Future Surface Combatant Cruisers/Destroyers (futur of US navy 2018-2045's)

colombamike

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I open this thread for a big secret project ! ;D
The Future Surface Combatant project !

This project replace eventually all US cruisers of Ticonderoga class & very probably all (a minima, all earlier DDG of arleigh burke class) arleigh burke DDG.
Any news, any data, info, possible drawing ?
;D
;) ;) ;)
 
Realistically we can only guess at this for now, if I had to make a wager I would go for something that looks allot like the DDG1000, perhaps smaller and without the ridiculous gun systems.
 
sealordlawrence said:
Realistically we can only guess at this for now, if I had to make a wager I would go for something that looks allot like the DDG1000, perhaps smaller and without the ridiculous gun systems.

Are you saying that guns/cannons on destroyers/cruisers are ridiculous, or just that the ones proposed for DDG-1000 were?
 
Just the main guns chosen for the DDG1000, whilst they will have their uses the cost benefit ratio appears to be out of sync in development terms and in overall ship design terms. I would suggest that the AGS was one of the reason for the near failure of the project.
 
sealordlawrence said:
Just the main guns chosen for the DDG1000, whilst they will have their uses the cost benefit ratio appears to be out of sync in development terms and in overall ship design terms. I would suggest that the AGS was one of the reason for the near failure of the project.

Would the cost benefit ratio of AGS have been greater if the Navy had been able to build the 32 Zumwalt-class ships it had originally planned?

Unless anyone knows any different, I believe that the US Navy's shipbuilding plans have been derailed with the cancellation of DD(X) after only two ships, DDG-1000 USS Zumwalt and DDG-1001 USS Michael Monsoor, and what we thought we knew about the 21st-century Surface Combatant (SC-21) program is obsolete. It was my understanding that the CG(X), or CGN(X) since Congress prefers a nuclear-powered ship, program was going to be based largely on DD(X) and the first was to be procured in 2011 with a possible 2017 commissioning. Plus the Navy is having cost overruns in the LCS program and the building of LCS-3 USS Fort Worth and LCS-4 USS Coronado is meant to determine whether Lockheed Martin or General Dynamics/Austal will build the remaining LCS ships planned by the Navy.

Hopefully, the US Navy will make an announcement of its plans for FY 2011 soon.
 
sealordlawrence said:
Just the main guns chosen for the DDG1000, whilst they will have their uses the cost benefit ratio appears to be out of sync in development terms and in overall ship design terms. I would suggest that the AGS was one of the reason for the near failure of the project.

One of the main criteria for AGS was to provide the gunfire support and strike for the Marines and other ground troops that was lost when the Iowas were put back to sleep. Although the Navy pays lip service to providing gunfire support, it seems that this always succumbs to "higher priorities" and ends up stillborn.

The BBs' actual and potential gunfire and strike capabilities were much more cost effective and reliable than aircraft or missiles for as far inland as they could reach, which would have been 80-100 miles, and that covers a lot of the world's potential trouble spots. When they were sent away, the Marines fought the decision at first because they were afraid that once again their needs would be left outside in the cold. Navy assured them that although AGS wouldn't be able to match the power of the BBs' rifles, AGS would be able to meet the Marines' needs (not everyone accepted that). To show the firmness of Navy's commitment to this, each one of its 32 upcoming Wonderdestroyers would carry two of them. This was a big driver for the AGS and its design In return, marines accepted the loss of the battleships.

Well, it looks like this is going the way of previous programs to provide fire support and the Marines and ground troops are back out on the porch again.
 
The problem with the AGS is that massively pushed up the cost of the entire vessel, the whole ship had to be almost built around it pushing up displacement before we even get to the development cost of the system. The USMC has plenty of fire support with the 5 inch on the existing fleet and their own harriers soon to be JSF and attack helos.
 
sealordlawrence said:
The problem with the AGS is that massively pushed up the cost of the entire vessel, the whole ship had to be almost built around it pushing up displacement before we even get to the development cost of the system. The USMC has plenty of fire support with the 5 inch on the existing fleet and their own harriers soon to be JSF and attack helos.

The existing 5 inchers are woefully inadequate to provide fire support of the kind needed for sustained support of ground forces ashore. They don't have the range, can't deliver a powerful enough payload, lack versatility, and are not expandable. Even the Navy acknowledges this, hence the AGS program.

