cruisers Bari and Taranto had their guns rated as 149/43 in Italy and 150/45 in germany. 30 guns of 20 mm seem a lot of weapons for a vessel of this size; please check if the source wrote 26 or 2-6 for two-to-six pietro151.29.143.193 (talk) 17:03, 8 February 2017 (UTC)


 * The number of guns is correct, per Gröner. Parsecboy (talk) 17:29, 8 February 2017 (UTC)


 * But in this point Gröner is incorrect.
 * According the War Diary of the (German) Admiral Adria from 12th November, 1943 the cruiser Cattaro was armed with:

--Mìchean (talk) 20:00, 13 June 2017 (UTC)
 * 6x1 8,35cm L/55 M.27 Škoda (naval version of the 8,35cm L/55 M.22 or M.22/24 Škoda)
 * 4x1 4,7cm L/44 M.??  Škoda (maybe former Austro-Hungarian navy guns)
 * 4x1 2cm L/70 M.?? Oerlikon
 * 2x2 13,2mm L/76 Model 1931 Breda
 * 4x1 heavy machine-guns
 * 10x1 light machine-guns


 * I'm afraid we don't generally use primary sources for articles. Is this information published somewhere? Additionally, the only discrepancy I see is the number of machine guns (18 vs 26—and the assumption that they were all 13.2mm Bredas). Parsecboy (talk) 20:27, 13 June 2017 (UTC)


 * dear sirs, I understand Michean contribution as follows: the 8 20 and 13.2 mm guns were fully-naval weapons (i.e. with holes in the deck below that connected with the ammunition magazines and all that), while the 14 machine guns were army weapons simply installed on the deck; with the light ones probably 8 mm MG-34 or MG-42. This seems to me consistent with the weight and size restriction on a vessel of this kind, while 30 20-mm weapons were the light AA weapons of a 8000-ton cruiser. This is a speculation, of course, and should be considered only an hint (I hope welcomed) for future searches in the literature. pietro 151.29.163.236 (talk) 10:34, 1 December 2017 (UTC)


 * My source doesn't mention any definite difference of the machine-guns installed on the NIOBE. But I assume, as this ship was a former Yugoslavian ship and a former Italian ship, the difference between HMG & LMG is not the land-army styled difference (bipod vs tripod, wheeled), but on the calibre of the machine-guns -HMG for the Yugoslavian models (7,62mm - 8mm) & LMG for the Italian models (6,5mm). Nevertheless, the 4 + 26 20mm a/a-guns on board are pure nonsense. --Mìchean (talk) 16:36, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
 * You need a reliable secondary source for all this, which we would contrast with what Gröner says. Otherwise it is just your opinion. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 00:56, 31 December 2017 (UTC)
 * War diary of a person relevant from the time period relevant to Niobe in Kriegsmarine's service is not "just your opinion" as you put it. Secondary sources can be - and must be challenged - if there is indication of them being in error. 82.181.143.171 (talk) 12:57, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

"8.4cm guns"
What exactly are these "8.4cm guns" supposed to be? I cannot find such gun that would have been in German service (captured or not) as an anti-aircraft gun. This is clearly a case of the 83.5mm Skoda guns (which was indeed used by Germany from captured stores - also used by the Yugoslav Navy) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/8.35_cm_PL_kanon_vz._22 being referred to aas this "8.4cm guN" - see the case of captured Yugoslav destroyer Dubrovnik (Italian article refers to "84mm gun", while English language article refers to them correctly as 83.5mm https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premuda_(cacciatorpediniere) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yugoslav_destroyer_Dubrovnik There is no such "84mm gun" as a separate gun. 82.181.143.171 (talk) 12:39, 23 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Do you have an actual source? Or are you just assuming? Parsecboy (talk) 12:57, 23 October 2018 (UTC)


 * You are dodging the issue. I ask - what are these "8.4cm guns"? The 83.5mm Skoda guns are a thing and were indeed in German service - these "8.4cm guns" which do not even seem to exist are something very different. 82.181.143.171 (talk) 13:00, 23 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Nonsense - that's not how Wikipedia works. You need to provide a source. Parsecboy (talk) 13:09, 23 October 2018 (UTC)


 * You are absolutely dodging the issue that you seem to be so adamant to defend. What are these "8.4cm guns" that you seem to insist absolutely existed as their own gun and were in German service instead of the 83.5mm guns: even a source source a few posts above by user Mìchean from a Kriegsmarine Admiral refers to the guns as 8.35cm Skoda guns. 82.181.143.171 (talk) 13:17, 23 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Do. You. Have. A. Secondary. Source? Parsecboy (talk) 13:20, 23 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Now you are almost just turning this into some personal debate now with the way you even word your message as if this were some chat-room debate. Why are you not even answering what is brought forward with a good source by Mìchean which you simply toss aside because you insist that a secondary source cannot be wrong? Can *you* find sources with pictures and technical aspects of this "8.4cm gun": that at the very least would show how this is just the 8.35mm as already addressed above by actual Kriegsmarine personal's source. 82.181.143.171 (talk) 13:29, 23 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Look, it's really rather simple. Provide a source or move along. Otherwise, this is nothing more than hot air. Parsecboy (talk) 13:36, 23 October 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree. This isn't a forum. Provide a reliable secondary source then it can be discussed how that information can be inserted into the article. As it stands, reliable secondary sources say 8.5 cm, 8.3 cm and 8.4 cm. Do you have a source that says she carried the Skoda 8.35 cm guns throughout her service? Even if you did, three different sources provide three different calibres, and two different barrel lengths, and a fourth source would only mean we would include that information as well. When we have reliable secondary sources that disagree, we compare and contrast what they say, we don't just pick one and go with it because we "know" it's right. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 00:36, 24 October 2018 (UTC)
 * The cruisers Strassburg and Pillau passed in italian hands at the end of WW I. Their guns were rated 150/45 by the german navy and 149/43 by the italian navy, due to different definitions of the caliber and of the barrel length (G. Giorgerini, Gli Incrociatori della Seconda Guerra Mondiale, Ermanno Albertelli 1974, page 375 -- this is a reliable source, albeit of difficult access for a non-italian). My personal preference would be to add a caution note like "In view of this fact ... the different names do not imply necessarily different guns" (a good english form is beyond my knowledge of the language). Moreover, note that the article starts saying that the vessel had "450 mm = 18 in" torpedo tubes, but 18 in are 457.2 mm -- everything is possible if a literature data involved an intermediate value in english units pietro151.29.177.129 (talk) 22:48, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Giorgerini does not explain why the nomenclature was different, but I remember an old article saying that the caliber difference is rooted in the inside/outside diameter of the rifled barrel, while the length one is in the inclusion/exclusion of the loading space of the projectile.

This is why we compare and contrast reliable sources. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 09:44, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

gelderland
in late 1943 the german navy operated two vessels with the name Niobe: this and the former dutch cruiser Gelderland (see the wiki page). pietro151.29.177.129 (talk) 22:51, 24 January 2019 (UTC)