Question about Rig for red

Kirk · 01-07-09, 08:58 PM

What is "Rig for red" and its purpose? I though that when a sub was on the surface red was not as visible as if using white. Can anyone tell me. Thanks?

JREX53 · 01-07-09, 09:09 PM

Rig for Red implies that the lights with red lenses are lit so that your eyes will become accustomed to the darkness, thus allowing you to see things at night better.

The control room and the berthing compartments are usually the only areas that are rigged for red.

Sandman_28054 · 01-07-09, 09:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JREX53

Rig for Red implies that the lights with red lenses are lit so that your eyes will become accustomed to the darkness, thus allowing you to see things at night better.

The control room and the berthing compartments are usually the only areas that are rigged for red.

That and, the ammount of light given off by red lenses, is 1/5 of what white light is. (Immagine a 60 watt light bulb verses a "nite-lite")

From a distance of 3000 yards, you could easily see a sub by the light shinning up throught the conning tower. With red lenses, it is possible, if the conditions were just right, for subs to sneek right up to within 1000 yards without being seen or detected.

Aramike · 01-07-09, 11:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sandman_28054

Quote:

Originally Posted by JREX53

Rig for Red implies that the lights with red lenses are lit so that your eyes will become accustomed to the darkness, thus allowing you to see things at night better.

The control room and the berthing compartments are usually the only areas that are rigged for red.

That and, the ammount of light given off by red lenses, is 1/5 of what white light is. (Immagine a 60 watt light bulb verses a "nite-lite")

From a distance of 3000 yards, you could easily see a sub by the light shinning up throught the conning tower. With red lenses, it is possible, if the conditions were just right, for subs to sneek right up to within 1000 yards without being seen or detected.

Query: is this modelled in the game?

Sandman_28054 · 01-08-09, 12:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aramike

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sandman_28054

Quote:

Originally Posted by JREX53

Rig for Red implies that the lights with red lenses are lit so that your eyes will become accustomed to the darkness, thus allowing you to see things at night better.

The control room and the berthing compartments are usually the only areas that are rigged for red.

That and, the ammount of light given off by red lenses, is 1/5 of what white light is. (Immagine a 60 watt light bulb verses a "nite-lite")

From a distance of 3000 yards, you could easily see a sub by the light shinning up throught the conning tower. With red lenses, it is possible, if the conditions were just right, for subs to sneek right up to within 1000 yards without being seen or detected.

Query: is this modelled in the game?

I don't really know.

Nine times out of ten when I'm running on the surface at night, I either have my head in the uzo or looking at the map.

But I have been able to sneek up to a convoy at night to within 1500-1000 yards.

Rockin Robbins · 01-08-09, 09:03 AM

A part of the problem of their difficulty in evaluating what the best color of light is that they didn't have any colored lights! All they had was incandescent lighting, which is uniformly......white! The best approximation they could come up with to give colored light was filters. If you'll look at Gino's photo, which I wish he had posted instead of only linked to, you'll see that the light has a very strong yellow component in it. Actually, I suspect that is more white than yellow and the color balance of the shot is wrong.

The upshot is that filtered light typically, and here specifically, is nowhere near a pure red light. Therefore they had to have significantly dimmer red light to minimize the white contamination that leaks through their filter.

To illustrate, Sky and Telescope magazine has a logo with white lettering on a red background. Find something similar and go into a closet with a flashlight with a red filter and a red LED flashlight. The red LED flashlight emits actual pure red light. Flip on your red filtered flashlight and read the white lettering. No problem. It's clearly visible. Why? It's because your light isn't red.

Now try it with the red LED flashlight. Shazzam!!! You can't see anything but a red rectangle. Why? Because white results from reflecting all colors of light striking it. Well, only red strikes the white lettering, so what color do you see? Red. Red against Red is no contrast and the lettering is invisible if your red light is pure.

If the submarines had pure red light available there would have been no reason to run those puppies at 1/5 normal brightness. They would have been less visible, more dark adapted with more comfortable light levels.

Irrelevant aside: What color is the moon? What color do you see? In actuality, the moon is a very, very dark gray, almost the same color as a briquette of charcoal. It seems to have some subtle brown shades in parts of it, but they really can't be detected without serious image enhancement. So why does it look white to us? Because we don't see with our eyes, we see with our brains. In this case, the brain sees the background sky for what it is: completely black. There is some light coming from the moon. It has no color (well, maybe that subtle brown undertone. Give me a break!) and is millions of times brighter than the background. The brain paints it white. That's called imputed color, mentally constructed from the contrast with its surroundings.

Soundman · 01-08-09, 09:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JREX53

Rig for Red implies that the lights with red lenses are lit so that your eyes will become accustomed to the darkness, thus allowing you to see things at night better.

The control room and the berthing compartments are usually the only areas that are rigged for red.

As a side note, I've read that skippers used a eyepatch at night over the eye they would use for looking through the scope and flip up the patch before viewing. The purpose was of course, to cause the pupil to dialate fully, allowing better night vision.

breadcatcher101 · 01-08-09, 11:16 AM

One of ours grounded onto a reef during WW2 at night. The commander was on the bridge and came in to check the charts to see where he was, as he was concerned about the reefs in the area.

