The Ship Model Forum

The 150 meter variant of the LCS hullform would be extended to allow a 180 meter hull length and 20 meter waterline beam and 27 meter extreme beam.
Features would include:
Mk 71 eight inch MCLWG forward.
24 VLS strike length launchers
After mounted P/S Sideshooter Oto Melara LW 5/64 inch gun atop deckhouse with mechanically to the trunnion 21 cell RAM launcher on either side of the gunhouse
Additional level to deckhouse and large hangar to allow hangaring of MV-22s, CV-22s and MH-53K helos, VTUAVs
increased hull depth to allow another level allowing stowage/maintainance/repair of helos or Ospreys up to MH-53K or VTUAVs
Mission Bay elevator in the deckhouse hangar connecting flight deck to below deck mission bay.
Like the abortive DDH Hayler, aircraft numbers increased to 4 MH-53 helos or 4 V-22s or 6 H-60s.
Cross trained 'generalized' mission specialists rather than specialized trained mission specialized that have to be swapped out with mission modules
Two typhoon mounts with Hellfire missiles and 30 mm automatic gun
Mk 48 surface launched, from 21 inch TTs
Permament mounting of VDS and MFTA and permament mounted VDS for mine hunting.
Retractable for shallow water operations hull ASW and MCM
SPY-1F passively scanned radar w/ two tracking/illuminating radars
Compatible combat system
Loadout of ESSM/ASROC/Tomahawk/Standard-2/Standard-6/Standard-3 w/ CEC for Remote Launching/guidance and illumination of OTH SAMs and SM-3 ABMs
Increased electrical power generation
Diesel and gas turbine plant form LCS for less than 40 knot sprint speed
Increased fuel and stores capacity for longer radius, sprint, endurance on station
How would you create a LCS based frigate?

I would still use a better hull like the improved Spruance hull for these kind of capabilities. For this kind of project, LCS is a bad idea all around. Side shooter is also a sexy but bad idea. If your gun goes down, you lose your whole RAM capability. It is far better to have 2 RAM mounts then 1 Sideshooter.

Why are you set on using the LCS hulls?

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I am following starting this thread to see what kind of ship and characteristics using the LCS monohull scaled up in length/beam/height of deckhouse/hull depth.
Navydaveso suggested I start a thread.
Does the LCS hullform and never mind it's uses have any merit.
Sideshooter was a 1992 patent and could fire decoys from the RAM launcher.
I have two Sideshooters and not one and I would put one Sideshooter on deckhouse and one forward with a raised platform to permit superfiring over the eight inch gun.
Does that answer Sideshooter objections?
Have to go for the weekend as I use public computers.
See you all next week.

Some gentle suggestions:
1) Define the mission set for what you want this ship to do. I think you are asking a lot for a 180 meter long hull. For example: four (4) H-53 helicopters would be a real challenge to effectively operate off of a hull of this size. ABM mission seems to conflict with the mine sweeping, and small VLS loadout and lack of fire control radars.
2) The physical length/beam relationships of the hull seem to be off. usual displacement hull length to beam ratio for warships tends to be in the 8/9:1 region for displacement hulls.
3) Look at other "frigate sized" warships for a better perspective of design. The Russian/U.S. dynamic is very interesting. The Japanese Akizuki/Takanami/Murasame at 150 meters are modest destroyers (sometimes characterized as large frigates). German Type 124 and 125 are other examples as is the Krivak III/Talwar class.

By this time, displacement has gone up by a few thousand tons an
The waterline beam works out to 66 feet while the flight deck/main deck extreme beam is about 89 feet.
The mission/hangar bay has an extra level to allow the tilt rotors and MH-53Ks to be hangar stowed.
The beam is to enable a wide and long flight deck ala the LCS-2 Independence class that can act as a lily pad for MH-53K while the deckhouse has alot of space allocated to it and the raising of the deckhouse/hangar by one level permits hangar to be able to handle MH-53K.
SV-22 has an ASW/ASUW missions and is offered as H-60 replacement that must be replaced in the 2025-2030 timeline and MCV-22 mine hunter is possible as well as MV-22 USMC and CV-22 special ops version while the proposed EV-22 AEW offers AEW for surface combatant early warning.
Two MH-53 are stowed/maintained/repaired in the flight deck/main deck level hangar while a the three level mission bay can accomodate a pair of MH-53s.

Okay, you are talking about the trimaran LCS - please ignore my comments about the length to beam ratio.

I still see no way that this hull is going to effectively carry (that is deploy with) H-53s, let alone V-22s.

