Surface Ships Need More Offensive Punch, Outlook

[Grey Havoc]

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/...xpanding-fleet-but-says-more-money-is-needed/

https://www.navytimes.com/news/your...-the-navy-wants-to-inactivate-in-fiscal-2022/

 

[Bhurki]

For people with a fanciful outlook.

https://cimsec.org/an-alternative-history-for-u-s-navy-force-structure-development/

 

[GruntFox]

This is due to how pitiful the barrel life of a railgun is right now. To give you an idea, most conventional guns right now have the mid-hundreds minimum for barrel life before you have to replace them. The various railguns? Not even 100 shots.

The metallurgy isn't there.

And they're going to solve the problems by giving up, is that it? Imagine if back in the 40s they went, "whelp, these turbine engines don't last as long as we'd like so we'll stop working on them until, somehow, they do." Nobody is suggesting throwing them on ships as-is but for God's sake keep developing them. That's how we got into the current situation with hypersonics. Both Russia and China are far ahead of us because we gave up. Too risky.

The thing is, we literally have to create new rail materials, and that is going to take decades and thus makes the program generally useless. The rail material is working on a rather thin tightrope overall between velocity, throw weight, conductivity, rate of fire, and durability (you literally shave a portion off the rails each time you fire due to ablation).

 

[Sferrin]

This is due to how pitiful the barrel life of a railgun is right now. To give you an idea, most conventional guns right now have the mid-hundreds minimum for barrel life before you have to replace them. The various railguns? Not even 100 shots.

The metallurgy isn't there.

And they're going to solve the problems by giving up, is that it? Imagine if back in the 40s they went, "whelp, these turbine engines don't last as long as we'd like so we'll stop working on them until, somehow, they do." Nobody is suggesting throwing them on ships as-is but for God's sake keep developing them. That's how we got into the current situation with hypersonics. Both Russia and China are far ahead of us because we gave up. Too risky.

The thing is, we literally have to create new rail materials, and that is going to take decades and thus makes the program generally useless. The rail material is working on a rather thin tightrope overall between velocity, throw weight, conductivity, rate of fire, and durability (you literally shave a portion off the rails each time you fire due to ablation).

And stopping is going to get that done sooner how?

 

[bring_it_on]

I think the Navy just doesn't want the weapon on its next surface combatant, and probably can't easily fit it on any of the current combatants. So with that information, it just ended the funding because the technology has no real short to medium term path to actually being deployed by the service. That said, there should probably be other areas within the DOD that should now take over and ensure that we continue to move the needle. The Army, and perhaps even the AF should invest in the technology (round and railgun) for base defense etc.

 

[Bhurki]

for base defense etc.

Railguns, inherently, provide just one major advantage over traditional artillery, thats range. For base defense, a guided artillery round (like the one that shot down a tomahawk) is enough.

 

[bring_it_on]

for base defense etc.

Railguns, inherently, provide just one major advantage over traditional artillery, thats range. For base defense, a guided artillery round (like the one that shot down a tomahawk) is enough.

How does that change if you aren't shooting at something like a Tomahawk, but at a Ballistic Missile?

 

[Sferrin]

I think the Navy just doesn't want the weapon on its next surface combatant, and probably can't easily fit it on any of the current combatants.

Typically poor planning on the USN's part.

 

[Firefinder]

for base defense etc.

Railguns, inherently, provide just one major advantage over traditional artillery, thats range. For base defense, a guided artillery round (like the one that shot down a tomahawk) is enough.

Should be pointed out that the shell that killed the Tomahawks drone awhile back?

Was the shell design to be fired out of the railgun.

That plus the railgun is a pretty hefty defense in depth set up.

This is due to how pitiful the barrel life of a railgun is right now. To give you an idea, most conventional guns right now have the mid-hundreds minimum for barrel life before you have to replace them. The various railguns? Not even 100 shots.

The metallurgy isn't there.

And they're going to solve the problems by giving up, is that it? Imagine if back in the 40s they went, "whelp, these turbine engines don't last as long as we'd like so we'll stop working on them until, somehow, they do." Nobody is suggesting throwing them on ships as-is but for God's sake keep developing them. That's how we got into the current situation with hypersonics. Both Russia and China are far ahead of us because we gave up. Too risky.

