JonesyThe point is the naysayers have been quoting £1.8 Billion upwards as the cost of converting one ship, before through life costs are taken into account. Once installed, the through life costs will also likely be a lot less than feared IMHO. Space and weight margins were incorporated in the CVF designs for eventual conversion with Steam Catapults, whereas EMALs takes up less volume and weighs about a quarter of a similar Steam installation (no donkey boilers for a start). Also the article reveals the US have already effectively decided for us that the Carriers are required, for their benefit as well as ours.
I’m sure the US expressed similar wishes as CVA-01 was cancelled. Through life costs will feature the same recurring costs as any other catobar carrier….additional personnel, training, sparing and logistics and operational costs like throwing used wires over the side after the determined no. of traps. Wholelife even ordinary cat operation costs.
Looks to me like someone confused the figure to shift to CATOBAR capability with the figure to convert one ship. North of £2bn though seems a lot to pay for payload/range benefits that are scarcely essential. Do we think, for eaxample, we’d be unable to do a Libya with a STOVL carrier flying off 400nm ranged strikers….would we be unable to tackle a recapture of the Falklands if we can only stand off 500nm from the islands putting precision CASOM fire in?.
As Liger notes….if that £2bn is going to jeopardise Carrier Strike isnt it best to get the ships and the capability first and evaluate requirements as they evolve?.
JonesyErrrr
Just a quick question. This article notes that the stated price is for just one shipset. That for PoW.
IF its £450mn per hull plus £400mn for adaptation of the second hull during build then we’re already at £1.3bn without the refit cost for hull 1 and with no mention of lifecycle costs. Doesnt this demonstrate that switch to CATOBAR, assuming the absurd decision to mothball QE is reversed, WILL actually be quite a significant amount more than the £1.8bn indicated whole-life?.
Costly for just a couple of hundred miles on the range and internal carry of 2000lb weapons.
JonesyIt’s a technology demonstrator, it would still take money to get a production version to market.
Fitting would still require cutting a big hole in the flight deck and all the work and expense involved in that.
I can’t say I’m overly optimistic about your potential list of customers either, although Japan could be a possible customer.
Its a technology demonstrator with 2500 test firings as of 2007. Theres a pretty solid analysis from an RN Lt Cdr below that states Converteams contention was that, with a longer run than the 15m test article, even the 2007 low-voltage configuration would be sufficient to send up a circa 5000kg MQ9 sized vehicle. That puts EMKIT, 5 years ago, at the level necessary to do the job.
There would be costs involved in cutting a hole in the deck for the cat and the recovery mechanism. There would be costs involved in systems integration and all the usual trials that go with such systems development. What you get at the end of it though is organic persistent ISTAR for, comparitive, shirt buttons.
The good Lt Cdr states that, in 2007, it was considered that it would take less than £2mn to polish up the trial system into something fit for a production run. The refit of the CVS’s to remove Sea Dart and introduce new hoists and aviation capabilities cost about £24mn each in FY’00 £’s and this modification would be analagous in complexity. Quadruple that sum for inflation, hardware aquisition and any surprise sys integration nasties and you are still looking at a tiny sum to deliver a huge capability set.
BAE have already been to India with Mantis, the IN is known to be less than wildly impressed with Ka-31 and they are building/inducting STOBAR hulls. You are so sure they would not be interested in a platform that can offer Searchwater type coverage 24hrs on station at 30k ft especially if the package includes the EM cats to launch them?. I could see India being very interested there as well as Japan.
http://www.jneweb.com/EntityFiles/5/2504/JNEPaperFileName/v44b1p04a.pdf
JonesyOnly if we stump up the costs for developing EMKIT, it’s not a finished product yet and will cost more to get working, and we’d have to develop the UAVs as well, for what would be a very limited range of customers (probably just us), also we would still need to pay for modification to the carriers.
Already done. We put money into EMKIT a couple of years back. Modifying the carriers to add a modest length EM catapult on the waist is not going to be a stretch.
GA produced the concept artwork of a carrier capable Mariner very quick when they got wind of the potential market. A twin-engine vehicle such as Mantis has at least similar, if not better, potential for BAE. Look at those services now picking up through deck vessels. India, Brazil, Italy, South Korea, Japan…all suddenly being offered high-endurance theatre ISTAR and, perhaps, force protection/precision light strike for the cost of a, say 30m, lightweight EM catapult mod to their flat tops?. There has to be commercial opportunity there to be exploited!.
JonesyActually There’s going to a larger training penalty with the F-35B too for rolling landings.
Seriously?. An SRL is basically just a way of using the wings lift to augment a few thousand pounds of extra thrust. Its not a full approach carrier landing. Its translating to fan approaching the round down and putting it down at maybe 30knts over the boats speed. Braking from 30mph, even in the wet, has never been something I’ve found particularly taxing?.
As to UAV’s you only need to look at something like the General Atomics Mariner concept to see what is feasible even today. Why does this need to be STOVL capable?. Why not just put a low-power EMKIT type unit on the waist for launching slow-mover MALE types?. Even ‘old news’ Mariner put up a decent capability surveillance set for upwards of 24hrs at a stint. How many deck reconfigs are you going to have to fit in the flying programme when you only launch/recover your ISTAR capability once a day!.
Note thats ISTAR capability not just AEW/AWACS as while you wont risk one of the three Hawkeyes, and their irreplaceable crews, you have aboard you might just risk a MALE unit to gather necessary intel and, hey ho, uncrate a replacement if it gets brought down!.
The only danger with F-35B/STOVL is if they cant get the bugs ironed out of the airframe. This is the same, now, as the state of play with the C-variant. The payload/range argument has been, once again, proven to be spurious as Charles de Gaulle was operating within 200nm from the Libyan shore sending off Rafales who were, in the main, carrying light ordnance….not the 2000lb weapons F-35B cant internal carry. Nothing that STOVL CVF with F-35B would be incapable of.
JonesyJust to ask a quick question here, as someone who has spent a little time aboard ships of many sizes and types, I cant recall many that have a prevalence of stones and sticks lying about on deck?.
Is the comment, seriously, that Sri Lankan sailors have been scuttling about ashore collecting rocks etc to sneak aboard in order constitute a handy non-lethal arsenal to pelt your poor hapless Indian fisherman with?. Have these blood soaked rocks and sticks been displayed at all?
Odd choice of weapon when its a fairly basic, and universal, tactic to turn the fire hoses on anyone close aboard who would be considered undesireable!. A few aimed blasts from naval fire hoses being the easy equivalent to a well hefted stone or stick with the dual advantages of obviating the need for the aggressor to grope around in the dirt ashore securing his arsenal and leaving very little by way of evidence on said hapless victim?.
JonesyIf the JMSDF cant have “offensive weapons”……….could we see a 65,000 ton DDH?:D
Sounds a bit counter-intuitive but you certainly can have a 65000ton carrier that is, undeniably, defensively optimised….though distinctly NOT a DDH!. There is already such a carrier built and deployed in the shape of the Russian Kuznetsov. This actually ties in to the TAKR thread quite neatly as it is this kind of scenario that can provide the justification for that kind of vessel.
In a Japanese context its not difficult to conceive of a modestly scaled up 22DDH with ski-jump and capacity to operate 2 9-plane squadrons of F-35B’s….just enough for round-the-clock maintenance of 2 CAP slots and an alert-5 pair. Add in AEGIS/SPY-x/BMD and deckhouse extensions to the island superstructure to house a 48 cell Mk41 installation fore and aft. Round it out with a STRALES mount on deck edge sponsons on each quarter and you have a very powerful fleet air defence unit with ASAT/ABM capability but only very limited capability to mount strike operations ashore. If they are willing to claim a 27k ton full load hull is a DDH I cant see trying the old Royal Navy dodge of classing such a vessel as a ‘through-deck cruiser’ would hold any problems for them at all!.
Jonesynow carrier… what next ? make a kirov style battlecruiser and call it yamato and musashi ? 😀
You see this is called ‘ship porn’ and should be banned from decent forums such as this……
Nurse!!!…Its happening again…..bring the medication. 😉
JonesyJust to clarify one point the Aeronavale did send out SEM’s to exercise with Task Force vessels to familiarise our Ops people with an Exocet attack profile and to help us build an ELINT reference of the SEM/AM39 weapons system.
Of course we actually had MM38 Exocet in the Fleet in 1982, as GWS50, and had been studying its capabilities for many years prior. We therefore had a feel for its seeker capabilities and vulnerabilities, but, being able to drill the operators against the all-up threat system was hugely beneficial and not to be underestimated as a contribution.
Resmoroh,
We had never, in 82, and have never used since the AM39 variant of Exocet. We knew when an air launched weapon was coming our way as we could identify the search racket from Super Etendard courtesy of Aeronavale. The only other Exocet shot at us was the one that took Glamorgan up the stern from the, wonderfully heath-robinsoned, shore firing post they set up and we knew about that one ahead of time as well. There was never any chance of an inbound weapon being mis-identified.
The AM39 that took the Shiny Sheff was picked up by Glasgow some time before it hit. The codeword for an Exocet seeker-head intercept was ‘HANDBRAKE’ if memory serves me and Glasgow reported making a HANDBRAKE call after she was cued in by the Agave racket. Sheffield had no local verification as her UAA-1 kit was off, owing to a comms conflict, and her PWO(A) was goofing, claimed later that he believed Etendard didnt have the reach to get to them anyway and did nothing so, crucially, no action was taken on Glasgows signal.
JonesyIrrespective of the merits of the spelling and grammar in the original petition, the reason that it will be ignored is is because so far only 1,228 people haver signed it!
If this is such a burning issue of concern to those serving, how come so few (and their families) have bothered to sign the petition?
Even if I agreed with it, I wouldn’t be willing to sign it until a few more of the people who would actually be impacted by the changes could be bothered to.
Perhaps because it has only been going 6 days or so?. I signed it just before I posted this thread up and was about no. 180-something. In 6 days a thousand people have expressed their view thats not so shabby is it?.
Perhaps because this is the work of a small group of service families who are genuinely concerned what the future could hold for them and that its bloody poor treatment after years of service to be turfed out of the accomodation that has, for decades, been promised to serving personnel. It is not some slick, well structured, publicity campaign blazened all over the media. If you are saying that the only things with any worth are orchestrated glitzy, professional, media campaigns I find that distasteful to put it mildly. Very X-Factor though.
Maybe if the service families got Simon Cowell to front their grievance they’d have got a few more phone votes….er….I mean petition signatories eh Indiaecho?.
JonesyIrrespective of the merits of the spelling and grammar in the original petition, the reason that it will be ignored is is because so far only 1,228 people haver signed it!
If this is such a burning issue of concern to those serving, how come so few (and their families) have bothered to sign the petition?
Even if I agreed with it, I wouldn’t be willing to sign it until a few more of the people who would actually be impacted by the changes could be bothered to.
Perhaps because it has only been going 6 days or so?. I signed it just before I posted this thread up and was about no. 180-something. In 6 days a thousand people have expressed their view thats not so shabby is it?.
Perhaps because this is the work of a small group of service families who are genuinely concerned what the future could hold for them and that its bloody poor treatment after years of service to be turfed out of the accomodation that has, for decades, been promised to serving personnel. It is not some slick, well structured, publicity campaign blazened all over the media. If you are saying that the only things with any worth are orchestrated glitzy, professional, media campaigns I find that distasteful to put it mildly. Very X-Factor though.
Maybe if the service families got Simon Cowell to front their grievance they’d have got a few more phone votes….er….I mean petition signatories eh Indiaecho?.
JonesyHaving just read the e-petition, shouldn’t it be shame on the person posting it for the bad English, grammer and spelling mistakes contained in it.
For that alone, not a petition that is going to be taken seriously by the vastly overpaid civil servants in Whitehall.
Brian
Shall we assume that the inaccurate spelling of the word ‘grammar’ above is ironic or illustrative?.
The petition is nether polished nor anywhere near gramatically correct. So, yes, I fear the punctilious, prissy, bureaucrats in Whitehall may well sneer at it and ignore the very clear message it transmits. That is part of the problem being described though isnt it?. The issue at hand is precisely that the Whitehall mandarins apparently find it easy to ignore the requirements of the lowly peasants who exist merely to serve.
As to the forces families misunderstanding the core principles of the New Employment Model I’ve seen some spirited defence, by civil servants, of precisely the benefits of culling MQ provision at 8 years.
Suffice it to say that the perception has been given, by MoD, that this IS on the agenda. If it turns out that its been quietly pushed into the long grass and is no longer an issue so be it. If it means my mates and their wives can stop worrying about it, as they very definitely are now, thats enough. I look forward to the press announcement, refuting the stories that appeared in the Times etc, stating that this definitively is not being considered.
JonesyHaving just read the e-petition, shouldn’t it be shame on the person posting it for the bad English, grammer and spelling mistakes contained in it.
For that alone, not a petition that is going to be taken seriously by the vastly overpaid civil servants in Whitehall.
Brian
Shall we assume that the inaccurate spelling of the word ‘grammar’ above is ironic or illustrative?.
The petition is nether polished nor anywhere near gramatically correct. So, yes, I fear the punctilious, prissy, bureaucrats in Whitehall may well sneer at it and ignore the very clear message it transmits. That is part of the problem being described though isnt it?. The issue at hand is precisely that the Whitehall mandarins apparently find it easy to ignore the requirements of the lowly peasants who exist merely to serve.
As to the forces families misunderstanding the core principles of the New Employment Model I’ve seen some spirited defence, by civil servants, of precisely the benefits of culling MQ provision at 8 years.
Suffice it to say that the perception has been given, by MoD, that this IS on the agenda. If it turns out that its been quietly pushed into the long grass and is no longer an issue so be it. If it means my mates and their wives can stop worrying about it, as they very definitely are now, thats enough. I look forward to the press announcement, refuting the stories that appeared in the Times etc, stating that this definitively is not being considered.
JonesyOf course the country has money to throw about!. They are just hesitating before pouring so much down the moneypit that the NHS has become.
£101bn last year in budget and you cant keep vital services operational??. Something wrong with that isnt there?. Government stats show that the NHS budget will climb to £111bn by 2014 while Defence will drop below £34bn. You dont want to start a conversation about wastage in government spending!.
My favourite soapbox piece being the unclaimed benefits pool from the Social Security budget that is listed by the government as being in excess of £10bn ANNUALLY. That is allocated, budgeted, money that does nothing….an amount equal to near a third of the entire defence budget!. Enough to pay outright for both aircraft carriers, the last two deleted Darings AND build an additional pair of Astutes to ease the stretch on the SSN fleet….from a single years wastage.
Lets dispense with the idiotry that the country cant afford to honour its obligations to forces personnel who have spent years in its service.
JonesyOf course the country has money to throw about!. They are just hesitating before pouring so much down the moneypit that the NHS has become.
£101bn last year in budget and you cant keep vital services operational??. Something wrong with that isnt there?. Government stats show that the NHS budget will climb to £111bn by 2014 while Defence will drop below £34bn. You dont want to start a conversation about wastage in government spending!.
My favourite soapbox piece being the unclaimed benefits pool from the Social Security budget that is listed by the government as being in excess of £10bn ANNUALLY. That is allocated, budgeted, money that does nothing….an amount equal to near a third of the entire defence budget!. Enough to pay outright for both aircraft carriers, the last two deleted Darings AND build an additional pair of Astutes to ease the stretch on the SSN fleet….from a single years wastage.
Lets dispense with the idiotry that the country cant afford to honour its obligations to forces personnel who have spent years in its service.
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