First of all, the H-53 is not just big and heavy airframe, it is a very limited asset, emergencies aside, it should only be deployed on ships where it can operate at full efficiency (LHAs, LHDs, LPDs, CVNs). An H-53 is by far the most maintenace intensive helicopter in the U.S. inventory by a factor of two over it's closest competitor. It really is not an aircraft suited for marginal operations. It also is going to go away this decade and *might be* replaced by the H-53K, which is really a completely new helicopter both structurely (finally an H-53 that can carry a hummer inside!), propulsion, and controls. So far, only the USMC are planning for the new 53K, and that is not comming until ~2028.

Second, a mine countermesures version of the Osprey is highly unlikely as the maximum speed the sonar can be towed will puts the V-22 in the transition zone from vertical flight (helicopter) to horizontal flight (airplane) mode. This is the where the V-22 is least stable and most likely to have an accident. Given that the V-22 has racked up the most Class A mishaps of any aircraft in the US military (at least before the increased the dollar definition of a mishap), this is clearly a bad idea. And this does not address the other issues of the V-22 (Hot Jet wash, hanger height, even more demanding maintenance than an H-53, etc.). The options are AW101 (unlikely given how Congress balked at the Marine Corps One procurement), the H-53, or the H-47.

Just curious, how do you plan on moving 15-36 ton aircraft around on your ship?

Hangar deck height is increased to allow the V-22 and H-53 to be properly increased.
The mission bay is similarly increased.
Aircraft are moved by small tractors used by CVNs, LHDs and the new class of LHAs.
Crew size is a major issue.
Perhaps the K variant of the H-53 will feature significantly better maintainence and availibility
Full size torpedo tubes offer increased capability against subs and surface ships.
This is a frigate or destroyer not a corvette having no real ability to defend itself in design, layout, armaments and EW
I had not considered the roles this ship and just tried to correct the baseline LCS lack of range, endurance, defensive and offensive armament and Level II or Level III survivability
I hoped that multiple mission modules could be embarked with the elevator from hangar to mission bay allow an increased number of a/c by using mission bay space at the cost of carrying different mission modules simultanously.

This is show stopper.

Many of the issues the LCS designs are now facing stems from failure to define and prioritize missions. Perhaps the most egregious was the unsupported requirement for 40+ knot speeds.

LCS was supposed to be a platform that addressed fleet shortfalls combat in the littorals: shallow water ASW, mine sweeping, counter missile boat and small boat swarms. And it was supposed to do this economically so the Navy could by dozens of them.

By growing the hull to 180 meters, you have effectively created a cruiser.

And simply “increasing hanger height does not make a ship a suitable platform for V-22s and H-53s. The Navy considered the HSV as an MCM craft to carry H-53s on an ad-hoc basis, but ended up rejecting this.

Generally the fleet coughs up an LPD, or better an LHA when it wants to support aerial MCM helicopters (H-53s). These ships were designed to operate these aircraft from day one, and a tremendous amount of thought has gone into this.

What the Navy is desperately short of is mine sweepers and strike craft.

This report shows that only one of 14 MCMVs could get underway!
http://www.informationdissemination.net ... -mine.html

I would go for the multi mission variant of the LCS. Adequate defensive and offensive armament but the price to pay for it may be too much.
I wonder what cost the stretched LCS hull multi mission variant might be worth the extra cost when the USN decides what to do with the LCS program.
The need for more hulls with useful offensive/defensive and Level II survivability is not going away so how we fix the program?
Design a need 'low mix' ship from a clean sheet of paper.
As for my stretched frigate, the great volume of reconfiguarative deckhouse and mission bay seemed like a good idea for expanded and much improved LCS or a frigate.
A frigate derivative of LCS seemed like a good idea:
mission bay to/from main deck hanger seems to have the raw space needed for H-53 and V-22 aircraft and any special acvamodation for these a/c seemed incorporating the a/c support with the mission module approach with rapid inserting of H-53/V-22 support modules and specialists trained for maintanence could be plugged in ala the regular swapping of the planned modules of LCS.
I wanted to make a 'real warship' out of this over priced, failure prone LCS.
Whether such an approach would make make LCS a 'real warship' is something I don't know.
Nonetheless, it makes for an interesting 'thought excercise'.

I'm trying to figure out why you want this hull so badly? is it because of the speed? I'm not an expert, but Im thinking if you expand this hull that much, you're going to lose your speed. Unless you increase the size of the plant, but then you have to increase size again to hold enough fuel to make all that speed worthwhile. I think the speed for the LCS is awesome, but its only really usefull in that size of ship with that mission. Once you start to get into a frigate sized ship, the amount of power and fuel to reach these type of speeds starts getting very cost inefective. Why not just design a frigate sized ship to accomplish what you seek?

My inflation adjusted two cents worth

Joe

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