Torpedo Bearing

If anyone is interested, I've made a small formula for one to calculate the bearing one has to launch the torpedo for getting a hit, under some preconditions.
Of course, you can't know how the enemy will react before you launch, so this only works if the enemy continues in the same direction with the same velocity. But it points out a general direction, and if you launch more than one torpedo, scattered around the calculated bearing, this formula should increase your chances of a direct hit compared to aiming by intuision.

Writing a small automated program on your calculator would be of preference.

Remember to set the calculator angles to degrees, as radians or other units would be less convenient.

a = arcsin(u*sin(b-c)/v)

Legend

a - the angle off center bore sight

u - enemy speed (kts)

v - torpedo speed (I've measured this to be around 32kts)

b - enemy bearing (as given in the B-tac)

c - your bearing

Good luck!

Does that have any effect? or does it all work with apparent angle to target?
(please excuse the daft question but i am too tired to work it out for myself)

Nice work tho!

Good question, I was wondering about that too at first.
But range doesn't matter as long as the velocities are constant.

One get a triangle with one corner being you, one being target at launch, one corner being hit point.

The sides are expanding as follows:

-Side 'target->hit' expands with the rate u*t

-Side 'you->hit' expands with the rate v*t

-Side 'you->target' is constant, it's the line beween you at launch time

Thus, the lengths of the following sides are proportional:

(target->hit)/u = (you->hit)/v.