From my understanding and reading circle runners were indeed real (no surprise there) but that long periods of time between tube flood and torpedo firing were causing corrosion that made them more likely to stick at full rudder when executing a gyro turn. I don't think a 0 angle shot could ever be a circle runner as it couldn't stick the rudder. I don't know if a very small gyro angle (1-10 deg or so) would ever command full rudder on the torpedo or if it would due to a "bang bang" steering type.
Improvements to the rudder posts (better grade of metal IIRC) as well as I think floodings much sooner to launch significantly reduced the problem.
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