Tell us what you are upto in your current campaign

[STEED]

July-Aug40 rotten weather but did bag a couple of medium cargo's.

[ediko]

Originally Posted by VONHARRIS

Kapitanleutant Erhard von Loser has just completed his 5th patrol on U-103 IXB. (Note : Any comment or even laughter on the Kaluen's name will be met with the firing squad!)
He is succesful so far.

We all know his name is actually Löser. Which would mean solver (like problem solver, you know problems like war etc). He has nothing to be ashamed of!

[VONHARRIS]

Originally Posted by ediko

We all know his name is actually Löser. Which would mean solver (like problem solver, you know problems like war etc). He has nothing to be ashamed of!

I know that. I was trying to make a joke here. The name was generated by the SH3Commander. I added the "von" since he is an aristocrat!

Frau Kaleun: Nice!

[nikbear]

First Patrol after a long Hiatus off SH3/GWX
Went well,U32 Ltz Werner Lott, And there wasn't alot either
5 ships of smaller size.only 16xxx tons,nice shakedown patrol,looking forward to the next one

[Gargamel]

So I'm putzing around the Shetlands, trying to pick up some merchants, when radio reports an enemy task force around the Faroe's, heading towards the Shetlands, so I slide over that way seeing if i can pick up a cruiser or something. I'm yo-yoing between surface and peri depth listening, it's a dark and stormy night (), when I pick up the first DD. I try to avoid him while attempting to figure out whats in the middle.

Well, I found my cruiser................

CAPTAIN'S LOG

Date and Time
Location
Occurrences
24.2.40. 1416 Patrol 9
U-102, 2nd Flotilla
Left at: February 24, 1940, 14:16
From: Wilhelmshaven
Mission Orders: Patrol grid AM54

27.2.40.
1917 Grid AF 78 Ship sunk! SS Quebec City (Granville-type Freighter), 4707 tons. Cargo: Tobacco. Crew: 98. Crew lost: 0

3.3.40.
1331 Grid AF 75 Ship sunk! SS Adherence (Coastal Freighter), 1870 tons. Cargo: Steel. Crew: 20. Crew lost: 16

4.3.40.
0838 Grid AF 75 Ship sunk! HMS Hood (HMS Hood), 48360 tons. Crew: 1412. Crew lost: 720

9.3.40.
0753 Patrol results
Crew losses: 0
Ships sunk: 3
Aircraft destroyed: 0
Patrol tonnage: 54937 tons

I had him lined up, and I was fine tuning the eels, when I lost him in the storm. By the time i reacquired him in the scope, he was almost out of the shot, and it was ugly. It was a 2' spread on 4 electric eels, at about 40' gyro. All 4 hit the back third of the ship, and he eventually went down. If I didnt have to dive and run silent, and if my guys coulda reloaded fast enough, I had the Revenge also lined up dead to rights........

And the rest of the patrol there was nada, I coulda stayed around for more, but the weather was horrible and I wanted to get back to base before the Norwegian party started.

And yes my next career will be more historically accurate. I'm still learning this sim.

[VONHARRIS]

Erhard von Loser has completed his 6th and 7th patrol

6. 27JUN1940 - 13JUL1940 17 days 106.557grt (1 BB HMS Rodney)
7. 19AUG1940 - 01SEP1940 14 days 20.949grt

During his 6th patrol a radio message came in informing him of an inbound convoy. A Fw-200 Condor had made an aerial recce finding out that the HMS Rodey was escoting the sheep. Weather was good so the wolf went for the kill. The convoy was made of 5 columns of ships each column had six ships and 4 escorts. The BB was the middle ship of the 3rd column.
U-103 dived and run silent letting the leading dd pass. Hydrophone search showed that the DD was well behind the uboat so the periscope was raised. And there he was! Three torps fired against him and one at a whale factory ship in front of the BB. All 4 eels hit and targets destroyed. The HMS Rodney sunk some 20 minutes (real time) after the hits but the whale factory ship expolded and sunk instantly.

