US destroyer/frigate designs of the 60s & 70s

fishjay

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I have finished some simple drawings of US destroyer designs from the 1960s and 1970s. The drawings are based on sketches and artist renderings found in Norman Friedman's book "US Destroyers An Illustrated Design History". I find the nuclear frigate design (Typhoon) very interesting.

Fishjay
 

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Fishjay

Love the drawings. They make a nice addition to my copy of the Friedman book. Much appreciated.
Look forward to seeing others like the pre-Spruance DX designs or some of the cruisers in his other book. Thanks again

UK 75
 
Looks like a Mk71 or its 175mm predecessor on the DDs bow?
 
I always got a good laugh at the "warships should look warlike" complaint.

It kinda makes sense, but just sounds pentulant regarding a class of excellent destroyers in the most powerful Navy on the planet. I mean, if your stick is the biggest and everyone knows it, there's no point putting on war paint.

As I say regarding NASA SLS and ULA Vulcan illustrations, adding stripes to your rocket does not make it go faster.
 
Looks like a Mk71 or its 175mm predecessor on the DDs bow?

No. It's an early drawing for Mk45. The gunhouse changed shape considerably between the early designs and the final version.

This CODAG DD was one of several designs for the Project Sea Hawk surface ship ASW program (not to be confused with the later helicopter). Armament for these ships eventually settled on one 5in/54 gun, Sea Mauler or a twin 3in/50 gun aft, a DASH drone helo hanger, an improved ASROC launcher, and both heavyweight and lightweight torpedo tubes. The sensors ate up a lot of space, with SQS-35 VDS and a very large twin-dome bottom bounce sonar based on SQS-26 (think SQQ-23 PAIR but with the much larger SQS-26 system.) The result, on roughly 4200 tons, would have been really tight and hard to upgrade when DASH was replaced by LAMPS and Sea Mauler with BPDMS.

Edit: I found a contemporary paper that refers to this a Project Sea Hawk rather than Seahawk.
 
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Based on data on the Land Based Mauler Launcher and drawings, that missile system would be quite large, around as big as a twin Mark 11 used for the Tartars and Standards. (required space on deck wise) though taller because of the integrated radar.
 
Based on data on the Land Based Mauler Launcher and drawings, that missile system would be quite large, around as big as a twin Mark 11 used for the Tartars and Standards. (required space on deck wise) though taller because of the integrated radar.

Well, yes, but Mark 11 is actually quite compact (similar in footprint to Mark 13). Where Sea Mauler comes out well ahead (I believe) is that it has little or no deck penetration, so it doesn't need a ton of space below decks like the Tartar launchers. A reload magazine would likey be carried but would not need to be immediately below the launcher.

That said, Mk11/13 was considered for Project Sea Hawk. Either possibly could have replaced both Sea Mauler and ASROC (Friedman states that these launchers could be adapted to handle ASROC, though they never actually were). This would also provide an antiship capability through Tartar (and later Harpoon). Bit adding a couple of channels of fire would also add a bunch of weight and expense in a ship that was already going to be very expensive.

Edit:. I don't think it's been mentioned that Project Sea Hawk started as an ASW sensor technology program but ultimately devolved into a fast ASW destroyer. They were looking at a 25-knot sonar search speed, and at least 35 knot top speed, which just wasn't feasible with the technology of the day.
 
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Edit: I found a contemporary paper that refers to this a Project Sea Hawk rather than Seahawk.

I've seen reports from the era that use one or the other. Mostly the latter usage though.


Originally intended to incorporate ASW cruisers and the like as well?
 
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Originally intended to incorporate ASW cruisers and the like as well?

No, originally intended to develop new advanced sensor capabilities: conformal hull sonar, integrated hull and variable depth sonar, increased sonar search speed, periscope detection capabilities,
all-ship sensor integration, etc.
 
Does anybody know about this destroyer design of 1963-64? Its displacement of 21,000 t was undeniably larger than any destroyers of its era, even surpassing Long Beach's by a considerable margin.
 

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I can all but guarantee that the logic was something like:
  1. A nuclear powered ship can run at full power until the food and ammunition runs out.
  2. Therefore a task group with nuclear powered ships must be able to sustain full power for some large number of days
  3. Therefore the future destroyer must have enough fuel to run at full power for that period
  4. Therefore the future destroyer must resemble an abnormally fast tanker with some missiles on top.
This kind of logic is usually used by someone with an axe to grind. In this case, most likely either 'the Navy needs nuclear destroyers!' or 'this is no way to run a fleet, look how ridiculous the destroyers are!'
 
