Weekend wrap: Expeditionary links

Weekend wrap: Expeditionary links

By Friday, August 19th, 2011 4:30 pm
Posted in Uncategorized

Lots of stuff took place this week, from the continued rise of the unmanned systems industry to the Army’s late-week news about the Ground Combat Vehicle. Here are just a few of the stories we couldn’t get to while it was all going on:

• Stars & Stripes’ Kevin Baron reports that Secretary Panetta says the Iraqis have already agreed to let some U.S. noncombat forces stay past the end of the year, and both sides are negotiating those details right now.

• There are rumblings that Libyan strongman Moammar Qaddafi might be fleeing his country, given the increased pressure the rebel alliance continues to put on him and his capital.


• The Navy started fabrication on Thursday of its fifth littoral combat ship, the future USS Milwaukee, up in Marinette, Wisc. Program executive officer Rear Adm. Jim Murdoch says he believes the service has a very good shot at finishing the ship on time, on cost.

• If you needed to drive to or from the Pentagon on Friday or Saturday morning — sorry ’bout cha.

• Here’s the lede of an official Air Force story that deserved to be called to your attention; whether you click the link is up to you: “Look out, Richard Dean Anderson. There’s a new MacGyver in town.” Read on.

• The Coast Guard’s third national security cutter, the Stratton, did a great job this week on sea trials, the service announced. Coast Guard officials’ pride and the business-as-normal nature of this story are examples of why it’s so important, from the services’ perspective, to start acquisitions programs. They may run over budget, get behind schedule, embarrass you in the press or up on the Hill — all of which has happened to with the national security cutters. But once you get over that first hump and get the program rolling, it drops out of sight — and in this case, you get a steady stream of brand-new boats.

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BigRick August 20th, 2011 at 1:01 pm

If our Navy leadership was smart (and not pigheaded like they are). They would immediately stop the LCS travesty and take the now successful national security cutter design and upgrade it to a Navy Frigate
It wouldn’t be very hard to do and we’ll reap the cost and time benefits of an up and running production line
here’s what we’ll need to do at a minimum:
–replace the 57 with the 127mm gun
–delete the fancy boat launch on the fantail and put Harpoon launcher there
–add (2) 25mm mod 2 mounts (the fully automated ones)
–add torpedo launcher (internal)
–replace the CIWS with SeaRam
–upgrade electronics as necessary
–upgrade helo hanger to handle SH-60 and 2 drones
–add lightweight armor to critical spaces
–add SQ-19 towed array

and start building these things like crazy, 3 per year

Thinking_ExUSAF August 20th, 2011 at 5:21 pm

Lets see now, lets just think about 57mm vs 127mm. A 57mm projectile weighs a bit less than 3 kg, a 127mm projectile weighs about 30kg. Think that there might be some difference in recoil if you kicked them both out at about the same muzzle velocity? Think that the deck and such designed to handle a 57mm would handle a 5″? Hull and deck structural beams are not light! Notice I did not even mention the difference in weight for the turret, ammunition, magazine, etc. but all of those start playing hot and heavy with the metacentric height and reserve buoyancy, particularly, up front where the hull sort of flares in. Did I mention metacentric height? :-) Add all of those other very nice things (and I do personally believe, almost essential things) and… that poor little cutter starts needing major redesign right down to the keel. We might all agree on what kinds of things would be nice for a small naval combatant but making the hull to keep it afloat, provide a bit of seakeeping, and maybe even some damage tolerance and before you know it.… .you would not recognize the cutter.

Your minimum would be a new ship entirely! :-)

BigRick August 20th, 2011 at 6:12 pm

ok fine, put the 3″ gun on there, but nothing smaller or it won’t be warship anymore.

Question for you mr naval architect, how was it that a 4,500 ton ship cannot handle a single 5″ mount whereas a WWII Fletcher class at 2100 tons had FIVE 5″ mounts?

geek August 20th, 2011 at 8:57 pm

Can a ship handle the recoil of a 120 mm gun without a major problem, yes. 127 mm is an odd choice and ignores interoperability with the Army and Marines. Lots of available proven approaches technology to mitigate the recoil forces and affect on the ship structure. Ammo weight is not that big of a deal if the planners can stop this nonsense of having huge amounts of ammo, that far exceed a realistic engagement. Give the ship some real punch along with medium caliber rapid fire cannon. Give the ships some real firepower or don’t bother..

