New european surface vessels

Politics mostly.

The Gibbs and Cox design was selected because it offered a significantly more capable design than the F100, hence the F100 was deemed inferior to the Gibbs and Cox design.

In particular the F100’s sea keeping was considered a concern given the different wave height and swell length encountered in the Pacific.

Reports from RAN observers on the Spanish F100’s indicated that sea keeping on them was not up to current RAN standards with regard to extent of roll and speed of roll.

The F100 is the fall back if the Gibbs and Cox design falls over, the same as the Leopard 2 was the fall back if the M1 acquisiition fell over.

It didn’t, so it was not needed.

Same goes for the F100, its an insurance policy the RAN has, but desperately does not want to have to use.

Unicorn

Ther F100 design was judged inferior to the modified Arleigh Burke class design from Gibbs and Cox, which was selected as preferred tenderer for the AWD.

Inferior is rather a strong word. Here is an excerpt from a story I posted a couple of days ago from the Australian newspaper

When the Government is set to make a major defence capability acquisition decision it requires a set of options be put up for consideration. The first of these is an “off-the-shelf option” — defined as “a product that is available for purchase and will have been delivered to another military or government body or commercial enterprise in a similar form to that being purchased at the time of the approval being sought”.

The second option is characterised as an “Australianised off-the-shelf” and allows for “modifications to meet the particular requirements of the Australian and regional physical environments, and the ADF’s particular operational requirements”. The final option is one that fully meets the identified capability need, even if the cost of that option exceeds the defence capability plan’s (DCP) budgetary provision for that capability.

The current DCP lists a budget of up to $6 billion for the new AWDs, but some observers have been citing a cost of up to $8 billion if the full wishlist is to be fulfilled. So while Gibbs & Cox has been selected to design option three (the all-singing, all-dancing AWD evolved from the US Navy’s Arleigh Burke Class destroyers), there is no guarantee at this stage that the Government will choose, or be willing to afford, it.

According to the Defence Materiel Organisation’s AWD program manager, Warren King, a couple of key areas in the Spanish design will require some modification, such as fitting the very latest version of the Aegis combat system, but overall the Australianised F100 will involve “minimal change”.

[QUOTE=Aurel]Didn’t they win a tender of the Oz’ Navy ?

Strange, found different data…
wikipedia

The Block IIIA has been acquired by the Bundesmarine.QUOTE]

Two things,

Ther F100 design was judged inferior to the modified Arleigh Burke class design from Gibbs and Cox, which was selected as preferred tenderer for the AWD.

Secondly, I would be EXTREMELY cautious in using Wikpedia as justification for anything, seeing it is compiled by individuals, and is subject to the biases that they may include, deliberately or otherwise.

Unicorn

From JNI Dec 2005

Germany advances frigate sonar upgrade
Joris Janssen Lok

Further details have emerged of the German Navy’s plans to upgrade its Brandenburg-class (Type 123) frigates’ anti-submarine warfare (ASW) sonars.
These plans have seen the German defence procurement agency (BWB) award a contract to Atlas Elektronik to upgrade the DSQS-23BZ (ASO 90) bow sonars of the four frigates in the German Navy, a company spokesman confirmed on 27 October 2005.
The technical scope of the upgrade includes modernisation primarily to the ‘dry end’ inboard portion of the sonar’s functionality with the goal of bringing the Brandenburg’s bow sonars up to a common standard with the Atlas Elektronik-supplied DSQS-24B bow sonars in the German Navy’s three new Sachsen-class (Type 124) frigates.
Work is to be performed between 2005 and 2009 in pre-planned maintenance refit periods.
The decision to implement the upgrades this way has been taken to keep cost and impact on operational availability as low as possible, Atlas Elektronik said.
Development and production will take place at the company’s main plant in Bremen, but onboard integration will be performed in Wilhelmshaven where the frigates are homeported.

16 in total, 4 in each quadrant can be guided for terminal homing.

