[REQ] Realistic "Ping" (not movie ping)

[Letum]

I have been reading up a bit about ASDIC.

It seams that almost all ADSIC was between 16khz and 24khz. Almost never lower
than 4Khz.

Now, thats very, very high frequency. Humans can't hear above 20khz, most people
can't hear much above 16khz. (you can (or can't!) hear a sample at 16khz HERE (http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/jw/hearing.html))

This means that the "ping" sound you hear in the game is bunkum!
It's just not like that at all unless you have equipment to lower the frequency.


That does not mean that you can not hear the high-pitched ping at all in a sub, but
what ever it sounds like, it wont be a "Ping".


Does anyone have any clue what ASDIC would sound like from inside a sub if
it could be heard at all?
I would guess that the ping would cause some lower frequency sounds as well.

Would anyone like to have a go at making a truly realistic ping?



So far the only lead I have is from Steve who says he read the sound was
like:"gravel being thrown against the hull".

[Sailor Steve]

In that same thread didn't someone who had served on a sub say it sounded like a 'click'?

Why can't I find that thread now? It was just today.:cry:

[Reece]

Well in some of the books I've read the U-boat Crew describes asdic as "pebbles dropping on hull",:x but that don't sound good! Give me the movie stuff anyday!:yep:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Good lord... why did I read this?

Repeat: do not start in the top third of the chart.

I've gone STRAIGHT to that ping on the top right corner, the louder one...

Jeez... My ears are not functioning properly, and at the time it was almost painful... a weird feeling.

But I did hear it...

[Philipp_Thomsen]

By the way... If having a real ping on the game means listening contantly to that disturbing sound, capable of hurting your ears, than no thanks! :up:

[richardphat]

By the way... If having a real ping on the game means listening contantly to that disturbing sound, capable of hurting your ears, than no thanks! :up:

Agree!

[d@rk51d3]

Another report stated that it sounded like steel wires being dragged along the hull.

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Another report stated that it sounded like steel wires being dragged along the hull.

And how the hell would they now what sounded like steel wires being dragged along the hull? :lol:

[Letum]

Another report stated that it sounded like steel wires being dragged along the hull.

At a guess, I would say that this wire/gravel sound is formed in the same way as if
you put a >20khz tuning fork against a sheet of metal.
You can't hear the sound the tuning fork is making, but you can hear the fork
bouncing off the metal.


It might also be the sub's own harmonic at play. Think of knocking the tuning fork you
can't hear against one you can. However, I rather doubt this. Sub's are big bells to ring
and I don't think a 120-200dbl ping is enough to do it.




To Laboe with steel wire, gravel and a microphone?


By the way... If having a real ping on the game means listening contantly to that disturbing sound, capable of hurting your ears, than no thanks! :up:

We can either skip that part of the sound altogether if we claim the ping is above 20khz or we can play it very quietly.

[d@rk51d3]

Another report stated that it sounded like steel wires being dragged along the hull.

And how the hell would they now what sounded like steel wires being dragged along the hull? :lol:

Sooooo, throwing gravel was more commonplace? :lol:

"Captain, were out of depthcharges, what should we do?"

"......Ummmmm, let's throw some dirt at those Jerry mongrels.":arrgh!:

[vince0018]

That 16 kHz sound sounds like the noises I hear when the tv is on or with certain music and sounds on games. It's annoying as hell and no one else seems to notice it but me. I can tell if someone has the tv on two floors down and several rooms over, lol.

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Another report stated that it sounded like steel wires being dragged along the hull.

And how the hell would they now what sounded like steel wires being dragged along the hull? :lol:

Sooooo, throwing gravel was more commonplace? :lol:

"Captain, were out of depthcharges, what should we do?"

"......Ummmmm, let's throw some dirt at those Jerry mongrels.":arrgh!:

:rotfl:

[ridgewayranger]

Hi All,
The 'Ping' beloved by movie makers is the sound which the operator hears and also comes out of the speakers. Because most normal hearing cannot detect those frequencies the incoming sound is mixed with another frequency 1k/c lower or higher than that transmitted, this results in a 1 k/c note still bearing all the characteristics of the original, pitch, doppler etc. The process is known as heterodyning. The sound heard in the submarine when the beam struck the hull was sort of a click/squeak. The reducing interval between these indicated they were in contact and of course the decreasing range, giving a good skipper some idea when to take avoiding action. Because of this Hunter/Killer groups devised a creeping attack whereby one ship held contact but used constant transmission interval while the others formed a line and virtually carpet bombed the target, hence their high rate of success.
RR

[caspofungin]

thx for the definitive answer.

also, i think british ww2 asdics operated at 14khz.

