[SS Guy]

I don't remember our O2 capacity but it was lots less than 60 days.

The diesel I rode you could stay down about 36 to 40 hours with everyone still smoking before the air went totally to hell. Killer headaches. Couldn't light a match or keep a smoke lit if you could manage to light one. Oldman would finally snorkle or surface and ventilate and headaches would go away. Quickly. Once you lit off the diesels the air took off like a shot to the enginerooms, was amazing to see.

SS Guy

[Robert A Cook PE]

Air still does that when you run the diesel on the nukes: Lot of people think the snorkel provides air to the diesel -> actually, it dumps air into the general fan room, only a little bit, if any, some of which goes directly to the diesel.

The diesel actually pulled combustion air directly from the diesel room (AMR) on 688's, and the snorkel dumped makeup air into the sub as a whole. If the DOOW dunked the snorkel mast, everybody would suck vacuum until he got it back up again. To pull smoke or fumes (in a drill for example) from some compartment, you'd line up vent valves from that compartment so the AMR would pull it's air into the diesel, burn it, and pass the junk overboard.

Deepest we got was 90+ feet with the diesel still (trying to) run. CO was pissed!

(Best I can tell from tracing vent ducts, valves, and AMR lineups on the WWII boats and German boats, the older diesels worked the same way.