To go back to colours, I have seen a few photos of torpedoes on a barge in Lorient around 1940. One of the photos is on page 5 of this thread (posted by SG on 13 July 2013). Looks like they have practice warheads? Have you any idea what colour the lines are on the warhead - white or yellow maybe?
I believe the conclusion was those being most likely captured french torpedoes. Unfortunately, I have no idea about colours of french torpedomaterial whatsoever (french torpedoes are generally not very well documented).
German exersiceheads (both Kriegsmarine and Luftwaffe) are painted with red and white "horisontal" lines. I have seen examples of larger surfacevessels painting their name onto the heads - presumably for id-purposes, as I reckon they had their own heads (you would not see it on U-boats and S-Boats). See the photos I have provided in the link below.
The reason I am interested is because I am working on a 1/35th diorama set in Lorient in December 1940. This will include 6 torpedoes aboard two train gondolas (one of them will be being moved by crane from a gondola). I would like to have 3 real warheads and 3 practice warheads. The issue I have is that I wondered if Lorient in late 1940 would only have live warheads?
It's a nice scene, but I'm not sure about the realism:
Depending on the distance and means of transport, the torpedoes would have been transported with warheads mounted, or with the heads in separate, special steelcontainers (I think I have posted some photos earlier). Pistols would always be transported separately in dedicated transportcontainers (photos also posted before). I don't think those open railway-wagons with stacked torpedoes w/warheads look realistic: Even though I can't refer to documents, I am sure that would only have been done for shorter distances.
Exersiceheads however, would most likely never have been mounted on a torpedo for transport besides between the workshop and the harbour, as they were quite delicate. I'm sure there would have been special crates for transport of exersiceheads over any longer distance.
The warhead and pistol would always follow the torpedo, while exersiceheads would be kept at the arsenal/-kommando/vessel, so they would not be transported like the torpedoes anyway.
I am not sure if Lorient would have any practice torpedoes as all the U-boats at this time were rushed back to the Atlantic as soon as possible, leaving no time for practice sessions. I would think all the practice firing would be done back in Germany and the Baltic. Does this sound correct or do you think practice firing wouild have taken place in Lorient?
There are several reasons for doing exersice-shots:
* Training of personell (both new and operational crews, as well as technical/logistics personell).
* Technical verification and ranging (especially with new torpedoes or torpedoes having been repaired etc).
Initial torpedoranging would have been done at the TVA-ranges, and initial training of personell would have been done at the different schools and their training areas. However, exersicetorpedoes would for sure have been used in all areas (for example: Numerous testshots have been documented from Torpedokommando Bakervågen in Bergen, Norway - often by submarines in surfaceposition, for testing of both torpedoes and onboard equipment like tubes, compressors, sights etc). At sea, large surfacevessels would have been able to do training on their own, without the need of dedicated vessels for "fishing" and maintaining the torpedo afterwards.
So, I definately think exerciseheads would have been present at any torpedoarsenal/-kommando/-werkstatt.
Here is a zip-file with some photos of german exersiceheads:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/38692668/TP-Heads.zipNote that Type 1210 and 1215 were the common heads for G7a(TI), G7e(TII) and G7e(TIII) torpedoes. The 1210 was an early type with only one blowingmechanism (often known to fail), replaced by the improved dual-mechanism type 1215.