Operating in singles, multiples and a part of a larger force the key attributes of SIMSS is flexibility and adaptability.
SIMSS is somewhat of a blank canvas and it is likely that uses will be found for it beyond its initial design and operational concept.
When testing the concept of SIMSS it might be interesting to compare it against recent deployments and standing patrols.
Libya, instead of a frigate and mine countermeasures vessel a single SIMSS could provide for non-combatant evacuation, special forces support, mine countermeasures, small craft interdiction and even land attack.
Caribbean, equipped with a range of disaster relief supplies, work boats, helicopter and embarked sappers SIMSS could provide hurricane relief to impacted communities. In the drugs interdiction role the same helicopter, multiple UAV’s, a small detachment of RM/civilians and a group of fast response boats would be able to cover a large area.
South Atlantic, basic presence patrolling would be combined with an embarked force for training opportunities.
Gulf of Arabia, using its workboats, tasking support equipment, diver support and unmanned MCM systems, SIMSS could combine the MCM and MCM Tasking Support role
Looking in more depth at the various equipment and personnel combinations for a couple of roles
Piracy and Smuggling Interdiction
Although the impact of piracy is often overstated and the role of the naval component similarly inflated the fact is sending billion pound destroyers or half billion pound frigates to carry out this task is lunacy, fair enough if they are all you have and equally fair enough if they were actually effective, but they are not.
A SIMSS pair could effectively dominate a large area, each carrying the following
- Wildcat helicopter
- Royal Marines security detachment
- Royal Navy small boat crew team
- Civilian legal and welfare team
- Containerised medical facility
- Containerised secure prisoner storage
- Multiple UAV systems
- 2 RHIB’s
- Containerised small craft fuel dispensing system
- 4 CB90 style 20m fast patrol interceptor craft
A third SIMSS could also provide logistic support, thus sustaining the capability in theatre for a long time.
This shows the tremendous flexibility of SIMSS, it’s the large spaces and configurable work areas that make the difference.
Click to enlarge
Comments on the Part 5 post so they are all in one place
Why is “maritime security” a bread and butter task of the RN ?
If as you contend, warships should indeed be warships, why aren’t the MSO missions handled by “auxiliaries” – manned by the RFA with Naval Parties, Marines, Coasties, Customs, or Fisheries officers as required?
I like the name, SIMMS,
but the interdiction part in it is sort of “over reach” relative to what you are describing as the base design (which I like, too).
I understand that here interdiction is about pirates in dhows/ outboard vessels. Compare that with LCS where the name is a misnomer
“seems that almost everything is predicated on operating at high speed”
- interdiction for them means reaching, checking and if necessary neutralising by one means or another suspect vessels over the vast distances of the Pacific
- these vessels could be many (intel, say about a dirty bomb in a container, might only say at which port it was loaded, not necessarily onto which vessel)and some of them might be aircraft carrier size, moving at 28 knots
… so, what is littoral about that role? But I read on with interest, just an observation
Fully agreed on the benefit of size: To be able to take Chinooks; “whether this goal can be achieved but making the assumption it can, this will be a significant capability that delivers great utility.”
- the SF edition of Chinook has a greatly extended range (by how much is perhaps not in the public domain?)
@ Jed
I’m not sure if you saw me mention about the Michael Lewis book “The History of the British Navy” on another thread, but “trade and commerce protection” was listed by that author as one of the four key roles of the Royal Navy (alongside; Command of the Seas, Defence of Britain, Armed Transport)
The Holland class are admittedly a lot of ship, for a price a tad over 2 x your target price
- they got criticism for being “over-specced” with the Thales i-Mast (their MoD wanted to include it as a reference installation for exports)
- their crew grew from the intended 32 slightly (never specified why, but I assume the late inclusion of CIWS dictated more bodies, even though the guns themselves are automatically operated (unlike what you specify for SIMMS)
@TD great set of posts with a lot of detail that will take time to digest. Overall though, I agree with wholeheartedly the approach. Tight budgets are here to stay, and the RN cannot support a domestic warship industry beyond a specific high end core. Having ships designed to commercial standards which could be built in multiple ship yards in a time of crisis to me seems a logical conclusion.
