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Snestorm 02-08-10 07:30 AM

U37 IX(A) 2. Flotilla. Patrol 2. Grid BF15.
 
07.nov.39. 19.26 Underway

21.nov.39.
20.03. Grid AM43.
C2 Cargo. 6.446 GRT. Sunk.
Course 275. Speed 9 Knots.
Night Surface Attack. Wind 15. Fog Light.
3 x T1 Torpedoes.

25.nov.39.
02.30. Arrive at patrol grid BF15.

07.17. BF15. Sound Contact.

08.16. BF15.
C2 Cargo. 6.447 GRT. Sunk.
Course 065. Speed 8 Knots.
Day Submerged Attack. Wind 10. Fog Light.
2 x Stern T1 Torpedoes. (Target D.I.W.).
1x Bow T1 Torpedo (Target Sunk)

23.43. BF15.
C2 Cargo. 6.448 GRT. Sunk.
Course 051. Speed 6+ Knots.
Night Surface Attack. Wind 10. Clear. Moon Full.
3 x T1 Torpedoes.

26.nov.39
03.35. Corvette Spotted. Dive.
Sound Contact. Convoy.

07.07. Surface.
Full Ahead. Course 232.

08.23. ASW Trwawler closing.
Dive. Undetected.

09.06. Surface. Full Ahead.

09.21. ALARM! Aircraft.

13.26. Surface. Full Ahead.

15.45. "We've been detected". Dive. 100 Meters.
Depth Charge Attacks.

20.06. Surface. Full Ahead. Course 237.

21.06. Dive for sound search. Convoy dead ahead.
21.08. Surface. Full Ahead.

22.00. Corvette spotted at 2.600 meters.
Periscope Depth. Gather information.

22.47. Surface. Full Ahead. Course 246.
Working around convoy, and escorts.
Gathering information on surface.

27.nov.39
01.23. Grid BF17. Submerged forward of convoy.
Lead escort is V Class DD.
Convoy coming dead on at us.
Match convoys course.
Will fire torpedoes at 90 degrees from boat.
(My 270. Targets 090).

02.09. Clear. Full Moon. Wind 10.
Target is a C2 Cargo.
Course 221. Speed 4+ Knots.
3 x T1 Torpedoes fired at 800 meters.
Fire. Dive to 100 meters. 2 impacts.
Nothing sunk. No torpedoes remaining.

4 escorts deliver numeriouse attacks.
Nothing close. No damage.
Evade, and head home.

06.dec.39.
15.34. Grid AE69. Alarm! Aircraft. No ASW attack.

08.dec.39.
14.50. Grid AF47. Alarm! Aircraft. No damage.

15.dec.39. Arrive at Wilhelmshaven.
Patrol results: 3 ships. 19.341 GRT.

U37's total for 2 patrols:
8 ships. 43.384 GRT.

(2 External Stern Tubes. No stern reloads.
No External Reloads carried.
12 Torpedoes in all.)

[SJ]nailz 02-08-10 11:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BillCar (Post 1260443)

...Oblt. Winter and all hands were lost....

Which sucked...


:rotfl2:

BillCar 02-08-10 02:40 PM

I figured someone would like to know that it sucked. :)

Just returned from 2nd Patrol, October 1939. Went to BE99, through the channel. I had promised myself I wouldn't torpedo anything in the channel, because I just want to get out of there as quickly as possible and, you know, not die. But I saw a large cargo flying a tricolour in heavy fog and overcast skies, so I figured I was safe. Sent her to the bottom with two torpedoes. On returning to base, I discovered that that was probably a Belgian tricolour, and I didn't pick up on that because of the bad lighting. The first neutral tonnage of this career, and it was worth 11000GRT.

Between some large cargoes and small merchants, I sank another 15000GRT of legitimate allied shipping, so I kind of rectified the situation.

They gave me an Iron Cross, but I'm still just a Leutnant. :(

krashkart 02-09-10 01:37 AM

Presently on our third patrol since I took command of the boat in October. We have just finished tearing through a convoy we had intercepted north of Ireland, near our assigned patrol area. The encounter could not have come off any better.

