Fire the navigator

[Peter Cremer]

After reading some posts about running out of fuel before getting back to base after a mission, I finally ran into such a problem. The mission was to deliver an agent to China, patrol the East China Sea, and return to base. I could get to China and drop off the agent and still have nearly 3/4 tank of fuel left. Plenty to patrol the area and sink a few ships, right? I tried it. Ran out of fuel about half way to Pearl Harbor. I had saved the mission after dropping the agent off so that's where I started from again with 3/4 tank of fuel. Skipped patrolling and headed straight for Pearl. No good. I ran out again, did'nt get as far as Midway. I tried again, and again. I wondered how I could put up some sails. I spent about 11 hours on this problem. Suddenly I remembered I had transferred from Pearl Harbor to Fremantle just before the mission. What a dumba$$. I restarted again and sank 3 ships in a convoy and 5 destroyers on the way back to FREEMANTLE. Mission complete!:woot:

[Aramike]

Also make sure you're not speeding along too fast as fuel consumption increases proportionally to speed.

[Peter Cremer]

Also make sure you're not speeding along too fast as fuel consumption increases proportionally to speed.

I never get out of second gear.

[Speedo]

I allways going on standart speed. And i can swim about 11,000 16,000 nm
If whever is good :)

[Stealhead]

What is second gear? In SH you either select a telegraph speed of use the knotmeter to set a specific knot speed. With TMO and RFb it is best to go ahead standard while on the surface as much as possiable or 9-10 knots if you have stock you will end up at around 15kts using ahead standard too fast for good fuel use Id try to do about 9 or 10 knots with stock as well. With fuel consumption issues it is very important to say what version of the game you are playing as with some like RFB they have the fuel consumption most "harsh" meaning that you have to be more careful with RFB. Another factor if running from Pearl are you topping off your fuel at Midway while heading towards Japan? if not I very highly reccomend that you do as even though you may only use a small amount of fuel from Pearl to Midway not topping will become an issue later.By topping of at Midway i have never run out of fuel on a very long patrol i may only have 25 or so units of fuel left when arriving at Pearl but I have never run out also if in doubt top off at Midway on the way back.If you plan ahead running out of fuel should not be an issue never has been for me in stock or TMO. To me another huge advantage with both RFB and TMO is that you can find out the max range of your sub at any given time.

[Very Jerry]

The only time I ran out of fuel was due to recharging the batteries the whole trip back to base (or not making base). What happens is during a depth charging attack my batteries were damaged. Well, even tough it says the batteries were repaired they really were not. The batteries would only take a 98% charge. but the sub will run the diesels extra hard trying to recharge them to 100%. What you must do is go to the command room and manually turn off the "recharge batteries" icon. You must turn off this icon each time you surface on the way back. A real pain in the "stern".

I would have never figured it out, but luckily read about it on this forum.

Good hunting

[Stealhead]

That is true but I have a feeling that this person if they are playing stock they may be going too fast and or they are not topping off on the way to the assigned area if you did not play the game for a while or read some books or this forum you might not think of this the same goes for your problem as you said if not for this forum youd never have known what the deal was. It can be hard in stock to know for certain what your subs exact range is one of the reasons I prefer one of the mods to just plain stock they help remove alot of that guess work.

[Sailor Steve]

What is second gear? In SH you either select a telegraph speed of use the knotmeter to set a specific knot speed.
I'm betting he was making a joke about using 2/3 speed.

[Stealhead]

Yeah I know that but I am trying to help the person to be more specific. If he wants a good answer it would help. The question by me was ment to be sarcastic.That being said the orginal poster has not made any replys so either he figured it out or he gave up sort of making this post dead.

[Loud_Silence]

Hm... there isn't any place on Australia where you can refit and refuel?

[Peter Cremer]

Yeah I know that but I am trying to help the person to be more specific. If he wants a good answer it would help. The question by me was ment to be sarcastic.That being said the orginal poster has not made any replys so either he figured it out or he gave up sort of making this post dead.


:doh: The original message was meant to be a "jab" at myself for forgetting where my base was and trying without success to reach it so many times before I finally figured it out. The comment about "not getting out of 2nd gear" was meant to indicate humorously that I was not going full speed and wasting fuel.
:salute: I do appreciate the replies I have read and I have learned more about the most economical speed to run at from the replies. I am currently running the stock 1.5 version and I have downloaded the mods (TMO, etc.) but I want to go through the stock version first (I paid for it, I want my moneys worth before I make changes).

Also, I don't have an Internet connection at home (WOW!) so I have to login at work. I have been off since I submitted the first message on the 9th.

[IRONxMortlock]

I just installed SH4 again and one noticeable difference seems to be that I can no longer get "range at current speed" reports like in SH3. Am I missing it somewhere? If not, is there a mod that adds this feature?

Thanks,

M

[PortsmouthProwler]

No, you're not overlooking it. Try Webster's GFO mod for a starting place.

Also, to another above - no, AFAIK, in Australia it's home port or bust until later in the war, where there are some ports in the Central Pacific available.