The thing is, we literally have to create new rail materials, and that is going to take decades and thus makes the program generally useless. The rail material is working on a rather thin tightrope overall between velocity, throw weight, conductivity, rate of fire, and durability (you literally shave a portion off the rails each time you fire due to ablation).

They have fixed by they way, mainly by designing so that the SABOT takes the hit and not the rails. This was back in 2018 mind you, and apparently works extremely well. The rails still take a hit, but 400, likely 600 these days, is more the good enough for the average war deployment let alot peace time. If you design it right you can easily replace the barrels at sea, done it before. In WW2 it only took a few hours to replace a battleship gun, railguns are far smaller then those monsters. Hell the tanks guns have lower life span (about 200) when only shooting APDS and the Abrams gun can be replace in about 4 hour ircc.

Its all about usage case, only firing it for trainning self defense and shore work? That will last a few months easily even in war. Cut down on training and remove shore defense? The seawater will mission kill it faster then the barrel life. Hell most of the training be working the computers so you dont even need to fire it for that.


No the biggest reason why the navy drop the railgun is because there is no ship able to take it. And even at best estimate will not be for the next decade or so. No point wasting the budget on something that will not be use for a decade.

 

[Sferrin]

for base defense etc.

Railguns, inherently, provide just one major advantage over traditional artillery, thats range. For base defense, a guided artillery round (like the one that shot down a tomahawk) is enough.

Should be pointed out that the shell that killed the Tomahawks drone awhile back?

Was the shell design to be fired out of the railgun.

That plus the railgun is a pretty hefty defense in depth set up.

This is due to how pitiful the barrel life of a railgun is right now. To give you an idea, most conventional guns right now have the mid-hundreds minimum for barrel life before you have to replace them. The various railguns? Not even 100 shots.

The metallurgy isn't there.

And they're going to solve the problems by giving up, is that it? Imagine if back in the 40s they went, "whelp, these turbine engines don't last as long as we'd like so we'll stop working on them until, somehow, they do." Nobody is suggesting throwing them on ships as-is but for God's sake keep developing them. That's how we got into the current situation with hypersonics. Both Russia and China are far ahead of us because we gave up. Too risky.

The thing is, we literally have to create new rail materials, and that is going to take decades and thus makes the program generally useless. The rail material is working on a rather thin tightrope overall between velocity, throw weight, conductivity, rate of fire, and durability (you literally shave a portion off the rails each time you fire due to ablation).

They have fixed by they way, mainly by designing so that the SABOT takes the hit and not the rails. This was back in 2018 mind you, and apparently works extremely well. The rails still take a hit, but 400, likely 600 these days, is more the good enough for the average war deployment let alot peace time. If you design it right you can easily replace the barrels at sea, done it before. In WW2 it only took a few hours to replace a battleship gun, railguns are far smaller then those monsters. Hell the tanks guns have lower life span (about 200) when only shooting APDS and the Abrams gun can be replace in about 4 hour ircc.

Its all about usage case, only firing it for trainning self defense and shore work? That will last a few months easily even in war. Cut down on training and remove shore defense? The seawater will mission kill it faster then the barrel life. Hell most of the training be working the computers so you dont even need to fire it for that.


No the biggest reason why the navy drop the railgun is because there is no ship able to take it. And even at best estimate will not be for the next decade or so. No point wasting the budget on something that will not be use for a decade.

Zumwalt.

 

[GruntFox]

for base defense etc.

Railguns, inherently, provide just one major advantage over traditional artillery, thats range. For base defense, a guided artillery round (like the one that shot down a tomahawk) is enough.

Should be pointed out that the shell that killed the Tomahawks drone awhile back?

Was the shell design to be fired out of the railgun.

That plus the railgun is a pretty hefty defense in depth set up.

This is due to how pitiful the barrel life of a railgun is right now. To give you an idea, most conventional guns right now have the mid-hundreds minimum for barrel life before you have to replace them. The various railguns? Not even 100 shots.

The metallurgy isn't there.