[LiveGoat]

I remember in Silent Hunter I when the Japanese pinged you it had a trilling sound like the bell on a kids bicycle. I wonder if the "trill" is what they mean by a gravel sound? My buddy who was on a navy supply ship in the 90's said his ship was pinged by sub at close range and it knocked him out of his bunk! It's kind of a letdown though to find that the pings are not authentic.

[vickers03]

what about this one:
http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/maritime/collections/boa/asdic.aspx

btw, i read in a book from a german ww2 sonar man that
they picked up the asdic sounds first in the hydrophone,
then after some time it was heard in the whole boat.
he also described the sound as a high-pitched trilling
(in the hydrophone).

[Myxale]

We need to keep in mid that the frequencies traveling tru the plancton, salt and thermal layers and there is of cause the pressure-hull this always makes the ping sound a bit off.

I'd say lets stick to the "pepples on a hull" and movie version. The real ping frequencis will damage you ears! :hmm:

[Letum]

Well, I suppose the second best solution is just to remove the ping altogether.

I can't listen to it now that i know its fake.

[vickers03]

maybe it sounds more like this:
http://www.uboataces.com/ref-sonar-sounds.shtml

don't know if it's meant to be inside the sub,
but it sounds close to the descriptions i read
about.

[Hitman]

OK, let's make some things clear: The human can't listen to sounds behind his frequency limits, that's correct BUT:

1.- If the source which produces that sound also creates a colateral sound in the frequency heard by the human, then you BET you will hear something. An example? Quite easy: Dolphins and bats. You CAN hear a very high pitch and short scream when they emmit their ultrasonic waves, yet you don't of course hear the waves themselves. You just listen to the secondary sounds produced by the air expelled through their organs who makes them vibrate and emmit the impuses So the ping we hear in naval sims is correct in that it represents the audible part of the electromagnetic impulse made in the sonar dome (Which is made of metal itself), more or less the same as when hitting a bell.

2.- The "gravel rattle". This has been told in many accounts of submariners, I can right now indicate if memory serves me well, Richard O'Kane f.e.

That gravel rattle along the ship is the result of the ultrasonic impulses hitting a metallic empty tube (The submarine) and as such causing a vibration (As well as being reflected to their origin, thus allowing the ASDIC to show the echo or return). The frequency with which the metal vibrates IS audible by the humans, and hence the comment about the gravel rattle.

Hope that makes it all much clearer :up:

[Letum]

Thats also my understanding Hitman, but that clear, well defines 1khz ping that is
found in all the mods I have tried is certainly not correct.

[wdq4587]

btw, i read in a book from a german ww2 sonar man that
they picked up the asdic sounds first in the hydrophone,


This discussion let me know why ping is not a 3D sound in SH3. (But no sound volume change based on distance is really sucks). And I guess in stock SH3 game you can not hear ping from hydrophone. (What you heared ping is just as in Command Room)

[geosub1978]

Hi All,
The 'Ping' beloved by movie makers is the sound which the operator hears and also comes out of the speakers. Because most normal hearing cannot detect those frequencies the incoming sound is mixed with another frequency 1k/c lower or higher than that transmitted, this results in a 1 k/c note still bearing all the characteristics of the original, pitch, doppler etc. The process is known as heterodyning. The sound heard in the submarine when the beam struck the hull was sort of a click/squeak. The reducing interval between these indicated they were in contact and of course the decreasing range, giving a good skipper some idea when to take avoiding action. Because of this Hunter/Killer groups devised a creeping attack whereby one ship held contact but used constant transmission interval while the others formed a line and virtually carpet bombed the target, hence their high rate of success.
RR

Exactly. What someone hears in the submarine is not the carrier frequency (it is the information-HF) but the transient frequency (which brings the wave to the target and back-LF). The compilation is called modulation. Also the doppler (if the submarine shows movement along the bearing) increases or decreases the LF.
Modern sonars, when they are operated like WW2 era, sound like a hammer hit agaist a steel block BUT NOT as a hit against the pressure hall. If the rest water mass is quiet and the contact approaches, then it sounds very clear and is less absorped and vice versa. Some times, it seems to me like a huge bubble colapsing in sound!

The alternation of the interval is an indication but not a certain one.

[Task Force]

So is it possiable to even get the real pinging noises.:D we dont even have a recording.:-?

[wdq4587]

Just found I missed ridgewayranger's post.