That’s a great article Admin! Took some time to read it all though. Some thoughts;
– Note to self, must check the ThinkDefence Tumblr on a more regular basis to avoid single day overloading,
– Nice to see the Forward Presence Ship idea fleshed out in more details,
– I’m gradually being swayed towards the way of the container,
– As for names, perhaps a return is due to the old rating system? So Carriers would be 1st rate, AAW Destroyers would be 2nd rate, Type 26 and associated ASW frigates would be considered 3rd rate, with your new ship design coming in as a 4th rate?
– A slightly unrelated question for anyone that knows; with regards to chaff against a missile attack, what is the preferred Navy method of meeting this threat? Turn into the threat and deploy chaff to one side (to reduce exposed cross section and “thicken” the apparent target)? Turn perpendicular and fire chaff aft (to “stretch” the ship)? Just curious.
– Would this vessel really need anything more than navigational radar? We’ve established that it’s not a combat ship and would be defended by other, better armed vessels. So does putting a higher grade radar on it risk making it more expensive than it needs to be?
– Overall the design is very good, but would 14-16 even be enough of these ships for the tasks we have to fulfil?
– I can’t even begin to imagine how many hours it took to put all this together,
My understanding is that the RN was planning 8 C3s to replace the Hunts / Sandowns. Assuming a one for one requirement to replace River, Echo and ice patrol ships this would mean 15 vessels. In my view we should be setting our ‘price bar’ to be for 24 vessels, with a construction cycle of one per year (e.g 24 year lifetime).
Repeating previous posts I know, but we should cancel T26 and build additional batches of T45s. 9 ASW / GP vessels (with CEC minus Sampson) should be achievable. As TD says focus on the warfighting bits…
TD I believe in several pieces the budget for mhpc is 1.4b pounds post sdsr
Yes, the 1.4 billions budget for MHPC appeared in an article, post-SDSR, rather recent, of Navy News.
A very well written and researched article. My only worry would be that you could create a 2 tier navy personnel wise with these Ships unable to keep personnel at same leve of readiness but with more advanced simulators this may be overcome.
@Chris b there is no definitive answer to your question. There is a publication which I will not name that covers the ASMD response to every known threat missile in exsistence. the response vaties from missile to missile dependnet on profile and more importantly the missile control system. Chaff would most commonly be used against a group 1 active seeker head missile and soft/hard kill sytems integrated. Chaff can be sown at different ranges to seduce or distract. active ECM decoys can also be employed. the crucial thing is to ensure taht you are presenting the correct profile of the ship prior to seeker head switch on wgich prevents a beam flash and a massive increase in radar cross section. For instance a T23 Frigate would present its stbd quarter to exocet prior to seaker head switch on. Active ECM decoys would gbe deployed at x miles and then if that was ineffective Sea wolf would be useed as soon as the 911 s could be moved as they must be locked in position to avoid increasing RCS during the soft kill phase. That is really as much detail as I could give in an open forum. The routine varys from missile to missile obviously and a 45 would of course look to go to hard kill at extended range as soon as it detected the missile or even engage the aircraft carrying the missile.
good series Admin, as ChrisB says above; it’s good to see the forward presence ships (or C3?) fleshed out some more.
i am quite happy to see them based on an OSV such as the ulstein designs, and perfectly content to see them configured as you have laid out.
predictably, i am unwilling to contemplate seeing the numbers of warfighting ships drop below 18.
the ATG post 2020 should have a normal escort of two T45′s and three T26′s, and in a situation such as the-island-that-must-not-be-named that needs to be doubled.
that screams 18 escorts as a minimum as far as i am concerned, and frankly i think the 19th SDSR escort will get canned by 2020, but i don’t see it dropping below that.
what does the £1.4b C3 budget buy you, make do with that.
Fair enough, cheers.
Chris
We fire inflatable balloons at incoming missiles as well
http://www.airborne-sys.com/pages/view/naval-decoy-ids300
@ TD
The mighty Killer tomato!! It is indeed carried though not as fashionable as gucci active deployed decoys these days.
These are wonderful posts by TD. However, I am concerned that the need to avoid cost escalation prevents the ‘future proofing’ of the design in the area of fightiness.
If the design included an integrated mast option then the potential future fightiness could be provided – given the size of the hull by providing an small weapons deck behind the bridge (instead of the space for a 20′ ISO).
Such an space (smaller then this one on the Absalon ships http://www.navalhistory.dk/images/Pressebilleder/ABSL_Vaabendaek.jpg) would enable fighty equipment to be added later in a modular way.
This would work best if those systems were sensor agnostic, but an integrated mast solution would enable the mast to be enhanced easily if required.
For a Royal Navy SIMSS those extra modular fighty fits in the deck could include a the loitering land attack capability suggested by TD, vertical launching chaff and other decoys or a small number of CAAM missiles in canisters. There is no need for the space to be big enough to include Harpoon!
The potential for a more capable air defence capability is important. If we remember Gulf War 1 there was considerable reluctance by the RN to forward deploy MCMVs into the northern gulf due to the need to provide them with an air defence envelope and that would in turn involve putting major units forward when there was a perception that the threat from the Iraqi airforce was significant.
If SIMSS is ever to be used for Minewarfare in the littoral then there has to be a risk that its deployment could be constrained by the risk of air attack. Future proofing by providing a weapons deck into which future systems could be fitted would allow additional defensive kit for those few units that need it to enable deployment in those higher threat environment.
I think for thias idea to have legs, it needs a hard power function as well.
Add a well deck, or a realistic ability to load Troops, ISO containers and Tanks onto landing craft via ramps and cranes, and its something that might both actualy happen and be useful when it does.
Steel is cheap and air is free, but, deep sea floor mapping equipment is very expensive, as are Lynx Wildcats and the like.
Could we build it with a through deck to provide a runway for light UAVs?
While you say it would not be a LCS, the possibility of carrying a wide range of aircraft, landing craft, combat boats and various other vessels does mean that it could be effectively used in that role; allbeit used with entirely different concepts and tactics than the Americans super-expensive new tubs.
———
I’m sold on the idea of this type of ship, but I think it certainly needs to have the potential to climb a couple of rungs of the fightiness ladder. Dropping down to around a dozen high-end fighty escorts would mean that the need for a flexible and adaptable fleet was more important than ever. The Navy certainly needs ships that can be adapted for new threats and tasks within their service lives.
I think the Finns have, or have ordered, the M12 LCP with a NEMO turret. Being able to launch that size of boat certainly gives you many more choices.
An interesting discussion, as always.
I think here there are two notions here that are complimentary, but separate. Yes a new approach to ship design is interesting to come up with something that may be better, more appropriate, more efficient, cheaper, whatever. The second is to recognise that the current RN fleet has fallen victim to the iron law of defense procurement – if the new one costs more than the old one, relatively speaking, then you are going to get less new ones than you had of the old ones. Therefore, quite separate from the specification is the simple fact of how much you pay for what you buy. You can buy your suits in Saville Row or buy them at Marks & Spencer; there is not a lot of practical difference in what you can do with the suit when you get it, but all the difference in the world in what you pay for it. Unfortunately the MoD habitually shops in Saville Row and hasn’t heard about Marks and Sparks.
If we bought our air defence ships at less than the one billion thereabouts we paid for T45s, or our submarines at less than the 1.2 billion we pay for Astutes, which I tend to think wouldn’t be too hard to do, then it’s a fair bet we would have more of both. If we had more ships by better procurement and not gold plating the specification, would we be motivated to creating a SIMSS rather than buying a frigate? Possibly not.
