2 of the Helsinkis bought by Croatia?

Gollevainen said:

Well weren't you saying they´ve lately been equipped with the guns you mentioned??

But the Helsinki class had always featured the 57mm and the 23mm from the start. (which the latters however was changed to new turret models which could launch the Mistral SAM as well)

Between Helsinki and Hamina class there was a Rauma class which was slightly smaller boat and thus featured smaller 40mm gun. As the current Hamina class was derivated from the later it orginally had 40mm gun solely, but was later one substituted with the new generation 57mm gun.

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Oh yes, the guns haven´t been changed since the craft were built (23mm turrets have been upgraded as you said), but one of the four twin SSM-launcher was removed to make room for the Sonac PTA. So lately the total armament has been a bit different than earlier, better?

I think Mistrals have never been installed aboard these craft, am I right? It is possible, though.

Well I haven't any pictures of Helsinki with the mistrals but the overal concept of the newer SAKO 23mm mount was that it could be replaced with Mistrals. In wartime, those would have propaply been fitted.

Gollevainen said:

Well I haven't any pictures of Helsinki with the mistrals but the overal concept of the newer SAKO 23mm mount was that it could be replaced with Mistrals. In wartime, those would have propaply been fitted.

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In theory the guns could have changed to missiles onboard the ship in a couple of hours. In practice it took several days in the navy depot. A nice theoretical plan which did not work out. The fastest way would have been to change the whole turret. Installing Mistrals into the Helsinki-class would probably also have meant removing them from other vessels first. As the missiles have never been seen aboard these vessels, there probably weren´t any to install. Well, I think neither of really knows how things are.

Indeed we dont.

Finnish goverment confirms the deal

Finland's Patria to sell FNS Kotka and FNS Oulu to Croatia

The Finnish government on Thursday cleared the sale of FNS Kotka and FNS Oulu to state-controlled arms group Patria and granted an export licence on the Helsinki-class missile boats.


http://virtual.finland.fi/stt/showarticle.asp?intNWSAID=19053&group=General

Ragusian said:

Finnish goverment confirms the deal

Finland's Patria to sell FNS Kotka and FNS Oulu to Croatia

The Finnish government on Thursday cleared the sale of FNS Kotka and FNS Oulu to state-controlled arms group Patria and granted an export licence on the Helsinki-class missile boats.


http://virtual.finland.fi/stt/showarticle.asp?intNWSAID=19053&group=General

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Thanks for the update, good deal in terms of value for money !
I hope it won't be used an excuse by politicians to cut new programmes...

cheers

I wouldn't put too much confidence in this source, but still...

The Finnish Navy is equivalent in size to that of Croatia. Nacional has learned off the record that the main objective of the upcoming visit by the Finnish Vice-Admiral in early May is to work out details on closer cooperation between the two navies, particularly since Finnish waters are under ice for up to half the year, leaving its members without training opportunities year round. The compatibility and similarity of the Croatian and Finnish vessels will certainly allow for Finnish Navy members to train in Croatia, if necessary.

http://www.nacional.hr/en/articles/view/44993/

Would finnish navy be interested maybe in stationing a ship or two in Croatia during the winter? Not just for training, it certainly is a lot closer to current hotspots...

For a supposedly neutral country with limited peacekeeping activities it would be surprising - I would believe their training needs to be the priority

cheers

Yep reports are true, 2 Helsinki rust buckets are to join Cro navy but mainly in patrol role, until Naval program gets the go ahead. 12 Patrol Boats (40-50m) and 4-5 large corvettes or small frigates are to be acquired, not sure how much will all this cost, but Helsinki PB's are expected to serve only for 4-5 years tops.

Will we be getting these ships with or without their armament, rockets...? I don't remember the last time Croatian FAC-s fired their RBS-15 rockets so I hoped that these ''new'' ships were bought as an interim solution until the modernization of our own ships is complete!
According to most media, 2 Helsinki class boats are going to be presented to the public on Croatian Navy's 17th anniversary, that is, on 18 Semptember 2008.

