Depth Charge 200m lethal range?

[Baxii]

Ive been killed a few times now by depth charges that completely missed my ship by up to 200m and still did massive damage to my sub, this just seems rediculous. All the sources ive read claim that a ship had to be directly over a submarine to inflict damage, hence the change to forward-launched weapons. Also from what ive read it seems depth charges only have a 3-4 meter kill range, with damage out to 8-10 meters...

[Pyrrhus]

Because your uboat becomes more fragile at that depth due to higher water pressure.

[Ξ Fr. Ted]

Are you saying your boat was submerged at 200m, or the depth charges dropped 200m away?

If the latter, how deep were you submerged at the time?

[derstosstrupp]

Lethal range of a depth charge was anywhere from 50-100 m. When tests were done by the Germans on U-78, minor damage started happening from charges exploding 250 m away.

The change to forward-launched weapons (hedgehogs) was because the attacking escort lost ASDIC contact with the U-boat temporarily when increasing speed to make its depth charge run, leaving the U-boat a window of opportunity to make maneuvers. With forward-launching weapons, this problem is alleviated - the escort can maintain contact with the U-boat throughout.

[nathan]

Publicado originalmente por Baxii:

Ive been killed a few times now by depth charges that completely missed my ship by up to 200m and still did massive damage to my sub, this just seems rediculous. All the sources ive read claim that a ship had to be directly over a submarine to inflict damage, hence the change to forward-launched weapons. Also from what ive read it seems depth charges only have a 3-4 meter kill range, with damage out to 8-10 meters...

So, I am guessing you can't go deep enough to get past the crush depth? If I recall I did see a video that someone made for a test run and they gone past the crush depth but the submarine never took damage?

[Rockymnt]

Could be worse... at least they don't have a nuclear warhead.
See paragraph 3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depth_charge

[NotNice]

The post gives confusing information as to what actually happened. But in real life like the game depth charges do more damage the deeper the submarine is, and do even more damage if you hull is already damaged beforehand.

If you are at periscope depth then yes - a depth charge needs to be 5-10 meters away from you to do any sort of damage.

But at 200m with all the water pressure - a depth charge can be very far away and cause enough of a pressure spike to damage the submarine.

Of course in the end its just a game and games can never be perfect, and this one has many flaws, but the specific situation is not really that unreasonable.

[wolf310ii]

Publicado originalmente por derstosstrupp:

Lethal range of a depth charge was anywhere from 50-100 m. When tests were done by the Germans on U-78, minor damage started happening from charges exploding 250 m away.

No, the lethal range was way below 50m.
When the test were done, at 85m still only minor damage.
The lethal range was 0-12m (hedgehog 0m, 250kg depth charge 12m)

https://www.alternatewars.com/BBOW/Subsurface/Depth_Charge_Lethality.htm

[derstosstrupp]

Interesting, I stand corrected. Contemporary literature is grossly exaggerated then. Worth noting as well that most of the time the hull breach didn’t happen, it was typically through repeated pounding and an accumulation of damage over time that caused most boats to be sunk.

[Urfisch]

One should add, the hull of the type VIIC was very resistant against pressure (crush depth around 250-300m) and shockwaves.

This is, what lead me to one of the first posts here in the forums, mentioning there are too many leaks as a damage result from dc and too less equipment damage. U-534 is a good example, how a dc affected the hull. A plane dropped this charge and it exploded just a few meters below the surface. So the range was <10m. The damage was quite heavy, the boat began to sink immidiately over the stern, but not that fast the crew couldnt leave the boat. If you look at the damage, you can imagine how it might be in -100m and 50m away. A hull breach of such a size like at U-534 needed a hit <50m.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:U_534_at_historic_ships_display,_Birkenhead_-_geograph.org.uk_-_82820.jpg

There are also reports from other cases, where the hull was not even breached by direct gunfire.

[Bowfin]

Are there any good videos explaining good counter measures to DC for the UBoat game?

[nathan]

Publicado originalmente por Bowfin:

Are there any good videos explaining good counter measures to DC for the UBoat game?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqvSkjVOvj8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0OHROkUVJA

[Bowfin]

^
Thanks nathan

[Baxii]

To clarify for everyone, I was at 15-20m depth

[Carcajou101]

The deeper the explosion, the bigger the inner and outer shockwave that will ripped a submarine. You have better chance to survive at shallow depth being depth charged. Although at great depth you have more chance to evade it because of time to reach you and also they can be sure the exact depth you are.

[Baxii]

Publicado originalmente por Carcajou101:

The deeper the explosion, the bigger the inner and outer shockwave that will ripped a submarine. You have better chance to survive at shallow depth being depth charged. Although at great depth you have more chance to evade it because of time to reach you and also they can be sure the exact depth you are.

I was at 15m