The Royal Navy Discussions and Updates

[RobWilliams]

Rapid progress on QE, most of her hull is painted by the looks of it. Won't be particularly long until she starts builders sea trials. Heck, when she's moved out of the dock it'll be a grand sight when she's being fitted out and finished off all the while in the dock Prince of Wales will be being assembled.

Anyway, lot of news about the RN in the last fortnight or so.

Illustrious recently visited Lisbon after taking part in Exercise Deep Blue (in which UK nuc boats did take part)

https://navynews.co.uk/archive/news/item/10735

During the exercise, a Wildcat dropped in on deck dropping off a passanger

https://navynews.co.uk/archive/news/item/10695

Nice article about Merlin operations on board Illustrious during the exercise

https://navynews.co.uk/archive/news/item/10655

Can't remember where I read it, but in another article a serving member of the RN was interviewed about the readiness of the Merlins and they said that 9 Merlins could sustain 3 flying in the air - with those 3 split into 2 on station and one transiting. So the implication is that the amount of Merlins which would need to be deployed to cover the AEW task as well as ASW would probably have to be towards 12 at least to maintain some kind of useful AEW/ASW component.

HMS Defender (Type 45 #5) deployed on her first tour of duty the other day, her destination was the Gulf, stopping in Gib on her way through as most RN vessels do.

https://navynews.co.uk/archive/news/item/10585
https://navynews.co.uk/archive/news/item/10675

40 Commando have been training up on Salisbury plain in preperation for COUGAR 14 which would be deploying "later this summer". It'll probably be Illustrious' last outing before she's decommissioned. Then we've hit a period where we'll only have a single LPH available for operations until 2016 at the earliest.

HMS Argyll also recently test fired her Sea Wolf missile system in conjunction with the new Artisan radar, pretty quick on the heels of the firing from Iron Duke if truth be told. She'll later be deploying to the Caribbean.

https://navynews.co.uk/archive/news/item/10665

 

[Volkodav]

Currently reading Brown and Moores Rebuilding the Royal Navy Warship Design Since 1945 and I was surprised to read that following the cancelation of CVA-01 it was planned to build no less than six Invincibles. Also that prior to the cancelation it had been planed to build four Invincible like Escort Cruisers in addition to the three strike carriers and that the sale of a CVA-01 to Australia was seen as likely.

 

[t68]

Currently reading Brown and Moores Rebuilding the Royal Navy Warship Design Since 1945 and I was surprised to read that following the cancelation of CVA-01 it was planned to build no less than six Invincibles. Also that prior to the cancelation it had been planed to build four Invincible like Escort Cruisers in addition to the three strike carriers and that the sale of a CVA-01 to Australia was seen as likely.

Abraham Gubler put me onto a 1962 report into RAN aircraft carrier replacement over at secret projects forum. They estimated a new UK built ship would have been around $73m AUD but with the UK builds for themselves we could not expect a ship till the mid 1970's, a new carrier from the US was dismissed as being to big but they wanted to settle on the Essex class modified to the Orinksy 27C design which someone built a model of if you go hunting that forum.

 

[153jam]

So I was looking into the future frigate program for Australia and I found that they have already committed $78.2 million to the prospect of constructing the ship in Australian yards. (I couldn't provide a link for this because of my post count but the information about that is available on the Minister Defence .Gov website).
With the preferred design for this option being the Navantia's design (I believe, although please correct me if I'm wrong).

Now this may have been mentioned lots on this thread so apologies if it has (I couldn't see anything about it in recent posting). The question I have is, could this be a serious blow to the T-26 project if they follow this option? I am concerned that without Australia in the picture, could we still think about procuring 13 T-26 for the RN to replace our T-23 frigates?

Sorry again if this has already been discussed, I did try to find something about it on this thread to no success given the amount of time I can sneakily post here while at work..

 

[RobWilliams]

13 frigates is the current planning assumption and isn't a figure which is dependent on export orders to be reached, there would not be many big savings of economies of scale in terms of construction because UK work would still only be for UK orders with other orders being built in their respective countries.

