I feel like i've written loads on a question that had a straightforward answer, if the answer came from someone that knew what sonar from a sub sounds like when listening to ships.
Interesting that the flow noise of a warship can be differentiated from a merchant simply because the hull is cleaned more often
Any idea why the prop sound is sharper?
As for the rest of what i said, the basic sounds already exist, and as you say, i think all that's needed is some imagination. For example, the flow noise can be altered slightly, say made to sound a little deeper or sharper, for wider hulled and bigger ships, and ships with bigger props would do less revs for their given speed than smaller ships, and sound sharper and/or deeper too. The type of noise would also depend on how many props the ships had.
The effects between ships can be scaled, say with almost indescernable differences for similar sized/width ships in prop and /or flow noise, but more noticeable when tracking ships of increasing difference to each other.
If it's done right you wouldn't be able to tell some apart, but others you would, and it would depend on how "tuned in" your hearing was, and of course experience.
Apologies if i had doubts about the accuracy of your earlier comments, it wasn't clear to me what kind of experience you spoke from, or whether it was guesswork.
You might have been a diver or something and heard a ship pass overhead.
Your last post cleared that up. You've been under a ship in a sub and listened to it.
That's the kind of input i was looking for if possible, from someone that knew first hand what he was talkng about.
Thank you geosub