And they're going to solve the problems by giving up, is that it? Imagine if back in the 40s they went, "whelp, these turbine engines don't last as long as we'd like so we'll stop working on them until, somehow, they do." Nobody is suggesting throwing them on ships as-is but for God's sake keep developing them. That's how we got into the current situation with hypersonics. Both Russia and China are far ahead of us because we gave up. Too risky.

The thing is, we literally have to create new rail materials, and that is going to take decades and thus makes the program generally useless. The rail material is working on a rather thin tightrope overall between velocity, throw weight, conductivity, rate of fire, and durability (you literally shave a portion off the rails each time you fire due to ablation).

They have fixed by they way, mainly by designing so that the SABOT takes the hit and not the rails. This was back in 2018 mind you, and apparently works extremely well. The rails still take a hit, but 400, likely 600 these days, is more the good enough for the average war deployment let alot peace time. If you design it right you can easily replace the barrels at sea, done it before. In WW2 it only took a few hours to replace a battleship gun, railguns are far smaller then those monsters. Hell the tanks guns have lower life span (about 200) when only shooting APDS and the Abrams gun can be replace in about 4 hour ircc.

Its all about usage case, only firing it for trainning self defense and shore work? That will last a few months easily even in war. Cut down on training and remove shore defense? The seawater will mission kill it faster then the barrel life. Hell most of the training be working the computers so you dont even need to fire it for that.


No the biggest reason why the navy drop the railgun is because there is no ship able to take it. And even at best estimate will not be for the next decade or so. No point wasting the budget on something that will not be use for a decade.

Zumwalt.

Not really, but then again, that's far harder than you would believe.

 

[Sferrin]

for base defense etc.

Railguns, inherently, provide just one major advantage over traditional artillery, thats range. For base defense, a guided artillery round (like the one that shot down a tomahawk) is enough.

Should be pointed out that the shell that killed the Tomahawks drone awhile back?

Was the shell design to be fired out of the railgun.

That plus the railgun is a pretty hefty defense in depth set up.

This is due to how pitiful the barrel life of a railgun is right now. To give you an idea, most conventional guns right now have the mid-hundreds minimum for barrel life before you have to replace them. The various railguns? Not even 100 shots.

The metallurgy isn't there.

And they're going to solve the problems by giving up, is that it? Imagine if back in the 40s they went, "whelp, these turbine engines don't last as long as we'd like so we'll stop working on them until, somehow, they do." Nobody is suggesting throwing them on ships as-is but for God's sake keep developing them. That's how we got into the current situation with hypersonics. Both Russia and China are far ahead of us because we gave up. Too risky.

The thing is, we literally have to create new rail materials, and that is going to take decades and thus makes the program generally useless. The rail material is working on a rather thin tightrope overall between velocity, throw weight, conductivity, rate of fire, and durability (you literally shave a portion off the rails each time you fire due to ablation).

They have fixed by they way, mainly by designing so that the SABOT takes the hit and not the rails. This was back in 2018 mind you, and apparently works extremely well. The rails still take a hit, but 400, likely 600 these days, is more the good enough for the average war deployment let alot peace time. If you design it right you can easily replace the barrels at sea, done it before. In WW2 it only took a few hours to replace a battleship gun, railguns are far smaller then those monsters. Hell the tanks guns have lower life span (about 200) when only shooting APDS and the Abrams gun can be replace in about 4 hour ircc.

Its all about usage case, only firing it for trainning self defense and shore work? That will last a few months easily even in war. Cut down on training and remove shore defense? The seawater will mission kill it faster then the barrel life. Hell most of the training be working the computers so you dont even need to fire it for that.


No the biggest reason why the navy drop the railgun is because there is no ship able to take it. And even at best estimate will not be for the next decade or so. No point wasting the budget on something that will not be use for a decade.

Zumwalt.

Not really, but then again, that's far harder than you would believe.

Where is it lacking?

 

[Moose]

for base defense etc.

Railguns, inherently, provide just one major advantage over traditional artillery, thats range. For base defense, a guided artillery round (like the one that shot down a tomahawk) is enough.

Should be pointed out that the shell that killed the Tomahawks drone awhile back?

Was the shell design to be fired out of the railgun.

That plus the railgun is a pretty hefty defense in depth set up.

