I’m curious – what are they actually going to DO with it? I mean not only is it about 30% incomplete, it doesn’t have any electronics or the reactors fitted. Would conventional engines actually be compatible?

So what are they going to use it for? Surely they couldn’t finish it. Are they going to slowly take it apart to see how it all fits together?

Well, they might fix it up to the point were you can actually take-off from and land on it and then tow it to some training area, anchor it there and use it for training. I’m not too confident it possible and/or worthwhile to do more with her.

The layout of the four ships of the Virginia class was similar to that of their two California class predecessors, but with some modifications, the most significant of which are the replacement of the California’s single-arm MK 13 launchers by the later MK 26 twin Asroc launcher forward and the provision of a helicopter hanger in the stern.

The helicopter hanger in the fantail measured 42 feet by 14 feet and was served by an electro-mechanical elevator covered by a telescopic hatch. This arrangement in a ship other than an aircraft carrier was the first since the Des Moines (CA 134) class of cruisers of the mid-1940s. The door/elevator reportedly leaked badly and were not liked by her crews.

The benefits of nuclear powered ships-primarily their long range and the reduction they allowed in fleet trains-were starting to be offset by their enormous capital costs, and when faced with a bid for a numerically large class of cruisers to take the Aegis system, the US Congress insisted that the oil fired Spruance design, rather than the nuclear powered Virginia design be used as the starting point. The result was the Ticonderoga Class.

Planned Refueling Complex Overhauls were canceled in the early 1990s due to the expense of maintaining the nuclear propulsion components. The ships were all decommissioned after a relatively brief period of service averageing somewhat less than two decades. CGN-41 for example was commissioned in 1980 with a life expectancy of 38 years, though it was retired in 1997 after only half that period in service.

A remarkably clean design, certainly when compared to the USN Spruance/Kidd/Tico class hulls or to Sovremenny and P15 Delhi classes.

Forget about meeting those ladies: its distance learning….

The American Public University System is a private higher education community comprised of two online learning institutions: American Public University and American Military University. APUS is accredited by the Accrediting Commission of the Distance Education and Training Council (DETC), which is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education and the Council on Higher Education Accreditation.

> Wanshan
> I found online indicate anything other than a HE (bulk) warhead on the Mk48
A little over a dozen years ago I obtained a picture of a Mk.-48 warhead in the process of exploding. The picture is taken a few micro seconds after the explosion started. The original caption wrote of the fact that the warhead a shaped charge. The shaped charge can be focused upward to insure maximum destruction of the keel.

> GarryB
> If the kursk heard a torpedo coming they’d have fired decoys. Also why would
> the torpedo hit it in the nose? There is no noise making gear in the nose.
> If an active sonar was used for guidance by the torpedo then a more central
> hit would be much more likely, while a passive torpedo would more likely
> have hit the rear of the vessel.
Thanx Garry, I had not thought of that perspective. You are correct, the Mk.-48 torpedo would have hit under the Kurst not on the side.

Adrian

Interesting! I’ve not heard of an upward directed shaped charge warhead on a heavyweight before. Non-directional warhead seem quite sufficient in breaking a ship’s back. Would a upward firing shaped charge be THAT much more effective to warrent its development? Or is it developed with a particular type of target in mind? If so, the torpedo would have to be made smart enough to know which ‘side’ is up and be ‘self righting’, unless it is always loaded and fired with a particular ‘side’ up (‘side’ is a strange term considering we’re talking about a round object ;-).

There’s no cloning going on between those two aircraft. If that’s what you’re looking for, though, the Y-8 is an illegal, reverse engineered copy of the An-12 (make that, yet another illegal copy of something Russian).

I think he was referring to surveillance systems, not airframe.

> Wanshan
> the Toledo accidentally collided with the Kursk, at which point the
> Russian submarine opened its torpedo tubes, leading to an attack from
> the Memphis
How would a US sub with damage and severe flow noises along with pumps working overtime and through all this the Russian Navy could not find it! I know the Russian ASW is not great since the end of the Cold War but, give them some credit.
In any collision, the LA Class would sustain real damage against a much larger ship such as Kurst.

Uhm, I quoted from the article and then pointed out I did NOT believe it. So don’t go commenting as if I wrote the article.

> the trademark evidence of an American MK-48 torpedo, which is made to
> melt cleanly through steel sheet due to a mechanism at its tip that
> combusts copper. “
Yes the Mk.-48 Torpedo uses a “shaped charge” to destroy a ship. A torpedo can be quiet when a sub lauches it from a long distance(17 miles plus) then dive deep, below 1,500 feet towards the target. The water in the area where the Kurst sunk is less than 500 feet deep.

I’m no torpedo expert but none of the sources I found online indicate anything other than a HE (bulk) warhead on the Mk48. Can you point me to an online source that you think discusses the warhead properly? Also, reading your comment, and especially the odd connection you make between shaped charge and noise and depth, I can’t help wondering if you understand what I mean by shaped charge warhead. It is the same kind of warhead used to penetrate tank armor, and relies on chemical rather than kinetic energy to achieve the penetration (i.e. the penetrating effect of a molten jet of metal versus that of a hardened subcaliber penetrator). It differs from a bulk charge in that the energy of the explosion is directed in a specific way.

> It is propelled by a piston engine with twin, contra-rotating propellers
> in a pump jet or shrouded configuration.
The engine of the Mk.-48 is an “external combustion” engine! This is an engine when the combustion occurs in one chamber and the exaust is then fed into another chamber where the piston is. The advantage of this type of engine is that it is that it is less affected by the back pressure against the exaust. The capability to conduct multiple re-attack procedures if the target is missed.

Thanks, that was informative.

Ah, the Testarossa …. so much fun to drive 😎

@matt: Nobody said steam turbines aren’t any good!
@JonS: Most naval vessels built in the 80s in my part of the world had gas turbines. But that’s besides the point since I wasn’t talking 80s but today, which is 15-25 years beyond the 80s.