Some of the options seem a bit exotic and un-proven if im honest such as the large LCAC type hovercraft etc. Not that these would be rubbish in anyway but i can see the RAN going for something simple and cheap rather than anything that deviates from normal watercraft. The L-cat i like the design but as you have mentioned it’s far too small for what is needed. The MRV seems like a good design but it cannot land equipment onto beaches etc but it would be a better all rounder.

My choice would be the Caimen 200 as it’s plain, simple and quite boring, the only thing not proven is the active bow ramp but that i dont think holds many issues. Basically it’s close to what is in use atm but has some advantages, not exactly thinking out of the box but i think it’s ideal. (Im a Brit so im biased:D)

I think if you asked an RN pilot to land on the Mid-ships deck in the North Atlantic at night in the rain he would most likely say Fook Off. Yes the deck would be a wee bit smoother but i would say more difficult to land on. I think with some clever hull design and modern stabilisers you could get the deck to stop moving enough to operate Helo’s on without many problems. Furthermore having a helo deck in the middle is maybe one of the least efficient design choice’s that can be made, it’s better to have the deck at the back and still have the rest of the ship for other uses. The ATF would have been an odd design and maybe not that good. I think world powers would agree as nobody has ever built a ship like this afaik not even the USN has made a trial ship.

Some of the ideas were ok such as the idea of having VLS cells at both ends of the ship etc. The problem is that this ship was supposedly designed to ‘fight hurt’ (not disputing this) but it would go down quite fast when hit by a Torpedo or the massive AShM’s the Russians use. So to me the idea of fighting hurt is flawed when it would either get it’s keel broken with a Torpedo or get slammed with a 1ton plus AShM.

My preferred option for a new Frigate would have been something nice and cheap and simple like what the T23 was meant to be but in the end we did get an excellent ship the current T23 frigate so no problem there.

Right there should be an image attached to this:o It’s a BVT C1 design from DSEi 2009.

What about that then? All you would really have to do is remove the Artisan radar slap the CEAFAR and CEAmount mast array on the top of it. On the bow switch out the Mk8 mod 1 gun for the 5″ gun remove the A35/A43 launchers add in the Mk 41 VLS system around 32 cells ideally. The Phalanx mounts i would put them on some sort of structure to raise them up for better arcs. Maybe extend the hangar to have 2 small side spaces for UAV’s and then put the Phalanx mounts on that.

What do people think?

Thanks Swerve i should have had a look on the website im just a lazy bones and i dont know any French.

By the figures on the Marine Nationale website then most ships will be substantially larger than the Durance class which i think they will need to be if they are to support larger vessels. Looking at the Picture of the A15 (i think?) tanking an F100 frigate then to me it looks like it could be too small. Ja it’s nice to see that the Berlin class can be scaled up, by doing so i think this would fit perfectly. Overall there seems to be quite a few options for the RAN to choose when they want to replace assets.

I in my own opinion i think a ship of around 18k tons deadweight is about the size of ship that is needed to support deployments. The reason for saying this is a Canberra class is likely to deploy with a Hobart class DDG for AAW and a new frigate for ASW. Therefore i feel that the larger vessel would be needed when going further abroad or simply to extend on station endurance. Also if the RAN does acquire F-35B’s then a larger amount of aviation fuel will be needed alongside things such as missiles and bombs. On the flip side however most of the work the RAN will be doing is in their own neighbourhood so long range deployment in some ways is not a huge factor.

What a nice Flame War we have going here, has anyone called the Fire Brigade?

Since the story about going down to 3 boats was first covered I’ve spotted 3 common points being made by any of the (few) knowledgable interviewees

*Correctly calling Vanguards Boats not Subs
*Pointing out that losing 1/4 of fleet does not equate to saving 1/4 money as some/many costs are sunk costs rather than unit costs
*Pointing out that Brown has couched his suggestion with the words – if the RN can guarantee the same uniinterrupted patrol pattern

Of course headlines and knee jerk comments (by people on all sides of the argument) have all omitted these.

Al

I agree with those points we dont save anywhere near 25% of the cash as most of it is R&D, tooling up etc. I think it will only save the cost of the steel really and some bits of equipment. So maybe around £2billion as some people have pointed out in the media.

I do realise as well that this has not been commited or written in stone so it could stay at the same 4 boats. I agree with Grim there are plenty of get out clauses but it is again as you have said about cost not some political agenda.

Ahaha! i was wondering when someone was going to bring something like that up.

Yes it is the required size and it was an ASW platform but it was designed for the cold war Atlantic Convoys. You could build something similar but heavily updated, the hull is and old design which would be the hardest thing to fix as it would need brought upto modern standards. I liked the class as they were good sea worthy ships and great all rounders, especilly with the large VLS.

Right i’ll start with the random question first, Yes the large golf ball is a SATCOM dome as far as i am aware. It could be a surface search radar or some sort of ranging device to see how far away the other ship is but it’s most likely a satcom dome.

The General Belgrano was not tanking up nor was here escorts as far as i am aware. Any tanker would have made less noise than the Belgrano anyway as she uses steam propulsion of the 1930’s vintage but later updated but still very noisy. Furthermore her 2 escorts used COGAG propulsion both quite noisy as well if they were T42’s. A tanker would have used either steam or large diesel’s but would not have made as much noise as a old warship at speed.

F-35b that was a nice post and i liked the pics. Something along the lines of the Fort Victoria class would be ideal as they carry both large amounts of dry and liquid stores. The other Fort class vessels are dry stores and ammunition ships so not ideal for the Australians as they dont carry bulk liquid. Australia needs some sort of mixed vessel such as the Fort Victoria class mainly thanks to the larger Canberra class LHD’s coming into service. These ships will need a wider range and a larger volume of dry stores than what an oiler can carry, therfore a ship like the Fort Victoria is ideal.

The Aegir 18R should suffice for Australia’s needs as it carries a large amount of liquid and a decent amount of dry stores. It can carry 12,000m3 of diesel fuel, 1,800m3 of Aviation fuel but if the ship is chosen with dual use tanks this can be increased by carrying less diesel, 800m3 of fresh water can be carried but more can be made and modern warships mostly make fresh water on-board. 1,000m2 (1,350m2 in some documents) of dry stores can be carried in the cargo hold and 8 refrigerated TEU’s can be carried. (Im not sure if these TEU’s are on deck or below deck but i would imagine on deck)

The above capacity of the 18R design is plenty of capacity more than what the RAN would need on deployments. One thing i dont think people know is this class of ship is 18,000 tons deadweight and HMAS Success which is a Durance class ship is around 7,600 tons deadweight. To compare RFA Wave ruler is around 18,000 tons deadweight and ja has a picture of all three of them. This clearly shows that this ship would do the job without a problem. If the RAN plans to replace HMAS Sirius around the same time then acquiring 2 of the Aegir 18R design would be a massive boost in RAS capacity.

EDIT: If anyone can find the capacity of the Durance class could the post it up. I will have a look myself but i did have a google while writing this.