The problem with a clean sheet of paper and new thinking is that while it sounds like common sense and gives you to believe that your good ideas will save money, in practice it doesn’t work like that. If TD were to send off his ideas to the MoD, at best they would appoint a study group to think about them while they are being paid generous salaries and pensions, then there will be studies commissioned, alternative options considered, test rigs produced, overseas studies of comparative equipment, RFPs requested, joint ventures with all and sundry investigated, and even if the final result was still TD’s dream ship at a parts cost of 250 million, the billion or so development costs the MoD is addicted to would be in addition.
The only way to avoid development costs is to avoid development. If the task is to replace the T23s because they are worn out, then the first question is to ask is would it be so bad to just buy more T23s? A hell of a lot cheaper and easier to build more of what you know and understand, than to produce something else that doesn’t yet exist. Okay you wouldn’t buy exactly the same – feel free to change any bolt on part you like for some other bolt on part, but by staying with the same design envelope there is a whole lot of cost you can avoid. If not the T23, then any other ship where you don’t have to go back to square one to design it and to learn how to build it.
TD – I love the concept, its a new way of doing MHPC, but that’s all, this is a MCMV and Survey vessel for the RN, and a coast guard cutter for our non-existent coast guard.
Pay for it out of MHPC budget for sure, but reducing actual “warships” to build these would be a bad, bad idea, as per Brian’s comments above: so when you say:
“The future RN surface combatant fleet would then consist of about a dozen frigates and destroyers, split between T45 and T26, plus CVF(s), amphibious and submarines” – then I say NO !
Your settling for too little. 6 x T45 and 8 x T26 gives you maybe 10 available warships to protect a carrier and its RFA, an amphibious group (say 1 x LPH, 1 x LPD, 2 x Bay, 4 x Point, 2 x RFA) and maybe a URG as well – simply not enough.
Build more Bay’s instead of getting rid of them and you have soft power, disaster response and anti-piracy / anti-narco “mother ships” for CB90′s or whatever.
So your concept rocks as the C3 / MHPC, but robbing the T26 budget to pay for them is wrong (IMHO and all that).
Why on earth would this class of vessel want to land on a Chinook ? Seriously ?
I think your over-egging the versatility pudding with Merlin. Keep the price down by have a flight deck sized for Merlin and a hanger sized for a single Wildcat ????
While I see the point of the vessel as a mother ship for fast interceptors and Helo’s / UAV’s I just think you have set the design speed way too low. The oceans as you well realize are vast, and as a modern container ship can do 22Kts or greater, your not going to be able to chase down pirated vessels, or get in position to board suspected terrorists, smugglers, whatever, if your relying on 2 x 18.5m Interceptors and your Wildcat.
Surely the Caribbean (and elsewhere) disaster support role is better undertaken by larger vessels, such as the Bay class, which are still relatively cheap, and are not constantly being used on amphibious ops / exercises ? Bay with Lynx shelter, or Bay / Enforcer variant with hanger as per my previous article.
These are wonderful posts by TD. However, I am concerned that the need to avoid cost escalation prevents the ‘future proofing’ of the design in the area of fightiness.
If the design included an integrated mast option then the potential future fightiness could be provided – given the size of the hull by providing an small weapons deck behind the bridge (instead of the space for a 20′ ISO).
Such an space (smaller then this one on the Absalon ships http://www.navalhistory.dk/images/Pressebilleder/ABSL_Vaabendaek.jpg) would enable fighty equipment to be added later in a modular way.
This would work best if those systems were sensor agnostic, but an integrated mast solution would enable the mast to be enhanced easily if required.
For a Royal Navy SIMSS those extra modular fighty fits in the deck could include a the loitering land attack capability suggested by TD, vertical launching chaff and other decoys or a small number of CAAM missiles in canisters. There is no need for the space to be big enough to include Harpoon!
The potential for a more capable air defence capability is important. If we remember Gulf War 1 there was considerable reluctance by the RN to forward deploy MCMVs into the northern gulf due to the need to provide them with an air defence envelope and that would in turn involve putting major units forward when there was a perception that the threat from the Iraqi airforce was significant.
If SIMSS is ever to be used for Minewarfare in the littoral then there has to be a risk that its deployment could be constrained by the risk of air attack. Future proofing by providing a weapons deck into which future systems could be fitted would allow additional defensive kit for those few units that need it to enable deployment in those higher threat environment.
TD – thank you for all your efforts indeed.
I am with JediBeefTrix, the thought of major surface units dropping below 30 (!!!) makes me vomit, never mind frakkin 18 – just look at what the JMSDF manages to do with a smaller budget….
Anyway, superb concept for “going big” for the C3 / MHPC role:
6 to replace Hunt’s as deployable MCMV
2 to replace Survey ships
3 to 4 to replace Rivers
2 more for good luck…….
As I have said before though, apart from MCMV’s, these should all be operated under the Blue Ensign by the RFA, as they are “auxiliaries” not warships, and I would move survey into that class too. This operating model would potentially reduce costs even further. There is a long history of Naval Parties operating on RFA’s and you add all the other government agencies required for the mission (Coast Guard, Customs, blah blah blah).
The MCMV’s should have enhanced fightiness in the form of a simple SeaRAM for self protection. Overall I think the vessel could be smaller by getting rid of Chinook ‘land on’ and Merlin ‘hanger’ capacity (although this obviously shrinks your covered multi-role deck too). Flight deck for Merlin, hanger sized for Wildcat plus a couple of UAV’s would be fine would it not ?
As for your Libya scenario, haven’t you drunk your own cool aid a bit ? : “a single SIMSS could provide for non-combatant evacuation, special forces support, mine countermeasures, small craft interdiction and even land attack.”
I fail to see after re-reading all the articles, how a SINGLE SIMMS could do all those things. Your not going to fit many evacuated civvies onboard if the bunks are all being used by SF and the module space is taken up by MCM kit. Where the hell are the land attack missiles going to fit…. ???
In the end if the T26 ends up as a fairly unsophisticated and crappy (sorry ‘relatively cheap’) “warship” based on CAMM, hull mounted sonar and some Anti-ship missiles, then it still has the greater versatility bestowed by the innate “fightiness” of being a “proper” warship; if we limit’s MSO capabilities to carrying bigger RHIBs (or more of them) then it is hardly going to be a gold plated battleship, and I would have no problem using them in the Caribbean on anti-narco duties, or even on anti-bloody piracy (a law enforcement role !!) because we have no Coast Guard to speak off. Believe me, from experience, just because your trolling up and down a certain piece of ocean somewhere, doing one particular job, it DOES NOT prevent the ops room being closed up for six hours at a time to practice ASW, AAW or anti-ship missile ops etc This is even more relevant with modern C3 systems having built in simulation capabilities. My point being, the whole “we should not be doing MSO with expensive warships” argument is often somewhat disingenuous.
However, superb articles, superb design, lets have it as the C3 / MHPC !
Bravo Zulu, time 10.45, authentication Lima Mike, out.
Have moved all the comments to Part 5 so they are all in one place
Thought a break from LAND stuff might be welcome by the way, better get my nose to the grindstone for the rest of the Army series
@ Jed
A ship needs to be able to move 500 miles per day. This is the bar set by the USN/USMC.
As for Chinook I take it that the latest RAF recruitment adverts aren’t shown in Canuckistan?
@ TD
Wonderful piece of work.
Some responses to questions and issues raised
Bread and Butter and Manning
They are bread and butter roles because that is how things have evolved but the point about RFA manning or even multi agency manning is well made and I hadn’t really thought of that, I like the idea
Interdiction being over reach
It was to introduce an I into the name
Chinook
A Chinook sized pad just provides options and if you can land a Merlin yo are not that far off Chinook, its a reasonable trade though
Numbers
It would be great if this or something like it (its only a thought exercise after all) could be obtained in serious numbers, I like the idea of proper commonality after all. Trading numbers for T26 etc is a tough choice, in an ideal world it would not happen but we always find ourselves in those difficult decisions where we have to trade one project against the other. Tough decisions eh
Fightiness
This is where costs rise and its tempting to keep adding stuff on top from day 1 but there is no reason why modest enhancement could not be added, SeaRAM etc. Fire Shadow should be pretty easy to add though for limited and precise short range land attack
Speed
is never a bad thing but increasing it adds cost and reduced endurance, this is a fat ship as well so its a trade off
Libya
We have been deployed for months, start with NEO (basically empty apart from a bit of security) no bunks just sitting in the enclosed deck, once offloaded then progress to MCM and SF support with the modules being embarked at the nearest sensible port. That’s the advantage of lots of space and modules
@TD
One issue the Ship would have in Libya is a limited comms fit. NSWAN and the ability to keep track of the RMP is vital but I am guessing there is no reason that could not simply come in a plug and play container.