Regarding Harrier/JSF and Cobras- while tremendous assets, they don't come close to what can be achieved with heavy cannon fire. Plus, they are far more expensive and complex. Of course, once you get beyond the range that can be reached from the sea, they're your only option until heavy artillery can be brought forward (our deficiencies with landbased heavy artillery is another topic).

With all the problems cropping up with the basic design of these ships (seakeeping, placement of the missile launchers, manning, propulsion, etc.) I don't think we can single out the AGS as the main cause of the program's problems.

Ironically, if we had kept the BBs (we'd have to come up with something to replace them about 10 years or so from now), we wouldn't have had to come up with something like AGS and maybe things would have turned out differently.
 
The existing 5 inchers are woefully inadequate to provide fire support of the kind needed for sustained support of ground forces ashore. They don't have the range, can't deliver a powerful enough payload, lack versatility, and are not expandable. Even the Navy acknowledges this, hence the AGS program.

No, the Navy acknowledged that they wanted something else, not that they needed it.

Regarding Harrier/JSF and Cobras- while tremendous assets, they don't come close to what can be achieved with heavy cannon fire. Plus, they are far more expensive and complex. Of course, once you get beyond the range that can be reached from the sea, they're your only option until heavy artillery can be brought forward (our deficiencies with landbased heavy artillery is another topic).

The air craft are more flexible than any naval cannon and are perfectly sufficient. The ability of the USMC to rapidly bring M777 ashore is another factor to consider.

With all the problems cropping up with the basic design of these ships (seakeeping, placement of the missile launchers, manning, propulsion, etc.) I don't think we can single out the AGS as the main cause of the program's problems.

Take a look at a cross section of DDG1000 and you will see how much the ship was built around the gun systems.

Ironically, if we had kept the BBs (we'd have to come up with something to replace them about 10 years or so from now), we wouldn't have had to come up with something like AGS and maybe things would have turned out differently.

Yeah, the USN would have been even smaller as it maintained 4 man power hogging museum exhibits with little versatility.
 
sealordlawrence said:
The existing 5 inchers are woefully inadequate to provide fire support of the kind needed for sustained support of ground forces ashore. They don't have the range, can't deliver a powerful enough payload, lack versatility, and are not expandable. Even the Navy acknowledges this, hence the AGS program.

No, the Navy acknowledged that they wanted something else, not that they needed it.

Regarding Harrier/JSF and Cobras- while tremendous assets, they don't come close to what can be achieved with heavy cannon fire. Plus, they are far more expensive and complex. Of course, once you get beyond the range that can be reached from the sea, they're your only option until heavy artillery can be brought forward (our deficiencies with landbased heavy artillery is another topic).

The air craft are more flexible than any naval cannon and are perfectly sufficient. The ability of the USMC to rapidly bring M777 ashore is another factor to consider.

With all the problems cropping up with the basic design of these ships (seakeeping, placement of the missile launchers, manning, propulsion, etc.) I don't think we can single out the AGS as the main cause of the program's problems.

Take a look at a cross section of DDG1000 and you will see how much the ship was built around the gun systems.

Ironically, if we had kept the BBs (we'd have to come up with something to replace them about 10 years or so from now), we wouldn't have had to come up with something like AGS and maybe things would have turned out differently.

Yeah, the USN would have been even smaller as it maintained 4 man power hogging museum exhibits with little versatility.


Please excuse the way I'm formatting this, when I try and intersperse with multiple quotes I produce something even more difficult to follow than my usual ramblings



"No, the Navy acknowledged that they wanted something else, not that they needed it."

I must confess I don't understand this statement at all. Are you saying the Navy just went out one day and said, "You know what would be really swell? Let's go develop a new cannon for no particular reason!"? The Marines, Army and Navy might disagree with you. The main reason for AGS was to provide fire support and strike because the existing 5 inchers with their limited capabilities and numbers (note that the Arleigh Burkes only carry one each) couldn't provide what was needed, something that had been of concern since the 1960s, hence the MK81 8 inch mount, the various iterations of the Autonomous Naval Support Round (ANSR), etc. In fact, the original concept of AGS was that it would not even be in a turret, but would be vertically mounted.



