So I started testing the repair times on the different segment size bridges by the engineering battalions. Here was my test setup:
1. All engineering units approach the bridge from the same side (I found, as a side note, that you can decrease the time to repair a bridge by sending engineers at it from both sides as opposed to just sending the engineers all from one side). I felt the approach from one side, however, was more realistic of what would happen in a campaign.
2. I ran my tests in the tactical engagement editor because I had more control over the setup of each individual test. I can only assume that the behavior of the engineers and the repair of the bridges is the same in the campaign.
3. Using the TE editor I placed each bridge in a "destroyed" state, i.e., if it had 5 segments making up the bridge then all 5 segments were destroyed to start with. The TE editor does not allow a "finer" level of control. A bridge is either all the way "destroyed" or all the way "repaired". Typically in a campaign this will usually not be the case so repair times will be shorter (as compared to my data) due to a lower number of segments on the bridge needing repair.
4. I placed each bridge in a state to initially belong to the U.S. Team. Engineering units also belonged to the U.S. team.
5. There was no enemy opposition (units) on the opposite side of the bridge from the engineers approach side. I found in my testing that if there are enemy units (especially enemy artillary/rocket units) on the opposite side to the friendly engineers then this enemy unit will engage the engineers. When engaged/opposed the time to capture and/or repair the bridge by the engineering units increased dramatically or repairs ceased all together.
6. All my tests were run at 64x time acceleration for reasons that will become obvious when looking at the resulting data.
7. I placed my engineering units next to the bridge and gave them orders to repair the bridge in the TE editor to exclude travel time from the nearest objective (i.e., town, city, depot, etc.).
8. I ran each test at least twice to verify my data was correct. Most tests I ran several times (3-4); these runs generated the range of values in the table due to variable repair times..
9. I ran all my tests in the Korean Theater. I couldn't find any four (4) segment bridges in this theater, hence, the empty space in the data.
10. All times are rounded to the nearest half an hour but actually repairs to a segment occurred right around 50 minutes after the hour every time.
11. Just for the record, the bridges I tested on were: Unch'on (1 segment), Ullyul (2 segments), Hyesan (3 segments), H'an-gang (5 segments) and Kimpo (15 segments).
This is the typical starting distance for the engineer units from the bridge they would be repairing.
Here are the results I got from my testing.
Observations:
1. Adding more engineers to a repair action can definitely shorten the total repair time for a bridge. Adding many (~10) engineers to a repair action really shortens the repair time. There is an inverse relationship between the number of engineering units assigned to the total time to complete the repair of a bridge.
2. It is a myth that multi-span bridges cannot be repaired. They can be repaired. They just take a LONG period of time to repair as compared to a single span bridge, that's all. I successfully repaired bridges from 1 segment all the way up to the largest 15 segment bridges. Towers and spans were all considered to be "segments" in my testing.
3. Repair times (even by multiple engineering units exceeding 3 in number) for totally destroyed multi-span bridges in excess of 5 segments are so long as to be not worth the effort in a campaign IMO. By the time a 10 to 15 segment bridge has been repaired it is likely the action will have moved well beyond that point and the campaign is likely to be either completed or nearing completion. As a reference point it took over 18 campaign days to repair a 15 segment bridge with four engineer units.
4. Approaching a bridge from both sides with engineering units does shorten the repair time when compared to approaching the bridge from just one side.
5. Capturing a bridge (defined as the action of the engineers moving atop the bridge) takes about 1.5 hours of game time no matter whether the bridge is a single span or a 15 span monster.
6. Engineers moving across a bridge location (and not stopping to repair it) do not make any repairs to the bridge.
7. Clearing (i.e., capturing) a buffer zone on the other side of the bridge from which the engineers make their approach appears to help them repair the bridge more quickly. I don't have any empirical data to back this up though. Just an observation I made when messing around with different combinations of factors.
8. The first segment to be repaired usually happens about 1.5 hours after the units capture (straddle) the bridge. I only noted this when testing with 4 simultaneous engineer units. The time to repair the first segment PROBABLY is longer for 3 or less engineering units and is PROBABLY shorter for 5 or more engineering units.
9. A bridge will remain at 0% and unusable until all of its segments are completely repaired.
10. Bridges consist of ramps, spans (sometimes), towers (sometimes) and bridge segments. The ramps and spans get repaired pretty quickly but the bridge and tower segments take longer.
11. The repair times for a particular size bridge are variable, meaning there is variation each time the bridge is repaired even if the same number of engineers are working on it each time. Hence the range given for most of the repair times.
