All of the discs turn independently, for both tools. If you're making both tools you can fix them together, back-to-back by laminating the bottom disc of each tool together. Also, make sure that when you print the Attack Course Finder, that you print the C disc on transparency, NOT the P disc. The P disc goes right under the C disc. I mixed up the two the first time. If that doesn't make sense, I can post some pictures if you need me too.

Thanks I have everything done done except fastening the disc together. I terrified of missaligning the disc when I attach them. KLH said he used a drill, then a nut, bolt, and washers. the "time in minutes" disc and the very top two on the front are transparencies, the rest are laminated paper. I am a bit worried that a drill might melt some of it...and most, well all hole punches I have seen will not reach.

I used an ice pick heated on the stove to burn/punch through. Worked like a charm. Caveat: go slow.

I used an awl, it has a sharp point so you can get it to penetrate right at the center of the X. I used round head fasteners(brass, 1 inch) from Staples to provide the axis/axle.

Urge

Made myself an "is-was" yesterday using the great stuff from the Cap'n and Hitman and the advice of others contained in teh posts here. Used laminated cardstock for first three layers of the front side and the bottom two layers of the back side. Cut up the plastic overlay layer from an old poster frame for the transparent layers. Printed the periscope and 'time in minutes' layers on clear stickers, adhered them to the thin plastic and then laminated them as well.

Carfully lined everything up, put the holes in and assembled with a short nut and bolt forming the spindle/axis. Happy with the alignment, I disassembled. Cut a piece of foam poster board as a backing material, then glued the base layers of the front side to that and made a hole for the bolt. Trimmed the poster board to fit, aligned and glued the back side base to the poster board. Reassembled and put into action.

Pulled into Surabaya on Jan 2, 1942 and earned my first RFB 100% realism Silver Star.

Coincidence? I think not.;)

Only 'mistake' I made was failing to heed the advice of others and put a proper 'handle' on the 'enemy vessel' card to get around the issue of that card being the same size as teh scope. Easy enough to fix if I feel the need. Adding the posterboard 'sandwich' layer really gave the thing a tiny bit of heft and a good deal of sturdiness. Also, with the thicker middle layer, I'm able to use one of those spring type paper clips as a sort of clamp to keep the B layer 'locked in' so that it doesn't want to move around when I move the enemy or periscope layers.

Thanks again guys for the guidance and inspiration. For anybody wanting to take the plunge and make one of these, it's really pretty easy, and it's a satisfying little project to complete.

Question:

Can anybody better explain the use of the squares on the enemy card and ticks on the periscope card. I think I 'got' the first answer in the doumentation, but I'm having a hard time seeing exaclty how these things work. I'm pretty good at graphical plotting anyway, but I'd like to know more about how this thing works.

I'm a bit confused about the squares as well despite reading the example problem a few times over.

The squares are very simple - it's a way of making very quick distance estimates

assume you have the thing set up to represent the situation

http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/6353/picture7g.jpg

You take a range reading - let's say it's an easy number, 5000m.

you'll note that on the periscope layer there are 5 divisions between you and the target, so in our example each division represents 1000m

The shortest distance to target track is this distance here:

http://img14.imageshack.us/img14/8613/27976971.jpg

you can see this is 3,500m given that each square represents 1000m

If you doing a normal intercept course (holding the target to a 90 degree bearing) the following shows the approximate distance

http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/7983/norm.jpg

which is about 5000m in this case

Remember, YOU assign the range value of each square to be convenient after you have your range reading.

Using this you can then calculate how far you need to move to be ready to strike the target

I just printed and build my KM wiz wheel:DL. Trying your Passive Sonar Approach, joegrundman, I didn't work out how to adjust the observed change in bearing (after slowing down/accelerating) in the KM version. I have a version from KLH that has angle of bow on the outermost ring. On the middle ring there is range and speed. It does not have several bearing scales in the middle ring, as does your in-game version of the KM wiz-wheel. Is there a way to convert small degrees into the large 1-90° of my wiz-wheel or is there a new version that resembles the SCAF?