This is due to how pitiful the barrel life of a railgun is right now. To give you an idea, most conventional guns right now have the mid-hundreds minimum for barrel life before you have to replace them. The various railguns? Not even 100 shots.

The metallurgy isn't there.

And they're going to solve the problems by giving up, is that it? Imagine if back in the 40s they went, "whelp, these turbine engines don't last as long as we'd like so we'll stop working on them until, somehow, they do." Nobody is suggesting throwing them on ships as-is but for God's sake keep developing them. That's how we got into the current situation with hypersonics. Both Russia and China are far ahead of us because we gave up. Too risky.

The thing is, we literally have to create new rail materials, and that is going to take decades and thus makes the program generally useless. The rail material is working on a rather thin tightrope overall between velocity, throw weight, conductivity, rate of fire, and durability (you literally shave a portion off the rails each time you fire due to ablation).

They have fixed by they way, mainly by designing so that the SABOT takes the hit and not the rails. This was back in 2018 mind you, and apparently works extremely well. The rails still take a hit, but 400, likely 600 these days, is more the good enough for the average war deployment let alot peace time. If you design it right you can easily replace the barrels at sea, done it before. In WW2 it only took a few hours to replace a battleship gun, railguns are far smaller then those monsters. Hell the tanks guns have lower life span (about 200) when only shooting APDS and the Abrams gun can be replace in about 4 hour ircc.

Its all about usage case, only firing it for trainning self defense and shore work? That will last a few months easily even in war. Cut down on training and remove shore defense? The seawater will mission kill it faster then the barrel life. Hell most of the training be working the computers so you dont even need to fire it for that.


No the biggest reason why the navy drop the railgun is because there is no ship able to take it. And even at best estimate will not be for the next decade or so. No point wasting the budget on something that will not be use for a decade.

Zumwalt.

It looks like the Navy weighed refitting Z's for rails and decided to go with maximizing the hypersonic missile load instead.

 

[bring_it_on]

Yup. The Navy had a much more mature system in the IR-CPS. I'd argue that it gets a much better ROI with that given the 3-ship class and what it can do as an offensive platform. Maybe future iterations of the baseline LSC can consider some form of EMRG for self defense.

 

[Sferrin]

Yup. The Navy had a much more mature system in the IR-CPS. I'd argue that it gets a much better ROI with that given the 3-ship class and what it can do as an offensive platform. Maybe future iterations of the baseline LSC can consider some form of EMRG for self defense.

Not if we stop developing them.

 

[Firefinder]

Zumwalt

Been somewhat answered but Ill add on to it.

The cost for refitting for railguns will roughly equal to refitting for the hypersonics. And railguns are one of those things that you need a large amount of, more the six, for effect use.

And the hypersonics have more immediate use then railguns and are less likely to get congressed since two other countries not friendly to the US has them. Especially handly since Congress hate the Zumwalts, seeing them as a overbudget failure. So the navy needs to do things slyly to get them to do anything with the hulls other then scrap them.

Basically hypersonics are the new shiny and I can the navy using that to get more Zumwalts hulls if the conversion works by making them look better.

Politics gotta love them.

 

[GruntFox]

for base defense etc.

Railguns, inherently, provide just one major advantage over traditional artillery, thats range. For base defense, a guided artillery round (like the one that shot down a tomahawk) is enough.

Should be pointed out that the shell that killed the Tomahawks drone awhile back?

Was the shell design to be fired out of the railgun.

That plus the railgun is a pretty hefty defense in depth set up.

This is due to how pitiful the barrel life of a railgun is right now. To give you an idea, most conventional guns right now have the mid-hundreds minimum for barrel life before you have to replace them. The various railguns? Not even 100 shots.

The metallurgy isn't there.

And they're going to solve the problems by giving up, is that it? Imagine if back in the 40s they went, "whelp, these turbine engines don't last as long as we'd like so we'll stop working on them until, somehow, they do." Nobody is suggesting throwing them on ships as-is but for God's sake keep developing them. That's how we got into the current situation with hypersonics. Both Russia and China are far ahead of us because we gave up. Too risky.

