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The belt armor is designed to prevent projectiles from penetrating to the heart of a warship. When struck by an artillery shell or underwater torpedo , the belt armor either absorbs the impact and explosion with its sheer thickness and strength, or else uses sloping to redirect the projectile and its blast downwards.
Naval armor refers to the various protections schemes employed by warships. The first ironclad warship was created in 1859, and the pace of armour advancement accelerated quickly thereafter. The emergence of battleships around the turn of the 20th century saw ships become increasingly large and well armoured.
Armored warships (dreadnought battleships, armored cruisers and later light and heavy cruisers) of the early 20th century carried their main protective armor above the waterline – the "main belt" – which was intended to stop flat-trajectory gunfire from piercing the hull. Below the belt, the armor generally tapered away, to reduce overall ...
The belt armor (A) is on the exterior, at the waterline. Also indicated is the main deck (B), the sloping deck armor (C), and the torpedo bulkhead (D). A torpedo bulkhead is a type of naval armor common on the more heavily armored warships , especially battleships and battlecruisers of the early 20th century.
The belt armor extends to the two transverse bulkheads fore and aft of the main-gun barbettes, forming the armored citadel. Part of the lower armor belt extends aft from the rear bulkhead to protect the ships' steering gear. Its maximum thickness ranges from 13 to 13.5 in (330 to 343 mm) at the top and the plates taper to 5 inches at the bottom.
The citadel consisting of the magazines and engine rooms was protected by an STS outer hull plating 1.5 inches (38 mm) thick and a Class A armor belt 12.1 inches (307 mm) thick mounted on 0.875-inch (22.2 mm) STS backing plate; the armor belt is sloped at 19 degrees, equivalent to 17.3 in (439 mm) of vertical class B armor at 19,000 yards.
The belt was inclined at 15°24' from the vertical to increase its effectiveness against long-range fire, and it was backed with 60 mm (2.4 in) of teak planking. It consisted of a single strake of armor plate that was 6.25 m (20.5 ft) tall, of which 3.75 in (95 mm) was above the waterline. At its lower edge, the belt tapered to 177 mm (7 in).
The belt armor was a much more intractable problem; the 16-inch gun could penetrate 13.5 inches (340 mm) of plate, the thickest in an American battleship at the time, even at 25,000 yd (23,000 m). To proof the ship against her own armament—a characteristic known as "balanced armor"—the main belt would have to be increased to 15.5 in (390 mm ...