"The air craft are more flexible than any naval cannon and are perfectly sufficient. The ability of the USMC to rapidly bring M777 ashore is another factor to consider."

Actually, this isn't true unless you restrict the comparison to existing naval cannon. The aircraft are superbly capable and flexible, but require an ashore infrastructure and unless they happen to be already overhead and have sufficient warload and gas available when you need them, a new technology naval cannon is going to do better most of the time, as long as it's in range. Once outside that range (and that's the rub) aircraft and mobile artillery, which doesn't move very fast, are pretty much your only choice. Plus that naval cannon is a lot cheaper to operate. Now, one of things we've found is that trying to pack usable capability in a shell operable from existing cannon is problematic. Witness BTERM (canceled), ERGM (canceled), etc. The latter was working towards being able to deliver at extended ranges the awesome warload of 19 pounds. At the time of cancellation, cost was approaching $191,000 a round. A good portion of this was trying to fit all that tech in a round that could use existing 127 mm tubes. Hence, AGS.


"Take a look at a cross section of DDG1000 and you will see how much the ship was built around the gun systems".

Absolutely true, but so what? Fire support was one of the main reasons for DDG1000's existence. This is like saying, "It would be so much easier and cheaper to develop bombers if we just dropped the requirement for them to carry bombs".



"Yeah, the USN would have been even smaller as it maintained 4 man power hogging museum exhibits with little versatility".

Not going to go into an explanation of what could have been done with Battleships, that's a discussion for another forum. But, keeping mind that they already existed, and with their much larger and more powerful main battery, many of the problems associated with trying to cram stuff into the smaller shell were simplified, and you didn't need to develop and build a new platform . As far as versatility goes, again without going into off-topic detail, they were much more versatile than you might think, for the types of missions we'd use them for today. However, restricting the discussion to simply fire support and strike they were really, really good, much better than anything we've had since. As far as manning goes, even though the Navy always had plenty of volunteers for those ships there were a number of proposals to reduce manning requirements (BTW, ever noticed the size of ship's company on a CVN?). For example, there was no longer any requirement for them to be able to sustain 33 knots. Therefore, you could mothball half the plant and operate on the remaining plant until overhaul time on that half, then reverse the process and operate on the other half and eventually overhaul them both and then do it again. Another was to further reduce the number of 5" weapons. There were others. My point, though, was that if they (or something like them) were available, AGS probably wouldn't be needed and the situation you decry with DDG1000 might have been avoided.
 
If you want to fantasise about the USN needing 155mm uber cannons when the DDG1000 programme has effectively killed itself through cost escalations (at least partially associated with the uber cannons), whilst the planned Virginia class production rate is being constantly postponed, the congressionally mandated 12 carrier fleet is already unsustainable, LCS is grossly over budget, the San Antonio class has been cut back to 10 units....etc etc etc....then go ahead. But the reality is that it shows an incredible detachment from reality on your part that is only reinforced by your perverse desire for the USN to have the Iowa class in service. You are aware that the 1980s are over are you not?
 
sealordlawrence said:
If you want to fantasise about the USN needing 155mm uber cannons when the DDG1000 programme has effectively killed itself through cost escalations (at least partially associated with the uber cannons), whilst the planned Virginia class production rate is being constantly postponed, the congressionally mandated 12 carrier fleet is already unsustainable, LCS is grossly over budget, the San Antonio class has been cut back to 10 units....etc etc etc....then go ahead. But the reality is that it shows an incredible detachment from reality on your part that is only reinforced by your perverse desire for the USN to have the Iowa class in service. You are aware that the 1980s are over are you not?

My, my you seem to be taking this quite personally. Please remember what this is all about. You opined that AGS is what "sank" (I couldn't resist the pun) DDG1000. That may be so. Still, providing the fire support and strike capability are a valid and important requirement that has not successfully been addressed for nigh on (don't get to use that phrase much) 20 years. You may want to sling smug barbs in lieu of addressing the situation (oops, now I'm getting testy), but naval gunfire really is the issue. DDG1000 was supposed to address this in one of its roles, the existing guns can't do it, so that's why AGS was on DDG1000. If not AGS, what then? We can't afford to sling Tomahawks, they don't really do this kind of job, and besides the Navy isn't The Man with the Golden Gun (James Bond aficionados will understand the reference).