The thing is, we literally have to create new rail materials, and that is going to take decades and thus makes the program generally useless. The rail material is working on a rather thin tightrope overall between velocity, throw weight, conductivity, rate of fire, and durability (you literally shave a portion off the rails each time you fire due to ablation).

They have fixed by they way, mainly by designing so that the SABOT takes the hit and not the rails. This was back in 2018 mind you, and apparently works extremely well. The rails still take a hit, but 400, likely 600 these days, is more the good enough for the average war deployment let alot peace time. If you design it right you can easily replace the barrels at sea, done it before. In WW2 it only took a few hours to replace a battleship gun, railguns are far smaller then those monsters. Hell the tanks guns have lower life span (about 200) when only shooting APDS and the Abrams gun can be replace in about 4 hour ircc.

Its all about usage case, only firing it for trainning self defense and shore work? That will last a few months easily even in war. Cut down on training and remove shore defense? The seawater will mission kill it faster then the barrel life. Hell most of the training be working the computers so you dont even need to fire it for that.


No the biggest reason why the navy drop the railgun is because there is no ship able to take it. And even at best estimate will not be for the next decade or so. No point wasting the budget on something that will not be use for a decade.

Zumwalt.

Not really, but then again, that's far harder than you would believe.

Where is it lacking?

If I had to guess, fuel efficiency. Currently, railguns aren't that efficient overall in terms of power consumption, last I've checked. Surprisingly, GURPS is right on how early EM guns are in terms of being energy hogs. Unless you have a nuclear reactor (good luck getting Congress to agree to that, thanks to the Long Beach), you're not going to be exactly fuel efficient even with gas turbines.

 

[Sferrin]

If I had to guess, fuel efficiency. Currently, railguns aren't that efficient overall in terms of power consumption, last I've checked. Surprisingly, GURPS is right on how early EM guns are in terms of being energy hogs. Unless you have a nuclear reactor (good luck getting Congress to agree to that, thanks to the Long Beach), you're not going to be exactly fuel efficient even with gas turbines.

Okay, never mind. I thought you actually KNEW something and weren't guessing. You don't actually KNOW that it's missing anything. They were specifically built with large amounts of electrical capacity.

 

[Sferrin]

Been somewhat answered but Ill add on to it.

The cost for refitting for railguns will roughly equal to refitting for the hypersonics.

Where are these numbers?

And railguns are one of those things that you need a large amount of, more the six, for effect use.

No you don't. If that were the case USN ships would have "a large amount, more than six" 5" guns instead of one or two. This isn't WWII.

And the hypersonics have more immediate use then railguns and are less likely to get congressed since two other countries not friendly to the US has them. Especially handly since Congress hate the Zumwalts, seeing them as a overbudget failure. So the navy needs to do things slyly to get them to do anything with the hulls other then scrap them.

Basically hypersonics are the new shiny and I can the navy using that to get more Zumwalts hulls if the conversion works by making them look better.

Politics gotta love them.

This I could buy.

 

[bring_it_on]

Yup. The Navy had a much more mature system in the IR-CPS. I'd argue that it gets a much better ROI with that given the 3-ship class and what it can do as an offensive platform. Maybe future iterations of the baseline LSC can consider some form of EMRG for self defense.

Not if we stop developing them.

Yes that needs to go on. But if you want something focused on defense as opposed to land attack, then you can get away with something a lot smaller. I hope there is money in the Army, AF, or OSD budgets to continue to support the various efforts around testing these guns against Cruise missile surrogates etc. Something like the General Atomics weapon is probably a better solution specific to that defensive mission.

 

[jsport]

Hypersonics are worsening the VLS cell size problem, hopefully to a culmination point.

Someone will finally realize solid fuel missiles are the major inhibitor of the USN ship capability. One can simply not get enough VLS cells on a ship to even defend itself let alone accomplish offensive ops. Then someone will start looking more closely at mulit-purpose rds from an exotic proplusion gun. Binary(safe)Liquid/light gas (highest energy density) fuel gives the range and is way more compact than huge solid fuel hypersonic missile. The faster the object the more drag and thus the lower the range. Deploying large numbers of huge missiles on a ship is going to have diminishing returns/complications way before deploying a gun does.

