[Kal_Maximus_U669]

Originally Posted by Zosimus

I would say that it depends entirely on how you hunt and what you're up against. If it's a single ship that is closing, it's pretty easy to get into position and just eyeball it. If it's constant distance, it's pretty easy to use a three- or four-bearing method to figure out how to intercept it.

If it's a single ship moving away, just fall into its path and you will know the course. From there, you can just go out and around to sink it.

In terms of finding the speed, this is easy. Let's assume the ship is going 30º and you don't know the speed, but you think it may be 8 knots. If so, you should lead the ship by 14º — that is to say that you should try to turn perpendicular to its course when a straight line from the ship to your vessel is 44 degrees. Another way to say that is that the ship should be 224º in your periscope as you approach submerged. If it's moving 8 knots, then it will stay exactly at 244º so if it slowly falls back to 240º then it's only going 7 knots whereas if it moves ahead to 248º then you know it's going 9 knots or faster.

You can work out these numbers easily just by using the drawing tool. For example, draw a straight line at 70º and a perpendicular line that intersects at 90º (160º). Measure back 7 knots from the intersection to represent the ship's speed in knots and then use the compass to draw a 2 knot circle. You will find that measuring from the back location to the right portion of the circle will yield an angle of 86º so if you are at exactly 86º off of the ship and you go 2 knots perpendicular, you will be on a collision course. It will be a simple matter to just slow to 1 knot or reverse a bit before firing to get at about 400-500m, which I consider the perfect range.

If it's a convoy, you can pretty easily eyeball the general direction of the convoy and get in front. As you penetrate the screens, you should easily be able to zoom in on the map and draw a line through the ships to find their exact course. If that feels like cheating to you, simply watch them through the periscope as you pass the first lane in. If you are going, let's say, true north 0º and the ships line up perfectly at bearing 275º then you know their true course is 85º and you can adjust your course to 355º to be perfectly perpendicular.

You don't need to worry about range if you're perpendicular. And you can fire at ships in front and behind you simultaneously.

The techniques seem interesting and worth trying... But there are a lot of approximations... in the real world it is not reliable enough... try in games... thank you for your demonstration..
Kind regards, Kal Maximus U669