60 Second Dive Time

[Iron Budokan]

I started reading Beach's Submarine! (eh) and in it he describes how it takes sixty seconds for a Gato to dive.

Are You Effing Me? Sixty seconds? Each one an eternity between you and the kamikaze diving out of the sun...

And I thought those Type IXs were slow. Oh, cripes....! :o

[flintlock]

Hey look at the bright side: if your watch calls ALLAAARRRRMMMM, the cook will still have time to hop up on deck and toss last night's leftovers overboard, and wander back to the conning tower at a liesurely stroll.

Seriously though, it took that long? :huh:

[Mush Martin]

Dont feel hard done by Ive been researching WWI Royal Navy K class subs
and the average dive time for a steam powered fleet sub was 5min's and the
record was 3.5min's. it could be worse.

Gato could dive quicker properly trimmed trained and drilled at speed.

MM

[Ducimus]

If I were you all, id get some stick time on an IXD2. :D Its very similar to a gato.
(edit: except it moved faster both submerged and surfaced, had more tubes to fire, and NO externally stored torpedo's ;)

[Subnuts]

Hence, the advantage of having a radar that could detect aircraft from ten miles away, right from the beginning of the war. :yep:

[Hartmann]

I started reading Beach's Submarine! (eh) and in it he describes how it takes sixty seconds for a Gato to dive.

Are You Effing Me? Sixty seconds? Each one an eternity between you and the kamikaze diving out of the sun...

And I thought those Type IXs were slow. Oh, cripes....! :o

Great book !:yep: i read it some time ago .

I played a lot with sh1 and a IXB is a lot faster in dive times compared with a Gato.

[bookworm_020]

Dont feel hard done by Ive been researching WWI Royal Navy K class subs
and the average dive time for a steam powered fleet sub was 5min's and the
record was 3.5min's. it could be worse.
MM

They were steam powered (they had turbines) It took theat long to smouther the bolier fires and to stow and seal the funnels. Yous can see this was not a good class of subs to be on. Many were lost through collision, either with there sister subs or destroyers when on training cruisers. Some were lost when the funnel seal failed and flooded the boat.
Even when it dived it was no fun, with all the hot machinery taking a long time to cool. It would start to make you long for the trenches of France!

[Finback]

By the end of the war they had trimmed this time to about 30 seconds. What they needed to do was cut back the conning tower fairing (sp?) and add a whole s**t-load more of free-flood holes in the superstructure.

Don't despair though. With SD/SG/SJ radar we should have ample warning to get under. Well--actually we'll be starting with SD radar (air detection) which had a pattern like a 4 leaf clover with blind spots inside the leaves. So make sure you pack extra carrots for your lookouts :shifty: .

Cheers!!!

[Sailor Steve]

Here's the full procedure:
http://www.maritime.org/fleetsub/chap18.htm#18A

Remember a Gato is a lot heavier than the average u-boat, which means it responds more slowly to every input. Also look down to D: Phraseology. It lists all the orders and everything which must be done during the dive process.

@flintlock: Good point about the cook, but on an American boat they don't say "Alarm", they say "Clear the bridge! DIVE! DIVE!" and ring the klaxon twice. Get's peoples' attention real good.

[BellJack95]

I found a link to the Fine Art Model company's site that offers a model of the Gato/Baleo sub and the description had an interesting comment about the average dive times for the US Gato and Baleo class.


"The increased volume of the conning tower appurtenances led to a notable increase in crash-dive time. The U.S. Navy attached little importance to this. Minimum dive times of 50–60 seconds, which would have been unacceptable in Atlantic operations, were adequate for the kind of warfare being carried out in the Pacific. The excellent radar outfit gave adequate warning of an approaching enemy. "

The link is: http://www.fineartmodels.com/pages/product.asp?content_area=3&sub_area=11&product_area=68

The earlier post by Finback about radar being very important for these subs, due to the slow dive times, is echoed in this comment. Just another knowledge nugget that the Pacific and the Atlantic were very different combat theatres.

[flintlock]

on an American boat they don't say "Alarm", they say "Clear the bridge! DIVE! DIVE!" and ring the klaxon twice. Get's peoples' attention real good. Indeed, you're correct.

I can sometimes still hear that Klaxon ringing and and Clark Gable yelling "dive! dive!" from Run Silent, Run Deep, during the repeated and lengthy training drill where Gable insists he wants to be level at 50' and be ready to fire.

[nattydread]

I think with good traiing some guys got it down to 45-50 secs...maybe a tad better. I gotta go back to my memoirs.