 

[Sferrin]

If I had to guess, fuel efficiency. Currently, railguns aren't that efficient overall in terms of power consumption, last I've checked. Surprisingly, GURPS is right on how early EM guns are in terms of being energy hogs. Unless you have a nuclear reactor (good luck getting Congress to agree to that, thanks to the Long Beach), you're not going to be exactly fuel efficient even with gas turbines.

Well don't be coy, enlighten the huddled masses.

 

[GruntFox]

If I had to guess, fuel efficiency. Currently, railguns aren't that efficient overall in terms of power consumption, last I've checked. Surprisingly, GURPS is right on how early EM guns are in terms of being energy hogs. Unless you have a nuclear reactor (good luck getting Congress to agree to that, thanks to the Long Beach), you're not going to be exactly fuel efficient even with gas turbines.

Well don't be coy, enlighten the huddled masses.

While gas turbines are quite efficient at high RPM, they (and their cousin jet turbines) can't sustain maximum capacity for too long due to maintenance and fuel efficiency problems. From what I understand, the longer you stay at max capacity, the faster you go through your fuel and the more likely something will go wrong. That's why full power is only really used for short-duration activities like, oh, take-offs or emergencies.

Given how much energy a Burke or Zulmwalt needs, a railgun (despite the fact that it uses capacitors) is going to break the energy budget. Railguns are already requiring double-digit megawatts to power (with surprisingly significant hull space required for the entire system), and given that Battletech has been proven surprisingly right in how material sciences can go (we literally have something akin to EndoSteel since 2016 via composite metal foam), that energy price tag is only going to get higher. Something that gas turbines aren't likely to keep up with. At least, with fuel efficiencies that we know and love.

 

[Firefinder]

From what I understand, the longer you stay at max capacity, the faster you go through your fuel and the more likely something will go wrong. That's why full power is only really used for short-duration activities like, oh, take-offs or emergencies.

Ah i see the issue.

You confusing the problems of aircraft engines with ship engines.

Despite their similarities they are pretty different.

The main issue with aircraft jet engines is that they over heat very fast and easily. Now they get around this by spraying distall water into the engine to cool it, most combat jets only carry less then 100 gallon thru. Plus they are lightly built, so less meat to tank the heat as it were. Materials science has taken the edge off that a bit.

Warship turbines fix those issues. One is that they can be built heavier, meaning that they have more meat to take the heat.

They also have active cooling systems, both a standard radaitor type set up. The Brit Type 35(?) The new ones, had power issues cause their radiators got clog up in the persion gulf. Also they have a water distillation plant to spray cold water into the engine for as long as the plant works. Or until the fuel runs out which is often the cause.

A Tico, Burke or Zumwalts can maintain full power for days with no issue cause of that. With the first two having roughly a peak output of almost 30 megawatts while the Zumwalts tickle 80 megawatts. And all three classes can and has hold this for several days. Longer if they unrep. Hell to cruise they often kill a turbine or two and run the others full out, saves a good bit of gas that way.

 

[GruntFox]

From what I understand, the longer you stay at max capacity, the faster you go through your fuel and the more likely something will go wrong. That's why full power is only really used for short-duration activities like, oh, take-offs or emergencies.

Ah i see the issue.

You confusing the problems of aircraft engines with ship engines.

Despite their similarities they are pretty different.

The main issue with aircraft jet engines is that they over heat very fast and easily. Now they get around this by spraying distall water into the engine to cool it, most combat jets only carry less then 100 gallon thru. Plus they are lightly built, so less meat to tank the heat as it were. Materials science has taken the edge off that a bit.

Warship turbines fix those issues. One is that they can be built heavier, meaning that they have more meat to take the heat.

They also have active cooling systems, both a standard radaitor type set up. The Brit Type 35(?) The new ones, had power issues cause their radiators got clog up in the persion gulf. Also they have a water distillation plant to spray cold water into the engine for as long as the plant works. Or until the fuel runs out which is often the cause.

A Tico, Burke or Zumwalts can maintain full power for days with no issue cause of that. With the first two having roughly a peak output of almost 30 megawatts while the Zumwalts tickle 80 megawatts. And all three classes can and has hold this for several days. Longer if they unrep. Hell to cruise they often kill a turbine or two and run the others full out, saves a good bit of gas that way.

That's... not what I've heard. If this forum had informative likes, then I would give you one right here.

From my understanding, gas turbines (be a jet, ship, or vehicle) have 'MAX OUT ALL THE TIME!' problems largely because it's too fuel-hungry (which is why CVNs can go full out for far longer than a Burke, if the Burke stays at top power loads for too long, it runs the chance to actually become dead in the water because it used all its fuel and/or breaks something in the turbine, or at least how it is explained to me, you get similar problems with steam turbines but only when you start mismatching the input and output as the Spruces did) at that output. That and you're still having compressed high-temperature fire (i.e. the combustion of petrol carbons) constantly hitting the fans as well.

 

[MihoshiK]

From what I understand, the longer you stay at max capacity, the faster you go through your fuel and the more likely something will go wrong. That's why full power is only really used for short-duration activities like, oh, take-offs or emergencies.

Ah i see the issue.

You confusing the problems of aircraft engines with ship engines.

Despite their similarities they are pretty different.

The main issue with aircraft jet engines is that they over heat very fast and easily. Now they get around this by spraying distall water into the engine to cool it, most combat jets only carry less then 100 gallon thru. Plus they are lightly built, so less meat to tank the heat as it were. Materials science has taken the edge off that a bit.

Warship turbines fix those issues. One is that they can be built heavier, meaning that they have more meat to take the heat.

They also have active cooling systems, both a standard radaitor type set up. The Brit Type 35(?) The new ones, had power issues cause their radiators got clog up in the persion gulf. Also they have a water distillation plant to spray cold water into the engine for as long as the plant works. Or until the fuel runs out which is often the cause.

A Tico, Burke or Zumwalts can maintain full power for days with no issue cause of that. With the first two having roughly a peak output of almost 30 megawatts while the Zumwalts tickle 80 megawatts. And all three classes can and has hold this for several days. Longer if they unrep. Hell to cruise they often kill a turbine or two and run the others full out, saves a good bit of gas that way.

That's... not what I've heard. If this forum had informative likes, then I would give you one right here.

From my understanding, gas turbines (be a jet, ship, or vehicle) have 'MAX OUT ALL THE TIME!' problems largely because it's too fuel-hungry (which is why CVNs can go full out for far longer than a Burke, if the Burke stays at top power loads for too long, it runs the chance to actually become dead in the water because it used all its fuel and/or breaks something in the turbine, or at least how it is explained to me, you get similar problems with steam turbines but only when you start mismatching the input and output as the Spruces did) at that output. That and you're still having compressed high-temperature fire (i.e. the combustion of petrol carbons) constantly hitting the fans as well.

Firefinder DID mention UNREP, and what you mention is a problem for everything not nuclear powered...

Gas turbines are more fuel hungry than diesel, but not THAT much more when run at their optimum.

 

[jsport]

https://www.19fortyfive.com/2021/04...4.09.21&utm_term=Editorial - Early Bird Brief

 

[jsport]

https://www.military.com/daily-news..._term=Editorial - Military - Early Bird Brief

 

[jsport]

https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2..._term=Editorial - Military - Early Bird Brief

 

[jsport]

https://www.defensenews.com/digital..._term=Editorial - Military - Early Bird Brief

 

[shin_getter]

https://www.businessinsider.com/chi...th-railguns-that-may-not-matter-in-war-2019-1

 

[jsport]

https://www.businessinsider.com/chi...th-railguns-that-may-not-matter-in-war-2019-1

artillery science in the US is sadly lagging after peaking in the 90s. ...again the very profitable missile fetish, misguided/lazy engineers, and politics.

If you want to win, you invest in guns, if you want be left doing the Iraqi salute, and your ships barnacle bait keep building ships w/o enough VLS cells to survive.

Various Ram Accelerator types solves defensive and offensive atmospheric and trans-atmospheric platform problems and as wiki points out is maneuverable enough for ship size targets as well as likely smaller targets.
https://www.aa.washington.edu/research/ramaccel/features
http://www.islandone.org/LEOBiblio/SPBI106.HTM
a few on this forum should read.
"The engineering challenges that the US is seeing with railguns are fundamental to the technology," Clark, a defense expert at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA), told BI. "Any railgun is going to have these problems."

