First of all let me say I am using a older GWM version. Only the manual aiming option is disabled.
The problem I encounter is that the escorts are to easy evaded. My last patrol was in late december '42. So I would have expected that the escorts or lone DD's would spot from miles away with their radar en ping me. Then attack me with this new device, the Hitchcock.
But somehow the DD's refuse to give me their full load. The last time I heard a 'ping' was in a previous career. The depth charging is way, way of. I can cruise by on the surface on a nice calm ocean within 5 km range of a DD and have nothing to worry about. This would be nothing new if it was the early 1940's, but now it is almost 1943.
Without escorts on a high alert, attacking a convoy isn't such a challenge
So...is it possible I somehow disabled a realism setting. I find it really strange that the escorts haven't made use of their sonar in late 1942