As we sailed NNE ahead of the convoy the watch spotted a small merchant about 8 klicks north. I was about to ignore it when it dawned on me that an attack on that ship might draw some of the convoy escort away. We closed in, opened fire and sank that ship in short order. Headed back to the convoy and sailed a box-like pattern around them, keeping a distance of 4-5 kilometers. The dark of night cloaked us well, and the weather was near perfect.

We came around behind them and trailed for close to two hours (much of that was in TC). Didn't spot any escort whatsoever so I decided to give the order, and away we went. Tore them a new chute. Out of 15 ships - three were neutral - we sank 12.

The only protection I saw for them was an armed trawler that had meandered back from where we had been spotted several hours before. It must have been too far away to notice what was happening... we were still busy lobbing HE at the last few merchants!

The only fire we took, I think came from the last merchant. We were pretty close to it by the time she went down. I had sent an aft torp to the escort, but never saw whether or not it hit.

All in all, hands down, the absolute best convoy intercept I have ever had since I started playing SH3. The weather was perfect, it was pitch dark, and there was a diversion opportunity nearby (I didn't think it would work). Not crossing my fingers for any subsequent luck, though.

I only took one screenie, of the map. Shows the rough path we were to sail as we scouted the convoy. The merchant we had sunk as a diversion is part of the smudginess in the upper-right corner of the image:


http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/pict...pictureid=1157

Dissaray 02-09-10 10:54 AM

Why is it that I never get to see those mythic unescorted convoys when I can attack them? As it is I have only ever seen one in campain play and the weather was too bad to make a gunnery run on him, just bearly thoguh, and I was fresh out of eels to give them. I guess I will have to bone up on my convoy finding skills :O:.

Nice work on that one though, I had a dead dark gun fight with an armed merchant once in '43. I ended up straifing him at flank speed, kind of, shooting when he presented a good target. I had faverable conditions for about 5 hours but only managed to criple the already damaged ship, I think a storm beat him up or the Luft had a pass at him, but I did manage to bust his rear gun mount off and eather kill his engine or rupture the fule tanks for him. I was gearing up for another night run, keeping a close eye on him incase he sank, when just about the same time I sufaced to finish him he went under anyway.

krashkart 02-09-10 06:34 PM

I was actually surprised. The first four or five convoys were all, like you said, in bad weather. I limited the time compression to 128 - not sure if that was also a help. But it was that one lone merchant that sealed the deal, I think. Never had that happen before. If it hadn't been there I would have had to knock out escorts first. :-?

Dissaray 02-09-10 06:55 PM

Keeping your time compresion no higher than 128 will definatly help with the weather. At higher TC the weather gets messed up and the current conditions will last much longer than they should, just poor game biulding.

unterseemann 02-10-10 07:55 AM

Patrol 7
U-46, Type VIIB, 2nd Flotilla, Kptlt Konrad Tietz
Left at: May 12, 1941, 17:39
From: Lorient

First encounter with enemy shipping after 21 days at sea.

Patrol results
Ships sunk: 4
Aircraft destroyed: 0
Patrol tonnage: 13261 tons


Total: 233452 tons. 39 ships sunk (3 warships)

Kptlt Tietz will now commission new type IXC uboot, U-153.

krashkart 02-10-10 01:51 PM

Grats on your new Uboat, unterseeman. :salute:

Highlights from Patrol 4

Nearing the year 1940 now, and it is my fourth patrol from Wilhelmshaven. We are in the Channel, roughly 80 kilometers southeast of Portland. Encountered a handful of merchant shipping, beginning from what I believe was the coast of Belgium and leaving a sparse trail of wreckage along the southern coast of England.

I do not remember precisely where on the map, but at some point I thought I would play chicken with an Elco. Ordered the gun and both flak mounts to be manned. It was headed straight toward us, so I decided to empty a bow tube at it. They saw the darn bubble trail and swerved to avoid it.

