747400sp From United States, joined Aug 2003, 1670 posts, RR: 2 Posted (3 months 3 weeks 3 days 7 hours ago) and read 6286 times:
I was reading in navy time the the USN will only build two Zumwalt class ( DDG 1000) then restart the Arleigh Burke (DDG 51) line back up. It was plan for the USN to build 6 Zumwalt class DDGs, witch was design for shore bombardment. The Burke's class are more suited for carrier protection. Also Zumwalt was originally design to replace Spruance class DD, where Burke's was design to replace 50's and 60's era CG and DDG. It was stated that the money that would be save on just build two Zumwalt class ship, could go to building more San Antonio and Lewis & Clark class ships. Is the USN making a big mistake by only ordering two Zumwalt class ships?
Ken777 From United States, joined Mar 2004, 1949 posts, RR: 0 Reply 1, posted (3 months 3 weeks 3 days 4 hours ago) and read 6225 times:
I believe that the two are already signed off on and at least one has started construction. While it may seem poor economics to only build two I served on the USS Long Beach (CG(N)9) in the 60s and she was the only cruiser of that design. She also did very well during the two WestPac deployments I made on her - the assigned talk being PIRAZ. (A question for Navy pilots - is the PIRAZ task still operational?) The Long Beach, however, was not designed for close in support or any other activity close to hostile land. Too large a target and too much aluminum, especially in the radar box.
I also served on a DDG for my 3rd deployment and our gunfire support was up close. Very nice views of the costal land and lots of opportunities to watch fighters make their dives. At night we anchored in Da Nang Harbor and fired about 150 rounds randomly. The ship was designed to get up close and personal, unlike the Long Beach.
From what I have read, the DDG 1000 series was more like the Long Beach and would need to stay further away from hostile land - effectively reducing the missions it could undertake. For that reason alone I'm glad that it will not be a major program.
But then I'm the type that believes we should still be keeping the USS New Jersey operational. Now that ship could get up close and personal like no other in the fleet.
747400sp From United States, joined Aug 2003, 1670 posts, RR: 2 Reply 2, posted (3 months 3 weeks 3 days 3 hours ago) and read 6191 times:
Quoting Ken777 (Reply 1): But then I'm the type that believes we should still be keeping the USS New Jersey operational. Now that ship could get up close and personal like no other in the fleet.
That would be a nice ideal, but the USS New Jersey is over 60 years old.
Alien From Afghanistan, joined Mar 2008, 362 posts, RR: 0 Reply 3, posted (3 months 3 weeks 3 days 1 hour ago) and read 6145 times:
The Navy got this one right. The Zumwalt's cost was out of control. The ship was not really looking like it was the great leap in capability that it should have been. One of it's main missions, gunfire support, is of greatly diminished relevance.
On the other hand, I think building the two ships as planned still give the Navy the platform and power system to enable them to use these two ships as test beds for the advanced weapons and sensors that they Navy is planning to deploy in the coming years.
The Iowa's are great ships but their time has passed. The problem is not that they are 60 years old but that they require almost 2000 sailors each to run. While they where built 65 years ago they all have less than 20 years actual service so they would be fairly easy to bring back in to service.
Ken777 From United States, joined Mar 2004, 1949 posts, RR: 0 Reply 4, posted (3 months 3 weeks 2 days 14 hours ago) and read 5948 times:
I agree that the New Jersey would be expensive to operate and is "Old Navy", but nothing compares with the fire power of those 16" guns. That is why I would still like to see one true battleship still in the fleet.
GDB From United Kingdom, joined May 2001, 10165 posts, RR: 70 Reply 5, posted (3 months 3 weeks 2 days 13 hours ago) and read 5926 times:
Just been reading about this elsewhere, it sounds a procurement screw up of monumental proportions.
They might not yet even build those two either, whoever is in the White House next year will be sorely tempted to axe it.
Defence writer Stewart Slade has this to say;
At its simplest, nobody has any faith the ships will work and if they do work, nobody quite knows what they will be working for.
DDG-1000 has been a screwed program right from the start. The people behind it broke every single rule of naval design and consciously did not discuss the ship or her basic theoretical precepts with anybody. The ship was, you see, a break from the hidebound traditions of the past that tied the navy to obsolete ideas and prevented them from striding forward into the bright days of the future.