So it's clear. The sound we heared in Command Room in game should be heared from hydrophone earphone and what we can hear in Command Room should be a click/squeak not the sound we heared now. And the sound should be heared in hydrophone we can not hear it based on hydrophone bearing and distance in game. Why we can hear it at sonar station is because SH3 play it same way as in Command Room.

Can we hear sonar ping just like hearing ship propeller?

[Reece]

I've never actually tried but when you are being pinged is it audable from the exterior of the boat?:)

[Sag75]

no.. you only hear your officer voice telling you "enemy is pinging us!" :huh:

[Sailor Steve]

So it's clear. The sound we heared in Command Room in game should be heared from hydrophone earphone...
I don't think so. The hydrophones are good at picking up sounds, but the ping is still ultrasonic, so even with the hydrophones I don't know if you'd hear it. The ones the sonarman on the sending ship hears is through a device that sends and recieves those signals.

[wdq4587]

The hydrophones are good at picking up sounds, but the ping is still ultrasonic, so even with the hydrophones I don't know if you'd hear it. The ones the sonarman on the sending ship hears is through a device that sends and recieves those signals.

Yes, you are right. I misunderstand the ridgewayranger's post. What he said is the movie ping sound is from DD's sonar station speaker. We don't know does the u-boat's hydrophone using heterodyning to receive the ping ultrasonic or not. And since the u-boat sonarman does not know the exactly DD's ping ultrasonic frequency before he detect it. May be there are no heterodyning method to detect the ping ultrasonic in u-boat.

And if there are no heterodyning on hydrophone. Since the hydrophone have a sound amplifier. The sonarman of u-boat still can hear the ping early than other crews. But the sound may be some different since the passive vibration by ultrasonic pulse if not from entire hull but from hydrophone mechanism structure. And the sound may be change while hydrophone change direction, but the sound volume may be not change as much as hearing other sound.

And if the game implement the sound level meter of hydrophone. I guess it should response to ultrasonic pulse.

[geosub1978]

It seams that almost all ADSIC was between 16khz and 24khz. Almost never lower
than 4Khz.



For the given frequency range what practically happens is this:

When the emittion takes place at great distancies (...) you can hear a very weak "click" comming from sonar operator's headphones. From the headphones themselves the sound is clear that it is an emition like I discribed in my previous post. Meanwhile hardly you can hear anything from the CIC. When the contact approaches (...), the sound gets even more clear, also by naked ears inside the CIC and you don't need headsets for that.

Generally speaking if just the sonarman is able to listen the emittions it is unlikely that the sub has been detected except if the sound reaches a "convergence" zone in the water, or a "surface duct" (for bow sonars). But both phenomenas, require medium or low frequency sonars to maintain enough energy along the path and back and certainly it is very difficult for sonars 16-24kHz. So, I believe in SH3 if we make pinging heard only from sonar man this should mean that the submarine is not detected. If someone can hear the pinging from the CIC, then the sub could have been detected or not.

The detection distance of a 16-24kHz sonar has to be very limited because of absorption. It is more likely that ASDIC operated at lower frequencies (10-14kHz,less :down: seems more logical), but I don't have any input from google!

[Letum]

The lowest frequency I have a good ww2 source for is 11Khz, but that was on a
sonar buoy in a harbor entrance.

[Ktl_KUrtz]

In all the books I've read on the subject the men have always described the sound as..."a hammer hitting the hull" or..."the sound of pebbles or gravel hitting the hull" or again... "the sound of a steel hazer or cable being dragged aginst the hull!"
Due to depth, water tempreture, sea conditions and season I should imagine that all might apply.
In my mod (no spamming, I promise, I am just trying to make a point,) I attempted to reproduce the effect/impression of a high energy beam hitting the hull!
I hope I have conveyed that impression.
I must say the ping sound now sounds phoney to me.
KUrtz.

[UberTorpedo]

Ktl_KUrtz,

I stumbled across some very good sonar sounds on sounddogs.com. Let me know what you think :hmm: . The gravel/pebble & the hammer sounds are probably authentic :yep: . http://hosted.filefront.com/UberTorpedo :)

cheers

[piri_reis]

I like the BritishAsdic mod a lot Kurtz, the sonar hit is much more scary, and sounds like it is described by others in this thread. Like a heavy hammer hitting the hull. One question though, the sound cuts kind of abrubtly at the end, with all three sonar wav files, was this intentional?
Also I'm guessing sonar_coat.wav files are the ones you would here if you had the sonar coating upgrade?

Thanks for the mod, IMHO it adds to the immersion. :up: