USS Freedom LCS-1 soon and very soon

[PeriscopeDepth]

Originally Posted by geetrue

I just read seafarer's link (here)
that the US Navy won't order anymore after these two, due to the shipyards inability to gurantee the price.

How can any shipyard gurantee a price with high gas and food prices?

After the Navy gets hold of these two ships they will change their mind, unless these new ships threaten more of the same old fleet ships they need to guard the aircraft carrier's.

The program is pending a rebidding at a fixed price, then three more LCS will be built. The contractor needs to be given incentives to not just lowball the hell out of their offer to get the contract and then claim "Whoopsie!" later at the taxpayer's expense. I am glad the Navy finally wised up instead of bending over backwards to the contractor in this case.

PD

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by PeriscopeDepth

The program is pending a rebidding at a fixed price, then three more LCS will be built. The contractor needs to be given incentives to not just lowball the hell out of their offer to get the contract and then claim "Whoopsie!" later at the taxpayer's expense. I am glad the Navy finally wised up instead of bending over backwards to the contractor in this case.

PD

Maybe the Air Force should take notice of the wise Navy?

-S

[seafarer]

I gather Congress is concerned that the costs of both ships look like they will come in at double, or more, the advertised price. Before they commit to anything further, they want some details as to just what the cost overruns entailed, since I gather that is not really very clear right now.

First ships of a new class are pretty much expected to cost more then originally thought, but double or more is a bit hard to swallow, especially when the overruns haven't been fully accounted for yet (and especially when you are considering ordering 15-20 of them over the next several years).

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by Raptor1

Fooling the wake-homers shouldn't be a problem:

Active Sonar - Spoof the Bounce Contact
Passive Sonar - Spoof the Sound Source
Wake-Homer - Spoof the Wake, I'm surprised such a thing doesn't exist yet

Also, You can always mount something like the old Torpedo-Nets on your stern that will detonate the Torpedo before it gets close, after all, it HAS to come from the stern...

According to my buddy in the Navy they do have some sort of Wake Reduction system already. Infact his destroyer probaly has it... or had it until they backed it in to a dock in Turkey... twice...

[Raptor1]

Yeah, but how about a wake-creating device, turn hard to one side, shoot it at the other and hope the Torpedo follows your decoy instead of you?

[SUBMAN1]

The undeniable fact here is in any war that involves subs, you are going to lose some ships to subs. Hopefully this LCS can hunt them and force them to either abandon their mission or kill them. Wake homers or not, if a sub wasn't such a power equalizer, no one would buy them.

-S

[geetrue]

It would take a brave submarine captian to hear those little echo ranging helio's pinging over 30 miles away and then order his sub and crew to turn towards the warship they belong to.

Yes siree that would be a dumb move in time of war.

I wonder if those little things can carry a weapon too?

[baggygreen]

Originally Posted by geetrue

I wonder if those little things can carry a weapon too?

No doubt, predators etc can carry hellfires, im sure that shipborne UAVs could also carry weapons..

[Bort]

The thing that sets the LCS apart from previous ships is also what makes it a potential white elephant. The warfare modules are the achilles heel of the whole ship, they must be fitted prior to sailing (which may be very complicated and time consuming besides which you may load the wrong module for the scenario and have to return to port), the amount of modules themselves may be limited, impairing flexability, they will require different sailors which aren't normal members of the crew to come aboard to operate the modular systems, they rely primarily upon unproven UUV/UAV technologies for sucess, and they limit the amount of onboard weaponry that the ship can carry, ie. torpedo tubes and surface to surface missiles. Many foriegn countries have stated an interest in purchasing ships of the LCS design, but all have opted to have a traditional weapon/sensor fit, which should raise eyebrows in the US government.

[Lurchi]

I have to agree with what you said, Bort: The modular concept is nothing new and was first used with the MEKO Corvette/Frigate concept developed by a german shipyard - the newest ships are the ANZAC Frigates and the german K130 Corvettes.

Although the modular design has its theoretical advantages, in reality however, none of the MEKO ships has been extensively reequipped with new weapon or sensor modules. No Navy decided to buy (and store!) additional modules yet, as they represent a dead investment in peacetime - navies prefer to spend this money for additional ships.

The LCS is certainly an innovative and interesting design but i don't see it as effective subkiller (like any surface ship). It looks like the perfect ship for hunting pirates and lightly armed vessels in the persian gulf ... which currently makes them the most expensive 'Patrol Boats' right now. The U.S. built Saar5's are more versatile with their mutli-mission weaponry and are probably a lot cheaper.

