Take it to the fantasy thread for the time being .... it needs some reasoned discussion and this is more realistic than some of the ideas to date.
alexsa
Royal Australian Navy Discussions and Updates 2.0
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alexsa
Another platform of interest is the XLAUV being developed by Anduril
Anduril and Australian Navy to Partner on XLUUV - Naval News
Anduril Industries and the Australian Defence Force will develop Extra Large Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (XLUUV) for the Royal Australian Navy.
www.navalnews.com
Lolcake
Active Member
Cant believe some people are suggesting we buy off the shelf conventional's.... Yep spot on, probably only cost about $4-500m per Sub, save an absolute fortune because you won't need all those useless things the Collins carry like Sigint and Elint Masts because you won't have the power reserves to operate them and you can cut back on crew quarters by half because you won't need to take your Sub into the North Asian Waters and your mission endurance will be cut(you will save a fortune in Diesel) as you no longer have any ISR capability, including carrying an SAS element. Won't matter anyway because your entire Submariner Corps will have either Quit or are dead of exhaustion.
Look at all that money you have saved, well done
(sarcasm off)
Look at all that money you have saved, well done
(sarcasm off)
It really seems that LOTE is the only answer until the nukes roll up....that and the RN detachment to WA.
That has been RAN’s position steadfastly through-out all of this, despite the multitude of “experts” offering contrary views…
Add in the (slightly) inconvenient fact that RAN has already asserted publicly in the short-term they cannot man another class of submarine and you start to realise how irrelevant every man and his dog’s opinions really are. Sure we could go and order a fleet of ocean-going A26’s or whatever. They’d look lovely sitting on blocks at Henderson, but I’m not sure that would help our “capability gap’ much. Submariners don’t apparently grow on trees I understand, which is why RAN has a long-term plan to address it’s submarine capability short-falls most especially in personnel numbers, rather than some crash program which we couldn’t make use of, even if we had new boats “tomorrow“ anyway.
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Relevant to the SSN discussion, Defence Australia has just released this "informational" video on YT, looks to be an initial PR effort to start educating the public : Nuclear Powered Submarine Task Force
Like many of the actual discussed "options" or "alternatives" there is no time or way to see in any new capability and no other actually implimentatable alternatives. Either we go with SSN or we abandon ssn and go with something else entirely.
Given the cancellation of the Barracuda it is hard to imagine there is a viable alternative to the SSN program.
This will be the main strategic asset of the GotD & ADF for a very long time.
Regards,
Massive
The trouble with submarines is they are a political football that have been used, very effectively to ruin political careers. They have also been used to big note defence and foreign affairs credentials, i.e. as a grand strategist, a gun negotiator etc. They are great for this because it takes years of good press and photo ops, from the announcement before anyone can tell if it's been screwed up, then there's always the opportunity to pretend the other side stuffed it when they were in power.
Over the years there have been really good, necessary things that haven't happened and completely dumb things that have. Just because something is dumb and will either not work at all or will be so difficult and expensive or take so long that there is no point doing it, doesn't mean the political classes won't sign off on it.
I and many who know a hell of a lot more about subs than I do, aren't game to speculate anymore, as we have already seen so many things that were definately never ever going to happen, happen anyway.
Over the years there have been really good, necessary things that haven't happened and completely dumb things that have. Just because something is dumb and will either not work at all or will be so difficult and expensive or take so long that there is no point doing it, doesn't mean the political classes won't sign off on it.
I and many who know a hell of a lot more about subs than I do, aren't game to speculate anymore, as we have already seen so many things that were definately never ever going to happen, happen anyway.
MARKMILES77
Active Member
The Navy League of Australia in the magazine "The Navy", discuss the options for filling the gap till SSNs are available.
They conclude the worst option is a Collins LOTE.
Second worst option is a new Submarine.
Instead they propose a completely new option which aims to reduce hull usage and avoid a full LOTE, which you can read about here for free from page 9:
Mark_Evans
Member
Purchasing two heavy lift ships certainly seems like a good idea to help shuttle the Collins from one coast to the other.
