Canadian Surface Combatant RFQ

[Colin Parkinson]

Speaking of Arsenal ships, here is the Iranian version

Watch: Iran Launches Ballistic Missiles from Converted Warship

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is claiming a historic first with the test firing of two ballistic missiles from the deck of a former commercial ship turned warship in...

gcaptain.com

 

[Navy_Pete]

As a combat recoverability guy, I wouldn't call these warships, just armed platforms.

Warships are intended to take hits and keep fighting, these provide a combat capability but will basically just go until they fail and then are essentially disposable.

Great idea, especially if you have the luxury of them operating in your backyard, and also not caring about your people surviving, but seems a bit more like a suicidal asset you are happy to lose, as they can be tracked from space easily enough and targeted accordingly.

Edit to add: aside from taking damage, warships also have various sensors to avoid detection as well as countermeasures to avoid getting hit, and preferrably taking out the enemy first. Probably hard for subs to operate in the gulf, but would be an easy target in most other op areas, or similarly get taken out by missiles or similar that they would never see coming.

 

[KevinB]

Russia is in that predicament right now. They can't replace their losses for the foreseeable future. I argue that Canada might have almost the same warship building capability as Russia currently has.

But they have a ton of old and even more very old stuff.

 

[Kirkhill]

They will come from whatever yard can be converted to build appropriate ships at the time. Which is exactly why I think investing in our industrial capability is far better than spending money on fancy toys of dubious usefulness 99.9% of the time.

For a historical example of what happens, look to the WWII RN. They created emergency destroyers, corvettes and frigates to fill the gaps left by sunk ships. Those designs were less capable than pre-war designs, but could be made cheaper and faster. In the future, we will do the exact same thing. CSCs won't be replaced with CSCs when they sink, they will be replaced by a cheaper and easier to build ship that is "good enough".

Also, what do you think will be easier to build in large numbers come a war, CSCs or USV arsenal ships? Does it not make the most sense to build the best we can now, and save the "good enough" for when the shooting has started and losses are mounting?

Again, I'm not against the concept of USVs, for sensors and weapons. I'm against the idea that they will replace real warships, or that we should build them at the expense of real warships. Like UAVs in ground combat, they augment the soldiers rather than replace them.

I understand the cost constraints and the imperatives but your "whatever yard can be converted to build appropriate ships at the time" strikes me as a COA dependent on a lot of hope.

Hope that there will be yards. Hope that they will have skills. Hope that they will have done this before. I believe that at least some budget should be spent developing prototypes and low volume production that can be the basis for rapid expansion.

One of the interesting points with respect to creating yards that can pump out OSVs in peace time for the government is that they not only serve as arsenal and sensor platforms in wartime, they will also act as logistics vessels in peace and war, handy for disaster response and .....

Can be sold off to the civilian sector after 5 to 10 years of service at discount prices.

Riley Clair aka USS Nomad.



Optionally manned, reserve crew, regular crew, coast guard or civilian.

To convert them to "warships", or any other duty, twistlock containers to them.

 

[Kirkhill]

As a combat recoverability guy, I wouldn't call these warships, just armed platforms.

Warships are intended to take hits and keep fighting, these provide a combat capability but will basically just go until they fail and then are essentially disposable.

Great idea, especially if you have the luxury of them operating in your backyard, and also not caring about your people surviving, but seems a bit more like a suicidal asset you are happy to lose, as they can be tracked from space easily enough and targeted accordingly.

Edit to add: aside from taking damage, warships also have various sensors to avoid detection as well as countermeasures to avoid getting hit, and preferrably taking out the enemy first. Probably hard for subs to operate in the gulf, but would be an easy target in most other op areas, or similarly get taken out by missiles or similar that they would never see coming.

How about just thinking of them as the naval equivalent of an MLVW/HLVW?

 

[Furniture]

I understand the cost constraints and the imperatives but your "whatever yard can be converted to build appropriate ships at the time" strikes me as a COA dependent on a lot of hope.

Hope that there will be yards. Hope that they will have skills. Hope that they will have done this before. I believe that at least some budget should be spent developing prototypes and low volume production that can be the basis for rapid expansion.

One of the interesting points with respect to creating yards that can pump out OSVs in peace time for the government is that they not only serve as arsenal and sensor platforms in wartime, they will also act as logistics vessels in peace and war, handy for disaster response and .....

Can be sold off to the civilian sector after 5 to 10 years of service at discount prices.

Riley Clair aka USS Nomad.

View attachment 83108View attachment 83109

Optionally manned, reserve crew, regular crew, coast guard or civilian.

To convert them to "warships", or any other duty, twistlock containers to them.

So we've been saying the same thing, in different ways...

When I say "industrial capability" shipbuilding is part of that capability I'm referencing. I agree that Canada investing in shipbuilding for ships other than warships is a great plan. I think building more than a few proof of concept hulls for RCN use is a waste of money in peacetime though. We don't have the R&D budget that the US has, so money spent on concept USVs is money we don't have for other things.