Those thirty words have doomed more naval programs than guns, torpedoes and missiles combined.
Some of the hide-bound conservative ideas they discarded included floating, moving, shooting, steering etc.
The big problem was that they changed everything in one go. They wanted new weapons, new electronics, new machinery, new crew levels, new hull design. Everything was new, everything was a major break with past practice. Of course, it all ended in tears, there's no way it could have done anything else (PS, check HPCA and you'll note I told everybody a week before the official announcement that this was going to happen).
Examples. The ship is supposed to use a radical hull form to reduce its radar cross section. . Great, only that hull form using a wave-piercing bow and tumblehome. Now, lets look at this more closely. Its a wave-piercing bow. That means it - uhhhh - pierces waves. In fact the water from the pierced wave floods over the deck, along the main deck, washes over the forward weaponry, hits the bridge and flows down the ship's side. Now, that water weighs quite a bit, several tens of tons in fact and its moving at the speed of the wave plus teh speed of the ship. That wave, when it hits the gun mount and bridge front is literally like driving into a brick wall at 60mph. The gun mount shield is made of fiberglass to reduce radar cross section. The wave also generates suction as it passes over the VLS system, sucks the doors open and floods the silos. The missiles don't like that. Spray is one thing (bad enough) but being immersed in several tons of water flowing down is quite another. Then we have the problem of the water flowing over the deck. It is strong nough to sweep men off their feet. In fact, its so dangerous that ships that operate under such conditions have to use submarine rules - nobody on deck. But to work the ship, we need people on deck. Uhhh, problem here?
Now tumblehome. This means the ship's sides slop inwards from the waterline, not outwards like normal ships do. Now, we take a slice through the ship at the waterline. That's called the ship's waterplane. There;s a thing called tons per inch immersion, the weight of water needed to sink the ship one inch. TPI is proportional to waterplane area. As the ship's waterplane area increases it requires more tons to make it sink an inch. As the waterplane decreases it requires fewer tons to make it sink per inch. Now, with a conventional flared hull, as the ship sinks in the water, its waterplane area increases, so it requires a steadily increasing rate of flooding to make the ship sink at a steady rate. If the rate of flooding does not increase, eventually the ship stops sinking. This cheers up the crew immensely.
However, with tumblehome, the waterplane area decreases as the ship sinks into the water. So, the ship will have a steadily-increasing rate of immersion at a steady rate of flooding. in short, for a steady rate of flooding, the ship sinks faster and faster. The ship will not stop sinking. This is immensely depressing.
The problem is the damage goes much further than that. As a ship with a conventional flared hull rolls, the increasing waterplane area gives her added buoyancy on the side that is submerging and gives her a moment that pushes upwards, back against the roll. That stabilizes her and she returns to an even keel. With a tumblehome hull, as the ship rolls, the decreasing waterplane area reduces buoyancy on the side that's going down, giving moment that pushes downwards in teh same direction as a roll. This destabilizes her so she rolls faster and faster until she goes over.
Having dealt with the hull design, we now move to the machinery. The DDG-1000 is supposed to have minimally-manned machinery spaces. This will save manpower etc etc etc. There's a problem, all of that automation doesn't work. Its troublesome, unreliable, extremely expensive and it needs somebody to watch it and make sure it does it's job. In fact, its useless. It gets worse. The purpose of a crew on a warship is not to make it goa round and do things. Its to try and patch the holes and put out teh fires when other warships do things to it. Repairing damage cannot be automated (did I tell you that DDG-1000 was supposed to have automated damage control systems ? Ah, forgot that but it doesn't matter, they didn't work either). So, having designed a hull that sinks if somebody looks at it crosswise, we now remove the people who were supposed to try and stop it sinking.
Now we come to the electronics. Great idea here. Put all the antennas into a single structure and we can cut RCS. That causes a problem called electronic interference. The systems all shut each other down. And they did. Very efficiently. The radar suite on DDG-1000 was the world's first self-jamming missile system. Oh, they took down the comms and gunnery fire control as well. Did I also mention that the flow noise from the wave-piercing bow was enough to prevent the sonar working? That was an easy problem to solve. Remove the sonar. Anyway easy way to solve the interference problems, use multi--functional antennas. That sounds good. One day, when they get them working, I'll let you know. MFAs are pretty good when used in their place but NOT for operating mutually incompatible systems.