I can all but guarantee that the logic was something like:
  1. A nuclear powered ship can run at full power until the food and ammunition runs out.
  2. Therefore a task group with nuclear powered ships must be able to sustain full power for some large number of days
  3. Therefore the future destroyer must have enough fuel to run at full power for that period
  4. Therefore the future destroyer must resemble an abnormally fast tanker with some missiles on top.
This kind of logic is usually used by someone with an axe to grind. In this case, most likely either 'the Navy needs nuclear destroyers!' or 'this is no way to run a fleet, look how ridiculous the destroyers are!'
In this case, the intention was the complete opposite, namely that larger conventional destroyers were still very cost-competitive with nuclear-powered designs.

The question remains to be asked, when referring to destroyers, are they describing DLGs/DLGNs, or DDGs/DDGNs? Typhon DLG and DLGN designs were already breaking the 10,000 ton displacement mark around this time, some as high as 13,000 tons, so 21,000 tons is not as extreme as it sounds, or are they describing DDG and DDGN designs, which were certainly studied.in this period, and if so, single ended or double-ended. The DDGs drawn up as part of the preliminary studies of austere DLG and DDG designs that led the Belknap were double-ended Tartar ships, as was the later DDGN. However DDGs FY66 and FY67 were single-ended Tartar ships.
 
My only thought is the 21000 ton variant might be using the Nimitz reactor? Some of the CGN(X) studies with carrier reactors came in around there iirc, at least based on what I've been told.
 
My only thought is the 21000 ton variant might be using the Nimitz reactor? Some of the CGN(X) studies with carrier reactors came in around there iirc, at least based on what I've been told.
I think there’s some crossed wires: the snippet posted by Sgt Miller mentioned NON-nuclear designs as alternatives to nuclear ones.
 
Well, yes, but Mark 11 is actually quite compact (similar in footprint to Mark 13). Where Sea Mauler comes out well ahead (I believe) is that it has little or no deck penetration, so it doesn't need a ton of space below decks like the Tartar launchers. A reload magazine would likey be carried but would not need to be immediately below the launcher.

That said, Mk11/13 was considered for Project Sea Hawk. Either possibly could have replaced both Sea Mauler and ASROC (Friedman states that these launchers could be adapted to handle ASROC, though they never actually were). This would also provide an antiship capability through Tartar (and later Harpoon). Bit adding a couple of channels of fire would also add a bunch of weight and expense in a ship that was already going to be very expensive.

Edit:. I don't think it's been mentioned that Project Sea Hawk started as an ASW sensor technology program but ultimately devolved into a fast ASW destroyer. They were looking at a 25-knot sonar search speed, and at least 35 knot top speed, which just wasn't feasible with the technology of the day.
hahahahahahahahahaha!!!!

Yeah, you're not going to hear anything at 25 knots. flow noise around the hull alone will make you deaf.

Does anybody know about this destroyer design of 1963-64? Its displacement of 21,000 t was undeniably larger than any destroyers of its era, even surpassing Long Beach's by a considerable margin.
No, haven't heard anything about a DDG or DLG that big. It must have been given absolutely huge fuel tanks to keep up with the nuclear escorts. I'm thinking something about like a SpruCan, just 3x the displacement and all due to fuel.
 
Yeah, you're not going to hear anything at 25 knots. flow noise around the hull alone will make you deaf.
It's possible they were thinking about an active sonar search. Charging around the ocean at 25 knots pinging continuously is certainly a
way to look for submarines. Probably one dreamt up by an admiral who wanted to refight the Battle of the Atlantic, only faster.
 
It's possible they were thinking about an active sonar search. Charging around the ocean at 25 knots pinging continuously is certainly a
way to look for submarines. Probably one dreamt up by an admiral who wanted to refight the Battle of the Atlantic, only faster.
They'd have to be. And even then, you're going to need immensely loud active to be able to hear the returns at 25 knots...
 
They'd have to be. And even then, you're going to need immensely loud active to be able to hear the returns at 25 knots...
Hey, it was the 1960s - 'immensely loud' was practically mandatory, and all problems could be solved by just adding more power.
 

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