His 7th patrol was a disaster. Patrol grid was BF11 but when passing AM53 von Loser decided to stay there as the weather was good. This time a lot of DDs were around. He had constanlty to dive to avoid them. The only valuable targets sunk were an intermediate tanker and an unescorted troop transport. Just when he decided to leave the area, a misteke a helsman made was almost fatal. A Hunt II DD was near and the helmsman instead of diving the boat deeper , as ordered, drove her towards the surface. As the conning tower broke the surface the DD began shelling. U-103 crashed dived with destroyed forward deck , deck gun , forward batteries and flooding. Chief engineer and the repair crew made a super human efford to stop the flooding and leved the bost before she hit the bottom. The DD called in his mates and a V&W came. Luckily , after three passes they gave up and left. The damage was big , 27% hull intergrity left. The patrol was aborted.
Upon return to Wilhlemhaven , the helmsman was arrested and courtmartialed. He was charged with treason and sentenced to death.

Next mission is to leave Wilhemshaven and go to Lorient naval base in France.

Will be in touch

[unterseemann]

03NOV43: Allied escorts of convoy HX 237 forced a german uboot to surface after heavy damages by both depth charges and hedgehogs.
The U-125 surrendered at sea and its crew is now P.O.W in a nice camp

War is over for Kptlt Dieter Haguenau:
10 patrols ( march 42-november 43)
53 ships sunk for 301379 tons
4 damaged ships.

U-125 was damaged 11 times in 13 patrols
U-125 was the former uboot of Kptlt Tietz who sank 150.428 tons in 3 patrols ( july 41-february 42)
So this uboot a type IX-C sank 451.807 tons of allied shipping.

The true story of U-125 was sadder...
http://www.uboat.net/boats/u125.htm

[VONHARRIS]

After a 2,5 months repair period von Loser left Wilhhemshaven on board
U-103 for his 8th patrol. Reurn port was Lorient.

8. 15NOV1940 - 24DEC1940 40 days 49.286grt (1 aux cruiser)

Von Loser has now a total of 542.650grt. Upon return he was flown to Berlin where on Chistmas day he was awarded the Diamonds on his golden Oak leaves of the Knights Cross by Adolf Hitler himself , in presence of Grossadmiral Karl Donitz. The ceremony was filmed by the Propaganda ministry to be shown all over the Wehrmacht , Kriegsmarine and the Luftwaffe. He was the first U-boat commander to reach this level.
The crew of U-103 had a whole month leave to celebrate Christmas with their families.

[STEED]

Sept-Dec41

Sail down to warmer waters hunting around Free town lots of small fry which did not interest me but every few days a medium one or two made it worth the wait.

[Gargamel]

Not worth a new thread, but I looked up my boat (U-102) on wikipedia, as that has been my "lucky number" over the years..... and I'm a little depressed, surprised I've made it to 10 patrols so far!

[Herr-Berbunch]

I've just started a new career, and I decided I'd try out a IXB from 2nd Flot. Lorient.

What a patrol I've just had, normally I'd get perhaps four vessels, a good patrol maybe six at a push. I normally go for lone merchants and the odd convoy I stumble across but as I encountered this convoy one seemed a little different, sailing merrily in the middle was a HMS Revenge - with just one escorting vessel well ahead she was easy meat, with three single topedoes set for impact the first hitting astern to disable her and the next two amidships she soon went down. Revenge sank swiftly, although the nice weather enabled 750 of her crew of 1189 to be rescued. I dived deep, and ran silently waiting for the escort to appear but to no avail, tubes reloaded and I waited as the hydrophone contacts faded - I was just about to surface and follow when two new contacts were picked up, heading straight for us. Reinforcements from the south I thought, and my attack on Revenge had me wanting more, but after waiting for them to appear in my 'scope a liner and a merchant travelling together appeared.