The gun. Ah yes, the gun. It fires shells, 155mm ones. Guided shells whose electronics can withstand 40,000G. The acceleration in the gun barrel is 100,000G. Ooops. Problems. Then we come to the missiles. They;re in new silos, all along the deck edge. Can anybody see the problems with that? Like moment and rolling inertia? The designers couldn't which proves they know slightly less about the maritime environment than the deer currently eating the bushes outside my office window.
Now, all these problems are occurring at once and the fact that everything in the ship is new means that one can't be fixed until the rest are.
And that is why DDG-1000 got cancelled.
If only half of this is true, heads need to roll.
Then there is the LCS programme, large numbers of cheap vessels, for a range of tasks that traditional vessels are less good at, what with the focus on the littoral these days.
Look what's happened there, bidders suspended, biblical cost overruns, these cheap vessels could come out at least early on, with a Destroyer's price tag?
WTF?
(The US should have looked at vessels in this category that the Swedes have been building, then adapt and build in the US, if they could do that without more massive cost overruns).
Baron95 From United States, joined May 2006, 1286 posts, RR: 5 Reply 6, posted (3 months 2 weeks 6 days 1 hour ago) and read 5525 times:
Quoting GDB (Reply 5): And that is why DDG-1000 got cancelled.
GDB, thanks for posting that - I always thought that the DDG-1000 design had too many "moving parts" that all had to come together just right for the thing to work. I'm sad to see that they couldn't come just right. I'd like to see capable LCS ships on the fleet ASAP, and if not having DDG-1000 is the price, I'm willing to pay it.
We need ships that we are not afraid to send into harms way (i.e. close to hostile shore). That means small crew, low price tag.
Things like B2 Bombers, nuclear-powered cruisers and the like are so expensive that we never send them anywhere were they can make a difference, and when we do, we send a whole package just to protect it.
Sprout5199 From United States, joined Feb 2005, 1428 posts, RR: 11 Reply 8, posted (3 months 2 weeks 5 days 18 hours ago) and read 5405 times:
Quoting Baron95 (Reply 6): We need ships that we are not afraid to send into harms way (i.e. close to hostile shore). That means small crew, low price tag.
Put a six inch gun on an FFG where the MK-13 launcher was. Cheap,small crew, fast.
PPVRA From Brazil, joined Nov 2004, 5001 posts, RR: 27 Reply 9, posted (3 months 2 weeks 5 days 12 hours ago) and read 5309 times:
Quoting GDB (Reply 5): The problem is the damage goes much further than that. As a ship with a conventional flared hull rolls, the increasing waterplane area gives her added buoyancy on the side that is submerging and gives her a moment that pushes upwards, back against the roll. That stabilizes her and she returns to an even keel. With a tumblehome hull, as the ship rolls, the decreasing waterplane area reduces buoyancy on the side that's going down, giving moment that pushes downwards in teh same direction as a roll. This destabilizes her so she rolls faster and faster until she goes over.
Sounds like a fine Doldrums Patrol boat to me. . .
LOL. My guess is that Lockheed and other boat builders can't sell enough boats and are coming up with creative ideas (cool looking anyways) to sell more to Washington.
“When goods do not cross borders, soldiers will.” - Frederic Bastiat
Quoting Baron95 (Reply 6):
We need ships that we are not afraid to send into harms way (i.e. close to hostile shore). That means small crew, low price tag.
Put a six inch gun on an FFG where the MK-13 launcher was. Cheap,small crew, fast.
That idea has been mooted, and ignored by the folks who wanted to keep the new programs rolling. A new 155mm gun on that vessel (or two) would enable the navy to have an LCS vessel for little new money, and they'd have a ready supply of spares for it (as you wouldn't need as many coastal bombardment vessels as they needed FFGs for their original mission, which is already being superseded by the DDGs.
This is similar to the Army's RAH-66 situation. Except that the RAH was working, it simply didn't have an application on the modern battlefield that couldn't be fulfilled by a less expensive alternative. The Navy is in that same boat. Pardon the expression.
GDB From United Kingdom, joined May 2001, 10165 posts, RR: 70 Reply 11, posted (3 months 2 weeks 5 days 11 hours ago) and read 5277 times:
Thats not a bad idea about the USN FFG fleet.
