How Hunter frigates will ride on wake of British experience
The first of the Royal Australian Navy’s nine Hunter-class future frigates will enter service about 2029-31, and the $35 billion program has had an encouraging start.
This incorporates allowable profit margins, other terms and conditions, the acquisition of long lead material and detailed scope for design and engineering work necessary to allow prototyping to commence in 2020 and to ensure steel is cut on the first ship in 2022.
BAES is focusing on design changes necessary for the Hunter class to accommodate Australian-specific systems. These include the Aegis combat system, Standard SM-2 Block IIIA/B and Evolved Seasparrow (ESSM) anti-air missiles, the Australian-developed CEAFAR2 active phased array radar, a new tactical interface, and the MH-60R naval combat helicopter.
“BAES’s job is to supply the entire ship and they have Lockheed Martin Australia and Saab as combat system integration partners to help them with that task,” says Paddy Fitzpatrick, assistant secretary ship acquisition — surface combatants in Defence’s Capability and Sustainment Group.
“Sea 5000 is running about five years behind the UK’s Type 26 program — enough time to allow us to learn from their process, and apply lessons learned to our own,” Fitzpatrick says.
“Australia doesn’t want the first Hunter to be a first-of-class ship. By the time the first Hunter enters service, there will be at least three de-risked [experience-tested] Type 26s in service with the Royal Navy.”
The new shipyard, being built adjacent to the existing Air Warfare Destroyer construction yard and leased to ASCS, will be completed by March 2020.
BAES Australia will move into the new facility in July 2020 and start prototyping activity in December of that year. Five prototype blocks (sections) will be built in total.
“Initially we’d like them to build the same block that they’ve built before for the UK Type 26. They know all the problems with it, they know exact widths, they know how to train the relevant people, they know the hours it takes to build, and the costs,” CASG’s Fitzpatrick says.
“I think it’ll take somewhere between 22 and 24 months to train the workforce, build the practice blocks, qualify the yard, and ensure all the systems are operational and fully reliable before we actually construct the initial block for the first-of-type. That would commence in December 2022.”
The first of the Hunter class should be launched between 2027-28 and enter service between 2029-31.
The ships are initially planned to be built on a two-year interval, culminating with the possibility of 18 months between later ships. The last ship is expected to enter service in 2044-46.
Looking ahead, fulfilling the government’s objective of continuous build would require work to start on the ensuing program after the completion of Ship Seven given that the yard will accommodate three ships in production at the same time.
“By the time we’ve delivered the last of the Hunter class we’ll already be in build of ships one and two of whatever will replace the air warfare destroyers,” Stewart says.
