safe distance during approach
 

in rough terms, what is a good, safe, distance to maintain while position my boat during approach for attacking a convoy/ freighter?


for some reason, most of the times I found a target, it is going away, then I have to maneuver and it is very hard without map updates, so 9 out of 10 I end up getting spotted



thanks

Hi I usually stay 15-18km away.More during the day-good visibility anyway,less at night.If cannot see smoke just submerge and listen for their position.

Hope this helps.

it helps, thanks

but the challenge is how to calculate enemy's course at those long ranges; you can barely see them

I know there is quite a bit of guesstimation, but I am poor at it

If you've got a convoy (using sonar), they're generally one of two speeds - which I'm forgetting now... 7 and 11 knots? But with the sonar, you can get a general idea of their direction of travel, and by their speed, sometimes an almost accurate route and speed. There are a couple-three sonar tracking tutorials on the site here, and you can get as involved in trigonometry as you want, or don't want (I don't - I am numerically challenged), but I sometimes use the sonar info to guess-timate a course and speed of a convoy. Chase for a while, stop and submerge, check again, lather rinse repeat. Shoot, hit, avoid... :salute: