I bottomed my IXB last night in about 90 meters of water. Some kind of random event appeared to be affecting my electric engines and I couldn't maintain depth very well, and as I was being pursued by two C-Class destroyers, I decided to let her settle slowly to the bottom. I touched lightly with engines at 1 knot and still suffered minor damage and one percent of hull integrity. In this circumstance, the tactic worked - they never found me. This was likely due to the fact that I "got out of Dodge" by moving at flank speed away from where they originally spotted me, figuring that while the destroyers were charging towards me at 34 knots that they wouldn't be able to detect me anyway.
If the enemy has already detected you, bottoming out is suicide. They'll ping and depth charge you until you run out of air and are forced to surface. I've experienced this first hand.
Also note that in the game, getting close to the bottom is considered the same as being close to land in terms of time compression, so unless you adjust this value (e.g., SH3 Commander allows this option), you'll be playing in real-time until you raise up your boat a few meters.
Good luck and good hunting!
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