Yep reports are true, 2 Helsinki rust buckets are to join Cro navy but mainly in patrol role, until Naval program gets the go ahead. 12 Patrol Boats (40-50m) and 4-5 large corvettes or small frigates are to be acquired, not sure how much will all this cost, but Helsinki PB's are expected to serve only for 4-5 years tops.

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Little bit more respect if you don't mind...These "rust buckets" that you so nicely mentioned are despite their old age in exelent conditions and can actually serve the 4-5 year period with out the need of any overhaul whatsoever...compared to the existing and newer FACs in Croatian navy which are practically unoperational conditions.
In fact the poor state of the existing Croatian FACs, exspecially the Petar Kresimir IV and the old Yugoslavian era Rade Koncar makes it propably more cost-effective to withdraw them completely and leave the Helsinki class as the main FAC force alongside with the possiple new build corvettes.

Mikojan said:

Will we be getting these ships with or without their armament, rockets...? I don't remember the last time Croatian FAC-s fired their RBS-15 rockets so I hoped that these ''new'' ships were bought as an interim solution until the modernization of our own ships is complete!
According to most media, 2 Helsinki class boats are going to be presented to the public on Croatian Navy's 17th anniversary, that is, on 18 Semptember 2008.

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No clue, Croatia has stock of 47 RBS 15, 27 of which are being upgraded to MK3 standard.

I think current HDZ government has showed little interest in what Croatian Armed forces need and NAVY in particular as the smallest of the 3 received little or no funding.

Government likes to think, it is doing a brilliant job, reality is quite the opposite, only with the NATO membership was MOD pushed to modernize, and even this is quite slow.

King class FAC's saga is a prime example. Both ships need new engines, yet MOD has failed to find funding to modernize what are two most capable ships in the Croatian Navy. Minister of Defense likes to talk, how Croatia will get this and that, reality is quite the opposite. What can I say other than hope for the best and post any positive news or info I come across. If I was a betting man, I'd tell you, at the next election make sure you vote SDP or HNS, bc until they get elected you won't see much of anything.

Im from croatia but this quote is from another forum, but I think represents different opinion than most of what you wrote.
Quote:
"Yes they have those sonars to my knowledge. That towed array sonar is supposed to be quite powerful as far as I've understood.

But yes they only have the two depth charge rails, so the ASW capability could be better, but as Croatia currently doesn't possess any ASW capability whatsoever to my understanding I guess it's a very welcomed addition to their arsenal. I wonder how big of a task it would be to add ASW rocket launchers on the deck to add more ASW firepower like the Finnish Rauma, Hämeenmaa and Kiisla classes have. Shouldn't be that expensive at least to my understanding.

What comes to the ships shape they are very well taken care of and are in a very good condition. It was mentioned in a Finnish Navy related magazine Rannikon Puolustaja recently, that those two last Helsinki class ships are partly even in a better shape than the 10 years younger Rauma class and Finnish Navy keeps their ships in a very good condition generally.

In the same magazine btw. they're saying that the whole Finnish Navy's underwater surveillance capability will drop now after the Helsinki class is decommissioned, so those sonars should be quite good indeed. The ship's air surveillance capability is quite a bit weaker though, than Rauma and Hamina classes have for example, but that's understandable as their radars are much older and their earlier planned upgrades were canceled after they decided to decommission the class."

Also some pictures - http://www.shipspotting.com/search.php?query=Oulu+62&action=results

The 2 Helsinkis have been delivered to Croatia.
They are currently at the shipyards in Sibenik, waiting to be refited for service with the Croatian navy.

I guess in a few months they should be ready to enter service, they seem to be in a good shape. Thank you, Finland!

Oh, and pictures can be seen at Croatian MOD site, the lower two are from Sibenik when they were unloaded.

http://www.morh.hr/vijesti_main.asp?id=1799

Helsinkis in croatian colours.


Both ships should be in full operational service by the end of july. Croatian navy is considering offering atleast one of the ships for service in the Med (presumably in Active Endeavour).