The threat comes from budget reductions, that's why the number could be forced downwards in the future.

 

[StobieWan]

So I was looking into the future frigate program for Australia and I found that they have already committed $78.2 million to the prospect of constructing the ship in Australian yards. (I couldn't provide a link for this because of my post count but the information about that is available on the Minister Defence .Gov website).
With the preferred design for this option being the Navantia's design (I believe, although please correct me if I'm wrong).

Now this may have been mentioned lots on this thread so apologies if it has (I couldn't see anything about it in recent posting). The question I have is, could this be a serious blow to the T-26 project if they follow this option? I am concerned that without Australia in the picture, could we still think about procuring 13 T-26 for the RN to replace our T-23 frigates?

Sorry again if this has already been discussed, I did try to find something about it on this thread to no success given the amount of time I can sneakily post here while at work..

Any answer I give is conjecture but bear with me:

BAE have a "terms of business" agreement in which the UK Government give them money if their ship building income drops below a certain level and they're committed under that agreement to build what amounts to 13 frigates worth of effort.

On top of that, a *lot* of the kit for the 26's is pulled through Type 23, radar, cms,, missiles a stack of bits.

So, it's hard for HMG to get much savings in getting the build numbers down. They could decide to cut back a bit and give work out as a few more OPV's or whatever but we're off into the wild blue yonder at that point.

 

[Volkodav]

Abraham Gubler put me onto a 1962 report into RAN aircraft carrier replacement over at secret projects forum. They estimated a new UK built ship would have been around $73m AUD but with the UK builds for themselves we could not expect a ship till the mid 1970's, a new carrier from the US was dismissed as being to big but they wanted to settle on the Essex class modified to the Orinksy 27C design which someone built a model of if you go hunting that forum.

I've read the National Archives document Abe referred to so was quite surprised to read in Brown and Moores account that an Australian ship would have been ordered and constructed at the same time as CVA-01 to replace Victorious and the second pair of RN ships would have followed later to replace Ark and Eagle. The RAN ship would have been used to generate economies of scale to keep the costs down on the later UK builds.

Hindsight is a marvellous thing oh but what if.

 

[swerve]

Any answer I give is conjecture but bear with me:

BAE have a "terms of business" agreement in which the UK Government give them money if their ship building income drops below a certain level and they're committed under that agreement to build what amounts to 13 frigates worth of effort.

On top of that, a *lot* of the kit for the 26's is pulled through Type 23, radar, cms,, missiles a stack of bits.

So, it's hard for HMG to get much savings in getting the build numbers down. They could decide to cut back a bit and give work out as a few more OPV's or whatever but we're off into the wild blue yonder at that point.

That agreement is currently building three OPVs, as we're not ready to order the Type 25 & we'd have to pay BAE even if we didn't buy anything. So why not get three shiny new OPVs for the money? Just enough to fulfil the agreement until frigate work starts, & gives us either three extra OPVs, or three new ones better than the old ones which we can sell on.

And no, apparently it doesn't count against the 13 frigate total, & we're still committed to that. Something to do with timing: there's an annual minimum, to keep the yards open & workforce skills up, or something like that, so if we stretch out the build we can end up having to buy more. I'm hazy on the details.

 

[StobieWan]

That's pretty much the way I'd read the last second decision to buy a trio of rather un-needed OPV's (well, if they're to *replace* the existing ones, they've got plenty of life in 'em)

I'm of the opinion that it's an agreement which has fended off the valley of death in Australia and the absolute plain of utter death all around in Canadian ship building but like you, I didn't get my annotated copy in the post for me to review.

It's interesting (and rather a relief) that the OPV order doesn't come off the total - all we have to do now is to find the cash to run all the new ones and keep the existing ones and we will see an effective increase in hull numbers. If it means we're not tasking Type 45's to chase drug runners so often (once in a while is cracking fun and good training)

 

[swerve]

Hammond was going on again today about how we really should try to operate both carriers, but saying something else might have to give to afford it. (1) Good, (2) A bit worrying.

