U.S.S, SEAHORSE ~ Report of Third War Patrol. some of us are not able to fully utilize our creat tactical advan- tage over the enemy. ‘The SD radar is still a menace. It picks up high flying planes at good ranges, but the Japs have stopped flying all their planes where the SD will detect then. We were not bombed on this patrol, nor particularly bothered by enemy airoraft, but the possibilities in the future-are of current concern. The eneny convoy trailed from Jan. 28th until the morning of February 1st maintained continuous air coverage during daylight. The weather was good and our lookouts were able to spot the planes on the horizon before they sighted us. If the visibility had been poor, as is common in the PALAU area, and. the enemy planes had been equipped with radar, we would not have been able to keep our contact over so long a period, to say nothing of the danage we might have sustained from a close bombing. In addition to ‘this, we should anticipate night radar equipped planes off inportant enemy bases. It is coming, and soon. The sD radar is worthless in combatting this type of anti-submarine activity. If a radar is avail, able that will pick up the low flying planes, we will cladly accept @ 60° conical blind spot overhead. The SD radar has received much | verbal abuse, but as yet the operating submarines have no assurance that it is going to be improved or replaced in the very near future. All of us have been lucky in the past, and haven't been too alarmed over the situation. It is believed the day is very near when nany of us are going to run out of our luck due to inferior plane detect~ ing equipment and radar equivped enemy aircraft. Svery effort should be made to combat this inevitable menace now. SJ RADAR CASUALTIES 450 volt supply to PPI scope failed. Rewired rectifier in the pump room to remedy trouble. Hours operation since refit - 47. Double ‘sweep appeared on screen varying with the amount of gain used. Replaced one 5Us-G rectifier tube in the regulated rectifier "B" unit. Hours operation since refit - 7h. Voltage in regulated rectifier "A" failed. Replaced two 5U4-G rectifier tubes., Hours operation since re- fit = 126. A.C. (115v) supply to H.V. rectifier failed. Found corroded connestion in main control unit and repaired. Hours operation since refit - 126. ll ENCLOSURE (A)Subjec U.S.S. SEAHORSE - Report of Third iar Patrol, The following is a tabulation of results obtained from all lis- tening frequencies: - 16,68 KOS: Good signal until about 3 days out of JouISTON. 56 KOS Never copied. 4525 KOS Very good night tine frequency in area. Signals loud and readability good. . 9090 KOS Signal strength 4 during day and usually faded out at night. Considerable amount of eneny interference during day, and very little at night. 14,390 KCS Signal strength 5 in area. Good readability. 17,370 KOS Not heard. All Serials ‘ere récoived with the, excestion of nunbers 26 and 82, All HATKU numbers. were received except those sent curing per- jods' when we were submerged, and waich were not subsequently repeated oa a later schedule. . Four messages were transmitted from the general patrol area on 470 KOS. All were receipted for on first transmission except the last message sent. This last message vas intercepted by some un- imown station and relayed to CTG 17. ‘de had intended to retransmit this message later, as we were unable to get through on our first transmission, However, before we, were ready to transnit again, we received a receipt from CTG 17 on the next regular Nel schedule. There was no evidence of enemy. jamiing of our transuissions. (i) RADAR The SJ-@ radar installed prior to this patrol was a great diss appointment. The fault lies entirely in the operating personnel, and there is nothing that can be done about it unless we get at least one highly trained man. The radar technician is intelligent; extrenely conscientious; a tireless worker; and an excellent operator. In fact, he ig one of our key men and a real subuariner.. The trouble is that’the Sd-a equipment is just too much for hin, because he does not possess the complete knowledge apparently necessary to keep the SJ-a operating at maximum efficiency. In reading over otner patrol reports it has been noted in several instances that both a radar officer and a radar technician have been coumended for their ability on the same ship. If there is that much talent available it is re~ commended that all submarines have at least one man adoard who ae (50)subject: U.8.S. SBAHORSE-- ‘Report of Third Wer Patrol. (L) bilges by means of a hose, and then pump it into the expansion tank with the drain pump, This difficulty is believed to have been caused by the fact that the filling end transfer line for No. 48 runs from the top of the tank down to the bottom of the tank through a six inch hole in the keel and up into No. 4A where it joins the filling and transfer line for Ho. 4A ina "I" fitting; a common filling and transfer line runs from this "I" fitting through the hull on the starboard side and taps into the filling and transfer main at that point. It is believed that a separate filling and transfer connection, similar to that provided for the other fuel tanks, would eliminate this trouble. 4. Bridge TBT: During a night surface attack the forward bridge TST binoe— ular bracket worked loose. This introduced a one decree error in the TB? in addition to two to three degrees lost notion. ELECTRICAL: 1, Main Motors: eee the patrol full power was limited by unbalanced loads on #2 and #4, motors. This condition had been observed on the last patrol and vas partially fixed by shifting the brush rigging in PEARL. Also the load had to be built up slowly as @ sudden increase of amperage on i, main motor caused it to spark badly. dnroute Pa4RL from the area, this motor began to spark excessively at very low loads (100 -300 amps.). Several brushes were observed to be badly burned and all brushes were replaced. The neutral point for the brushes then returned to the original benchmark of the manufacturer's and no sparking occurred at full load after the brushes were worn in. The loads on j/2 and jl, motors were balanced and the defect remedied. RADIO Radio reception was good during the patrol when using 4524 KCS from 1000 GT to 1800 GT. Since the increase in power on 4525 KCS and with the receiver tuned properly, there were fe occassions when the eneay was able to make any effective interference. During day light hours reception was very poor on 9090 KCS due to eneny inter- ference and interference from our own SD radar, Reception on 14,390 KOS during this time however, was universally good. “=h2- ENCLOSURE (A) yh Ww