If you're doing manual targeting, you have to aim where the target will be when it and the torpedo's paths interset, not where it is at the moment of firing.
The rough and ready guide is as follows:
the very first thing you want to do is open the torpedo tube doors. If you don't do this, when you give the order to fire, there's a few second delay while the doors are opened and the torp usually misses the mark.
First thing you want to do is lock the target and then open the ship recognition manual. Determine what type of ship it is and relay that to the ship's weapon's officer (by pushing the confirm button in the ship rec. manual.) Next you want to determine the ship's distance from you. You do this by using the UDC or periscope's range finder function. Make sure the centre horizontal hashmark is lined up on the level where the target ship's hull touches the waterline. Once that's done, select the rangefinder tool. This tool superimposes two images of the target over each other. Drawthe topmost image down until the waterline of the top image touches the highest point (usually a mast or conning towner) of the lower image. Confim this as the initial range.
The next step is to determine the heading of the target ship. You can guestimate by using the 0, 45, and 90 ship profiles in the ship recognition book and try to judge by comparing your sight picture with the manual's pictures. This usually isn't that accurate but if you're close (say under 1,500 yards, it's usually good enough to score a hit even if you're off a little.)
Finally, you need to determine the ship's speed. Once you've got distance and heading, you can use the stopwatch and ask the WSO to determine heading. The longer you leave the watch running, the more accurate the speed estimation will be. (double check speed estimate with the ship rec manual to dee if you're wildly out of whack.) Once you've got all this data entered, set torp speed and depth and take the shot. It's usually better to fire a salvo of 2 or three torps. You can use the torp gyro setting to enter a slight offset so you fire one dead on, one 1-2 degrees to the left and one 1-2 degrees to the right.
That's the quick way and it's not bad but it's by no means foolproof. Once you get good at judging distance and heading, you can get within the 50-60% success range against slow merchantmen.
the much more acccurate, but much more time consuming way to do things is as follows. Spend a bunch of time manoeuvring yourself so that your target will pass your bow as close to perpendicular as possible. While you're piloting, you should be able to determine the heading of the target by moving parallel to him and taking a series of ranges, if you're on the same heading and he keeps the same bearing and the distance doesn't change, you've just determined his course and speed. (It's rarely this easy).
What you usually end up doing is positioning yourself ahead of the target and lying in wait. Using the periscope, get your initial range and make note of the angle off your bow. Using the mapping tools, plot this on the map. Start the stopwatch and measure a set amount of time (3 min if you're using the nomograph). Take a second ranging and make note of the bearing. Plot this second point on the map and draw a line between the two points. Once you've got this line, you can project it out further to mark the targets's course on the map. Using the compass and protractor, you can work out the target's speed and heading very accurately. You can also determine the range from your sub to the target at various points along his route of travel and, using this data, set up a firing solution yourself.
As long as the target is unaware of you and maintains a set speed and heading, it's virtually foolproof. Expect hit rates in the 90% range.
Good hunting.
Log in to comment