 

[hauritz]

Are there any plans to replace the HMS Ocean?

If not then the RN could be down to just one flattop if it chooses to rotate its two Carriers in and out of service.

Possibly no replacement for the Ocean would mean both ships being operational with one of them acting as a super sized helicopter carrier.

 

[H-D]

Are there any plans to replace the HMS Ocean?

If not then the RN could be down to just one flattop if it chooses to rotate its two Carriers in and out of service.

Possibly no replacement for the Ocean would mean both ships being operational with one of them acting as a super sized helicopter carrier.

hauritz, I wouldn't be surprised that a replacement for Ocean is on someone's wishlist. There is no doubt that such a ship would be very useful. Perhaps a new Ocean could take over some of the duties currently performed by the aging Argus. The problem is, how is the navy going to man a new Ocean?

 

[Volkodav]

Ironically had the invincibles not been retired early there would be no issue with trained manpower going forward.

 

[RobWilliams]

No plans for replacing Ocean, no manpower to support any replacement and no budget to support the construction and running of her.

Neither will act as a super LPH, the plan was - and always has been - to smush the roles of strike carrier and LPH together in one hull if we needed a commando carrier which isn't always the case. Consider recent cases like Libya, Syria or even Iraq where air power was/could have been the order of the day.

Frankly if we want more flat decks, my personal preference is we stick it out until the LPDs need replacing and replace them with a pair of LHDs.

The plan too has always been to get both carriers in service to keep 1 available all the time, that's the best scenario and frankly what we should aim for rather than replacing Ocean.

 

[StevoJH]

Stating a lack of man(woman) power isn't really accurate, especially since the RN is cutting manpower due to government cutbacks rather then due to a lack of recruitment.

 

[kev 99]

I'm with Rob on this, any additional flat tops need to be the LPD replacements.

 

[RobWilliams]

It is accurate to a degree, it's suffering from the same problem as the Army. There's been so many tranches of cuts and a significant amount of internal 'doom and gloom' that recruitment is dropping and people are leaving the service faster than recruitment can make it up.

The delay in the induction of Scan Eagle was directly linked to a lack of qualified manpower to help bring it in.

I find it difficult to easily say that buying a ship and needing to find another 1000+ crew for her is something not to worry about.

The carriers are going to suck up the crew of both illustrious and ocean each including air group. There won't be a carry over of personnel to a third flat top. Reduction in RN manning is the guideline and it's up to the RN to decide how best to allocate that manpower. Right now with the carriers and everything, I'd rather see any extra manpower to into more escorts or bringing our laid up LPD back into service. But then that leads into budget problems.

 

[the concerned]

How old are the LPD's now must be close to 10yrs. If that is the case shouldn't a design be looked at now considering how long it takes for a new class of ships to enter service.

 

[StevoJH]

How old are the LPD's now must be close to 10yrs. If that is the case shouldn't a design be looked at now considering how long it takes for a new class of ships to enter service.

It doesn't take 20 years to design an Amphib, and I wouldn't be surprised if the LPD's last 40-50 years rather then 30.

 

[Nick underscore]

...I'd rather see any extra manpower to into more escorts or bringing our laid up LPD back into service. But then that leads into budget problems.

Ideal and maybe practical to some degree would be to sell another Bay class LSD and transition crew to bring Albion out of extended readiness.

Yes, a Bay LSD uses RFA personal and to half the levels of the RAN with Choules and there are some comparable differences in the capabilities of both these ships within the RN/RFA, however this will provide RN/RFA with active "Twos" for each CV, LPD and LSD platforms* out to 2020's.. Finding a buyer for another Bay wouldn't be a problem in current market.

Financially, it will cost more to run the LPD vs LSD, but with another £55-60mio on sale of Mounts Bay and the £300/500k saved with Albion out of extended readiness, this should provide financial short term relief from MOD and Govt until focus on defence budgets comes under less pressure.. I hope

Just a thought

* Obviously Ocean (LPH) is the only girl on her own.. Shame too