Didn't take long to close with them. We were dropping 88's all around them. I manned one of our flak mounts and ordered rudder full to port, to get my sights on them and still be able to fire. The engagement lasted probably 20 minutes or so. Toward the end the Elco ran straight away from us. I learned from earlier experience that a bubble trail will get them to turn hard, which bleeds energy and helps shorten the distance between boats. We can't go as fast, but in smoother waters my gun crew can be fairly accurate. We managed to score enough hits with the 88 to sink the bugger.

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/pict...pictureid=1160

The following morning we were in pursuit of two contacts moving west out of the Channel. Hopes of catching them were fleeting at best, as we had picked them up late the afternoon before. At some point my Watch Officer yells out "Enemy ship engaging us, sir!".

I thought, "Well that's odd. There's nothing on the map but those two benign contacts...". Went up top to see what was happening, asked the WO for a bearing and he had nothing. Could hear shells flying overhead, so I tracked around with the UZO to our portside and saw a V&W with a full head of steam coming straight at us. She was less than 5,000 meters from us and the weather was clear. How could we not have seen it?

I'll keep a long story short. We were being shelled and had to get under pronto. The destroyer had a moments-old fix to rely on, which gave us enough time to evade with minor damage. After maybe fourty minutes I took a peek around through the periscope and saw an opportunity to sink our adversary.

Took three torpedos total. They evaded the first, took the second one under the stern. Thought that would do the trick, but it wasn't enough. She zig-zagged toward us, slowly, and I think maybe there was some damage after all. Within about 800 meters she seemed to be turning sluggishly away, so I set the third torpedo to run fast and fired. That did the trick. That was the first opportunity I've had to see up close and personal what a torpedo under the funnels will do! :DL

Here's a screenie of her, snapped just after the keel had collapsed back into the water.

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/pict...pictureid=1161

Gilbou 02-10-10 02:38 PM

Started a carreer with manual targetting.
Three patrols, no torpedo ever touched any ship.
Read again and again the GWX 3.0 part about manual targetting.
Going back to auto targetting.

Jimbuna 02-11-10 04:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gilbou (Post 1263868)
Started a carreer with manual targetting.
Three patrols, no torpedo ever touched any ship.
Read again and again the GWX 3.0 part about manual targetting.
Going back to auto targetting.

I taught myself by firing from a range of 500 metres then gradually upped it to 800 then 1000 etc.

Obviously the further away you are from the target the error of margin becomes magnified but practice does/should eventually make you quite proficient.

BillCar 02-11-10 08:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gilbou (Post 1263868)
Started a carreer with manual targetting.
Three patrols, no torpedo ever touched any ship.
Read again and again the GWX 3.0 part about manual targetting.
Going back to auto targetting.

That's how it was for me at first, but a couple weeks after I started playing, I got really good at it. Now I never use manual targeting, and I think my record for distance is a single-torpedo kill on a passenger cargo at a distance of 4000m.

It's definitely worth sticking with it until you can do it – it's way more rewarding!

I strongly recommend using the fixed-wire method to get the target's speed for your solution, by the way. I only do the 3m15s plotting thing when overhauling now, but it's rarely necessary – I usually just sail towards my hydrophone contact, spot it, and overhaul outside their visual range). Using the fixed-wire method gives you a very, very accurate speed reading on your target, and most importantly, it gives it to you immediately before you maneuver to fire.

Gilbou 02-11-10 12:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BillCar (Post 1264579)
That's how it was for me at first, but a couple weeks after I started playing, I got really good at it. Now I never use manual targeting, and I think my record for distance is a single-torpedo kill on a passenger cargo at a distance of 4000m.

It's definitely worth sticking with it until you can do it – it's way more rewarding!

I strongly recommend using the fixed-wire method to get the target's speed for your solution, by the way. I only do the 3m15s plotting thing when overhauling now, but it's rarely necessary – I usually just sail towards my hydrophone contact, spot it, and overhaul outside their visual range). Using the fixed-wire method gives you a very, very accurate speed reading on your target, and most importantly, it gives it to you immediately before you maneuver to fire.

