Royal Australian Navy Discussions and Updates 2.0

[Todjaeger]

What did defence want instead of Hobart? What was the pressing reason Hobart were chosen?

IIRC (and keep in mind this was like 20 years ago when it was getting discussed) Gibbs & Cox offered a design that was referred to as the "Baby Burke" which would have been smaller than the USN's Arleigh Burke-class DDG, but larger than what is now the Hobart-class DDG. As I recall it, the options at the time were for three 'Baby Burkes' which would individually been more capable than a Hobart-class DDG, or for three Hobart-class DDG's with the option for a fourth DDG. Unfortunately though, the option for a fourth DDG was not exercised and lapsed in late 2008 or early 2009.

From what I can recall, and there are others here on DT that were actually involved in the Hobart-class DDG build that could provide far more information than I, what became the Hobart-class DDG was viewed as "less risky" because the base vessel class, Álvaro de Bazán/F100-class had already been built, whilst the proposed Baby Burke version of a Flight II Arleigh Burke-class DDG only existed as a paper design. One of the unfortunate realities though was that changes to the Spanish design had to be implemented in order to deliver a destroyer the RAN wanted rather than it being a build to print order.

 

[spoz]

The Defence teams evaluating the offers did in fact prefer what became the Hobarts, for a variety of reasons which all effectively boil down to lower risk. The evolved design (baby Burke) was in many ways more capable, but higher risk. That is not to say we thought that there was no risk with the F100 design, just that it was much less than the Burke derivative.

I was involved in the assessment at a fairly senior level, on what was called the blue team, ie the team which did the comparative analysis. The other teams, which put together the assessments of the individual offers, were known as yellow and black from the colours of the lanyards they wore. They did not see anything other than the offer they were working on. And no, I am not going in to what the risks we identified were.

Further, the majority of the problems we then encountered were more related to the “build to print” aspect than to the Australianisation. What had been underestimated in particular was that we were building on the level, and the Spanish had built on sloping ways. Further, we were building in a shipyard which was effectively brand new, with a workforce which had really built nothing since Collins more than 10 years before. And, one of the proposed major stubbies proved to be not up to the job. Hobart being the first was the delay; Brisbane and Sydney were effectively built in the anticipated time, and to a very high standard.

That is not to say everybody in Defence was delighted by the outcome - Russ Shalders comes to mind - but the design choice was a very strong consensus.

 

[iambuzzard]

The Defence teams evaluating the offers did in fact prefer what became the Hobarts, for a variety of reasons which all effectively boil down to lower risk. The evolved design (baby Burke) was in many ways more capable, but higher risk. That is not to say we thought that there was no risk with the F100 design, just that it was much less than the Burke derivative.

I was involved in the assessment at a fairly senior level, on what was called the blue team, ie the team which did the comparative analysis. The other teams, which put together the assessments of the individual offers, were known as yellow and black from the colours of the lanyards they wore. They did not see anything other than the offer they were working on. And no, I am not going in to what the risks we identified were.

Further, the majority of the problems we then encountered were more related to the “build to print” aspect than to the Australianisation. What had been underestimated in particular was that we were building on the level, and the Spanish had built on sloping ways. Further, we were building in a shipyard which was effectively brand new, with a workforce which had really built nothing since Collins more than 10 years before. And, one of the proposed major stubbies proved to be not up to the job. Hobart being the first was the delay; Brisbane and Sydney were effectively built in the anticipated time, and to a very high standard.

That is not to say everybody in Defence was delighted by the outcome - Russ Shalders comes to mind - but the design choice was a very strong consensus.

And it's a good ship. Pity about the 4th option.

 

[Reptilia]

TKMS

thyssenkrupp Marine Systems and Saab Australia sign Memorandum of Understanding to deepen naval collaboration

Expected.

 

[seaspear]

The Mekoa-200 E.N of Egypt has finished its production cycle for Egypt and potentially would not require many modifications ,its touted as the more heavier armed of this type of ship price wise would seem to meet Sea -300 requirements

Al-Aziz class Meko A-200EN Frigate Egyptian Naval Force

al-aziz meko a-200en class frigate egyptian navy ens al-qahhar al-qadeer sajm al-jabbar

www.seaforces.org

Project Sea 3000: What we know - Australian Defence Magazine

The Royal Australian Navy’s new general purpose frigate program – Project Sea 3000 – is something of an oddity as it’s the government, not Defence or the RAN, that’s in the driving seat | Ben Felton

www.australiandefence.com.au

 

[iambuzzard]

The Mekoa-200 E.N of Egypt has finished its production cycle for Egypt and potentially would not require many modifications ,its touted as the more heavier armed of this type of ship price wise would seem to meet Sea -300 requirements

Al-Aziz class Meko A-200EN Frigate Egyptian Naval Force

al-aziz meko a-200en class frigate egyptian navy ens al-qahhar al-qadeer sajm al-jabbar

www.seaforces.org

Project Sea 3000: What we know - Australian Defence Magazine

The Royal Australian Navy’s new general purpose frigate program – Project Sea 3000 – is something of an oddity as it’s the government, not Defence or the RAN, that’s in the driving seat | Ben Felton

www.australiandefence.com.au

No CIWS?

 

[spoz]

Mica-NG is not much more than a CIWS - effective range is only about 10 - 12nm, and it seems to have little capability against a crossing target.

 

[seaspear]

Should the ships be equipped with missiles currently being used or planning to be used ,or is a better solution available like quad packed Camm-er

 

[Todjaeger]

Should the ships be equipped with missiles currently being used or planning to be used ,or is a better solution available like quad packed Camm-er

I would imagine that it would be far better for Australia and the RAN to approach this question from one of two perspectives. Either look at what is already fitted to/integrated with a prospective design and see if that meets Australian service requirements, or else look at what Australia already has in service that is capable of meeting service needs and determining what could be fitted and integrated most quickly/easily.

Now from my POV the CAMM family of missiles are not bad missiles, but also somewhat redundant for Australia. Australia already has the RIM-162 ESSM in service which is also capable of being quad-packed in the Mk 41 VLS and already has a 50+ km engagement range and Block II has a dual mode seeker. Unless there is something specifically available in the CAMM-ER capability set that is not available in the RIM-162 or other RAN air defence missile inventory, then IMO it would not make much sense for a new class of frigate to add yet another type of missile into inventory, again assuming that it is something not already integrated into the design.

Now if the CAMM family ever gets a modular launcher developed, one which could be added/bolted onto clear real estate aboard a vessel prior to deploying, then such an arrangement could be useful to the RAN and other services because they could potentially add to the available VLS cell count and missile loadout options prior to specific deployments. Again though, there would need to be quite a bit of development work to ensure that such a modular system could be developed and successfully integrated. If this were to happen, then it might expand the self-defence capabilities of the Supply-class if/when needed, as well as some of the other classes of vessels which do not normally have much in the way of self-defence capabilities.

Aboard proper RAN warships though, if such modularity could be developed and utilized it would be to expand existing capabilities and not in place of missiles already in service.

 

[iambuzzard]

Question without notice. Is the Evolved Mogami capable of an increase to the VLS cells due to it's size? The TKMS A200 certainly isn't. The PLA-N have a short range ASM capable of being quad packed.

 

[Todjaeger]

Question without notice. Is the Evolved Mogami capable of an increase to the VLS cells due to it's size? The TKMS A200 certainly isn't. The PLA-N have a short range ASM capable of being quad packed.

As I understand it, the ability to add a VLS/another VLS or more VLS cells is not directly related to the size of a given vessel. Rather it has to do with what is the available physical real estate aboard a vessel, as well as the available displacement and topweight margins. Having said that though, a larger vessel with both greater overall dimensions as well as displacement will typically have a greater margin to fit new/more kit.

If a given design has already allocated effectively all the available real estate, displacement and/or topweight, then one could not fit more kit aboard without removing something else. This is also sort of where FFBNW comes into play, where a design might get built with a specific fitout, but there are physical spaces (the real estate) which have been set aside to fit specific future kit additions as well as increases in the design's overall displacement to account for the future kit.

Of course things can happen which can come along and blow any FFBNW plans out of the water, quad-packed ESSM being one negated previous RAN plans. The loadout available from a single 8-cell Mk 41 VLS quad-packed with RIM-162 ESSM was better than what would have been available had the RAN decided to fit the 2nd planned 8-cell Mk 41 VLS to the ANZAC-class frigates since the likely topweight margin would only be sufficient for a single ESSM per VLS cell.