The Ship Model Forum

Bob. We just talked about this. The Mk71 mechanism was based off the Mk45, ie single stack host and loading mechanism and not the two separate hoist propellant/projo hoists that then combined them on the cradle and rammed them of the Des Moines Mk16 gun.

The Mk71 is the next step in the Mk45 evolution. Unfortunately, the USN failed to take that next step.

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Indeed, if you have followed the NGFS time line, you would understand why the Mk71 was passed over....and you would also understand why the Mk71 is indeed the correct technology, 40 years old or not, to employ today.

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It is for sure not the correct technology, if the goal is more ships. An established gun already in production would be for sure cheaper. And making ships more expensive will reduce the number of ships not increase the number of ships. I mention again: there will be even less money available, when the current tax laws will be executed.

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If the goal is more ships, which are also more capable, than this goal is very very difficult to reach, because much more money would be needed, which is difficult in times in which the reduction of taxes is the apparently the main goal and the spending on defence in the USA is already very high compared to most other countries (for sure in absolute terms, but also relative its is extremely high).

I would think that the LCS have the problem of wrong priorities, e.g. they sacrifice a lot for speed.

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That sentence I had written already three or four times...

To summarize:
Goal: more ships

Problems:
a) which type of ship? How sophisticated? For which tasks?
b) increasing costs per ship (because of increasingly complex fighting systems)
c) likely decreasing state income (taxes), i.e. less money for the navy

For a) a simple question would have to be answered: for what more ships are necessary?

I had understand it that way that navy lacks ships for patrolling, e.g. against pirates and smugglers (weapon, drugs). It was ridiculous to deploy ships as sophisticated and expensive as an Arleigh Burke for this kind of tasks - but that was done because of the lack of alternatives! Even LSDs were deployed to hunt pirates.

For this kind of ships no new systems as new heavy guns are needed. The question is what kind of features such a ship should have. What kind of level of fighting capabilities?

Historically large navies always had a mix of high end warships and cheap ships for patrolling the seas. The US Navy lacked the later and decided to built LCS for that - for sure a problematic design with strange requirements, i.e. high speed, lightly built hull, uneconomic for patrolling and ineffective for a lot of other tasks.

But instead of such a design there were discussion here how to update high end ships and how to develop new high end ships. For sure also a problem, because all the programs of the US Navy to develop a new high end ship (DDG, CG) in the last decades failed (if we consider the Zumwalt class a failed program, which could be justified by the reduction of the class to just three ships) - and still Arleigh Burkes are built. But that is not part of the answer regarding quantity, because more such ships are not affordable. And there are no older ships to update, because all the older ships are at the end of the designed lifetime.

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Perhaps the original mission requirements for the Street Fighter (before it became the LCS). It pretty much described a FRAM I Gearing-class DD with a hull lengthened to that of a Perry-class with a medium range and counter battery set of radars that can also land an HH60 helo and a UAV hangar that, if in a pinch, could house a single HH-60. See my other LCS Flight II thread on how to make the Freedom-class meet the original mission requirements.

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I always had thought that the Streetfighter design was a enlarged fast attack craft and that the weird high speed requirement of the LCS is derived from that design.

The large hangar and flightdeck facilities of the LCS are one of the best features of both LCS classes and should be kept for an alternative design. These parts of the ship are not expensive and it is easy to use and equip the helicopters for different missions.

The main problem of the LCS classes are their lightly built hulls and the requirement for high speed. A hull optimised for ASW and economic operations - with a maximum speed of 27-30 kn - would fit much better. It would also allow to built a stronger ship more resistant to damage (the LCS are sometimes described to have a survivability of a civilian ship) and there would be also likely more space for future updates.

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"Haijun" means "navy" in Mandarin Chinese.

"You have enemies? Good. It means you stood up for something in your life."- Winston Churchill

For the most part, yes. The mission dictation was to be able to provide counter battery while performing MCM, UUV, and UAV operations near the coast with the ability to defeat small craft swarm assaults, engage in ASuW, self defense and area AAW. A huge part of that was to perform counter artillery fire. A large hangar to accommodate UAVs and a high speed was in there, too. The specific configuration called for the ship to have a "large number of deck guns".

This immediately calls one to the Gearing FRAM I type configuration. After much analysis, my idea is that this would indeed be a Gearing-type configuration on a Perry-length hull (3 deck guns, 2 fwd and 1 aft, with a helo/UAV hangar and landing pad amidships with the stack combined either as the after part of the forward structure or just ahead of the hangar.

Maxim, I would like your input on the above arrangement. Should the stack be attached to the forward structure or the hangar structure?