Interesting series of articles. Thanks.
One remark though. In part 3 (design) you compare Viking Poseidon (base for SIMSS) with the Echo-class. The Echo roughly measures 90.6×16.8×5.5 and comes in at 3.500 tons full load displacement. The SIMSS, as proposed, roughly measures 130x24x7 or so. I think that translates to a full load displacement of more than 8.000tons. Obviously a lot bigger than the Echo-class.
This makes me wonder whether the SIMSS is not too large for some tasks or circumstances. Wouldn’t it be better to have two classes of SIMSS?
one large one (between 4 and 8 units as proposed) for e.g.
- South-Atlantic patrol
- Carribean patrol in hurricane season
- Chasing pirates off Somalia
- Forward presence base off West-Africa
- More generally : long endurance, large payload tasks
a smaller one (between 8 and 12 units at 2000-3000tons in line with current thinking and concepts for MHPC or C3) for e.g.
- MCM operations in the Gulf (maybe supported by a large SIMSS mother-ship)
- Offshore patrol activities in UK waters
- Carribean patrol outside hurricane season
- More generally : medium endurance, specific tasks
One or two of the larger class could also have additional protection and features for operations in icy waters up north or down south.
The larger one could form the bases for two other specialised variants later on : one dedicated ocean survey vessel to replace Scott and one OMAR-variant to replace Diligence (as TD already suggested
Both types of course share the same design philosophy of the SIMSS.
Ref Chinook abilities
Rotors turning areas is quite a bit bigger than Merlin – depending on where that crane sits, a Merlin can be main wheels on the deck (i.e. tied down) with the tail rotor boom extending out over the dropped safety nets. A chinooks after wheels are pretty much at the aft end of the fuselage, and of course the forward mounted rotor is thus much further forward.
Of course it also about weight. A fully loaded Chinook is a lot more mass than a fully loaded Merlin HM3A – so your looking at considerable expense to stress the landing deck to take the weight.
Just saying…..
As for speed, well that is the main problem with using this hull form is it not.
“Why on earth would this class of vessel want to land on a Chinook ? Seriously?”
Because containerised accomodation/stores and a chinook pad gives you a low grade assault ship.
Last time we discussed these I wanted a modular Apache workshop remember….
I think 10-15 knots is plenty for this sort of ship, its still 240-360 miles per day, and the fuel savings are amazing.
I’m sat looking at the fuel consumption for a 65ft yacht, at 6knts, it has a range of 5000 miles, at 8knts, it has a range of 2000 miles, at 10knts, its down to 1000 miles.
2.7, 1.1 and 0.55 miles per gallon respectivly.
Tops out at 18knts, where it burns 4 gallons for every mile it moves.
3x the speed, 10x the fuel consumption.
Thats not a good trade off for a long range endurance vessel.
Leave going fast to embarked whirly birds or boats
DomJ
I completely understand ref fuel burn, but then maybe this is the wrong hull form – a big part of TD’s roles for this vessel is MSO, and yet it cannot keep up with, or chase down a suspect vessel if its a modern ocean going merchant ship.
Ref: “Because containerised accomodation/stores and a chinook pad gives you a low grade assault ship” – WTF ? Seriously ?? WHY ???
It does not give you a low grade assault ship at all, it gives you a low grade troop transport. Even if only carrying an Merlin HC3A (because don’t forget it can only ‘land on’ a Chinook) and containerised Accom, your only carrying two “lifts” worth or troops (or less). What mission do we need this for exactly ?
What mission do you foresee requiring between a Platoon and a company of RM supported by a Merlin HC3 and 2 x CB90 or 2 x LCVP, and maybe a LCAC(L) craned off the arse end in “mini-assault ship” role????
I def would not reduce the warship fleet below 18. I think the vessel outline is too large particularly it’s draft these will spend a lot of time in shallow areas looking for mines sf insert ect. I keep coming back to thinking these needs to be 2 diff ships with common systems. Perhaps the austral jhsv ship and a more reducted signature vessel perhaps an enlarged visby type 16 ships min eg 8 each. min arm would be 57mm gun mini guns and fitted for but not with phalanx. Cracking serious the innovation of the modules are endless
At some point 6+ years go I got interested in LSDs as incredibly versatile (mother)ships.
The classic approach for real combat is the cruiser, though.
I’d like to see a ship that combined credible ASW with credible area AAW, a powerful surface target gun and an unknown (below deck) depot of ASuW munitions.
A really big production run (several units per year for one or two decades, comparable to Arleigh Burkes) and improved procurement (such as buying the electronics in large batches instead of one or two sets per year, real competition between shipyards for such a business of the generation) and export success (one navy specifies it, but with many navies’ needs in mind) could make such a ship look affordable.
My suggestion would be that in a time of war, these ships should be able to be re-configured as mini LPDs, capable of carrying say, two LCVPs or an LCU.
Also, could you discuss a bit about what is the advantage of the SIMM over a Bay class?
As a general of thumb a ship burns twice as much fuel at 30kts as it does at 20kts.
High endurance speeds are important. The time difference between 20kts and 15kts to cover say the 6845nm between here and Port Stanley is only 5 days (14 days vs 19 days.) Now 5 days doesn’t sound much but it is 5 days extra the opposition has to consolidate defences. How many extra deaths is that in an natural emergency? At 10kts the Falklands are 28 days away. And all that extra time is on top of the time the politicians have had to dither about an appropriate response. In military terms the higher cruise speeds add to the manoeuvre envelope.
As for yachts I take it you mean a motor vessel and not a sailing yacht with a small engine? What you have to consider here is thermal efficiencies. A ship engine is considerably more efficient than a yacht engine. It has only been over the last decade or so that motor yacht designers have treated fuel efficiency as a major design driver. A container being moved from China to Europe costs about $1 per mile. It is only been over the last 5 years or so that the main container lines have introduced slow steaming to reduce their costs. And their slow speed is 19kts as opposed to the design speed of many of the bigger ships which is about 25kts. The lines get by this by increasing the number of ships on the loops by one or two. Of course there is a difference between operating a shipping line and a military force. The latter could spend the majority of its time at 15kts or even alongside. But if the balloon goes up the military force needs to move and move fast.
But remember, these are not fighty ships, they can be propositioned and when in place, use the UAV’s, helicopters and small craft to do the high speed stuff. It doesn’t replace conventional fighting vessels but allow them to be marshalled, trained hard and resources concentrated where it counts
By the way fellas, I would like to see a bit wider air time for this series so if anyone fancies posting the links on any other forums you might be involved with I would very much appreciate it.
I know this is fantasy fleets but it makes a change from the sad depressing reality doesn’t it?
@Mark / @WW, I agree that a single size does seem overkill for all the scenarios listed. Perhaps what we should be looking at is a Clyde plus hanger solution for Patrol and MCMV replacement (e.g. 12 vessels) seperately. Surely, these would still be in the £75m ball park and could be built commercially?
Reducing the number of first rate escorts below 18 is not ideal, but I think we should be thinking about maximizing the use of what we have. If we could get 8 of these instead of 2 escorts and long term replacements for the echo class and Protector/Endurance then it’s a big win in my opinion.
