Kriegsmarine map grid

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SES
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Kriegsmarine map grid

#1

Post by SES » 14 Apr 2004, 17:55

When we read accounts of maritime operations and study sources we come across the Kriegsmarine map grid system. Part of it can be found on the internet in resolutions ranging from acceptable to poor. I came across a very good home page with some fairly good maps, but more importantly a neat little program that will convert e.g. AO 4462 to a lat./long. I hasten to share it with you.

http://www.geocities.com/germangrid/eindex.html

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SES
Last edited by SES on 14 Apr 2004, 19:37, edited 1 time in total.

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Erich
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web-site ?

#2

Post by Erich » 14 Apr 2004, 19:09

SES :

the site mentioned in unavailable !

Erich


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Kal_El
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#3

Post by Kal_El » 14 Apr 2004, 19:30

Worked for me though:)

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Morten

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SES
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Re: web-site ?

#4

Post by SES » 14 Apr 2004, 19:36

Erich wrote:SES :

the site mentioned in unavailable !

Erich
Hi Erik.
I just checked it. And I have a pretty roboust security setting, Norton Firewall etc. so it should work. Have you tried to type the address in stead of just clicking on the link?
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SES

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Marcus
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#5

Post by Marcus » 14 Apr 2004, 19:38

I wonder if the owner of the website has recieved permission from the author and publisher of "Axis Submarine Successes of World War Two" to reproduce those maps.

/Marcus

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Erich
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#6

Post by Erich » 14 Apr 2004, 20:06

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek 8O good point Marcus !

now I remember this site as it just came up for me.........some months ago. wonderful materials

E ~

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SES
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#7

Post by SES » 14 Apr 2004, 20:11

Erich wrote:Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek 8O good point Marcus !

now I remember this site as it just came up for me.........some months ago. wonderful materials

E ~
And an absolute wizzard program. 8)
SES

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Kal_El
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#8

Post by Kal_El » 14 Apr 2004, 21:21

Marcus Wendel wrote:I wonder if the owner of the website has recieved permission from the author and publisher of "Axis Submarine Successes of World War Two" to reproduce those maps.

/Marcus
I dont think he has. the next quote is from the begining:
All the maps showed in this website come from the wonderful book by Jurgen Röhwer "Axis Submarine Successes of World War Two". These maps have been published in order to allow to all the interested in German naval subjects using them, always without lucrative purposes. I hope the editor will understand it.

but at least the program sounds handy.


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Morten

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#9

Post by Station » 14 Apr 2004, 22:59

This site is hosted on Geocities. Obviously, if it's down, it's because the bandwidth for the day or month has been used up. It even says so on the error page.

Ken Dunn
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Re: Kriegsmarine map grid

#10

Post by Ken Dunn » 22 Jan 2013, 00:41

Hi All,

Anyone doing WWII U-boat research eventually runs into the problem of having to deal with a grid reference from a KTB and a latitude and longitude from a merchant ship or warship document. The German system was meant to disguise the true latitude and longitude of a given position and required a map with the exact location of the squares and sub-squares which of course wasn’t readily available to the Allies.

Well, there is a new (free) web based WWII German Naval Grid Reference Converter called “Naval Grid Calculator” at: http://grid.nylle.de that will convert a grid reference like DN8452 (or just DN, or just DN8 etc.) into latitude and longitude and display it on a Google map. It will also convert latitude and longitude (you have multiple choices as to how you enter the latitude and longitude too) into a grid reference and display it on a Google map. Of course the Google map includes zoom, map view and satellite view. It is also handy for just displaying latitude and longitude on a map and you can also download the grid square as a KML for Google Earth.

There are other programs out there but most require you to download and install them on your computer and they are still a work in progress & only cover some of the grid squares. This one covers them all though a very few (11 out of total 536 large grid squares) of the irregular ones haven’t been proven yet and is web based so you don’t have to install anything on your computer. It also provides more information than any of the others I have seen. For example it also gives you the latitude and longitude of the corners of the square as well as the center of the square and its size (height & width etc.) in nautical miles (not all squares are the same size or shape).

Lastly there is considerable documentation on exactly how the WWII German naval grid system works that you won’t find anywhere else that I know of.

I contacted the author, Jan Kockrow, and he is an engineer and a former post war German Navy radio operator and also an avid sailor. Future enhancements might be:

(1) Release of the complete code under an open source license to allow people to build their own grid converter service. E.g. a U-boat community website might want to provide their own grid converter with their own interface so they can use this code and build upon it.

(2) Some additional calculations to be determined.

All in all this is the most comprehensive and accurate grid converter I have found & it is easy to use as well.

Regards,

Ken Dunn

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