Sinking vessels in rought weather.
 

I'm off the strait of Gibraltar (seen Das Boot... long version... NOT GOING IN THERE).

I have intercepted a westward moving convoy in the middle of some serious **** can weather. I have struck a C2 cargo ship and it's not moving anywhere. It's sitting barely deeper in the water and try for the life of me I CAN'T SINK IT!

I am using the RUB mod. I have been sitting off its port beam firing torpedos for 30 minutes all of them get deflected. What's my problem? I'm not supposed to use magneticly fused torps because I have heard that they are practically useless in rough weather. Even if I did, since the cargo ship is sitting SLIGHTLY deeper in the water there is no way to accurately find it's draft under the surface.

I need advice all you experts out there. I'm in a Type IX so no shortage of torps.

Help me out!!!

I personaly don't use RUB, but... what is the tgt's AOB? Looks like you're not in the right angle if they bounce off, or you set your torps a bit too low (The hull slope will deflect torps I guess). I usualy go for a 4-5 m depth torpedo, with an AOB closest to 90 as possible.

I'm at 90 degrees. 4-5 meter depth is the default setting is it not?

Yes.. (wanted to just say "Yes.", but... apparently you can't have a response shorter than 5 characters.

Did that.

Engel.... What am I doing wrong here?????????

Is there a minimum distance to arm???

If I move too far away I lose sight of the vessel (storm is THAT bad).

I'm pretty sure you're too close. Back off to at least 300m distance, and your torpedoes will have time to arm before impact.

Roger that Admiral. I'll back off. Visibility sucks!

Yes 300M is the arming distance for your torpedos.

Yeah i learned that the hard way also. 4 torps bounced of the hull simultaneously. But i wonder Is it the real value (300m) to arm a torpedo? in real life i think they are able to adjust it. Am i wrong?

IMHO you are wrong, the torps armet itself with the little propeler in the nose, they need to move a certain amount of turns to arm the torpedo, more or less 300 meters of travel.

an iteresting article, not really about this item, but
http://www.uboat.net/history/torpedo_crisis.htm

Why 300m ? and why not 100m?

Whats the speciality of 300m to arm itself?

Presumably 100m was not enough to ensure the safety of the sub if the torpedo went off prematurely. 300m was probably a safer number given that it's pretty pointless for a sub to blow itself up.

I think the actual German arming distance was 250 meters, but I'm not totally sure. US arming distance was 500 yards, or about 450m.

If memory serves then Michael Gannon quoted above 300m as the arming distance, then later related how Hardegen closed to less than that and got a hit. He didn't explain the discrepancy in his figures. I'd have to check the book again to be sure but I'm drunk and I couldn't read a 50 foot signpost if it smacked me in the face.

Pistol

The device to detonate the warhead was the pistol. There were two types, magnetic and contact pistol. Most torpedoes had both types and the captain could select a combination of magnetic, contact or both, prior to launching the weapon.
The magnetic pistol was triggered by the ship’s magnetic field and was designed to explode underneath the hull. Such explosions could break a ship’s hull in two, sinking it with just one torpedo. However, magnetic pistols were prone to premature detonations, with many exploding as the torpedo approached the wake of the ship. There were several reasons for this. First, the earth’s magnetic field changes with different latitudes, which were not properly offset by the device. Second, torpedoes tend to approach the target from astern, where the differential speed was reduced. The magnetic pistol could not detect a gradual change in magnetic flux, and failed to detonate. Finally, poor design led to high vibrations within the torpedo itself, which ultimately caused the relay to fail. Until the problem was solved, the less effective contact pistol was used.
Contact pistols comprised of four whiskers mounted at the tip of the torpedo nose. They were designed to react to a glancing blow which detonated the warhead. Many problems were also encountered as it was discovered due to poor design, only a narrow impact angle of approximately 20 degrees was required to consistently trigger the pistol. There was also a safety device which armed the pistol only after a minimum run of 250 meters. For this, a small propeller was fitted to the nose of the torpedo. As it moved forward, rushing water would spin the propeller until it wound shut, arming the pistol.