lol...

I missed it too, the first time around--that 6SJ7GT is sneaky-clever:up:

Welcome. I think you have the same problem Don Had when he first installed.

Check the Stellarium config.ini file. Near the bottom there is a line "time_zone". change that from system_default to utc. There is another line right above called landscape_name. put ocean in that one and it will look like you are on the sea.

I still have to put this on the instruction page.

Don,
I played with that sextant again this afternoon, took a bunch of sun sights and 1 LOP was right on. 5 LOP's were within 1-2 nm. I spent some time refilling the bubble and when I was through with that it clouded up.:88) The sextant dial reads to the nearest minute and 1/2 min is easy to interpolate. Also noticed a bit of a difference depending on which way I turned the dial (gear backlash probably). Another 10,000 sights or so and I should have it down.
Mike

I have to say, i've followed this thread with mouth open amazement. I am completely in awe and i have to admit that the only time i tried to understand the maths you're using, i felt my brain dribble out of my nostrils... :lol: but the reason i'm posting, i just want to say that you've really ignited my passion to learn and have given me a renewed respect for all navigators out there.

Great thread...my hat's off to you all. :up:

Welcome to the club Schultzy! :)

@6SJ7GT: That backlash error is aka index error (IE) on a regular sextant. Don't know how you would compensate for it on a bubble sextant, but what I do before every round of sight(s) I take is--zero the index arm then point it at the sun (w/shades in place), which should show the mirrored sun and direct-view sun as one congruent object. In RL; however, there's always a smidgen of error present. Turning the index vernier on or off the arc to make the two suns congruent will indicate the amount of IE to be added or subtracted from Hs as part of the altitude corr.


Cheers,

Thank you castorp345 and Mike for your promt reply! The path is the right one (the script runs and ask me for date and time)and I did the modification in conf.ini but without any result.Stellarium doesn't want to use the data in startup.sts file provided by the python script.Maybe one of you can send me a copy of conf.ini so I can see the diferences between yours and mine!?

Howdy HerrFritz and welcome to our version of "Lost" :lol:
Here's part of what my config.ini looks like:

and further down the ini file:

-...-



Here's a pic of my current progress using castorp345's mod to 6SJ7GT's script. Still heading SWxS toward Singapore.


http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j42/donhreed/7cn.jpg

and to share with all, here's a blank plot sheet dated 1941 if you're into being authentic:

Edit: Here's a better pic:

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...reed/7cn-1.jpg

sweet!!
thanks for that, don!
:rock:

cheers
hc

Ok. In this pic I've added a postit to emphasize the "cocked hat" of taking three star sights. As you can see my actual position is in the middle with 2.5nm on each side. How's that for a little uncertainty of knowing precisely where you are?
http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/6669/8cnns8.th.jpg


also...

Has anyone tried this with the U-Boat addon?

Cheers,

I finally completed my 1st patrol using 6SJ7GT’s script and castorp345’s mod to the script for Stellarium, 17 March 2008 to 6 April 2008, that’s 20 days real time.


Granted, I wasn’t at it 24/7. I took breaks that a retired guy has to take; but, the entire patrol in-game time was from 8 Dec 1941 to 30 Dec 1941, amazingly only 2 days longer. (22 days)


I was ordered to patrol south of Formosa out of Manila, P.I., later, ordered to patrol the shipping lanes between Japan & Singapore, and finally, to change bases to Sarabaya, Java as Manila had been overrun.


It seemed like a honest, realistic patrol as I was only able to sink three sampans throughout (w/deckgun). It was the only enemy traffic observed, frankly, for the entire patrol. (Mainly due to game mods) So much for a 2 hour arcade patrol. :)


The weather (wx) overall, remained generally balmy as what you might expect for the South Pacific. Except for my 5 daily sextant sightings and sight reductions culminating in plots on paper of my position (over ***100*** 8.5” x 11” sheets). It was as boring as it was in real life, on a daily basis, that is.


I found myself getting anxious as I finally neared port, wondering if I’d make land fall or not. Felt the joy of self accomplishment when my first sight of land popped up pretty dang close to where I had predicted it would.


Aftermath:


I feel drained and need some R & R--oh yeah!


In Port:


Restock & Refit ( this usually means adding on new mods that were invented while you were on patrol).


2nd Patrol:


I’ve begun a new patrol out of Sarabaya, ordered to patrol Makassar strait. This time I’m trying it without paper and keeping all the plotting on the F5 screen. So far I’ve taken two separate sun sights and now have data for my first running fix. See below:




Cheers,

http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/6...dpathh3.th.jpg

congratulations on your first patrol, and may your second see more tonnage sunk!
:p

i too run in "real-time", refitting (ie retooling my install to be up-to-date with the latest mod work) in between patrols... though what this means for me is that i'll use time compression (with a max of x128) to bring the sim time up to my actual local time (so, for instance, my current in-game date/time is 04-07-1943, 1341Z), and then run at 1x until, for whatever reason, the sim needs to be shutdown.

cheers
hc

Hi hc!

Thats great advice: matching game-time with real-time. Now, if we could only match the wx lol. ( com'on spring!!!)

anything to increase immersion!
;)

i've been toying with the idea of keeping an open container of diesel under my computer setup, but don't think the wife would take too kindly to that...
:doh:
:lol:

lol...bless all distaff & long-haired mess cooks worldwide...they sure tolerate (barely) an awful lot from their simmers. :yep:

cheers,

amen to that!
:yep:

(now if only my particular long-haired "mess cook" could actually cook... 'would free-up a whole heck of a lot of time for me from hanging out/working in the galley to attending to the serious business of punching virtual holes in the virtual ocean! :rotfl:)

Don or anyone,

While we are talking about navigation, how were zigs planned? did the ship heading alternate back and forth either side of the base course, did they go from a base course heading parallelling on either side of the actual base course, or...?

Mike