OK. I thought it was a joke.
They want to carry subs on heavy lift ships. Rimpac and scs missions.
It would make for a grand entrance at rimpac..
They want to carry subs on heavy lift ships. Rimpac and scs missions.
It would make for a grand entrance at rimpac..
Antipode
Member
I bet there is a hole in the wall.
So adquiring and crewing three new, big (hotel for its crew, at times two Collins’s, support technical teams, training and UUV assets) complex (CIWS, UUV..) to haul around decades old submarines is not only the way to go, but won’t endanger the SSN program?
“Why get nuclear submarines if we can transport conventional ones?”
Transporting conventional submarines sounds a bit naff but the RAN will need to work out how it is going to deploy UUVs. A shore-to-war capability really wouldn't be of much use to use. In the case of XLUUVs you could be looking at vessels up to around 30 meters in length with a displacement of around 80 tons. Only a few RAN ships could handle that size and weight assuming that they could even be spared for that role. You might also need some sort of afloat support maintenance and control capability.
I see there is more talk about an East Base submarine location in the media.
Like the one we originally had, or the one outlining how a two ocean fleet would work with two bases.
Even with nuclear boats, having a base ~7000km closer to where you want to operate is a significant advantage. The US doesn't base all its nuclear submarines out of is west coast, it has multiple bases.
This would give the east coast units the ability to practice ASW without going to the west coast or to another region. The West coast base would still be the primary submarine base and of course still exist.
I don't quite see why it would cost ~$10b, but I guess its not clear what capability is being sought.
Like the one we originally had, or the one outlining how a two ocean fleet would work with two bases.
Even with nuclear boats, having a base ~7000km closer to where you want to operate is a significant advantage. The US doesn't base all its nuclear submarines out of is west coast, it has multiple bases.
This would give the east coast units the ability to practice ASW without going to the west coast or to another region. The West coast base would still be the primary submarine base and of course still exist.
I don't quite see why it would cost ~$10b, but I guess its not clear what capability is being sought.
Redlands18
Well-Known Member
I would think that most if not all the Trg facilities will still be at Stirling, of course with some major expansions, the exception may be Engineering.
wollongong protests on subs - Search (bing.com)
The biggest issue for a East Coast SSN base will be getting it past the locals, there has already been some protests by people who don't seem to realise they are living within 60ks of a Nuclear Reactor now.
I can't remember if I asked this before, but what's the reason for choosing a 25mm gun over the 30mm gun, in the RAN? Is it purely logistics? It's what we have at the warehouse, so we'll keep using them until they wear out, and use up all the 25mm ammo?
There's a video on Youtube, that several including ngatimozart, in the previous RAN thread, comment number 29,327, linked, which shows the 30mm gun causes 9 time more damage than the 25mm round, and 500m more range. Not to mention there are more types of shells now
(yes, I searched 25mm guns and went through the 10 pages of listings)
The physical and cost differences between the two seem relatively small, compared to, say, 30 and 40mm. So aren't there 3x 30mm guns on say our Canberras, vs 3 x 25mm guns?
There's a video on Youtube, that several including ngatimozart, in the previous RAN thread, comment number 29,327, linked, which shows the 30mm gun causes 9 time more damage than the 25mm round, and 500m more range. Not to mention there are more types of shells now
Royal Australian Navy Discussions and Updates
https://www1.gov.au/project/phalanx-close-weapons-system-block-upgrade Not sure whether the time frame for the upgrade has been posted here or not. Currently only 2 upgraded systems have been fitted, Sydney and Supply. 4 more systems should be back by now awaiting fitting and Hobart and Brisbane...
www.defencetalk.com
(yes, I searched 25mm guns and went through the 10 pages of listings)
The physical and cost differences between the two seem relatively small, compared to, say, 30 and 40mm. So aren't there 3x 30mm guns on say our Canberras, vs 3 x 25mm guns?
If I were transporting subs on a transport ship, said transport ship would need to be equipped like a Hobart!