Until now I have found ships. Sea is calm. I come from astern. I take a lot of time to identify ships. Sometimes I go around the book 4/5 times before I found the good ship. I pause the game so I can set the height using the mast, then speed. I see my depth to 3/4 of the ship's depth.

I try to get within 1 km or so. But then, the ship goes in front of the sub quite fast so I don't have much time. I calculate the distance again, the speed usually did not change so it's just distance and AoB. To calculate the AoB I go to the map, use the protactor so I can calculate the AoB. I set everything and when I check, the torpedo has the good settings.

I shoot, and all the time the torpedo either goes too much to the left and misses the ship or it goes too much in front. I have done 3 patrols, and spent my time shooting salvos of 2 torpedoes and seeing all of them miss.

And I got no clue in how you can make a torpedo hit anywhere but at the middle of the ship.

Obltn Strand 02-11-10 12:32 PM

Practice makes perfect. I did two careers with auto targetting. After a while there is no challenge anymore.

1000m or so are maximum firing distance for me although sometimes I have to try my luck at greater distances.

Your 4000m is admirable BillCar:salute: I shot Orecarrier at distance of 5000m. Scored a hit to Auxilary cruiser at full 100% realism and no map update. But it had more to do with luck than skill. Can't complain though.

BillCar 02-11-10 12:42 PM

If you're shooting from a gyro angle of roughly 000, the distance also doesn't matter (assuming that you're in range, and keeping in mind that closer is always better until you hit 300m). Just the speed and the AOB.

There are some tutorials on calculating the AOB by other means – I've gotten very good at determining it simply by looking at the ship.

What will help you very much is to "overhaul" the ship – this means passing it, getting in front of it, and then adjusting your angle so that you are lined up to shoot it before it arrives at the point where you will shoot – this will give you more time to check your calculations.

It is also very important to remember that, after you turn off the automatic TDC to put in the target information and AOB, you *MUST* turn auto TDC back on. The reason for this is that as you turn the periscope or UZO with the movement of the ship, this information is being fed to the TDC and will adjust it. For example: if you are stationary, and a ship doing seven knots comes at you with a 45º AOB, as you follow its progress closer to you with the periscope, the TDC will update itself based on your calculations – as the ship's AOB becomes larger relative to your boat, the TDC will reflect this.

This means that if you overhaul, arrive ahead of time, and establish the target speed is 6 and the AOB is 20º (for example), then you can put that information into the TDC, switch it back to automatic, and track the target with your scope until you hit a gyro angle of zero. Hopefully when you hit gyro angle zero, you're at roughly 90º AOB. If you're off to the point where it will be a problem, get your engines moving, and order rudder hard in the direction of the ship's movement. You may need to adjust the targeting computer again. Try and turn so that you wind up with a zero gyro angle coinciding with a roughly 90º AOB, and remember to switch your TDC back to automatic again once you've adjusted the AOB. I have yet to miss a ship while doing this, even making some snap shots while turning hard (just make sure your tube is open, and have your finger on that red button for the second you've got a good gyro angle and aimpoint coincidence).

You can choose your aimpoint with the periscope – it will send torpedoes where you aim it, basically. If you're only able to aim at the middle of the ship, it may be because you are locked onto it. If you want to aim at the stern or bow or other areas, disable the lock so that you can freely move your periscope.

Remember also to open your torpedo tubes BEFORE you fire. If you fire without doing this first, the tubes still have to open, so you may wind up losing critical seconds, between firing at your aimpoint and the torpedo actually leaving the tube, which can lead to misses.

Additionally, when selecting a salvo, make sure you don't set the angle too wide, since with two torpedoes, neither goes directly to your aimpoint – they go however many degrees on either side of it. I personally do not fire salvos – I fire one torpedo at a time, but quickly, so I can still get two torpedoes out about as fast as a salvo was. I don't have to worry about the salvo angle, though, since I am aiming each torpedo myself.