Replace the hangar mounted Phalanx with RAM, upgrade the 76mm to 'Super Rapid' standard, (or replace with the 57mm planned for the LCS), if they are not already fitted, some crew operated cannon in the 20-30mm range.
As for the rest, the choppers and/or Fire-scout UCAVs do the rest.
The only question mark here would be the lack of speed (and manoeuvrability?) that they say the LCS needs.
Then build an adapted Swedish stealthy Corvette for the 'lower end' of the mission.
The converted FFG could act as a 'mothership' (not in the George Clinton sense though!), for the Corvettes as well as packing some heavy back up firepower.
LMP737 From United States, joined May 2002, 3598 posts, RR: 14 Reply 12, posted (3 months 2 weeks 5 days 6 hours ago) and read 5164 times:
Quoting Baron95 (Reply 6): Things like B2 Bombers, nuclear-powered cruisers and the like are so expensive that we never send them anywhere were they can make a difference, and when we do, we send a whole package just to protect it.
The Navy decommissioned the last of their nuke powered cruisers back in the nineties.
Cadet985 From United States, joined Mar 2002, 655 posts, RR: 3 Reply 13, posted (3 months 2 weeks 5 days 1 hour ago) and read 5128 times:
Quoting Alien (Reply 3): While they where built 65 years ago they all have less than 20 years actual service so they would be fairly easy to bring back in to service.
Last time I was on the USS New Jersey, I asked one of the crew members about the Navy recalling the Iowa class ships. Pretty much, the engines are maintained, but to modernize everything and get them up to today's standards would take about 18 months. Also, computers have become so prevalent, that they would need much smaller crews. We're talking about 900-1200, tops.
I had gotten this e-mail from a mailing list I'm on a couple years ago and it might be of interest to this discussion...
Quote: Battling for battleships
By Dennis Reilly
June 21, 2005
This week, a critical decision will be made regarding the defense of the
United States as the 2006 Defense Authorization bill goes to conference.
The June 6th Op-Ed "Battleships fit for duty", made the case that our
nation needs to have the battleships Wisconsin and Iowa modernized and
reactivated. The Nov. 19, 2004 GAO report states "Marine Corps supports
the strategic purpose of reactivating two battleships in accordance with
the National Defense Authorization Act of 1996...". The Pombo bill,
would turn those ships irretrievably into museums. Irretrievably,
because, within days after that bill passes, the Navy will be all over
those ships with cutting torches to make sure that they never again can
serve.
Should we have to move against threats as North Korea, Iran, or China,
most of whom have or will have sophisticated air defenses, battleships
can provide superior support for landing or air-inserted Marines.
The Navy, in the June 13 Op-Ed, "Building a new navy" tried to counter
these assertions. However, the Navy's position supporting the DD(X)
destroyer was thoroughly refuted in the June 17 Op-Ed, "Distortions
about ships" by James O'Bryon, the official who recently bore the
responsibility in the Office of the Secretary of Defense for evaluating
the vulnerability and lethality of weapons systems.
O'Bryon also affirmed that development of precision-guided
extended-range projectiles for the battleships 16" guns was a practical
near-to-mid-term goal.
On May 19 the House Armed Services Committee abandoned the DD(X), a ship
that never could have supplied the necessary fire support.
Now the question is, "Which is more suited to the mission, battleships,
more carriers, or an even longer delayed DD(X)-derivative?" They have
complementary capabilities, but within the range of targets that will be
available to the battleship's guns, out to 115 miles in the near term,
there are some notable differences. Long-range shells will reach as far
115 miles in a life-saving time of only 3.2 min, clearly faster than
aircraft response.
Aircraft could loiter over the battlefield, but that is probably not
wise in the face of strong enemy air defenses.
Now that the troubled Joint Standoff Weapon, which would have allowed
aircraft to safely stay outside of kill zones, is in danger of being
cancelled, another option for the aircraft is about to close. When
battleships do the job, there are no lost airplanes, and, of utmost
importance, no lost airmen, no Hanoi Hilton.
Another significant advantage for the battleships is the cost in terms
of both manpower and dollars for adding additional firepower (measured
in pounds of ordnance delivered on target per day) to the fleet in
support of the mission.