The radar would be the same as the Bertholf-class NSC with SWIP and the rest of a modern ECM package. The amidships that would typically have sliding padeyes and small craft would be dedicated to 16 ASCMs. The boats would be in a stern well deck like LCS-1 has. Just aft of the stack would be 3 Mk41-cell VLS arranged forward and aft splitting the hangar in two. This configuration could accommodate ESSM and VLASROC while separating the hangar down the middle.

If the Freedom variant is involved, it could only do this if it's strengthened a LOT. While there is volume to house 3 HH-60s, the deck and mission bay load-bearing beams can only hold one before they are projected to buckle, all that space is wasted. A huge strengthening redesign will have to be undertaken.

I agree. My LCS-1 Flight II thread breaks this down. First off it must be stated that I remove the gas turbine and relying on the diesel engines, strengthening all load bearing members, decks, thicken the hull, and most importantly, increase its draft to add stability.

In that thread, I explain how two 76mm guns, 16-32-cell Mk41 (one port, one starboard of the hangar on the flight deck), 8 Harpoon ASCMs, can all be fitted onto a new build Freedom-class.

However, a build based on the Gearing FRAM I arrangement on a Perry lengthed hull that reflects logical elements of the original mission requirements could accommodate 3x Mk45 Mod4 5" guns, 2x 330 round and one 500 round magazines with 24-32 Mk41 VLS, 8-16 Harpoon ASCMs, a NSC electronics package, two hangars to accommodate a large number of Shadow and ScanEagle UAVs or 2 HH-60s is extremely attractive.


In my LCS-1 Flight II thread, I explain how a Mk45 Mod4 5" gun with 320 rounds consisting of modern 5"/54 HE/HE-CVT/CCF reaches out to 19nm. Then we could use the 5"/38 rounds we have in the inventory with a CCF (GPS guidance). With the ERGM propellant charge, they could reach out to 30-35nm with precision guidance. Two 76mm guns, 16-32-cell Mk41 (one port, one starboard of the hangar on the flight deck), 8 Harpoon ASCMs, can all be fitted onto a new build Freedom-class
However, a build based on the Gearing FRAM I arrangement on a Perry lengthed hull that reflects logical elements of the original mission requirements could accommodate 3x Mk45 Mod4 5" guns, 2x 330 round and one 500 round magazines (100 of which could be long Excalibur extended range rounds) with 24-32 Mk41 VLS, 8-16 Harpoon ASCMs, a NSC electronics package, two hangars to accommodate a large number of Shadow and ScanEagle UAVs or 2 HH-60s is extremely attractive.

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I would consider a Oliver Hazard Perry class hull too small, especially it has not enough beam. I guess a larger hull with less armament is much cheaper than a smaller hull with more armament. And the larger hull can be upgraded in case more sophisticated ships are needed or simply to modernise the ships. In addition, it should be possible to improve seakeeping compared to a OHP hull. Also VLS launchers with hangars on both sides would require more beam. And I cannot really imagine a OHP hull with three 12.7 cm guns, 24-32 VLS, 8-16 harpoons plus two hangars - in such a small ship? Which had one 7.62 cm gun, one Mk 13 launcher and two hangars? Plus in Taiwanese ships 8 HF2 Anti-ship missiles? Or in Australian and Turkish ships plus an 8 cell VLS? That is much less than what you propose.

The Streetfighter concept - as well as the LCS aimed to fight swarms of boats - is weird. Which enemy would deploy only swarms of small boats? A suicidal tactic, which probably best would be countered by helicopters. I know that Iran has such boats - but Iran also has fast attack craft with anti-ship missiles, land-based anti-ship missiles and likely can deploy a significant number of aircraft - and therefore a LCS would have be too weak to survive. For what else so many guns would be needed? The Italian navy used 7.62 cm guns as CIWS, ok, but 12.7 cm guns cannot be used for that.

If you propose diesel propulsion - which would make sense regarding economic operations - the stacks would be relatively small. There could be a small one on the bridge complex and one before the hangar, if there is space for two engine rooms.

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Maxim, NavyDaveSof,

Despite earlier discussion on the feasbility of reactivating them, it appears the US DoD has decided against reactivating the Perry class FFGs:

Naval Today



Perhaps the very idea of reactivating older ships, such as the Kitty Hawk which has been slated for scrapping as posted before, is more trouble than it's worth to them. I'm not so sure about your idea of buying back the Kidd class DDGs from Taiwan either, although the fact they're currently active with the ROCN/Taiwan Navy will negate the reactivation costs.

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"Haijun" means "navy" in Mandarin Chinese.