[PeriscopeDepth]

Originally Posted by Lurchi

The LCS is certainly an innovative and interesting design but i don't see it as effective subkiller (like any surface ship). It looks like the perfect ship for hunting pirates and lightly armed vessels in the persian gulf ... which currently makes them the most expensive 'Patrol Boats'.

IMO, LCS is a platform suitable to operate in the littorals not by its capabilities but rather its expendability and scale. Any number of things can get you whacked in the littoral during a hot war, and the USN would prefer it wasn't a ~$1 billion Aegis DDG.

It does make a much more appropriate peace time patrol boat for these areas, though, no mistaking that.

PD

[Takao]

Well, at the numbers I have been seeing, I hardly think $630-$677 million qualifies as expendable. The Congressional budget Office has placed the cost per ship, upon series production of 55 ships, at $450 million. The $450 million does not include the cost for "mission modules", just the ship "as is." Who knows how much the cost of the "mission modules" will be, $80 million per module according to some sources. Now, that would give the LCS a cost of $530 million. But, where is the flexibility in that? There isn't any, to have some flexibility, you would need two or three modules. Now, you are talking $610-$690 million per ship. At $690 million per copy, why not just build another DDG-51. Delving further into the LCS lunacy. One of the ships the LCS is intended to replace is the MCM-1 Avenger class minesweepers. If my math is correct, an MCM-1 would cost roughly $200 million dollars to produce
today versus a LCS with 1 module at $530 million. That is two MCM-1s for an LCS and you still have $130 million in the bank!

Going further, the USN is using the assumption that the LCS will be operating under the protection of the yet-to-be-built DDG-1000 and CG-X class ships. Given the spiraling cost of the LCS, the base cost of a DDG-1000 or CG-X will make them prohibitively expensive and limit the number, if any, that are built. Thus, the Navy will be faced with a choice of increasing the size, capability, and cost of the LCS or operating the very vulnerable LCS in a much more hostile environment.

In conclusion, this cost of this limited value, minor combat vessel of is approaching the cost of other nations' larger combat vessels without any increase in the LCS's fighting ability or capability.

[AntEater]

Building as ship as a "cheap alternative" and ending up with a hugely expensive project is certainly not very smart. Especially since they apparently couldn't decide on one design anyway.
I hope the modules (are any of them ready yet??) fit both versions!
Actually those texts contain a lot of blah blah but not really much info on what can be fitted to these ships. Another problem is that these designs are basically high-speed ferries adapted for military use. I know much of the cost overruns are from adapting that civilian design, but I suppose a ferry was not build with watertight integrity in mind and there's only so much you can do after you design it.
Also, giving the contract to one contender who is actually not a shipyard is calculated risk taking, giving both contracts to companies with zero warship building experience is stupid.
Re international competition, the german K 130 is much slower and most of its innovative systems were cancelled before the ship was ever launched (UAV helicopters, fibreoptically guided missiles). The follow up K 131 class might turn into something useful, but the 130s are basically large but very slow (26 knots) high seas missile boats. The complementing larger "white elephant" will be the F 125 frigate which is something in between a small landing ship and an oversized gunboat without any ASW and marginal AAW capability. Yet even the 8000 ton F 125 is still (a bit) cheaper than the LCS.
The Israeli ships are the same as all israeli ships: Overloaded. The Saar 5s never sail with their full weapons load and in any other sea than the eastern med, these ships would be misplaced. Not everything with "Israeli" on it means quality. Israel has a great army and the best air force in the world, but its navy is the stepchild of the military.
Even though the missile strike on the Hanith was not due to a design flaw, but due to the usual arrogance paired with incompetence that doomed the whole Israeli Lebanon campaign of 2006.

[PeriscopeDepth]

Originally Posted by AntEater

Building as ship as a "cheap alternative" and ending up with a hugely expensive project is certainly not very smart. Especially since they apparently couldn't decide on one design anyway.

What IS up with that? In the new fixed bid arrangement, winner of the bid builds two, loser one. It sounds like the Navy really doesn't trust either of the bidders, no surprise there I guess.

PD

[geetrue]

There won't be a history channel to tell us what we did wrong after the next war ... just go ahead and get rid of a couple of carrier air strike groups especially in the western Pacific.

Protect the homeland ...