WesWorld

So I have made some rather troubling discoveries about several of the Italian Sub-Sims that are currently in use, mostly the fact that they just do not work when I try and resim them. To that end, I feel it is necessary to redesign or otherwise deal with all of the classes that I cannot replicate as the rules violations are rather substantial. *rimshot* There are three options that I can see, tho I am open to others.

1) Dispose of the boats in question. I would rather not go this rout as it could end up in having to basically start over on subs but I am willing to consider it if many feel it is the best course of action.
2) Resim the classes in question with matching displacement. This would likely result in many capability ajustments, but it is my preferred option.
3) Resim the classes in question with emphasis on matching performance. This would result in a tonnage difference that would need to be made up. Given that the capabilities on some of the subs are rather advanced, I do not wish to go this rout.

Please comment if you have an strong opinion on the matter.

Just how "advanced" are the capabilities of the submarines in question?

Depends on the class. It appears that the laydown date on the classes in question (I only have properly simed versions of the U and Adua classes) has been significantly advanced. This is what is used to improve the capabilities.

my suggestion. because factories handle production by the 1000 ton. round up all your subs tonnage to the nearest 250t. then try and match performance as best as you can. if it is still off by an unacceptable margin then put them in the dock for 1-2 months with a matching material cost to boost tonnage by and additional 250ton. that is a max tonnage change of 500t and a performance match as best as you can.

Quoted from "Alias72"

my suggestion. because factories handle production by the 1000 ton. round up all your subs tonnage to the nearest 250t. then try and match performance as best as you can. if it is still off by an unacceptable margin then put them in the dock for 1-2 months with a matching material cost to boost tonnage by and additional 250ton. that is a max tonnage change of 500t and a performance match as best as you can.

Dont think thats going to work.

Quoted from "snip"

Quoted from "Alias72"

my suggestion. because factories handle production by the 1000 ton. round up all your subs tonnage to the nearest 250t. then try and match performance as best as you can. if it is still off by an unacceptable margin then put them in the dock for 1-2 months with a matching material cost to boost tonnage by and additional 250ton. that is a max tonnage change of 500t and a performance match as best as you can.

Dont think thats going to work.

No - It won't. Snip has enough experience dealing with the 'oddities' of Italian design practice to realize that there are no quick and dirty solutions.

Quoted from "snip"

Depends on the class. It appears that the laydown date on the classes in question (I only have properly simed versions of the U and Adua classes) has been significantly advanced. This is what is used to improve the capabilities.

Do I infer from what you are saying that it is as if a later-date of construction was used to generate the Subsim but the final version posted to the Italian encyclopedia was backdated to indicate an early date of construction? Or do I misunderstand?

Quoted from "BruceDuncan"

Quoted from "snip"

Depends on the class. It appears that the laydown date on the classes in question (I only have properly simed versions of the U and Adua classes) has been significantly advanced. This is what is used to improve the capabilities.

Do I infer from what you are saying that it is as if a later-date of construction was used to generate the Subsim but the final version posted to the Italian encyclopedia was backdated to indicate an early date of construction? Or do I misunderstand?

Yes. For instance the Adua class has its earlyest examples built in 1932, but that date results in a sim that does not work. Advancing the date to the mid 1940's makes it slightly less illegal, but still broken. Brock told me of a similar issue recreating a Italian-designed sub that is/was in the Chilean Navy.

Quoted from "snip"

Quoted from "BruceDuncan"

Quoted from "snip"

Depends on the class. It appears that the laydown date on the classes in question (I only have properly simed versions of the U and Adua classes) has been significantly advanced. This is what is used to improve the capabilities.

Do I infer from what you are saying that it is as if a later-date of construction was used to generate the Subsim but the final version posted to the Italian encyclopedia was backdated to indicate an early date of construction? Or do I misunderstand?

Yes. For instance the Adua class has its earlyest examples built in 1932, but that date results in a sim that does not work. Advancing the date to the mid 1940's makes it slightly less illegal, but still broken. Brock told me of a similar issue recreating a Italian-designed sub that is/was in the Chilean Navy.