As they passed by I could see no armaments so I surfaced and followed with my finest three POs manning the deck-gun. Only to find out that the merchant was armed! Still, I presented a small target for the DEMS crew and soon she was ablaze and disabled patiently waiting for the inevitable. I chased the liner down and within 30 minutes she too was on her final voyage.

Success after success followed, my patrol of grid AL33 just south of Iceland was unremarkable but my return - looping around Rockall Banks and skirting the continental shelf of Europe - I encountered myriad vessels and sunk 'em all .

Me like the IXB.


I wondered if this shot would actually make it!


It did

My log.

[nikbear]

Do you know what? I bloody love reading others reports! Its such fun seeing what scrapes you lot get into!

[Arael]

Originally Posted by Gargamel

Not worth a new thread, but I looked up my boat (U-102) on wikipedia, as that has been my "lucky number" over the years..... and I'm a little depressed, surprised I've made it to 10 patrols so far!

I hate you. I never thought of looking up my boat's number until you mentioned it. I looked it up, only to find U-111 was sunk on its second patrol by a stupid ASW Trawler.

[Tessa]

That shot probably blew up the boilers sending her to the bottom fast. Intentionally trying to hit the aft bioler section is a mighty challenge, usually you end up hitting it by accident. Good solid hit (doesn't even need to be magnetic) can be as effective or more so than exploding a magazine.

Current patrol left the supply ship heading back to Kiel (again, last time ran straight into a convoy 12 hours later and sank 50,000 tons, and 2 solid hits on an iceberg but she was tough, she wouldn't go down even with a magnetic hit at 30 meters deep) and once again ran into a convoy this time about a day and half out. Weather was awful so was one of those situations where one of my watch crew spotted the lead escort about 4000 meters away and was able to dive before it saw me.

Maneuvered so I would go straight through the convoy submerged (luckily it was daytime, with the rotten weather - heavy storm, rain, and 20 foot waves) I was able to see through my scope to a range of about 2000 meters and spotted the jackpot. Sat in wait till she got closer made a 90 turn to port and went at her flank using my only 2 electrics:



Being point blank I aimed one eel at the B turret and the second at the boiler room (being so close would be nearly impossible to evade it). First shot impacted into the armor (despite a liberal setting of 12.5 meters deep), second was a direct magnetic hit to the engine room.






And here she finally goes down (after a good 10 minutes of taking some severe pounding from the waves):



Escorts were trying to get all over me with so much deep water and the noise of a very large sinking ship was easily able to evade but lost contact with the convoy, temporarily.

Proceeded to one of my favorite hunting areas in the squares around AM65 and got notice of a task force leaving Liverpool. Was heading NE so was in the right spot to intercept. Somehow (weather was still rotten, very heavy rain and no visibility) and I passed the task force somehow just to come back in contact with this same convoy I harrassed several thousand Km's back. All the tankers were too far ahead that the escorts managed to keep me away being forced to stay submerged.

Figured with the weather being so bad I could try and slip by them on the surface and maybe get 1 more shot. For better or worse convoy made it to its destination but the enterance to Liverpool was completely devoid of any patrol boats. Went into the harbor on the surface then submerged once in the river. Apparently all the escorts had followed the convoy and were going back out. Having made it past the hard part went to the harbor to see if anything was there, luck had it a task force was forming up and got just plain lucky:




Was some weird fluke that there happened to be two of them moored in the harbor. Have 5 eels left and going to head to Dunkirk to "help" with the evacuation that has been going on and hopefully catch another big fish before the long trip through the Kanal back to Kiel.

[Arael]

Originally Posted by Tessa

Oh, good. I'm no the only one that's sunk the Hood more than once in a single campaign. Honestly, I was shocked when I saw it show up again. I guess I thought a dynamic campaign would tally what has sunk, and make sure it didn't pop up again.