[sunvalleyslim]

Natty,
You got it down. It was all about training, all about wanting to survive...
Just think about being a lookout, ever searching for that contact, wanting to be the first to report. Seventy plus men below relying on you...
The Officer of the Deck screaming "Lookouts Below"
The diving claxton blaring
The officer yelling "Dive, Dive"
Tumbling down the ladder to your diving station
The Chief of the Boat yelling the "Christmas Tree is Green"
The Officer of the Deck dogging the conning tower hatch
Then down to the Control Room, where you mann your planes station
and the Diving Officer says "Full Down on the Bow Planes"
'Fifteen Degrees Up on the Stern Planes"
"Flood Negative"
"Ahead Flank"
And you watch, as ever so slowly as the depth gauge creeps to safety
You don't count seconds....You wait for the explosions....and pray....

[CCIP]

I'd be very happy if, as your crew improved, so did your average dive time in SHIV :up:

[NEON DEON]

The following comes from the USS Pampanito web site a Balao class submarine and very close relative of the Gato:

"A World War II submarine spent most of its time on the surface where it could travel quickly and more easily find its targets. She dove to make stealthy attacks or escapes from the enemy. To make it possible for the crew to walk outside the boat while on the surface, and to protect equipment that is not in the pressure hull, the main deck is built up over the pressure hull. The space between the pressure hull and the deck is the free-flooding superstructure. The many holes that are visible allow air to escape and water to flood this space. Any trapped air would slow down the dive. Pampanito can go from the surface to 60 foot depth in under 30 seconds."

http://www.maritime.org/tour/tadeck.htm

[nattydread]

Yeah, i found in one of my 5 or so WWII US sub memoirs that the USS Jack did its first dive in 70 secs, but the Skipper was aiming for 30-35secs. Within their second week they were routinly doing 45secs.
These references (paraphrased) are from 'Silent Running: My years on a World War II Attack Submarine" By: James F. Calvert pg. 7

He says the secret to fast diving was training, practice and steep dives. So steep that initailly you feared the sub was going out of control. So steep you have to properly stow stuff so they wouldnt fall out all over the place it sounds.

I certainly hope the game models the increased ability for veteran and well trained crews to accomplish such fast dives. I wouldnt mind this requiring we actually drill and maintain or crews efficiency for crash dives and other emergency procedures(drills for damage control, flooding, fires, etc).

Ill come back and edit once i can find their fastest dive time.

Also the Skipper(Dykers) at the time was drilling into them the NECCESSITY for dives around 30 secs to survive air attacks (see pg 6).

[Mush Martin]

If I were you all, id get some stick time on an IXD2. :D Its very similar to a gato.
(edit: except it moved faster both submerged and surfaced, had more tubes to fire, and NO externally stored torpedo's ;)

wasnt Gato faster on the surface?

[Mush Martin]

Dont feel hard done by Ive been researching WWI Royal Navy K class subs
and the average dive time for a steam powered fleet sub was 5min's and the
record was 3.5min's. it could be worse.
MM
They were steam powered (they had turbines) It took theat long to smouther the bolier fires and to stow and seal the funnels. Yous can see this was not a good class of subs to be on. Many were lost through collision, either with there sister subs or destroyers when on training cruisers. Some were lost when the funnel seal failed and flooded the boat.
Even when it dived it was no fun, with all the hot machinery taking a long time to cool. It would start to make you long for the trenches of France!

Im going to do a bit on the K class and the "battle of may island"
for the imperial flotillas forum. ill let you know when I get to it.
MM

[geetrue]

Natty,
You got it down. It was all about training, all about wanting to survive...
Just think about being a lookout, ever searching for that contact, wanting to be the first to report. Seventy plus men below relying on you...
The Officer of the Deck screaming "Lookouts Below"
The diving claxton blaring
The officer yelling "Dive, Dive"
Tumbling down the ladder to your diving station
The Chief of the Boat yelling the "Christmas Tree is Green"
The Officer of the Deck dogging the conning tower hatch
Then down to the Control Room, where you mann your planes station
and the Diving Officer says "Full Down on the Bow Planes"
'Fifteen Degrees Up on the Stern Planes"
"Flood Negative"
"Ahead Flank"
And you watch, as ever so slowly as the depth gauge creeps to safety
You don't count seconds....You wait for the explosions....and pray....

Sunvalleyslim ... you and me are the two best guys on this forum and
I'm not too sure about you ... :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Seriously though, we're the only two that have had to clear the bridge in a hurry. We were both in the old boats ... sunvalleyslim's boat was older than mine, but mine was bigger and sank faster.

The USS Salmon SS-573 could be at 60' in 30 seconds going all ahead full and rigged for dive, just like in the movies men are doing something all over the boat when she dives. Valves have to be shut and buttons have to be pushed and hatches have to be dogged, sometimes all hands not actually on watch have to race to the stern room to get the down angle off.

