The Ship Model Forum

Eh, not quite. You're forgetting a pretty big difference that makes all the difference. Burkes have both steel hull and super structure. The Spruance and Ticonderoga-classes have steel hulls and aluminum super structure, which is about 3/8 of the ship's material. Aluminum weighs 40% that of steel. With that in mind and the sheer dimension differences, it's pretty clear how much extra internal volume a Spruance has than a Burke, or in the case of my proposal, a modernized Kidd with an RCS reduced super structure and masts.

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No, absolutely not clear. I have not seen a single argument why they should be more capable. They have less cells (if the advertisement text is right, 736), i.e. less capable. All the other advantages every active phased array radar has. And that is also true for short ranges. An APAR radar e.g. can track 1000 targets (not only 400) and can be in addition used to guide missiles. The advertisement texts for CEAFAR, APAR, Samson etc. are for sure even more impressive than the one for TRS-3D, a cheap antenna for cheaper ships.


@ navydavesof: the superstructure is made of aluminium and the superstructure has more volume than a Arleigh Burke, therefore that does not tell us anything about the volume of the hull if the larger superstructure has less weight. If a more voluminous hull would be needed, a lengthened Arleigh Burke hull would be still much more optimal than a narrow Spruance class hull with its old-fashioned form. But anyway needed is a cheaper ship, because otherwise not more ships are possible. A high-end Spruance class was at its time the opposite of a cheap ASW ship, the same is true for a lengthened Arleigh Burke or a new destroyer/cruiser design.

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Maxim...no. You called out the ship's displacement, not "hull" or hull vs structure or only the hull's displacement without the super structure. You called it out as:

Don't be dishonest with yourself or with us. If you continue to be sloshy with your data, you will likely lose credibility and be completely ignored in the discussions.

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Proper Preparation Prevents Poor Performance

Yes, but for that I have seen NO argument. It is cheaper, for sure. But not more capable, also not more capable at short ranges. The more advanced (but more expensive) radars are also more precise at short ranges - and that you can see in the number of targets. If you argue that the radar would be sufficient for e.g. a frigate, state that. But that is not the same as more capable.

@ navydavesof: You said that the Spruance class uses aluminium for the superstructure, which is lighter than steel. True. But the superstructure of a Spruance is also much larger. Do you know if the superstructure of a Spruance weights more or less than a Arleigh Burke superstructure? The material alone does not answer that question (I do not know the answer). It was your argument that the material would indicate that the Spruance hull has more volume even though the displacement is less.

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The bulwarks at the Ticonderoga class show that in that case the loaded weight was too much for the normal hull so that they had to add them to save enough freeboard.

In case of the Arleigh Burke the biggest obstacle for a second 64 cell launcher is hull length - for sure not width. To calculate half the max beam appears massively overdoing, even 75% could be too much. I have not seen any drawings showing such a hull form.

But anyway: for more ships, cheaper ships would be necessary, not expensive ones - and therefore not a hull with two 64 cell VLS or something similar. For a new design a modern hull design and not an nearly 50 year old (Spruance) or 30 year old (Arleigh Burke) one should be always better. I do not understand the fascination for old-fashioned designs. That reminds to the US Navy after the Civil War, the dark ages of the US Navy

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The Spruances also had no bulwarks, but the Ticonderogas need them because of the extra weight. The Arleigh Burke hull appears to be optimised for better seakeeping compared to a Spruance, e.g. regarding lengh/width ratio or the bow form.


Hulls improved regarding stealth and economics in the last decades. Zumwalt is not (yet?) a good example, because it is massively optimised regarding stealth and its seagoing capacities are to be tested (the stability doubts are well-known, some expected because of the tumblehome hull form, but the wavepiercing bow can be an improvement and that design is for sure new and not related to older ships at all). The LCS are too much optimised for speed to be a positive example. But there not only USN designs Compare e.g. modern Italian or French designs with an Arleigh Burke and there are many details making the Arleigh Burke looking old-fashioned. But there are a lot of new developments in hull design in recent years, e.g. regarding bow forms (X-bow, axe bow etc.), many promising better seakeeping and economics. Actually there is now much more progress than in the second half of the 20th century. But it is mainly applied for offshore ships, some for other types of ships, e.g. cruise ships, but hardly yet for warships.

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There is a big difference between a ram bow and a waverpiercer! The only look similar, but they have very different functions and therefore design. The same is true for the axe bow. The bow of a Fletcher is not even remotely similar to an axe bow! To call the bow of Yorktown an axe bow is strange. Please check what an axe bow is! A very superficial look on it will not help

An ram bow makes a ship wet, it can not displace the waves and it is also not optimised for wavepiercing (but for ramming!). A wavepiercer bow is designed to reduce the pitching movement and by that is should reduce the wetness and loss of speed. For this also the upper part of the bow is important, not only the area around the waterline. A wavepiercer works in that way that with an rising wave at bow the buoyancy is not increased (as in case of a conventional bow, e.g. of Yorktown) and by that the upward movement is reduced - and that decreases the downward movement when the bow reaches the trough and by that pitching is reduced.

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Sorry, no, a waverpiercer is not a ram bow. The shape of the bow is different - there are different designs of wavepiercers, but non is similar in design to a ram bow. The similarity is as similar as a SPS-49 radar antenna is to a fisher's net, both look net like...

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Sorry, but that cannot be serious, especially the later comparison of Zumwalt and Connecticut!? How you would like to judge the form of the bow from that view!? And even in that drawing is not similar. For me that gave the impression of someone arguing that two grey ships are the same, because both are grey...

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