The disks you see in the pictures of Joegrundman here above, are equivalent to the other side of your KM Attack disk. Except the KM disk does not have that square grid on it to judge distances graphically. The side you are talking about can only be used for multiplying/dividing angles, speeds, distances and times. The side in the images above only for manipulating (adding/subtracting) courses and (periscope-) bearings. They work completely different and those scales cannot be mixed. All you can do is memorize the number and locate it in the scale on the other side.

I hate to dig up an ancient thread but the link for the speed determination side of this tool is dead. I have the course and AOB side. Does anyone have it?

06:00 in the morning and on the way to work :yawn: so it's just a quick and dirty pack... probably with dublets too :D

http://www.mediafire.com/file/bnmu8a...Finder_Mix.zip

Thanks bro, I really appreciate it:yeah:

Printable Manual

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/down...o=file&id=4419

Hi am looking to building one of these tools in the near future.

However am looking for advice on materials to use.

1. What thickness in microns for the various disks

2. What type of transparancies to use ie would acetate be ok and if so what thickness.

3. What thickness of laminate pocket to use 125 or 250

4. The most important how to fasten all the pieces together assuring that they will all turn easily

Really appreciate any and all help in this matter

Cheers

I used...

1 heavy paper.
2 overhead transparency in a laser printer
3 dunno, its a 3m product, one sheet is heavy plastic, the other a thinner plastic with adhesive.
4 a #6 bolt, fender washers, and 2 nuts with a split washer between them.

The bottom has the lamination used as intended, all others I only used the adhesive sheet covering the printed side. That includes the transparent sheets, both to protect the printing and to make the disk more rigid.

As a kid these things were all around the house (other circular slide rules that is) and they were made of anything from navy card stock to metal.... My grandfather was an engineer in the 1940s onward so we had slide rules as well as "data wheels" where you made a selection and read the answers from a window on the tool.

Thanks for the help TG,

Would you be able to post / link all the relevant template files for both sides of the whiz wheel. Or any other slide rules that you may have the templates for that would make playing the game feel more "authentic" :)

Also is this wheel primarly for SH4, can I use it for SH5 too.

Many thanks

http://www.hnsa.org/doc/attackfinder/index.htm

This link contains still valid download links to all the template files of the US Is-was Attack Course Finder on the hnsa.org site. Somewhere in there is also a photo of the original device. (only black on white, seems perfect in low-light conditions, considering) The first link in the first message of this thread is dead, and should have pointed to this. But somehow ended up linking to some Google Group and died in the process.

I also uploaded them in different packages (untouched, probably downloaded them back then from the now dead links) to my website:

Range/Speed/Sine/Time sliderule disk (rear side):
http://ricojansen.nl/downloads/Printable_IS-WAS.rar

Course/Bearing solver (front side)
http://ricojansen.nl/downloads/Subma...er_-_White.pdf

As an added bonus I still have a Shockwave file somebody made (don't know who, probably mentioned in this thread somewhere), with which you can play around with the Course/Bearing solver in your browser:

http://ricojansen.nl/downloads/iswasxc2.swf

It can be used with ANY game that is based on the proper mathematical rules and nautical concepts and units. It's only specific for SH4 in the sense that it (initially) focused on the US submarines. But could technically also be used in SH3 or SH2 (atleast the angle solver) and certainly SH1. I think Destroyer Command too worked with yards. It's just a replica of a mathematical device used in the real world back in those days. You just have to consider that the range scale is in yards. Speed in knots is standard among most games.

Big thanks for these. I'll get right on with making them :)

So. Have made the thing, with enough gear left over to make an onmimeter too - Thanks to everyone who took the time to make and upload these files - and thanks to Don and Hitman for this little gem, which is going to be extremely useful....