According to the Navy, a modernized battleship would require a crew of
only 1100 men. A carrier, with its aircrew, requires 5500 men. The Navy
does not dispute the assertion that a battleship has firepower (weight
of ordinance deliverable per day) equivalent to two carriers for targets
within the 29 mile range of existing heavy one-ton projectiles.
This works out to the battleship (for a given level of firepower) being
10 times as manpower-efficient as the carrier. It should be noted that
North Korea and the coast of China opposite Taiwan have numerous targets
within that 29 mile range.
In terms of adding firepower to the fleet, the cost of modernizing and
reactivating a battleship is $1.5B. The cost of building the two
carriers with aircraft is about $22B, a cost advantage of fifteen to one
in favor of the battleships.
The Marines are also looking for naval surface fire support to protect
deep incursions into enemy territory via the V-22 Osprey tilt rotor
aircraft. The battleship's reach out to 115 miles exceeds the Marine's
72-mile objective by 60 percent.
Necessarily, the mass of a round that can be delivered to this longer
range is markedly less than that of a round that travels 29 miles, but
it is still a substantial 525 lb. At this range, the advantage in the
number of ships required reverses; one carrier has the firepower of two
battleships.
But, battleships retain an advantage in manpower per unit of firepower
and cost per unit of additional firepower. The manpower advantage
becomes to 2.5-to-1, and the cost advantage becomes to 3.7-to-1, still
very significant figures.
In this time of strained defense budgets, Senator Warner and Rep.
Hunter, respectively Chairmen of the Senate and House Armed Services
Committees, should not ignore such economic figures. If uncertainty
remains, the issue should be put before the Defense Science Board, but
the Pombo Bill should be removed from the 2006 Defense Authorization
Bill.
After all, there is no imminent crisis due to a shortage of battleship
museums. Then, six months from now, when work on reactivation begins,
the Nation can be assured that our Marines will be getting the support
that is their due.
Dennis Reilly is a physicist, who serves as science advisor to the
United States Naval Fire Support Association.
I would like to see the Navy either bring back the battleships, or start building new ones. The next BIG war will happen in our lifetimes, I'm sure, and its time to start preparing for it now.
Sprout5199 From United States, joined Feb 2005, 1428 posts, RR: 11 Reply 14, posted (3 months 2 weeks 4 days 14 hours ago) and read 5053 times:
Quoting GDB (Reply 11): The only question mark here would be the lack of speed (and manoeuvrability?) that they say the LCS needs.
I don't know what the requirements are however, a FFG can do 35+ knots(been there,done that, seen it with my own eyes), and is very manoeuvrable.
Quoting GDB (Reply 11): if they are not already fitted, some crew operated cannon in the 20-30mm range.
I know some have a 25mm chain gun on the port and starboard main decks just forward of the quarterdeck. And I believe that they adapted the TDT's to control the CIWS in addition to the 76mm gun.
DL021 From United States, joined May 2004, 10976 posts, RR: 89 Reply 15, posted (3 months 2 weeks 4 days 14 hours ago) and read 5053 times:
FFGs could act as such motherships, and the mods wouldn't be terribly expensive as long as some genius didn't try to keep adding the latest and greatest stuff. Replacing the 76mm with a 57mm isnt terribly useful, but if they could squeeze in a shore bombardment 155 tube or two in place of some of the Harpoon launchers that'd be very useful. Put a harpoon unit up where the 76mm pod is and you've kept capabilty with modular upgrades.
Quoting Cadet985 (Reply 13): computers have become so prevalent, that they would need much smaller crews. We're talking about 900-1200, tops.
Sprout5199 From United States, joined Feb 2005, 1428 posts, RR: 11 Reply 16, posted (3 months 2 weeks 4 days 13 hours ago) and read 5040 times:
Quoting DL021 (Reply 15): place of some of the Harpoon launchers that'd be very useful
The FFG's carried the Harpoons in the SM-1 mag and launched them with the MK-13 launcher, so I really don't know where you are talking about.
Quoting DL021 (Reply 15): Put a harpoon unit up where the 76mm pod is and you've kept capabilty with modular upgrades.
Keep the 76mm mount and put the harpoons were the STIR radar was.
Quoting DL021 (Reply 15): Can that few execute damage control?
With the armor the BB's have I wouldn't worry too much about battle damage. Fires are another thing though. But the Navy will never bring back the BB's---Not sexy enough and takes too much away from the carriers(BB's are soooo much cooler than CVN's).
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