Does sitting on the bottom help you at all?

[maillemaker]

So is there any advantage in bottoming your sub on the bottom and sitting quiet?

Or do they hear you just the same? I would think the asdic would have a hard time differentiating you from the bottom?

[DanCanovas]

So is there any advantage in bottoming your sub on the bottom and sitting quiet?

Or do they hear you just the same? I would think the asdic would have a hard time differentiating you from the bottom?

in real life yes I think this would work, not in SH3 as far as I'm aware

[Penelope_Grey]

In my experiences it does work. They cannot pinpoint your exact location, the deeper the bottom is the better, so if for example the bottom is only 30m then chances are they will get you. But if its like 80m+ then you are sorted.

[Corsair]

Well just happened to sit on the bottom around 85m due to some flooding on board and I can tell you they dropped every can right on my head... boat lost with all hands after 5 patrols.:cry:
Will write a hundred times : "Even if it is a beautiful convoy, never attack in shallow waters..."

[Penelope_Grey]

If you hit the bottom with a bang, that is usually a dead giveaway. You have to set it down gently so not to make a racket.

[Chock]

As already mentioned, in real life it would probably be a viable tactic, although it probably wouldn't do your hydrophone heads any favours either.

But as far as I'm aware, from the way detection works in SH, it wouldn't make any difference.

[Penelope_Grey]

Bottoming the boat is moddeled in stock, and I do believe improved with GWX? I read it somewhere here.

[Spytrx]

real life - a saviour for many submarines of all countries when it got hot. There are some great tales of US subs sitting on the floor for 10 hours whilst the Jap fleet dropped hundreds of DC's on them

Vanilla of SH3 this trick doesn't work - might have something to do with the seabed being flat and you painting a real nice picture on their sonar :|\\

[Tricky]

It seemed to work for me on my last patrol. Botched a convoy attack just south of ireland and got dc'd pretty bad. Ended up sinking to the bottom and hitting with quite a bang. 137 meters deep. Because of the positive bouancy(sp, whew!) effect in gwx (after i got damage under control), i had started floating back to the surface. Around 128 meters they started detecting me again, but once I got settled in on the bottom and stayed there, I didnt once get detected and the escorts eventually sailed off.

In my opinion, it was the only thing that saved me from certain death.
Limped back to port with:
stern tube destroyed
stb and port electric engine destroyed
electric engine room compressor destroyed
port diesel engine destroyed
aft batteries destroyed
con tower heavily damanged

[Spytrx]

You were deep though - 127 mtrs I would take my chances and move away at 1kts... ;)


anything above 80mtrs though is suicide in the long run (especially in the later years of the war)

[Brag]

In Vanilla, I got severely damaged. Settled softly on bottom at 210 meters and stayed quiet. Managed to fix things once DDs left and limped back to willi.

[KeptinCranky]

worked for me in GWX too, several times. Usually I try to hover just a bit above the bottom...only trouble is I tend to get stupid when trying to go a little shallower and bump the stern into ground :damn::damn:

[Telgriff]

worked for me in GWX too, several times. Usually I try to hover just a bit above the bottom...only trouble is I tend to get stupid when trying to go a little shallower and bump the stern into ground :damn::damn:

Did the same off Gilbratar and couldnt get the bow off the bottom due to flooding weighing the entire front of the sub down.

[Heibges]

I believe in real life, it worked best in shallow water. Many uboats used it effectively when they went close to the English Coast late in the war.

The biggest danger from resting on the bottom was an oil leak. It would mark your exact spot because you weren't moving.

[jwatch]

At 20 km nw of Casablanca got flushed out by a DD and trawler. Took 150+ depth charges but not much damage. After lots of evasive moves and battery power, sat it out on the bottom (60 meters), 0 knots and silent. The escorts lost the scent and gave up after 2 1/2 hours. It worked for me! (That's with GWX for what it's worth)

[Crazy Ian]

Seems to work for me... but then I am in a type II so my active echo is hardly the largest..

[zombiewolf]

Nope Run silenT and SHALLOW.man the hydros and F5 station yourself

[Jimbuna]

Sitting on the bottom gives no benefit at all in both SH3 and GWX :nope:

[johnno74]

In real life sitting on the bottom is NOT a guarantee you won't be picked up.

It reduces your signature for passive sonar (hydrophones) as you don't have any engines (or pumps, but pumps aren't modelled in SH3...) running, but it doesn't help you much against active sonar - the sound waves largely pass through the hull and bounce off the inside of the hull - its actually the trapped air pocket which creates the strong return, as mentioned here. (http://www.memoriesofwar.com/veterans/white.asp)

As mentioned on that link, thats how BOLD decoys worked - they create air bubbles which create a sonar return like a submarine.

[Crazy Ian]

But in the real world, being too close to the bottom clutters up sonar... giving a skimmer operator lots of ghost targets... same went for being very shallow too..