Even if each railgun shot packs a punch, its limited rate of fire — maybe eight rounds per minute — means it has little use for air and missile defense against fast-moving targets.

Maintenance and electricity generation are also huge problems. The gun requires an enormous amount of power to fire and the shear force of firing hypervelocity projectiles tends to wear out the barrel quickly. The barrel would likely need to be replaced after every few dozen shots, a problem that likely limits the gun to one short battle.

"They’re not a good replacement for a missile," Clark said. "They’re not a good replacement for an artillery shell."

"It's not useful military technology," he added.

Facing a handful of difficult-to-overcome challenges inextricably linked to railgun technology, the US Navy has slow-rolled its railgun development.

​

 

[jsport]

https://www.seattletimes.com/seattl..._term=Editorial - Military - Early Bird Brief

 

[Grey Havoc]

https://breakingdefense.com/2020/06..._term=Editorial - Military - Early Bird Brief

 

[Bhurki]

https://breakingdefense.com/2020/06..._term=Editorial - Military - Early Bird Brief

Damn, they're getting deep into this.

 

[uk 75]

I remain puzzled by the worry about surface to surface weapons on ships.
The most effective shipkiller remains the nuclear submarine. These need torpedos and missiles designed to do that job.
Surface warships from patrol boats to aircraft carriers have a short life in a shooting war from either air or submarine attack. Since shooting naval wars have been rare since 1945 this is not as bad as it sounds.
The RN lost 2 frigates and 2 destroyers in the Falklands but they and their class companions had many years of service in peacetime.
Modern warships are as much about peacetime duties as war fighting.
The USN is particularly impacted by this. It has lost some destroyers and frigates to sneak enemy attacks but has not been engaged in a naval war since 1945.
China is even less experienced having until the last decade only maintained a coastal defence force. Building impressive looking ships is not the same as knowing how to use them,

 

[GruntFox]

I remain puzzled by the worry about surface to surface weapons on ships.
The most effective shipkiller remains the nuclear submarine. These need torpedos and missiles designed to do that job.
Surface warships from patrol boats to aircraft carriers have a short life in a shooting war from either air or submarine attack. Since shooting naval wars have been rare since 1945 this is not as bad as it sounds.
The RN lost 2 frigates and 2 destroyers in the Falklands but they and their class companions had many years of service in peacetime.
Modern warships are as much about peacetime duties as war fighting.
The USN is particularly impacted by this. It has lost some destroyers and frigates to sneak enemy attacks but has not been engaged in a naval war since 1945.
China is even less experienced having until the last decade only maintained a coastal defence force. Building impressive looking ships is not the same as knowing how to use them,

That isn't the case anymore, but then again, people ignore the advances in laser-tech and the fact that UVA and Blue-Green wavelengths are great for zapping torpedoes.

 

[Grey Havoc]

https://news.usni.org/2021/07/21/la..._term=Editorial - Military - Early Bird Brief

 

[Grey Havoc]

An earlier story from back in June:
https://news.usni.org/2021/06/17/la...isers-navy-says-cuts-will-save-5b-across-fydp

 

[Sferrin]

I remain puzzled by the worry about surface to surface weapons on ships.
The most effective shipkiller remains the nuclear submarine. These need torpedos and missiles designed to do that job.
Surface warships from patrol boats to aircraft carriers have a short life in a shooting war from either air or submarine attack. Since shooting naval wars have been rare since 1945 this is not as bad as it sounds.
The RN lost 2 frigates and 2 destroyers in the Falklands but they and their class companions had many years of service in peacetime.
Modern warships are as much about peacetime duties as war fighting.
The USN is particularly impacted by this. It has lost some destroyers and frigates to sneak enemy attacks but has not been engaged in a naval war since 1945.
China is even less experienced having until the last decade only maintained a coastal defence force. Building impressive looking ships is not the same as knowing how to use them,

That isn't the case anymore, but then again, people ignore the advances in laser-tech and the fact that UVA and Blue-Green wavelengths are great for zapping torpedoes.

Why is nobody doing that then?