Thinking_ExUSAF August 21st, 2011 at 6:05 am

Fletchers are one of my favorite ship designs by the way! Take a quick look at a Fletcher. Two decks above the main deck, very little top hamper and five 5″/38 turrets, a true gunboat/destroyer for the WWII era. Metacentric height is essentially a matter of leverage. Think of the center of buoyancy (defined by the size and shape of the hull) and the center of mass for the ship. Every ounce you put on the ship up high moves that center of mass up. Once the center of mass is above the center of floatation, the ship rolls over. With a Fletcher, or any of the WWII gun-destroyers, the metacentric height had very little reserve and the crew had to manage fuel/ballast carefully. That is one of the reasons, along with the need to take on fuel, why we lost 3 DDs in the typhoon of 18 December 1944. Now look at the top hamper for a 21st century DD. Lots of radar antennas, EOIR systems, satcom antennas, etc. All sorts of stuff up high on the ship just makes it less and less stable. Fletchers were pretty much low to the water and still had stability issues.

By the way, not a naval architect by a long shot, but I did sleep at a Holiday Inn Express once! ROTGL!

Thinking_ExUSAF August 21st, 2011 at 6:15 am

In our drive to go metric after 200 years, 127mm is the standard 5″ naval gun, i.e. a 127mm/54 or something similar and pays tribute to compatibility with the rest of the Navy! LOL!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5″/54_caliber_M…

Admittedly the Zumwalt DDG’s will carry 155mm autoloaders in consonance with the Army and Marines, but.… that is an even bigger, heavier mount and magazine, and the recoil is truely vicious! I do think that you are on to a concept with the 120mm though, if you are referring to the 120mm M256 gun from the M1 Abrams. Consider the likely targets to be shot at in a naval engagement and the very flat, high velocity round that the 120mm fires. None of the targets are armored these days. I would want to navalize some similar, vehicle mounted, army derived weapon with more explosive power but even lighter weight and armor piercing is not really required. Think AMOS.…
http://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​L​q​s​x​r​N​e​x​jkY

Bringing a knife to a gun fight is a bad idea, running out of ammunition in the middle of a gun fight is even less appealing, and with a ship at sea, the resupply may be a long way off! :-)

I do however agree completely with your last statement. A littoral CRUISE ship makes no sense at all. But modern firepower is not measured solely by the caliber of the main gun.

Guest August 21st, 2011 at 12:59 pm

Apart from the 127mm business, your basic idea is sound. A NSC turned into a frigate would be a much more appropriate replacement for the Oliver Hazard Perry class than the LCS is.

BigRick August 21st, 2011 at 6:38 pm

OK OK, I’ll put up with a little 3″ gun (just like on the Perry). But that little 57mm bb gun has got to go.

Everything else will fit just fine, without major modifications.

Ok now Navy, get smart and let’s get rolling on this idea. We need capable warships not fast cruise ships

Thinking_ExUSAF August 22nd, 2011 at 3:47 pm

An NSC could be turned into a slow, undergunned, under-sensored, mission incapable frigate, but why pray tell would you want to do that? Except for the slow part that is essentially what we have with an LCS. Why not just fall back to the basic Perry (which we know how to build like Carter knows how to make liver pills) and stamp out a few more? The problem remains. And a small ship designed to patrol the domestic littoral battlespace (NSC) is going to need to do a lot of redesign to be operable as an expeditionary littoral frigate.

Think about the week long USCG “deployments” and the multi month deployments for the USN; but more important think of the redesign required to accomodate the new equipment and the inherent chance of “screwing something up” in the process.

Also consider the issues generated when the USCG “upgraded” and upsized the Matagordo and her sister ships. http://​www​.nola​.com/​b​u​s​i​n​e​s​s​/​i​n​d​e​x​.​s​s​f​/​2​0​1​1​/​0​8​/fe…

Even if you start with a good proven foundation, bad things can happen when you try to glue on more.…

Alan Hinkel August 25th, 2012 at 2:56 pm

If they did that, they wouldn’t get to spend as much of the taxpayers money. They’re not even building all 8 Cutters. I think it’s been cut to 6. I think they should build LPD’s, DDG’s,LHD/A’s, Carriers and a small one like the Cuters. I live in the Pascagoula Area and I’m a photographer. If you would like to see some of these ships, the LHD-8, LHA-6, LPD 19,22 and 24, DDG’s 100, 103,105, 107 and the 110. I also have photos of all 3 WMSL Ships. The 751 and 752 can be seen on Wikipedia. The others can be seen at http://​www​.alanhinkelphotos​.com

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