 

[Kirkhill]

In the High Tech / Low Tech discussion I would suggest it seems to be all hands to the pumps these days.

At the same time the Future is under consideration

Franchetti confident prototypes will usher in manned-unmanned fleet

The chief of naval operations said she's bullish on the Navy’s ability to operate a manned-unmanned fleet within the next decade or so.

www.defensenews.com

The Reagan past is being gainfully employed. USMC Harriers are in action over the Red Sea knocking down drones with SAMs.

Under cover of darkness, a single fighter jet roars as it rips across the deck of the USS Bataan, a vast US assault ship. Moments later, a second jet follows.

…

But when Yemen's Houthis began firing missiles and flying drones into commercial ships in the Red Sea, the crew of the USS Bataan found themselves having to adapt to air combat, sending jets out to try and shoot them down.

"I never imagined I was going to be doing this when we launched," says lead pilot Capt Earl Ehrhart.

…

"We took a Harrier jet and modified it for air defence," Ehrhart tells me. "We loaded it up with missiles and that way were able to respond to their drone attacks."

Who are the Houthis?

US and UK strikes fail to slow Houthi attacks

An experienced fighter pilot, Ehrhart says he has intercepted seven Houthi drones. But when flying so close to these explosive devices, he says, every interception carries great risk.

"They are shooting at us all the time, so we need to be even more focused. Our systems need to be primed so we can stay safe."

The Little Carriers That Could

more is better

cdrsalamander.substack.com

 

[Kirkhill]

So we've been saying the same thing, in different ways...

When I say "industrial capability" shipbuilding is part of that capability I'm referencing. I agree that Canada investing in shipbuilding for ships other than warships is a great plan. I think building more than a few proof of concept hulls for RCN use is a waste of money in peacetime though. We don't have the R&D budget that the US has, so money spent on concept USVs is money we don't have for other things.

Violent agreement.

I'd be good with a "few" proof of concept hulls. A dozen sounds about right.

 

[Navy_Pete]

How about just thinking of them as the naval equivalent of an MLVW/HLVW?

I think pickups with AA guns welded on is a better comparison. Does the job of getting lead downrange, and is really useful, but it isn't like a LAV or something.

Ukraine is showing why these ideas (or random guys on ATVs with juiceboxes and small arms) can be really effective at ramping up, but they still want battle tanks etc to go along with them.

Nothing wrong with it, just call it what it is. The big difference I think is you can project power with warships, where these odd jobs are more for playing in your backyard, so there is a place for both I think, and a cheap and easy way to give you some glass cannons to pair them up.

 

[Kirkhill]

There is a temporary glut of OSVs - about 10 MUSD for a used hull.

As the demand for OSV vessels has been recovering, the supply side of the market has undergone a profound transformation over the past decade.

The market deterioration from 2015 onwards has led to historically low orderbook, while long-term layups and scrapping of vessels have combined resulted in a finite and shrinking total fleet.

Most Old Units Not Coming Back

Although reactivations have provided some relief to the tight market, the majority of the cold-stacked units has been out of the market for close to ten years and/or are more than 20 years old, meaning it is unlikely for those units to return back to work, in our view.

Meanwhile, newbuilds are at the moment capped by limited financing, rising building costs, longer lead time at yards, and uncertainty over the prevailing fuel technology.

The continued uptick in dayrates and replacement costs has translated into higher secondhand asset values.

As an example, the 2012-built 680m2 PSV Standard Duke was recently sold for USD 11m after being purchased for USD 7m (including reactivation) a year before. Looking at larger transactions, Tidewater benefitted from the distressed sale of Solstad Offshore PSV fleet of 37 large-and-mid PSV (10 years avg, age), priced at USD 16m per vessel vs our estimated fair value of USD 30m for large and modern tonnage.

As the sector keeps heading towards full recovery, we see capital discipline to prevail among OSV owners, focusing on debt reduction and returning value to shareholders.

While newbuilds are not on the table today, several players have commented on being open to the possibility of ordering new vessels if supported by multi-year term contracts at dayrates significantly higher than current levels.

Though, limited yard capacity and financial constraints will limit newbuild influx in the short term as we see it. Meanwhile, we expect more corporate activities going forward as owners streamline their fleets and focus on core segments.

The Resurgence of the OSV Industry: From Trough to Triumph

The offshore supply vessel industry has weathered a tumultuous decade characterized by a prolonged trough that tested the resilience of vessel owners.

www.marinelink.com

 

[lenaitch]

I'm just wondering where the time will come from to build new ships while the CSCs are being sunk.

And I wonder by whom. A lot of our WWII fleet was built by small yards, many on the Great Lakes, that no longer exist.

 

[Edward Campbell]

And I wonder by whom. A lot of our WWII fleet was built by small yards, many on the Great Lakes, that no longer exist.