Restoring the Battleships is probably no longer possible, and in any case is not what this particular forum is about (although thank you for the reference, TinWing). My bringing them up was simply to show an asset in being that could have been an alternative to AGS, a way we could have avoided the whole fiasco we find ourselves in now. Given how often these missions would be needed, they could have handled it, and then the DDG1000s might have been built around existing guns, which you imply would have been scads better.

Regarding the valid CVN and SSN issues, those are good examples of kicking the can down the road, leaving it for "the next guy".
 
F-14D said:
sealordlawrence said:
If you want to fantasise about the USN needing 155mm uber cannons when the DDG1000 programme has effectively killed itself through cost escalations (at least partially associated with the uber cannons), whilst the planned Virginia class production rate is being constantly postponed, the congressionally mandated 12 carrier fleet is already unsustainable, LCS is grossly over budget, the San Antonio class has been cut back to 10 units....etc etc etc....then go ahead. But the reality is that it shows an incredible detachment from reality on your part that is only reinforced by your perverse desire for the USN to have the Iowa class in service. You are aware that the 1980s are over are you not?

My, my you seem to be taking this quite personally. Please remember what this is all about. You opined that AGS is what "sank" (I couldn't resist the pun) DDG1000. That may be so. Still, providing the fire support and strike capability are a valid and important requirement that has not successfully been addressed for nigh on (don't get to use that phrase much) 20 years. You may want to sling smug barbs in lieu of addressing the situation (oops, now I'm getting testy), but naval gunfire really is the issue. DDG1000 was supposed to address this in one of its roles, the existing guns can't do it, so that's why AGS was on DDG1000. If not AGS, what then? We can't afford to sling Tomahawks, they don't really do this kind of job, and besides the Navy isn't The Man with the Golden Gun (James Bond aficionados will understand the reference).

Restoring the Battleships is probably no longer possible, and in any case is not what this particular forum is about (although thank you for the reference, TinWing). My bringing them up was simply to show an asset in being that could have been an alternative to AGS, a way we could have avoided the whole fiasco we find ourselves in now. Given how often these missions would be needed, they could have handled it, and then the DDG1000s might have been built around existing guns, which you imply would have been scads better.

Regarding the valid CVN and SSN issues, those are good examples of kicking the can down the road, leaving it for "the next guy".

No smug barbs, getting testy or any of the other misplaced descriptions you used. The notion that the USN could keep the BBs in service today is nonsensical. The USN does not have a naval gunfire support problem. It has more than enough means of striking in land targets.
 
sealordlawrence said:
F-14D said:
sealordlawrence said:
If you want to fantasise about the USN needing 155mm uber cannons when the DDG1000 programme has effectively killed itself through cost escalations (at least partially associated with the uber cannons), whilst the planned Virginia class production rate is being constantly postponed, the congressionally mandated 12 carrier fleet is already unsustainable, LCS is grossly over budget, the San Antonio class has been cut back to 10 units....etc etc etc....then go ahead. But the reality is that it shows an incredible detachment from reality on your part that is only reinforced by your perverse desire for the USN to have the Iowa class in service. You are aware that the 1980s are over are you not?


My, my you seem to be taking this quite personally. Please remember what this is all about. You opined that AGS is what "sank" (I couldn't resist the pun) DDG1000. That may be so. Still, providing the fire support and strike capability are a valid and important requirement that has not successfully been addressed for nigh on (don't get to use that phrase much) 20 years. You may want to sling smug barbs in lieu of addressing the situation (oops, now I'm getting testy), but naval gunfire really is the issue. DDG1000 was supposed to address this in one of its roles, the existing guns can't do it, so that's why AGS was on DDG1000. If not AGS, what then? We can't afford to sling Tomahawks, they don't really do this kind of job, and besides the Navy isn't The Man with the Golden Gun (James Bond aficionados will understand the reference).

Restoring the Battleships is probably no longer possible, and in any case is not what this particular forum is about (although thank you for the reference, TinWing). My bringing them up was simply to show an asset in being that could have been an alternative to AGS, a way we could have avoided the whole fiasco we find ourselves in now. Given how often these missions would be needed, they could have handled it, and then the DDG1000s might have been built around existing guns, which you imply would have been scads better.

Regarding the valid CVN and SSN issues, those are good examples of kicking the can down the road, leaving it for "the next guy".

No smug barbs, getting testy or any of the other misplaced descriptions you used. The notion that the USN could keep the BBs in service today is nonsensical. The USN does not have a naval gunfire support problem. It has more than enough means of striking in land targets.


Oh, I dunno..."fantasize", "incredible detachment from reality on your part", "You are aware that the 1980s are over are you not? ", etc. do seem a bit smug, but no matter. This forum seems on the precipice of descending into a virtual volley of slings and arrows. That does not serve its valuable purpose and focusing on AGS is unfair to columbamike and his initial request. I propose we just let this little subtopic drop.
 
The pure vertical launch version of the AGS that would have been swappable with VLS tubes would have been an interesting alternative to reduce some front end capital costs, though one wonders how much you save in the long term since you are forced to use advanced guided projectiles all the time, as opposed to a classical turret gun where you still had the option of much cheaper "dumb" projectiles. Since the business end of a guided round is essentially the same as a missile, it's hard to get away from the primary costs of a missile. Unless of course you consider ballasting the ship to lean to the side as a means of aiming a vertical AGS...
 
If the AGS is intended to bombard shore targets only, why not just have it at a fixed, sloped angle for max range so you don't have to have electronic guidance within the round, and just adjust the distance to the shore accordingly?
 
fixed elevation with unguided rounds is pretty much useless. For starters, it can't accound for ship motion. And even more fundamentally, it would take a long time to adjust between separated targets (e.g., two targets 10 miles apart requires 20 minutes sailing at top speed). Besides, it might not even be possible to steer a curving track that maintains constant range to a given target.

The issue of vertical vs trainable gun is a fraught one. The Navy's initial preference was for the vertical gun, largely because of its lower RCS, butCongress made it plain that it preferred a trainable gun in the FY 1999 budget. Rather than argue the point, the Navy switched from VGAS to a trainable AGS. I was working in support of the program executive office for surface combatants at the time, and I remember much annoyance at this, which was seen very much as uninformed meddling by the House staff.

It's amusing that although Congress' objections to VGAS included the fact that it locked the Navy into a single Navy-specific family, AGS actually does exactly the same thing. The ability to fire Army-pattern guided or ballistic rounds disappeared from AGS long ago--it's totally tied to the Long-Range Land-Attack projectile, as far as I can tell.
 
From April 2011: http://www.navsea.navy.mil/Media/SAS2011/SCOTT%20HALE-SAS2011.pdf

EDIT: A short CRS (Congressional Research Service) report on USN Aegis Cruiser and Destroyer modernisation plans, from May 2008: http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA482852

EDIT2: A January 2011 version of the same report: http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/RS22595_20110118.pdf
 
2030 seems awfully far off. Especially considering the difficulties in designing a Flight III Burke that can incorporate all of the new capabilities the Navy is looking at. It's almost frustrating when you consider they are soon going to christen the first of what was supposed to be 32 next generation destroyers.
 
Further, what is the United States Navy going to do about the 20 frigate-sized vessels it isn't getting with the reduction of the LCS program from 52 to 32 ships? Does the Navy refuse to look at the Huntington-Ingalls Patrol Frigate concepts?
 
Triton said:
Further, what is the United States Navy going to do about the 20 frigate-sized vessels it isn't getting with the reduction of the LCS program from 52 to 32 ships? Does the Navy refuse to look at the Huntington-Ingalls Patrol Frigate concepts?

My understanding is that there is a scheme for an enhanced ship to take the place of the now abandoned LCS hulls.
 
JFC Fuller said:
My understanding is that there is a scheme for an enhanced ship to take the place of the now abandoned LCS hulls.

I know that they were asked to look at this by the Department of Defense when the LCS program was reduced to 32 ships. Hopefully, the Navy won't get side-tracked by wanting leading-edge technology on this class so that it can be built in sufficient numbers. The world has changed and the Navy needs blue water capability again.
 
Colonial-Marine said:
2030 seems awfully far off. Especially considering the difficulties in designing a Flight III Burke that can incorporate all of the new capabilities the Navy is at. It's almost frustrating when you consider they are soon going to christen the first of what was supposed to be 32 next generation destroyers.
Soon is this weekend, in fact.
 

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