BTW about the Type 45, only in the terminal phase is the Aster missile reliant on its own radar, outside that phase it needs continuous updating from the ship.

this allows virtually unlimited simultaneous engagements

Nonsense! Here read from http://navy-matters.beedall.com/paams.htm

UK PAAMS can track approximately 2000 targets simultaneously and is able to engage up to 12, including 8 in local self-defence. All 48 Aster missiles are “ready to fire”, with just a few seconds elapsing from first autonomous detection of a target to the firing of the first Aster missile, and 8 Aster’s can be fired within 10 seconds. Up to 16 Aster missiles can be simultaneously guided in the air at once, making it difficult for attackers to swamp the ships air defence’s with saturating threats from aircraft and even supersonic missiles. Maximum theoretical range against aircraft is 100km although 80km is more usually quoted (a French senate report says PAAMS can intercept up to 70 km), against missiles the maximum range is 25km. The Aster missiles active seeker allows almost instant launching or further weapons or retargeting of in-flight missile once the target has been locked-up.

You realize the F-100 is from Spain?

Didn’t they win a tender of the Oz’ Navy ?

the 70/80nm range u mention for SM-2 is for SM-2 block IV with the extra booster stage, which only the USN has. the european SM-2 ships have SM-2MR instead whose range is closer to 30/40nm. ESSM range is about 25nm.

Strange, found different data…
wikipedia

The Block IIIA has been acquired by the Bundesmarine.

another good thing abt Aster is it has active terminal radar homing like an AMRAAM. it does not require separate illumination radars (eg APAR, Mk99 for the burkes and F100) which SM-2 and ESSM need. this allows virtually unlimited simultaneous engagements. whereas burkes with 3 illuminators can only handle up to 3 SM-2s/ESSMs in terminal homing stage. so advantages in this area are twofold:

O.k., this is indeed a big advantage. Do you know how many missiles the APAR can simultanously illuminade ?

the dutch one is a beauty.

http://img29.exs.cx/img29/4339/DZPinBiscaya.jpg

The F-100 is the least capable, but with it’s pure american suite, it was exactly what the Aussies wanted.

You realize the F-100 is from Spain?

Observation on the use of corvette/frigate/destroyer/cruiser designatinos: in the context of funding and budget discussions the tendency is to call a cruiser a destroyer, a destroyer a frigate, a frigate a corvette and a corvette and opv etc. Once in the water, the tendency goes in the opposite direction, trying to impress/intimidate the neighbors by saying an opv is a corvette, a corvette is a frigate etc.

What I Still don’t understand completely is the differnce in capabilities.
It seems the smaller ships cover with their SM-2 missiles (range ~70/80 Nm) a larger area than the larger ships with the Aster 30 (range ~50 Nm).

In comparison: Daring/Sachsen

Daring: 48 cells Aster 30/15 (Sylver launcher)

Sachsen:32 cells SM2 IIIA or ESSM in Mk41 launchers + 2 RAM Mk 31 launchers (21 rockets)

So got the Asters’s a better ECM resistance or why are they acknowledged as the more modern system ?

the 70/80nm range u mention for SM-2 is for SM-2 block IV with the extra booster stage, which only the USN has. the european SM-2 ships have SM-2MR instead whose range is closer to 30/40nm. ESSM range is about 25nm.

another good thing abt Aster is it has active terminal radar homing like an AMRAAM. it does not require separate illumination radars (eg APAR, Mk99 for the burkes and F100) which SM-2 and ESSM need. this allows virtually unlimited simultaneous engagements. whereas burkes with 3 illuminators can only handle up to 3 SM-2s/ESSMs in terminal homing stage. so advantages in this area are twofold:
1)no illuminators needed
2)no limits on number of missile/target engagements

active radar homing also enables engaging low-flying missiles that are over the horizon of illuminator radars.

in a sense Aster places the illumination radar in the missile rather than the ship, giving much more flexibility.

a disadvantage however is the tiny active radars in the Asters are more prone to jamming than the much more powerful shipboard illuminators.

PS: F100s have 2 illuminators.

Roughly speaking the size regions seem to be;

Corvette 700-2,000t
Frigate 2,000-5,000t
Destroyer 5,000-10,000t
Cruiser 10,000t+

I am really interested in a lot of these ships.

Also, whats the difference between a Frigate, Destroyer, Cruiser, Corvette, and whatever, what are their definitions?

Size and the amount of armament on board is the difference.

from large to small

Cruiser, Destroyer, frigate , Corvette

I am really interested in a lot of these ships.

What do you guys think about the smaller ships armed with larger weapons, you have the Skjold Patrol Boat which is stealthy, very fast(over 100km/h, 50 some knots) and carries like 8 NSMs. Then you have a few other smaller Russian corvettes which are armed with Moskits, Yakhonts, Urans or Klubs, just about whatever you want. There is a new Russian missile boat which is armed with something like 4 Moskits or like 16 Urans. I think it’s the Molnya or something.

