I was going to edit this in, but its a lengthy explanation. Had to make sure my physics teacher from highschool wasnt yankin my leg.
"Basically maths is used to aim a mortar (I'm excluding direct fire where you can see the target from the mortar here, which uses part of what I describe).
First you need the direction, in degrees or mils (miliradians 6400 to a circle).
In older times this could be done with a map and a protractor. Now it's done with GPS positioning (for the target you combine your own GPS position with a laser range finder + compass to get the direction and distance to target, and from there its position), and a computer that does some basic trigonometry.
Then you need range, also pretty simple with a map and ruler, or GPS coordinates and simple maths.
Then you need to aim the mortar.
Fairly simple to set the direction using a compass (they set up sticks at certain directions and then measure offsets. If you set up a stick at due north and want to fire at 10 degrees, the you set your mortar sight to 10 degrees left of gun, and rotate your mortar so the sight is looking directly at the stick. You know know your mortar is facing 10 degrees right of north).
For the range, the old system was to use a range table. Either a mathematician worked out ranges to produce a table, or more likely they literally fired the mortar are various angles and measured to range the shell went.
The range table was a list of elevations in degrees or mils and the range the shell would travel. When you knew the range you could look it up on the table to get the elevation.
Modern systems use formulas built into a computer to generate the required elevation.
Elevation can be set fairly easily using a spirit level/bubble to get level and a measuring device to shows how many degrees you are from that level."
I was going to edit this in, but its a lengthy explanation. Had to make sure my physics teacher from highschool wasnt yankin my leg.
"Basically maths is used to aim a mortar (I'm excluding direct fire where you can see the target from the mortar here, which uses part of what I describe).
First you need the direction, in degrees or mils (miliradians 6400 to a circle).
In older times this could be done with a map and a protractor. Now it's done with GPS positioning (for the target you combine your own GPS position with a laser range finder + compass to get the direction and distance to target, and from there its position), and a computer that does some basic trigonometry.
Then you need range, also pretty simple with a map and ruler, or GPS coordinates and simple maths.
Then you need to aim the mortar.
Fairly simple to set the direction using a compass (they set up sticks at certain directions and then measure offsets. If you set up a stick at due north and want to fire at 10 degrees, the you set your mortar sight to 10 degrees left of gun, and rotate your mortar so the sight is looking directly at the stick. You know know your mortar is facing 10 degrees right of north).
For the range, the old system was to use a range table. Either a mathematician worked out ranges to produce a table, or more likely they literally fired the mortar are various angles and measured to range the shell went.
The range table was a list of elevations in degrees or mils and the range the shell would travel. When you knew the range you could look it up on the table to get the elevation.
Modern systems use formulas built into a computer to generate the required elevation.
Elevation can be set fairly easily using a spirit level/bubble to get level and a measuring device to shows how many degrees you are from that level."