The charts had the reefs marked off in red shade and the commander had red goggles on which prevented him from noting the reef locations.

Kirk · 01-07-09, 10:20 PM

Thank you Sandman. Someone ask me this question and that is what I said. They didn't believe me. Thanks again.

Gino · 01-07-09, 10:47 PM

Although most of us know about the 'Rig for Red' issue.

It was not always so...
Check this out: http://img176.imageshack.us/img176/8075/blue1nq8.jpg

This picture shows you one of the interior red lights of the USS Cod in Cleveland, Ohio.
As you can see it reads BLUE on the casing. Somewhere in time it was thought that blue light had the effect as described for red light. After experiments it was found that red light was better. So, you see that even something simple as rig-for-red had to be 'invented'. It was RIG FOR BLUE at one time

groetjes,

01-07-09, 08:58 PM	#1
Kirk Helmsman Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Pennsylvania Posts: 102 Downloads: 2 Uploads: 0	Question about Rig for red What is "Rig for red" and its purpose? I though that when a sub was on the surface red was not as visible as if using white. Can anyone tell me. Thanks? __________________ -Kirk

01-07-09, 09:09 PM	#2
JREX53 Frogman Join Date: Jan 2006 Posts: 300 Downloads: 353 Uploads: 13	Rig for Red implies that the lights with red lenses are lit so that your eyes will become accustomed to the darkness, thus allowing you to see things at night better. The control room and the berthing compartments are usually the only areas that are rigged for red. __________________ Jim

01-08-09, 09:03 AM	#6
Rockin Robbins Navy Seal Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: DeLand, FL Posts: 8,900 Downloads: 135 Uploads: 52	A part of the problem of their difficulty in evaluating what the best color of light is that they didn't have any colored lights! All they had was incandescent lighting, which is uniformly......white! The best approximation they could come up with to give colored light was filters. If you'll look at Gino's photo, which I wish he had posted instead of only linked to, you'll see that the light has a very strong yellow component in it. Actually, I suspect that is more white than yellow and the color balance of the shot is wrong. The upshot is that filtered light typically, and here specifically, is nowhere near a pure red light. Therefore they had to have significantly dimmer red light to minimize the white contamination that leaks through their filter. To illustrate, Sky and Telescope magazine has a logo with white lettering on a red background. Find something similar and go into a closet with a flashlight with a red filter and a red LED flashlight. The red LED flashlight emits actual pure red light. Flip on your red filtered flashlight and read the white lettering. No problem. It's clearly visible. Why? It's because your light isn't red. Now try it with the red LED flashlight. Shazzam!!! You can't see anything but a red rectangle. Why? Because white results from reflecting all colors of light striking it. Well, only red strikes the white lettering, so what color do you see? Red. Red against Red is no contrast and the lettering is invisible if your red light is pure. If the submarines had pure red light available there would have been no reason to run those puppies at 1/5 normal brightness. They would have been less visible, more dark adapted with more comfortable light levels. Irrelevant aside: What color is the moon? What color do you see? In actuality, the moon is a very, very dark gray, almost the same color as a briquette of charcoal. It seems to have some subtle brown shades in parts of it, but they really can't be detected without serious image enhancement. So why does it look white to us? Because we don't see with our eyes, we see with our brains. In this case, the brain sees the background sky for what it is: completely black. There is some light coming from the moon. It has no color (well, maybe that subtle brown undertone. Give me a break!) and is millions of times brighter than the background. The brain paints it white. That's called imputed color, mentally constructed from the contrast with its surroundings. __________________ Sub Skipper's Bag of Tricks, Slightly Subnuclear Mk 14 & Cutie, Slightly Subnuclear Deck Gun, EZPlot 2.0, TMOPlot, TMOKeys, SH4CMS

01-07-09, 10:20 PM	#9
Kirk Helmsman Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Pennsylvania Posts: 102 Downloads: 2 Uploads: 0	Thank you Sandman. Someone ask me this question and that is what I said. They didn't believe me. Thanks again. __________________ -Kirk

01-07-09, 10:47 PM	#10
Gino Pacific Sub Expert Join Date: Aug 2006 Location: Las Vegas, Nevada Posts: 148 Downloads: 56 Uploads: 0	Rig for Blue? Although most of us know about the 'Rig for Red' issue. It was not always so... Check this out: http://img176.imageshack.us/img176/8075/blue1nq8.jpg This picture shows you one of the interior red lights of the USS Cod in Cleveland, Ohio. As you can see it reads BLUE on the casing. Somewhere in time it was thought that blue light had the effect as described for red light. After experiments it was found that red light was better. So, you see that even something simple as rig-for-red had to be 'invented'. It was RIG FOR BLUE at one time groetjes, __________________ Gino

01-08-09, 11:16 AM	#8
breadcatcher101 Captain Join Date: Sep 2008 Location: Southeastern USA Posts: 546 Downloads: 1 Uploads: 0	One of ours grounded onto a reef during WW2 at night. The commander was on the bridge and came in to check the charts to see where he was, as he was concerned about the reefs in the area. The charts had the reefs marked off in red shade and the commander had red goggles on which prevented him from noting the reef locations.