If that is the case, it would seem that your Option 2 would result in a boat with performance comparable to the date of its construction and its stated tonnage. I would therefore see that as the best of the three options presented, as Option 3 might still result in a boat that is not possible to build.

For further enlightenment, I'll demonstrate the issue with a compare-and-contrast.

Quoted

Original U Class (RA's Sim)
Date 1937
Oceanic
Armament 1x 100/35, 1x 25
ElecHP 1600
DieselHP 3600
CREW 51
wt fuel&batts 380
Light weight 1150
kerb wt 1410
disp 1656
res buoyancy 15%
Max Surf Spd 15.5knts
Max Sub Spd 10.4knts (1hr rate)

L 70.0m
Beam 8.6m
D 5.5m
Crush depth 250
#TT 10 x 533mm (6 bow, 4 stern)
Tons Oil 260.0
Tons Battery 120.0

Surface Range 13500@10knts
Underwater range 170@4knts

My attempt to replicate the design using Subsim. Red indicates the differences in output:

Quoted

Date 1937
Oceanic
Armament 1x 100/35, 1x 25
ElecHP 1600
DieselHP 3600
Crew 44
wt fuel&batts 380
Light weight 1150
kerb wt 1410
disp 1656
res buoyancy 15%
Max Surf Spd 15.3knts
Max Sub Spd 8.3knts

L 70.0m
Beam 8.6m
D 5.5m
Crush depth 250
#TT 10 x 533mm (6 bow, 4 stern)
Tons Oil 260.0
Tons Battery 120.0
Tons Misc 369.0

Surface Range 12368@10knts
Underwater range 78@4knts

In order to get the underwater range RA posted, you'd need to either strongly advance the date of the sim or add a lot more weight for batteries.

I will note that in order for me to get the displacements correct, I had to add a lot of miscellaneous weight, which seems to be accounted for in the reserve buoyancy. If this was simmed instead as Weight for Batteries, you could probably get the underwater range up to the posted specs without changing the construction year. At a guess, RA probably simmed the boat first with the batteries for range, and decided the weight of batteries was too high for the period, shuffling the weight off to the Miscellaneous category whilst still retaining the range figures he originally arrived at.

I can't explain the higher submerged and surfaced speeds; perhaps he did the same sort of thing with the diesel and electric horsepower.

But the point I'm getting at is that you cannot achieve the figures posted by RA in the encyclopedia using Subsim. They can only be achieved by manually changing the data.

I would go with #2 too and take the current posted figures as "propaganda" or designer promises.

I'm disappointed to hear this, but I think we've had this arise before.

I'd be cool with option 2.

Another nightmare!
I agree option 2 is best.
I don't know why you've resimmed these subs (I assume your wisely double-checking everything RA designed), but at a push I would say since submarines don't often get rebuilt or refitted (unlike ships there is not much to change the fundamental specs, a faulty SS report = headaches when you come to change the armament or armour) you could have gotten away with leaving the sims alone and just replacing the subs at end of life. However, its the more honest option to redo these sims. Since most of us don't use SubSim, or didn't until recently, I guess no one did any check comparisons or was aware of the errors our experience with SS makes us more aware of cheating. Saying that, I feel, like Brock, that RA was trying to match real machinery figures than any attempt to cheat.

Given SubSim was developed by a German and that the example subs are all German U-Boots, I wonder if the calculations are based on German data rather than generic data. I assume British, American, Japanese and Italian diesels and batteries all offered differing weights and power ratios given differing levels of technology, much like each nation's steam plants were not equally translatable in terms of weight and space across all navies. In WW we assume ALL steam plants are equally as efficient as the results SS gives us so everyone has a level playing field. We should therefore assume all SubSim results are equally applicable to all nations regardless of real-world stats.

I was actualy planing on refurbishing a class of coastal boats or two, just to extend there life and focusing more on new Oceanic subs. Was resiming based on a hunch that the Adua's were imposible based on the stats.

Yeah. I can kinda see where the U class can be worked out, but the Adua class is seriously screwed up. I can't explain how RA got the specs on that one.

Quoted from "Brockpaine"

Yeah. I can kinda see where the U class can be worked out, but the Adua class is seriously screwed up. I can't explain how RA got the specs on that one.

Vodoo?

Probably as good an explanation as any...