Depth Limit - When are you too deep?
 

I am currently shadowing and sniping at a very large convoy guarded by a Class C Submarine and two Black Swan DDs. As I go below the waves riding ot yet another depth charge attack, I had a question. I am at 160 meters at 1 knot on silent running. I have toyed with the idea of going deeper into the red. When I approach the line between yellow and red, I hear "Approaching critical depth, sir". Does that mean once I'm in the red I'm hosed, as in RIP or does that mean when you hit red you start suffering damage from bolts flying loose? At what depth have you found is the true 'critical depth'? This is a Type VII B by the way.

Also have another question - its' November, 1939. I dive right after I loose my torpedoes and I am at 50 -60 meters n my way to 100 + when the DDs arrive on scene. I do change course quite a lot, and I get pinged sporadically, where sometimes I can hear the ping bounce off my ship back to the DD. I have not taken damage yet, but they are dropping depth charges close to my position, albeit they are set to explode way to shallow. Once in a while I hear a loud one, but the ratio of shallow to deeper DCs is 4:1. Judging from this, do they know where I am and can't compute my depth so early in the war? Or, are they jut flailing about. Knowing this, I will switch things up down the road. Mainly becuase I know they'll get wiser and actually set the depth on their charges right, maybe on this patrol (I have two fish left to burn up).

You never know when your hull will get crushed. You're reasonably safe , unless you have damage, down to 150 meters. After that you start sweating.

For the other answers, there are three articles om my webbie , which cover evasive tactics.

Best of luck! :up:

Very Nice! Danka! Danka, very much! I will be reading this! :up:and sure enough I survived yet another depth charge attack. So far, they've been sweeping an area, blowing it up. Then when the convoy gets ahead of him by about 5 kms or so, he turns tail and hauls back to the convoy. So, at this point in the war I'm thinking 1. he knows I'm still hanging around close by but he's obligated to rejoin the convoy or 2. he really did lose me. I'd like to think it was 2. as later in the war they have dedicated ASW groups for this, which means I have to pull some rabbit out of my hat to escape. :huh:

For now I will enjoy the "Happy Times" and try to stay ahead of the learning curve :sunny:.

If your hull integrity is still 100% the VIIB should be able to reach 200m safely without sustaining damage, though, once you go beyond 220m that is when things really will start to get rough, after 220m its anybody's guess when the hull starts to buckle under the strain.

In the early part of the war, the allies were not very good at anti-submarine operations because there were a number of factors like;

1) they were not entirely sure what the capabilities of the U-boats were, as in, they were not certain how deep the U-Boat's could actually go to escape.

2) Asdic limitations. Early war Asdic was not great. The range on it was not very good, at 160m you should not be hearing any pings anymore. But, they will still be able to get you on hydrophones, so your best course of action is to keep silent running and silent speed.

3) Inexperience, most of these crews had little to no experience in hunting down enemy subs. They literally were in many cases just dropping depth charges and hoping for the best.

These three things played right into the U-boat's hands and they were sure to exploit these key factors in the early goings.

One of my favorite mods is the 'Crush Depth Randomizer'. It gives the historic calculated crush depth for each u-boat, and if you hit the randomize button then changes it to +10/-20%, so you really never know for sure!

I've taken a type VIIC down to around 220 and had no issues. That was with no damage though. I've taken my IXC recently down to a test depth of 240 and not sustained any damage. But I dared go no deeper.

I think that you can go as deep as you like. Just be wary once you get blow 220. Usually though the crew will tell you "we're taking damage sir". And if you aren't being DCed at that moment then you know its the depth.

From your site.

" The crew will automatically do this when you order a crash dive and dive to 72 meters. You can increase the speed of the dive by sending crew to the forward torpedo room.."




IS THIS TRUE?!?!?!?

There has been a topic about this last year or so.
I remember someone claiming, that the boat rides the waves better, when the crew is spread in a particular way...but I'm still not sure, whether this was all a hoax, regarding SH3.
I did some tests, but couldn't tell any difference.

*Avoids Inappropriate Joke*

You know your too deep when the hull is crying and your crew is sobbing and curled up in the corner.

How deep
 

UBM
On your next patrol when you are in deep water and away from any ships, save your game and test your sub.
You may find that with an undamaged sub you could get 400+m for a brief time and survive.
Using SH3CMDR with randomized settings, crush depth will vary +/- 200 m. during game play. Just as in real life, the sub commander will never know how deep he could go. If you play at 100% and never know how much, if any, damage your hull has sustained, and use SH3CMDR this will also be the case with you also.

I agree with that - i'm skippering a VIIC at present and I regularly take her down to 220m to escape the escorts. This is with no damage though, so equivalent of 100% hull integrity. I've imploded with what I thought was "light" damage at 190 meters though - so be very wary how deep you want to tread after you have taken some blows.

My hull integrity is 97%, thanks to some airattacks. I'm not sure I'll push it on this patrol. The DDs seem to run about 5 or 6 laps, ping away, drop their charges and run away to catch up with the convoy. The consensus seems that 180 -190 gets into 'your pushin you luck' range. For the next DD attack I'll try 170. It'd be only 10 more meters than last time.

Earlier today (well yesterday now) I ended up plummeting downwards due to flooding I got down to 365 m before I was crushed!

Don't know what damage I had though.

Well all i can say is you you dont suddenly go scrunch, there is lots of warnings, from the crew saying your taking damage (this is the most clear one as it meens you have entered the crush depth range), to the groaning sounds, glass breaking, bolts poping, water leaking in. I have never once spontaniously imploded, always the hull integrity steadily droped down to 0%.


"The crew will automatically do this when you order a crash dive and dive to 72 meters. You can increase the speed of the dive by sending crew to the forward torpedo room.."

I dont belive this is true, i have never seen such an effect in game, or anything indicating such a thing from my modding. However this claim is easy enough to prove or dissprove. Do two dives, one with all the crew you can stuff in the back of the boat (rear torpedo rooms, diesel, electric, rear crew compartment all filled), and the other dive with everyone cramed up front. Go to the periscope, get the speed up to flank speed on the surface, click the stopwatch and press the crash dive button, stop the stopwatch at 25 (or 50) meters. Repeat with the other crew arangement, then compare the two dive times.

@NeonSamurai

I agree....no noticeable difference :nope: