IAs it stands the RN is still the second most powerful navy in the world.

That’s a hell of an assertion.

The UK skimmer flotilla has the paper capability to do lots of things but there are not many spare hulls or rounds to fire from them.

The SSNs have some very impressive technical capabilities and the best crews in the world.

It is possible that the boomers are amongst the most effective*

The amphibious capabilities have received a boost just at the right to avoid losing ALL of the expertise of previous generations of combined ops.

But second most powerful in the world? I think that’s a stretch too far meself.

Al

* I suppose all boomer fleets have been effective in that we haven’t had WWIII yet

and is only about 16,000t short of a Nimitz.

Don’t read anything more sinister into this than amusement. What other conversation could we have where the words ‘only‘ and ‘16,000 tons‘ in the same sentence and no one bats an eyelid?!

Al

Please excuse the shotgun nature of this post and laziness in not quoting properly. Big breach of netiquette and common manners I know.

Firstly. I am almost embarssingly politically correct and I did not know that ‘chinaman‘ was a racial slur. So thanks for the heads up and assuming that I am not a complete moron I don’t find it unbelievable that someone else could use the term without realising that it could cause offence. If I had made the gaff I’d have have appreciated a subtle word in my shell like rather than an accusation of racism. Maybe disagreement with a discussion point could have been separated from disagreement with (quite possibly inadvertent) use of an offensive term. (And I am more than aware that this advice is gross hypocrisy given the format of this post!)

Secondly in the UK the racist moron brigade have happily lumped all ‘ethnics’ together. One of the corollaries of this is that it is not uncommon for members of ethnic minorities to react to racism as a catchall term against non-whites and so find it unbelievable to be accused of it. Just because there is racism between different non-white groups doesn’t mean that individuals are guilty of it. There is also a sociological assumption, in the UK at least, that -isms can only be directed at the least powerful. Hence sexism cannot be directed at males. As only females are sinned against on basis of gender. The fact that individual males may be disadvantaged in comparison to individual females due to class/education/job/geographic locale/other does not come into it. One may or may not agree with this but it is a backdrop to the line ‘my parents are from India so how can you accuse of being racist‘ line of thought.

Thirdly. Why did the UK not buy AV8B+? Its not just money. Well not in terms of defence spending. When BAe granted licensing rights to McD to develop the Harrier II it was on the understanding that McD would not fit a radar and thus compete with SHAR. Certainly in the UK at the time there was a feeling of ‘that’s a gentleman’s agreement but McD aren’t gentlemen‘ or even ‘that’s a gentleman’s agreement but yanks aren’t gentlemen‘ as stereotypes know no national boundaries.

Fourthly. Yep Falklands War was very much driven by the desire of TWO regimes to maintain a hold on power. Every Agentinian I’ve ever met* has felt gratitude to the Brits for defeating the invasion of the Malvinas as the military defeat directly left to the junta’s loss of power. Some UK citizens are grateful for the war and deaths and UK victory as propping up the TransAtlantic alliance and keeping Thatcher in power as they approve of her subsequent decisions. Whilst others feel the opposite.

Fifthly. I THINK that the initial thought experiment is an interesting one. And I would echo the sentiment ‘history shows us that just because we cannot envisage a scenario that does not mean that it will not happen‘ AND THUS that just coz we THINK that Argentina is the only likely specific case of this general scenario that don’t make it so. (Spain and Gibralta?!? Channel Islands and France?!?)

Sixthly. It is also a slightly depressing thought experiment. What a shock service personnel are put into a situation where they may die. And that some of those deaths may be entirely unecessary because the politicos sending them off to fight didn’t want to splash the cash to equip them correctly. I certainly hope that this scenario will never come to pass.

Seventhly. Sharky Ward, who may be a verbal hero or villain according to your viewpoint, has gone on record saying that he does not think that having Phantoms available for CAP in the Falklands conflict would necessarily have been better for the UK. One of his arguments being the better serviceability and availability of SHAR airframes versus Phantoms. Given the maintenance overheads on Harrier II (can you say ‘delaminating wings‘?) refurbing SHARS might** be a better bet than upgrading Gr9s or borrowwing AV8B+s.

Al

* admittedly I’ve not met many so this may very well not be statistically robust. Also presumably an Argentinian who is happy to talk cordially to a Brit may well be assumed to be possitively pre-disposed.

**’might’ as in I have no idea on possibility, time or cost to do any of these!

The concept of placing the VLS install down one side of the hangar on C2 was mine so thanks to Frosty, again, for his spirited defence of another mans follies! 🙂

The Sylver A35 module if, CAMM does end up as an approximately 3m long round, should be big enough to take the new missile. Cutting in to the hangar on one side will obviously steal space inside from the aviation department and would be likely to limit a 4k ton hull like this to FLynx and UAV’s. For me this is no loss to be honest. I think the chances of seeing Merlin, given the modest numbers we actually have, assigned as C2 ships flights are extremely remote. C2’s mission is actually just as well served by FLynx/Firescout/A160 anyway.

The 120m design you’ve generated is obviously superior, but, its interesting to see what could be achieved on the planned 100m layout Vospers are putting forward for C3. The below renderings are based on a chap called Wakazashi’s quite superb drawing of the VT C3 proposal. I have taken his name off solely to distance him from my tinkerings.

The changes to C3 are obviously the extension of a hangar back between the funnels to the mainmast and, naturally, the replacement of the OTO Super for’d mount with a Mk8 mod 1. Neither change being something outrageously difficult to accomodate IMO. The C2 concept obviously moves the hanger farther astern to createa weapons deck aft of the mainmast and modifies the raised forward superstructure, shown in the original VT plans, to accomodate, notionally, 6 A35 modules for 24 cells.

These both look nice. Size wise they also look like the kind of thing which might actually get approved. (Although we know that steel is pretty cheap big ships are easier to cancel on the grounds of cost or no need for the capability they provide).

I’d love the C3s to have either
SeaRAM on hangar
or VLS for’d of bridge
and 4 Harpoons
as on the notional C2 design

Of course I’d also like the world’s most rubbish gun mount aka Gambo to be replaced by a Bofors 57mm each side but all of these push cost UP UP UP

Al

@Al.

Absalon is too slow, it can only do 25knots, it would also cost a lot more then it cost the dane’s by the time you integrate the UK combat systems and weapons into the design.

I do not necessarily agree with either of those points.

However see above as to why my proposal is already toast!

Also diesels are of course the worst possible powerplant for a unit which wants a low acoustic signature. (As one would for mine ops and to avoid being fodder for boats)

For C1 i would suggest using the base T45 design, replacing Sampson with Artisan and removing the aft search radar (you can receive the radar picture from the T45’s and CVF’s via datalink). You boost the number of VLS up to the number the ship is designed to carry (64 or 72 IIRC) with the VLS cells being the A70 varient of the sylver launcher and modify the area under the flight deck so a Towed Array can be fitted (maybe a minor hull extension).

I agree with everything except the minor hull extension. See my first post as to why.

Cheaper alternative to Sampson certainly makes sense. Especially if Artisan will do the job for C1, C2 and (pos) C3. Economy of scale is everything.

Al

Good evening

This is my first post on this forum (which tbh I stumbled across purely by accident)

Apologies for resurrecting a dead thread (but I promise that I have read all the previous posts, ‘read’ not being the same as ‘agreed with’ of course)

I think that the concensus is that the following points have been agreed:

Economies of scale are good
Re-use old but not obsolete kit is good
Political will and gratitude evaporate
Currently developed or off-the-shelf solutions are cheaper than from scratch
RN has too few platforms at the moment
C1, C2 and C3 offer a once-in-a-lifetime chance to redress this

Points made but not universally agreed include:
Big ships survive hits
Steel is cheap, electronics and crews are expensive

I would like to add:
Off-the-shelf is only off-the-shelf if we resist the urge to tamper with it. Suggesting cutting sections out of or sticking sections into the T45 require new design work and RISK.

Remember the problems with:
Re-engining F4s for RAF, RN
Re-engining Nimrods for MR4
Stretching the Hercules
New avionics for Chinook

Even if the changes go without a hitch they add COST. Reference the nonsensical situation with the Sea Wolf and Virginia class SSNs

This is not limited to physical hulls. Any changes in kit need to be non-penetrating changes (easier if the original kit was in modular containers………)

What can be re-used?
Phalanx……..from T42, Flat tops
Harpoon…….from T23
Mk8………….from T23 and T42
Decoys………from T23, T42, Flat tops

What kit is in production now?
PAAMs
Aster
SeaRAM
SCALP

What is nearing end of production or recently ended?
EH101
WH64
T45
Absalon

A long production run of hulls gives enormous financial leverage

‘Build us 10 T45s each for fixed price 2/3 of what we paid for Daring’
‘Build us 16 Absalons each for fixed price less than, actual not adjusted, cost of the 2 Danish units’

Are just too tempting to ignore (especially in a downturn/recession)

However MoD PE must also sign up to ‘and we promise not to keep trying to change the design to shave off pennies and add £ks in development and engineering costs, the final design will be the final design unless you the contractor have loused up’

So my suggestions as follows:

C0 ‘Daring Class’
current T45
Build the missing 1 or 2 units
Fit all 8 With And With (!)
Harpoon
SeaRAM or Phalanx
Middle row of Sylver cells for more Aster 30

C1 ‘Pride Class’
HMS Ark Royal, Dreadnought, Eagle, Hood, Illustrious, Invincible, Revenge, Warrior
8x T45
delete* aft mast and Volume search radar
Fit with
Harpoon
SeaRAM or Phalanx
Middle row of Sylver cells for SCALP
TAS

C2+C3
Licence built Absalons
Helos………….WAH-64 Apache + EH101**
Aft……………..SeaRAM or Phalanx
Amidships ……5x Sylver silos
(have you seen how flexible that Danish mount is?! It should be a doddle to fit Sylvers there, as to size of Sylvers I honestly could not say)
For’d…………..2x Mk8 (from T42***)
Ro-Ro………….varies

C2 8x ‘Ally-class’
HMS Australia, Canada, India, Ireland, USA, West Indies (plus 2 from Botswana, China, Egypt, France, New Zealand, Poland, Russia, Ukraine and so on dependent on political message to be sent out!)
Ro-Ro
– reloads
– possibly Harpoons or SCALPs launching through side doors?
– minehunting, clearing, sweeping gear
– fuel

C3 8x ”Kingdom-class’
HMS England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales, (plus 4 from Channel Islands, Falkland Islands, Kernow, Mercia, Wessex and so on dependent on political message to be sent out!)
Ro-Ro
– minehunting, clearing, sweeping gear
– survey gear
– hospital
– CB90s

Al

* obviously by ‘delete’ I mean build without!
** I would love for one of each on each unit but ease of maintenance spares and training suggests that 2 of the same on any platform
*** A and B positions for big man-size NGS