Much of the 1939-41 Canadian built WWII fleet were little more than glorified fishing boats (whale hunters) that could be built in almost any yard.

 

[Navy_Pete]

And I wonder by whom. A lot of our WWII fleet was built by small yards, many on the Great Lakes, that no longer exist.

There are still a fair number of yards capable of building small ships in the 500-1000 tonne range (which is why that was carved out of NSS with the NSS yards not allowed to bid on them).

A lot of facilities are gone, but so are the trades and skills. Even with a design, takes some skill and organization to actually turn that into reasonably efficient production. Kind of like a good general contractor building a house; things are sequenced properly, so you do concurrent work that you can, sort out the rest so it's done in the right sequence, and don't have people working on top of each other. That takes a lot of practice, planning and organization.

Still, there are a few dozen smaller build companies left that could fill that niche, and they have enough work they don't need government projects to survive so they are pretty good at what they do.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Even a lot of our Corvettes sailed with much of their equipment missing as Canadian yards could not access them or did not have the money to buy them. Often the first thing that would happen when a new Canadian Escort arrived in the UK, it would go into a yard to be completed and often uparmed to meet evolving threats, whereupon indignant Canadian authorities would strip it off again on return to Canada as the new AA armament was not "authorized"

 

[Cloud Cover]

Agreed. As mentioned, a crew of 50 means actually about 20-ish people on watch at a time, and very limited ability to respond to other shipboard emergencies.

Well I guess the RN will let us know?

“The Telegraph can also reveal that, amid a recruitment crisis in the Royal Navy, the next generation of British frigates will be crewed by as few as 50 sailors.”

https://twitter.com/x/status/1758244294454903091

 

[calculus]

New win for Bronswerk, for air handling. Not sexy stuff, but critical nevertheless. Hopefully designed to minimize issues with mold.

Quebec’s Bronswerk Group awarded $100 million in contracts by Irving Shipbuilding to contribute to the next generation of vessels for Royal Canadian Navy

new_item_en

www.canadiandefencereview.com

 

[Navy_Pete]

New win for Bronswerk, for air handling. Not sexy stuff, but critical nevertheless. Hopefully designed to minimize issues with mold.

Quebec’s Bronswerk Group awarded $100 million in contracts by Irving Shipbuilding to contribute to the next generation of vessels for Royal Canadian Navy

new_item_en

www.canadiandefencereview.com

This is good news, they are a very experienced company that knows what they are doing (if we let them do it and don't screw it up). The AOPV design was a bit of a frankenstein though and seems like for some of the stuff Bronswerk did there they were one sub on a system that didn't seem to be working off the same requirements.

 

[calculus]

This is somewhat concerning. Looks like the Aussies may be paring back there Hunter class to 6, from 9.

Controversial warship program survives as government prepares to unveil Australia's 'Future Navy'

Australia's troubled Hunter-class frigate program has avoided being axed following a sweeping review of the navy's combat surface fleet, with at least six and possibly several more of the large and expensive warships to be built over coming decades.

www.abc.net.au

More on this. Reduction to six seems more and more likely, though there is talk of adding a "Tier 2" ship to the program, possibly the Arrowhead 140, which is similar to the UK T31.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1758248309221966224

 

[Rainbow1910]

More on this. Reduction to six seems more and more likely, though there is talk of adding a "Tier 2" ship to the program, possibly the Arrowhead 140, which is similar to the UK T31.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1758248309221966224

I am very skeptical that chopping up the Hunter class and replacing it with some lesser frigate design is worthwhile overall. In order to remain relevant as a combatant in Australia's Pacific threat environment, whatever Arrowhead 140 (or other frigate) variant is going to have to be outfitted with a capable array of sensors, weapons and other equipment where I don't think there will be worthwhile cost savings over just building the original Hunter class figures. You get an overall less capable design regardless of what you pick, you cut the legs out from another shipbuilding program and would have to spin up either another yard or retool the existing yard to build these ships after the Hunters are built. I also have my doubts about the viability of operating a properly capable frigate design at only around 100 men, regardless of what the shiny brochure of the Type 31 would like to tell you.

Sounds like a fools errand to me, people are just going to take one big scary program figure and cut in into two programs that will cost comparatively similar or even more than the current program. Not even getting around to the logistical burden of operating yet another design in the fleet and the modifications required by Australia in all likelihood to make the design suitable for them. Stay the course with the Hunters.

 

[KevinB]

More on this. Reduction to six seems more and more likely, though there is talk of adding a "Tier 2" ship to the program, possibly the Arrowhead 140, which is similar to the UK T31.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1758248309221966224

One would think it’s possible to make a different version of the Hunter more suited to AAW at a lower cost, than make different ships entirely.

They could cut out some of the GP aspects and make room for more missile cells. Dump the MMB, and ASW aspects and one could probably find room for another 48 or so cells looking at the model.