If we scrapped the T26 design and kept with the T45 hull, it would also mean we would have 3 hull types for 90% of the significant RN surface vessels…
I quite like the idea of the HMS Clyde design but with a 114 or 127mm gun on the forecastle, plus a slightly ice reinforced hull like the latest NZ patrol ships (Otago?). Great for hunting pirates & smugglers.
Also interested in the X-Bow design. Would make a stable rough sea tanker to replace the old Rover tankers.
Would also make a base ship for 4 helicopters. No forecastle for a gun, but vertical launch missiles would be ok.
WW
I have Long thought that it would be fiesable to have 2 ships sizes with essentialy identical equipment.
JED
On the other hand I think the Bay sized derivative has benefits.
In short IMHO TD’s Idea is very sound; there may be some discussions about design and vessel type, but beyond that, the commercial vessel based patrol ship seems to have much to recomend it.
My only question is speed.
TD’s point about how much it costs is as ever well made, but 15 knots sounds too slow it would be faced with many commercial vessels that could outrun it and that would make interceptions difficult and force the launching of expensive helicopters. It seems from TV that the most of the Anti Sommali piracy stuff is being done at 17 knots or so…
Some of the Commercial vessels can be pushed up to 20 knots. At cost always at cost.
x, I’m not familiar with such a rule of thumb. I do remember that power requirements grow a lot more than that, though.
I am curious about your source.
DK Brown quotes it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_K._Brown
BAE Systems and the Admiralty seem to me to be the two biggest obstacles for correct completion of such a progressive project like a “SIMSS”.
IXION said “Some of the Commercial vessels can be pushed up to 20 knots. At cost always at cost.”
A good number of commercial ships (other than the big 25kt container ships,) especially some big ferries can do 20kts with ease. Ships much bigger than what TD proposes. It isn’t a question of going all out all the time but having the legs to do the distance when needed.
This is going to become another rabbit hole I think I will stop.
Jed
Chasing down the suspect vessel could be left to a flock of smaller boats.
Something along the lines of the CB90.
Perhaps operating in pairs, and fire support and a seizure varient, to ward against another iranian incident.
As for the troop transport.
Alone, you are right, its basicaly pointless, although for resupply of places like South Georgia its ample alone.
But 8 of them, is, well, giove or take a battalion worth of infantry.
Not a huge amount, but a handy addition to the actual landing fleet.
X
It was a Flemming 65
http://www.flemingyachts.com/
So a motor yacht.
http://www.beringyachts.com/hybridpropulsion/
Apparently yachts now come with hybrid drives, and the RN tells us the T45 is one of a kind.
Remember, these are not warships.
99% of the time, they will be used for peace preservation.
The carriers ajnd such could really use a sustainable 30knt + speed, for the reasons you gave, but if the SIMSS arrive after 30 days, not 10, does it make a huge difference?
True, in an emergency, 5 days is a long time.
But is it?
At the end of the day, a forward deployed slow ship is gouing to beat a UK based fast ship
No one was praising the UK for a swift reaction to haiti, the bay class arrived how long after?
Ixion
The big ship acts as a mother ship for the actual interception vessels.
Which should be fast little buggers capable of 40knts
SO
From what I understand, the shape and size of the ship has a massive effect on fuel consumption at different speeds.
Which was why battleships were made longer to make them faster.
Admitadly, I figured it would go up much more than double 20 to 30
I think I read of a new, thin fast 25kt cruise ship for the Med, designed for American/Japanese tourists that only have a few days to “do” the Med.
A similar ship would make a fast troop/cargo transport.
It takes about double power output to go from 20 to 25 kts, I doubt that 20 to 30 kts means only double fuel consumption. Drag increases about proportional to v^2, after all.
On top of that you have the option of using fuel-efficient diesels at 20 kts, which becomes quite impractical for 30 kts (exception: FACs with turboloader diesels). For 30 kts you will likely employ gas turbines.
Have a look at the installed power of the T45 destroyer: The diesels for 18 kts cruise have only about a tenth of the power of the gas turbines for 29 kts top speed.