hydrophones not working

[Joe S]

I am getting back in to SH4 after a few years off, for some reason my soundman often times does not pick up escorts. I went to the sonar station to take over that post and listen myself, but for some reason I cannot get the machine to work, cannot turn it on or change the direction of the sonar head to scan around. Any ideas?
Thanks!
Joe S

[Captain Jeff]

I use the hydrophones a lot. Mine are always on. It stops sweeping when I enter the station. I click on bearing indicator to make it sweep. I'm not sure what to call it but what I'm calling the bearing indicator is the large dial on the upper right when I enter the sonar station. It has 360 degree markings on the outside of the dial and compass directions on the inside. This is where the arrow rotates to indicate the heading for your hydrophones. Just click anywhere on that dial and the hydrophones will rotate to where you clicked. Keep clicking around the dial, staying ahead of the arrow, and the hydrophones will run a sweep.

Hope this helps. Good luck and good hunting to you.

[SilentPrey]

There's also an issue where ships traveling at less than 50% of their top speed don't show up on sonar. I think that's only when you man the station but I'm not certain of that. Escorts are usually traveling at less than 50% of rated speed.

[ColonelSandersLite]

Originally Posted by SilentPrey

There's also an issue where ships traveling at less than 50% of their top speed don't show up on sonar. I think that's only when you man the station but I'm not certain of that. Escorts are usually traveling at less than 50% of rated speed.

This is incorrect. To be more specific, the effect where you can't hear a sllow moving ship exists, but it has nothing to do with max speed/2.

Just copy + pasted from another thread:

I checked this and the idea that the problem is related to target speed < max speed/2 is definitely wrong. I can hear a 5 knot conte verde liner (max speed 21 kts) and hakusika maru (max speed 12 kts) just fine. On the other hand, I can't hear either when they are doing 4 knots. It might be a blanket problem with speed < 5 knots (or some number close to it, like 4.37822 knots or something). There may also be other causes. At a guess, the point of confusion is that a *lot* of the games merchants have a maximum speed of around 10 knots. Somebody probably did inadequate testing and jumped to the wrong conclusion.

[SilentPrey]

Ah. We'll go with that then.