Also, whats the difference between a Frigate, Destroyer, Cruiser, Corvette, and whatever, what are their definitions?

Russians have nothing in this purpose. The only thing close to it, would be the Slava and Kirov cruisers, with the S300F(M). Mostly their destroyers, Sovremenny and Udaloy are used in a combo, one anti-ship/anti-air (Sovremenny) and one purely anti-submarine (Udaloy).
The new designs of Corvettes and frigates seem to have a version that is equiped with S300FM too. Yet it doesn’t have any active phased array radar and will hence probably lack certain capabilities.

are the Russian destroyers used for a different role? and what ships do the Russians have that are similar in purpose?

The Asters being active radar guided and TVC are far more capable of dealing with stealthy/small/fastmover/low targets than the SM2 methinks despite the higher raw range of the SM2. arent they also faster than SM2?

Shouldn’t the comparison Aster 15 <> ESSM, Aster-30 <> SM2?

any reports on how the new A53 Sylver module is coming along – this is supposed to bring Sylver on par with MK41 in ability to fire land attack weapons (thawk, apache) and ASMs.
Any TBMD version of Aster30 also needs the extra depth.

The Asters being active radar guided and TVC are far more capable of dealing with stealthy/small/fastmover/low targets than the SM2 methinks despite the higher raw range of the SM2. arent they also faster than SM2?

Yeah, LCF has a slot for one more MK41 but recent discussion of Tomahawk purchase for Dutch navy mentioned that adding this missile would reduce SAM load out, suggesting no 6th Mk41 will be added.

Oops, F100 does indeed have 6 Mk41 :rolleyes:

As for the Danish ships, 2 have troop carrying and support facilities but another 3 halfsisters are more like pure destroyers

See also http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showthread.php?t=31557

BY THE WAY: should we add Norway’s Nansen class and Denmark’s large StanFlex ships to the list?

Yes, I don’t see why not. They are both new European surface vessels…

The Norwegian class displaces 5,300t full load and has the SPY-1F (AEGIS). It is armed with 8 NSM SSM and will initially have only 8 Mk41 cells. There is a space next to it made ready for another 8 cells and if you look at the bow it seems that atleast 32 cells could be fitted (depending on how things look beneath deck). In the imidiate future they will have to make do with only 16 cells though. Because of the ESSM quadpacking this is better than it sounds and can give you for example 16 ESSM and 12 SM-2. It has MRS 2000 hull mounted sonar, CAPTAS Mk2 towed array, stingray torpedos and a NH-90 helicopter. This makes it more of multipurpose frigate with emphasis on ASW than a air defence vessel.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/europe/images/Nansen-12_big.jpg

The Danish class displaces 6,300t full load and is a mix of many different types. It even has a ro-ro deck and carries landing craft, earning it an “L” designation. I’m unsure about the exact weapons fit.

LCF has 5 8-cell Mk 41.

And a space where the sixth can be easily slotted in:

http://www.navynews.co.uk/articles/2003/0304/0304_images/0003042301lx.jpg

F-100 and F-124 have 4 8-cell Mk 41.

No, F-100 has 6 of them.

Terran’s point about ESSM applies to any of the Mk41 equipped ships that employ or will empoy a mix of ESSM/SM2/T-Lam, rather than Aster 15/30 plus some LACM.

Yes, I was just thinking about the Spanish class when I wrote it. That is why I used the example of 48 cells.

LCF has 5 8-cell Mk 41. F-100 and F-124 have 4 8-cell Mk 41. Type 45 will have 6x 8-cell VLU, either Mk41 of Sylver or a mix. Horizon will have 6 8-cell Sylver VLU.

Terran’s point about ESSM applies to any of the Mk41 equipped ships that employ or will empoy a mix of ESSM/SM2/T-Lam, rather than Aster 15/30 plus some LACM.

Sev: navy source is fine, no problem with that, just wondered of any of this ever got published anywhere (esp. the helicopter going through the heli-deck).

BY THE WAY: should we add Norway’s Nansen class and Denmark’s large StanFlex ships to the list?

Alvaro de Bazan class

Nansen class

Zeven Provincien class

Sachsen class