I have much reading and research to carry on with. And thats great!
Welcome to DT. You can start with reading the following:
(i) a
2004 US Navy League article;
(ii) an old US article on
Anti-Submarine Warfare;
(iii) a '
2006 Australian Working Paper';
(iv) a
2008 paper by the Submarine Institute of Australia and a companion
presentation; and
(v) a 2009 article on '
Future Submarine Technology' by HDW engineers.
I know that these articles do not answer your questions but as you requested, I have provided links to these articles as jumping off points for your further research. There's also old threads in DT relating to submarines
here and
here. Feel free to take a look at the old threads. Further, there is a FPRI e-note that reviews the broad developments in Asia
here, which is quite useful to get a sense of the submarine numbers.
For the larger diesel-powered attack submarines you should read up on the Collins, Oyashios and Soyu classes of submarines which are designed for long transits, quickly and with minimum indiscretion. If I'm not wrong, these submarines use Raytheon’s AN/BYG-1 combat management system from the USN’s Virginia Class submarines which has requires a larger onboard power capability, which in turn, enhances their detection capabilities.
As I understand it, the Australians are even developing nondestructive techniques for inspection of glue for anechoic tiles (
link). Other coatings on submarines are fairly hi-tech materials science stuff - there's even Australian research on the coatings on submarine antennae to reduce water droplets on submarine antennae (
link). BTW, gf0012-aust used to work for an Australian company that supplied some tech that has been used in Singapore's Swedish made submarines (Challenger and Archer classes, which have been tropicalised' for operating in our waters), which are smaller. I'll not clarify further for gf0012-aust here unless he chooses to do so himself.
If you are interested here's a brief given in Singapore on '
Underwater Research Opportunities' given to Singaporeans. Singapore's Archer Class submarines are much smaller, with limited power. Some sources have speculated that small diesel-electric submarine like the Archer Class may have 3 megawatt-hours of energy stored in it's batteries. In contrast, if that same submarine turns on it's diesel engines it probably has about 300 megawatt-hours of stored energy in its full fuel oil tanks. With AIP, about 30 megawatt-hours of stored energy is available to power "hotel loads" (sensors, lights, air conditioning, heating, and other necessary auxiliaries). When a AIP submarine like the Archer Class uses one of it's two AIP engines, there might be 10-20 KW left over for propulsion, which is 15-30 horsepower (HP) - enough for 2-4 knots. If they want to move faster, it is necessary to draw upon battery power. AIP gives our submarines endurance, but, not mobility. Therefore, submarines like the Archer class are well suited when deployed as an anti-access/area denial tool - which is quite different from the role of the Australian and Japanese submarines.
Cheers
