Assigning propellers to engine rooms

Is it possible to assign a propellers function to the integrity of an engine room?
How do the engines/prop working functions tie in to each other?

I found the props easy enough in the .sim file, but can't find any indication of how many engines/engine rooms a ship is supposed to have, aside from zones in the .zon file.

[Blue-Casket]

In my opinion propellers aren't part of the engine room.
With the most important reason that most of this part is outside the engine room itself and the only thing u can do on board is checking the lube oil of the propeller shaft if there isn't a leak.
How do the engines/prop working functions tie in to each other?

The crankshaft of the engine is connected to a special hydraulic clutch which then drives the propeller shaft.
depending on the revolutions of the engine (for example a turbine engine) the speed is too big and a special gearbox is installed called a reduction but i don't think the uboats used that because the engines are slow runners.
Also if you noticed when recharging batteries u can see that one engine is in high rpm and one in lower. and in exterior view u can only see one propeller work. The higher rpm is the one of the working propeller which is trying to keep the boat at speed while the other one is connected to the generator that whill recharge the batteries. This is done by that special clutch many ships have. then we call the other engine an auxilary engine.

I do not know if that's an answer to that question but maybe it is a good background information
in my opinion the most fragile part is the propeller shaft because it is long and a very weak spot outside the ship.

I guess Blue Casket is enterely right.
Propeller shafts were a weak spot, and this, not only outside but inside too, like abnormal vibrations on the shaft due to the continous run of engines on extended patrols, being its bearings made from white metal with a lube box, and to some extent, certain hard woods as Guayacán, (several species through south-central america; and this is the name some call the shaft bearings in spanish), but lower revolutions.
Some U-boats on the Monsun wave had problems with the bearings as i've read in several Kriegstagebuch, and definitely all german raiders had the same problem since the Panzerschiffs (i.e. Graf Spee) spent many months on patrol and some had to rely on the supply ships, among other things, to deliver white metal in order to change this parts.
On the case of Hilfskreuzer (german auxiliary cruisers) which were converted merchants, had mostly guayacán bearings that had to be changed from time to time (some had more than a year patrol, no port to call) and sometimes they did rely on lucky improvised spares.
And, yes, the reduction gearbox was mostly installed in turbine engines.

Detailed plans of U-570 of its various (an separated) systems here:
http://www.uboatarchive.net/U-570DesignBook.htm

Cheers

Thanks Blue-Casket, that's a good lesson in mechanics

Do you fix cars by any chance?

Just kiddin m8

You hit on exactly the point i was trying to find an answer to, when you said that the re-charging prop on the u-boat stops when it's charging the batteries.

I'm trying to link the propeller function on some ships in SH3 with the integrity of the engine room, so that when an engine room on a ship is destroyed or flooded, the relevant propeller stops working.

For aircraft carrier's with 3 engine/3 prop, and 4 engine/4 prop setups, i'd be much happier about the effects if i could actually link the function of a particular prop, to a particular engine room.

Any idea how it's achieved for the u-boats?
Hopefully i can then apply the same conditions with the ships.

Unfortunately, so far i've found no link between prop id's and engine zone id's to enable me to marry up their function.

Thanks to you also Nictalope, but i meant in relation to the ship models in SH3.

Even so, it's interesting to hear the problems they had with prop shafts during WW2, how they work, and what they're made of

A bit more historical knowledge gained.

[Blue-Casket]

OH no problem at all.
Well i study at a naval academy to become a chief engineer myself on board of a vessel.

And i spent 4 weeks in a small engine room with my teachers and they taught me alot there
For people who have never heard of it i know it can be difficult so i thought it would be a nice story to tell about how they make electricity aboard a vessel
If you have any more questions i will be happy to answer them !
And nice story about the bearings there!
Now they have a different way of keeping the water out and the shaft turning without damage on vessels but that's another story
probably checking the lube oil didn't exist either back then on those u boats, wish i had a book about it so i could study it closer.

[Blue-Casket]

nice link there Nictalope!

Boy they sure had a lot of pipings inside there !
Must have been hell figuring out which pipe is broken and the importance of it!

[tomfon]

Originally Posted by roadhogg

Is it possible to assign a propellers function to the integrity of an engine room?

Open the zones.cfg found at Ubisoft\SilentHunterIII\data directory. Scroll down till you find the Uboat Items section. Scroll down again till you see the following two blocks: [UPropellers1] and [UPropellers2]. Just under these two blocks there are another 4 blocks. The first two correspond to the propellers of type XXI Uboat while the following two blocks correspond to the propellers of type II.
There is a setting in each of these blocks called, Father and a number assigned to this setting. If you change this number then the propellers will be assigned to another compartment. How? Go to the beggining of the file. There you will see a block named after [Zones List]. It contains each of the Uboat's compartments and more. A number is assigned to each of them. So all you have to do is to find the compartment you want the propellers to be assigned to and then go to the blocks and change the number assigned to the "Father" to the appropriate number.