If I've given any wrong information here, hopefully someone more knowledgeable than myself will come along and correct it – but I can promise you that this all works for me, and I've gotten so that I very rarely miss now. Usually, if I shoot at a ship and it doesn't sink, it's because I sent the torpedo underneath it in rough seas, or it was a dud.

BillCar 02-11-10 12:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Obltn Strand (Post 1264830)
Practice makes perfect. I did two careers with auto targetting. After a while there is no challenge anymore.

1000m or so are maximum firing distance for me although sometimes I have to try my luck at greater distances.

Your 4000m is admirable BillCar:salute: I shot Orecarrier at distance of 5000m. Scored a hit to Auxilary cruiser at full 100% realism and no map update. But it had more to do with luck than skill. Can't complain though.

Thanks! I only took that shot because it was my last stern torpedo, the ship was passing the optimal gyro angle, and I was getting frustrated with maneuvering around it. So I said "well, this looks right to me" and let her go. I was very thrilled when she went to the bottom!

Your 5000m beats my 4000m handily, though! :salute:

But yes, I agree, 1000m is a good distance. I sometimes go up to 2000 on larger targets when pressed for time in convoy attacks, but that's about it.

I also don't have map updates on. One simply has to get proficient at whatever method of plotting and firing solution one chooses to use!

Falkirion 02-11-10 05:57 PM

Continued first patrol of U-207, 1940.

The crew and I having transferred from our faithful boat U-47 to a new Type VIIC and making one successful convoy attack were ready for more of the same.

We tracked a convoy just north west of Rockall bank, they were headed to transit the area and I wanted to have depth on my side during the attack. We made contact visually in the middle of the night, luckily the lead escort had his back turned and we cut to starboard to avoid being spotted but it was a close call nonetheless. After making a quick rough estimate of their course we did an end around to get out bow tubes lined up. We centered our sights on a small tanker and a whaling ship. Small tanker was on the other side of HMS Rodney. Darn brits must have some kind of ressurection technology, because we sent her to the bottom two patrols ago (I know this is a game generated thing but it still ticks me off that ships wont stay gone, especially when I've sunk the 2 BBs that comprise the class) We fired off a spread of 3, then dove down to 200m and went straight to silent running.

End result, 1 whaling ship. Was really annoyed my tanker torp prematured on its way to target because I'm sure it would have sunk it too. We evaded for around an hour then the 2 Flowers that were hunting for me disengaged and returned to the convoy. We surfaced about 20 minutes after they'd left and continued south east to try and hunt up some shipping in the mid atlantic. We've got a total of 4 torpedos left.

krashkart 02-11-10 07:01 PM

^^ I have a feeling that the rest of my convoy intercepts will be in foul weather. :wah:

My boat collided with a KM destroyer and sank, shortly after setting out from Wilhelmshaven for her fifth patrol. January 3rd, 1940. So long, '47. :-?

Obltn Strand 02-11-10 07:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BillCar (Post 1264844)
Thanks! I only took that shot because it was my last stern torpedo, the ship was passing the optimal gyro angle, and I was getting frustrated with maneuvering around it. So I said "well, this looks right to me" and let her go. I was very thrilled when she went to the bottom!

Your 5000m beats my 4000m handily, though! :salute:

But yes, I agree, 1000m is a good distance. I sometimes go up to 2000 on larger targets when pressed for time in convoy attacks, but that's about it.

I also don't have map updates on. One simply has to get proficient at whatever method of plotting and firing solution one chooses to use!

Rough estimate and didn't hit where it supposed to:oops:
It was my last bow torpedo against a convoy.

Chef 02-11-10 11:26 PM

Went out on patrol before the start of the war. The weather was horrific for weeks while I awaited the start of hostilities. Upon receipt of the war order authorizing hostile action against British shipping, the weather cleared up and a 10K ton tanker sailed into view. It's a good start for U-52. Aaarrrggg! :arrgh!:


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