"You have enemies? Good. It means you stood up for something in your life."- Winston Churchill

It is clear to me that SECNAV is not serious about executing the President's demand for a 355 ship fleet. He is obviously not on board with this idea. He just issued a memo stating that we will not do something as simple as reactivate 10 OHP-class FFGs in even the smallest capacity much less modernize them with any worthwhile combat systems.


Kitty Hawk was slated for the scrappers without logical explanation. To suddenly get her out of the running for reactivation, however is inline with the Navy's decisions over the past 15 years to eliminate the threat to new ship building; ie the entire Spruance-class. If we could have 20 Spruance DDs reactivated and added to the fleet for another 15-20 years through a SLEP, then we would not need these dumb LCSs and DDG-1000s....right....sink them....scrap them....get them out of the way.

No, unfortunately under current leadership, they will continue to "accept the risk" of our current force structure and not execute any efforts to grow the fleet under even the easiest circumstances.

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But it make perfect sense to scrap old 30 year old ships and replace them with new ones...

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No, it does not. The immediate demand is more ships now, not whenever the new ships happen to come around and wind up being proven. For perfect instance, we have a bunch of LCS's that over the past 9 years still have not proven any real combat capability. UAV platform is not a combat capability. They even have a poor time defending themselves much less anything else. Existing ships near the end of their service lives can be extended by 10-20 years could be modernized with combat system and SLEP for less than 1/2 the cost of a new LCS, a new ship that won't be around for 5-7 years. That answers the need in the near and mid term. This is how you expand a fleet in the near term with capable platforms even if it does not last 20+ years.

Unless you can magic up real FFGs in the time it would take to reactivate Perry FFs or modernize them to FFGs, your case does not stand up in the light of the need to immediately expand the fleet with capable warships.

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But there no immediately available old ships

They would have to be activated again, refitted to be able to serve longer and still e.g. the Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates would have a very similar fighting power to a LCS: one 7.62 cm gun, some smaller guns, torpedoes and hangar for two helicopters. I.e. they are on the level of an average OPV. And for less half the money you get a ship with a life time less than half of that of a new ship and the operating costs are likely much higher. I.e. they cost actually more.

Old ships come with several severe disadvantages, if a larger fleet is wanted and less money is available:

expensive (compared to their capabilities!) to refit to enable the ships to server longer than designed

expensive to maintain, because older ships require more repairs in average

expensive to operate (large crews, less economic to operate)

There are also good reasons why most navies (except of the very desperate and very inexperienced ones) do not want second hand USN ships - and this is apparently also true for the US Navy itself (which should know the condition and costs best).

If a larger fleet is the goal, the only option are CHEAPER ships and CHEAPER to operate ships. And for this new ships are needed. If they are desperately needed, then the US Navy would have to order proven designs abroad, which can be immediately built and which would take (for cheap ships!) c. 1-2 years. Or they order simply Legend class OPV for themselves without major modifications - would have very similar capabilities to OHP class frigates.

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Again you forget the urgency of the build up. Your are operating 10 years in the future. The dictation is NOW. I will let carr handle this one.

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1.) Nobody argued that it would be faster to built ships than to reactivate ships!?

2.) Why is the goal of a 355 ship fleet urgent? In which time period this goal should be reached and why? I would understand the word "urgency" in case of war - but we talking only about a political goal.

3.) To make 30 year old ships able to serve additional 10-20 years is a very expensive solution - as I had argued before. For a long term goal - and I have seen nothing urgent - only new ships make sense. This would be also clearly different from a simple reactivation, because navydavesof argued for a life time extension and modernisation - and indirectly that the ships should be more capable than the LCS. And that would require additional weapon and sensors, because the last OHP frigates had at the time of their decommissioning at very similar armament compared to the two LCS classes (but were otherwise completely outdated). For sure such a modernisation could be faster than building new ships - but the ships would have much less life time compared to new ships, would be less capable and would be more expensive to operate. All acceptable in case of an emergency, but not an optimal approach for a long term goal, because it would disproportionally increase costs (for the complete time these ships would be active).

4.) For sure it is possible to build new ships faster than in four or ten years - if it would be really urgent. An existing design as it is - without massive modifications - could be simply ordered and built with existing yards. For sure, there there are only a limited number of designs available from US yards, which could be built rapidly - e.g. more LCS or more Legend class. But there are plenty of other yards building warships outside of the US.

5.) The US Navy do not give any indication that there is an urgency - they asked a lot of different yards for designs and this process will take time. That makes perfect sense, if we talking about a long-term political goal and not about an emergency, which would be the time for desperate and expensive (and often very problematic) solutions. And the US Navy obviously is not interesting in keeping these old ships. It obviously was interested in decommissioning the Spruance class, it wants to reduce the number of old Ticonderoga class ships, it wanted to decommission the OHP class etc.

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