Gyroangle
 

I`m following Wazoos tutorial at minute (great work) and have a question re Gyroangle.

Once I have calibrated my Scope and TDC and am preparing to fire, I notice that the gyroangle doesnt read the same as my scope reading, its about 4-5 degrees out. This means that when I fire my torp it doesnt set off on the scope reading, but the gyro reading. So if I therefore use my scope as a target reading I usually miss the target, cos the gyroangle offsets its path.

Hope that makes sense!!

Can someone please tell me how I can correct this?

Many thanks

SZ

That is what the gyro angle is supposed to do. If the gyro angle was just set to where your scope was pointing, you would have to lead the target yourself, and that would be tough. Once you give the inputs to the TDC and it comes up with a gyro angle for the torpedoes, all you have to do is line the crosshairs up on the part of the ship that you want to hit and launch. Make sure the doors are open before you launch, or you will lose 2-3 seconds waiting for them to open and you can easily miss.

I don't know how good of an explanation that was, so here's another. The gyro angle is the bearing that the torpedo will turn to once it has been launched. This saves you from having to point your sub directly at your target, as your torpedoes can turn quite a bit. Now, if you wanted to try the John Wayne approach to things, you could manually set the speed in the TDC to zero, and then put the TDC back on automatic mode. What this does is make your periscope a "point 'n shoot" device. If you look at the gyro angle as you move your scope around, it will always be the same as the bearing you are looking at. Whatever bearing you are looking down is the bearing the torpedoes will move down. Technically, this "fixes" the problem you were experiencing, but I bet it's not what you really want. If you decide to use this method, you're going to have a hard time hitting anything without knowing exactly how much to lead the ship.

That's where the TDC comes in. Once you tell it the target's bearing, range, AOB and speed, it will automatically set the torpedoes to the correct gyroangle to properly lead the target. So, if you are looking down a bearing of 0 at a target that is crossing your bow from left to right, and your gyro angle says 005, this means that the torpedoes will turn 5 degrees to the right after launch, and they will probably hit the target as long as you set the TDC up right and had your doors open before launch. So, you could have done this the John Wayne way before, but you would have had to know to aim 5 degrees ahead of your target in order to hit it. With the TDC way, you just point it at the ship or at the specific area of the ship that you want to hit, and lead is automatically calculated and the torpedoes are automatically set up to turn to the right bearing. It's too easy!

I'd say that is a pretty good explanation... :yep: :up:

Thanks! :)

I like it my way pardner!!

http://www.nedraspyrography.com/John...ne%20photo.jpg

Yeah John Wayne wouldn't bother with any of that thar fancy computin' gadgetry sech as the TDC. He'd launch all four tubes from the hip like any real man would do :arrgh!:

Hey Trav

Thanks very much for that - I understood both explanations.

My main thing to take from this is that I need to open the tube doors early. I have left this until I fire, and my hit rate has been lousy.

Again, many thanks.

Cheers

SZ

Well I'm glad that something I said helped. I have a habit of overexplaining the hell out of things, but I know how frustrating it is to have 3 or 4 people reply to your question but still not answer it. So, I tend to explain as much as possible.