Screw that.
Build the Montana class.
Posted on 07/18/2019 4:22:09 AM PDT by tlozo
So they found someone to make GFTs again? Never saw one for the 700 series projos.
Oh how my chiefs hated me when I made them do it all manually at least once each AT. Then they fat fingered a target out of the box that the computer said was safe.
Manual MET and high burst, mean point of impact! What fun.
This brings to mind how in Vietnam some of our planes only had missiles but not guns, and if they ran out of missiles, they couldn’t dogfight?
re: “I just wonder without GPS how they will position the battery?”
Terrain map on CD; you don’t need GPS with that in hand ... (BUT your laptop will have to work. Alternatively, a 7 1/2 minute paper “topo” map will work.)
Also, carry an aneroid barometer, used in conjunction with topo map.
Oh, you’ll need a pair of function eyeballs to locate land features correlated to the topo map.
I was going to mention about ship’s navigation also. And don’t forget to get a daily solar azimuth for compass correction due to magnetic poles wandering.
So how close in accuracy can you get with a map and what a compass?
Of course as a young devil dog I didn’t care to ask too many questions but as I age I am more curious as to the details. Heck a few weeks ago I spent a night trying to find out how they emplace 81mm mortars, and damn there was scant info beyond aiming stakes and stuff.
Map spot sun shot. Simple.
Now with the new 777 that supposedly takes awhile to emplace and displace that seems almost reckless in regards to near peer combat.
re: “Morse code (CW) is gone by the wayside but plenty of Old Timers l still know how to use it, “
There is digital comm mode (JS8, with JS8CALL being the app) that works down to -24 dB SNR, which is about 15 dB below what a good CW op can copy a message at ... this is great during this period of low sunspot activity (and poor band conditions).
A LOT of development has taken place since the days of PSK31, such as the WSJT suite of low-SNR modes courtesy of Joe Taylor W1JT Nobel Laureate and astrophysicist.
I’ll be running JS8 in a little bit here on 40 meters ...
The old fashion way. Read a map.I know,it is tough in the desert.
re: “So how close in accuracy can you get with a map and what a compass?”
Depends on the terrain (flat as in no features/creeks, hilly with passes), how many land features are noted on the topo map, and how good your “range estimation” faculties are with your two eyeballs.
After the Chinese shoot down the GPS satellites, USN will be sorry Annapolis dropped celestial navigation by hand, as well.
I was in bn FDC in an 8” bn in the reserves in Florida and had an FDO, CPT Danny Henson that could that.
I can see him now with his stop watch hanging around his neck, sitting on the ramp of the 577, sweating in the heat at Blanding or Avon Park, on top of multiple fire missions. The guy was on top of everything, country boy from Arkansas and scary smart. Tough too, whipped the commo section CPT’s butt one night at the end of AT when said officer got smart about criticism of commo deficiencies, I believe Jack Daniels may have been involved, lol.
I used to maps spot the battery Center of Mass when I was an XO. I could get to within 100 meters or so.
Once you shoot a registration, you can shoot pretty accurate.
On a week long backpacking trip I assigned the navivation job to a soon to be Eagle scout and aspiring Army officer. When I was bugged with “how much further Mr Bert?” I told them to ask Tim.
Years later, he wrote me thanking me for teaching him about maps and navigation. As a second LT, he was ordered to check out a trackless desert with no landmarks and miles and miles of literally mothing. He had a map, a compass and a watch to navigate by calculation and dead rekioning.
Later, he was given a verly GPS device
This article warms the cockles of my old Redleg heart. Comes now the misty memories of the GFT and TFT issued to us at FA Officer Basic Course, the TFT full of columns of mysterious figures and GFT appearing to be the easier solution, only to face learning how to apply MET data to the GFT for a better firing solution. Then, off to missile school to compound the learning with trig and log tables to get the manual solution within the performance standard time.
I’d be surprised if anybody below the rank of E-8 has actual experience in setting up firing stakes, the infinity collimator, or using the sun filters on the M2 aiming circle to lay the battery using the sun as the EOL.
That might just keep them from colliding with tankers and freighters.
Arrrr, matey, that be Morse Code.
Screw that.
Build the Montana class.
Well, it could certainly be done before the Advent of GPS. The crew did have to inspect a map, locate their position on that map, and then extract the coordinates. We could do it all just fine.
Of course, how else would one know terrain features before “going there”?
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