I'll never forget my first dive or I should say the first time I had to clear the bridge. When I reported on board the USS Salmon I has just turned 19 years old a week before and it was just three days after the Threasher had sunk.

The COB said find a bunk and then pointed to one behind the hatch from the crews mess to the crew quarters, the one that kept opening with the sickening suction sound (they have to get their air from somewhere) of four big diesel engines running, three racks high and I got the middle one with two stinky zippered clothes bags hanging from the other two, but that didn't matter as the cook was the next person I got to meet.

He showed me the sink and gave me an apron. I was the next messcook (and the only one) and I had to wait six (6) weeks for my replacement to come aboard, boy was I happy to see him.

I was washing dishes one time when the captain got on the 1 MC and said, "If anyone hasn't made a dive from the bridge yet ... come on up" We were just off the coast of California usually somewhere near San Clemente Island doing training exercises.

Tony the cook says, "Hey messcook have you ever cleared the bridge"? I said, "No, all I've done is empty the trash from the sail" I had never been up that high, it was forty feet from the keel to the top of that huge sail that had been built for radar picket duty in the Atlantic ocean. He said, "Go, go, don't keep the captain waiting"

So I hurried on up to control room where the COB said, "You here for clearing the bridge" I said, "Yes sir" He said, "Don't call me sir" He hands me a foul weather jacket to put over my apron and then puts a pair of binoculars around my neck and points up, "Go on up the captain is waiting for you"

The next level up is the conning tower where the helmsman was at ... everyone was sort of grining at me, but I couldn't figure that out. You have to understand that I was born and raised in Texas and I'm kind of slow.

So, I go on up to the bridge and get to meet the captain for the first time face to face. He was grining too and I was in awe of my surroundings, sort of looking around at the magnificent view.

The captain says, "Okay were going to pull the plug and you go first" "Just clear the bridge and I'll dog the hatch" I said, "Yes sir"

Well, he yells dive, dive and I wandered over to that big hole starring at me and I wanted to make sure my foot was just right for the first rung, but that was not my captains intention to let me pussy foot down that ladder. I forget his exact words, but remember officer's are gentleman except when clearing the bridge on a 350' long submarine in the Pacific Ocean on a training exercise, especially on a boat that can be at 60' in 30 seconds (if we were going full speed).

He was steping on my head, he was stepping on my hands, he was doging the hatch to the bridge so fast that he was on top of me before I could get to the conn ... everyone is yelling at me to keep going and get on the planes down in the control room one more level down. So I started down the ladder and everyone (including the captian) is yelling jump. jump. So I jumped landing in a heap at the bottom of the ladder in control room with everyone laughing at me.

My fingers were bloody the skin had been broken, I was bruised, the binoculars had come up and hit me in the teeth and in the face, I was flustered, I was hot, I was embarrassed. Captain said, "You'll do better next time" as they prepared to glide away under the ocean.

I slunk back to the galley and my dish washing, knowing that something important had happened that day. I had been introduced to how to be a lookout on a U.S. Navy submarine.

Over the next few months I learned how to do it the right way, first by tucking the binoculars inside of my jacket and by kicking my legs out from underneath me and letting my hands litely grab the long rung handle on the ladders and just slide down one level, hit the hatch to the second level, grab the bow plane seat and joy stick my way to the depth the OOD ordered, but how could I ever forget that first introduction to becoming one with them ... :lol:

Here's a picture of the best submarine to ever slide beneath the waves ... SS-573

http://theworldwideweather.com/PhotoDraw31.jpg

[Finback]

Great story geetrue!!! Thank You!

:yep:

[Sailor Steve]

If I were you all, id get some stick time on an IXD2. :D Its very similar to a gato.
(edit: except it moved faster both submerged and surfaced, had more tubes to fire, and NO externally stored torpedo's ;)

wasnt Gato faster on the surface?
By a knot or so. Gatos were rated at 20.25 knots; reports from captains claimed just over 21.

[Finback]

and by all reports--a little more when on the way back to port or being chased by a DD :hmm: .

;)

[flintlock]

IXD2. Its very similar to a gato. except it moved faster both submerged and surfaced
wasnt Gato faster on the surface? The answer to your question is right there in the snippet you quoted.

;)

[Ducimus]

If I were you all, id get some stick time on an IXD2. :D Its very similar to a gato.
(edit: except it moved faster both submerged and surfaced, had more tubes to fire, and NO externally stored torpedo's ;)

wasnt Gato faster on the surface?
By a knot or so. Gatos were rated at 20.25 knots; reports from captains claimed just over 21.

I need to go back to english class in grammer school i guess. When i edited my post , by "it" i was refering to the gato.