TECH QUESTION , About decks awash !

[Stormfly]

Originally Posted by misha1967

I'm fairly certain that there were some Kaleuns out there using the tactic whether it was documented or not. After all, "invisibility" is the first, second, third and fourth commandment of a sub skipper, and surely all of them knew that the lower your profile to the enemy, the harder you were to spot.

you`re maybe right yes, i renember there was also a stupid "Kaleun" who sank the boat by not knowing how to operate the new sea toilet system which was useable while the sub was at dept.

If you compare the hight and size of a german sub`s cunning tower or the boat`s mass with the american version, you see that a pre flooded german sub only need a little mistake done by one of the dive plane operators to sink it then. If you have the cunning hatch closed, the advantage of a faster dive is maybe gone in that case. I dont think that a smart Kaleunt would take such a risk for the little advantage having a allready invisible small cunning tower 1 meter deeper. If you follow the handbook, you see that a german sub using the right "stern trim" was nearly invisible while approaching in a "dog`s curve" from the dark side at night. Last by not least, running decks awash is only a replacement of risc`s, visual detection was not the only problem. Why should they trade a maybe 5% lower visbility against a 20% higher sonar signature, keeping the same speed running pre flooded means higher rpm.