New Canadian Shipbuilding Strategy

[dapaterson]

How would we move them from Saskatche....oh....sorry.

The Last Saskatchewan Pirate enters the conversation.

 

[Rainbow1910]

The Multirole CCG ships will replace the 1100 Class and will be twice the tonnage and better ice class. In fact the CCG might actually find they need a few smaller buoytenders to get into places the bigger ships can't. At some point you will want to replace the AP1-88/400 Hovercraft, with newer versions of them with 4 for the west and east coast. and likley 2 more for the Arctic. That will mean a hanger, apron, accommodations up North. Rotate crews in during the open water seasons and slowly buildup the skillsets to have them manned and maintained by Northerners.

The CCG also has the Mid-Shore Multi-Mission Vessel which will provide 6 vessels for these various duties that the larger Multi-Purpose Vessels might struggle in the littorals. These ships are under 1,000t and will be built by a non-NSS yard.

The Mid-Shore Multi-Mission Vessel project seeks 6 vessels for the Canadian Coast Guard. The primary mission of these vessels is to aid in core functions of the Canadian Coast Guard, including: navigation, ice-breaking capability, ecosystems and marine science activities, hydrographic missions, in addition to search and rescue services.

An idea of what these kinds of ships might look like.

Few thoughts.

Davie can beat the Seaspan timeline for a few reasons. First is that their build isn't as complicated as the Seapan one. Second they don't have any of their workforce diverted to building other ships (just converting) like JSS, JSS2, OOSV and somesuch. Which means Davie can start right now. Third, yes having Finland in their pocket is extremely helpful, not only because a third of it being built overseas reduces timelines by (does math) a third at least, having the Finish expertise to show them the way will reduce mistakes, do overs and design time.

I'm ok with Davie showing some icebreaking competition. Our full suite of ship requirements for the governement fleets cannot be done by only two yards unfortunately, this speeds things up significantly.

Not necessarily; Davie is running pretty full out doing the DWP, and needs to retool a bit to build the icebreakers that size efficiently.

VSY and VSL are different yards at different locations, so Seaspan isn't splitting resources between build and DWPs.

The Polar icebreakers have also been on the go for a while at Seaspan so things like produciton engineering and planning is already progress, while Davie would be starting from scratch, so lots of things Davie is working against but none of that makes good soundbites.

I am a bit hesitant to say Davie can or will beat Seaspan to commissioning the first Polar Icebreaker for the CCG, for a few reasons. I would take Davie's claims on a 2030 delivery with a grain of salt, even given their help from Helsinki here. Davie commonly makes outlandish claims and is rarely called out on them, especially given their track record cannot be leaned upon at all here. Seaspan is supposed 2 years behind than Davie/Helsinki (2030 vs 2032 delivery), even though they've already started physical prototype module work, the design is largely finished and full rate production will begin in April.

Kanadan hallitus tilasi 10 miljardilla jäänmurtajia ja hävittäjiä - Navigator Magazine

Väistyvän liberaalien Justin Trudeaun hallitus tilasi viimeisinä päivinään jäänmurtajia ja hävittäjiä kotimaisilta Kanadan telakoilta yli 9 miljardin euron arvosta.

navigatormagazine.fi

This recent article paints Helsinki itself in a less favorable light.

Davie reports that the Quebec administration is providing 519 million CAD (332 million euro) funding as part of a total investment of 840 million CAD (540 million euro). In practice, Davie cannot manufacture the hull of a new polar breaker in Canada from a production-economic point of view until new investments have been made. Therefore, it has had to acquire the Helsinki shipyard. However, the challenge for the Helsinki shipyard is that its steel block manufacturing facilities in Hernesaari have already been demolished and the shipyard is thus completely dependent on block procurement from other parts of the Baltic Sea. In the Baltics, Poland and Germany, however, the capacity utilisation rate is currently very high, which may delay the schedule of hull assembly in Helsinki. The total need is probably nearly 10,000 tonnes of steel blocks or a complete frame, which was, for example, Meyer Turku's plan for the UVL 2025 project.

So, Davie might not have their Lévis Shipyard entirely up to task to even handle such a large, complex and expensive vessel at this point, or any point in the near future. Helsinki is having issues with block fabrication and more generally with this shipyard, that is why Davie swooped in and purchased it after a lot of their Russian work dried up following the invasion of Ukraine. Helsinki can have all of the on paper experience they want but if their yard isn't up to the task, it matters not. Media claims have said a 30%/70% split is happening between Helsinki and Davie respectively, so how are they going to square all of this to beat Seaspan, who is already started on their Polar? Colour me skeptical.

So my next question is the Canadian Patrol Corvettes are going to be built by who? Irving has not capacity, Seapan is busy for years that leaves... Davie or smaller yards in Ontario. Or perhaps a combo of them.

Or we go overseas and do it Dutch style, combat systems in Canada, hulls from Romania/ Korea

If I recall correctly, Topshee has been pretty open about the CMMC being something dome domestically. Considering Irving is the only yard allowed to deal with combatants within the scope of the NSS alongside the 1,000t cutoff for smaller yards, I'd project something like Irving/Seaspan/Davie partnering (sub-contracting?) with Ontario Shipyards (Former Heddle) to deliver the boats. If they really needed them on the sort of schedule required, the first few ships might need to have their hulls built abroad and shipped here to be fitted out.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

The CCG also has the Mid-Shore Multi-Mission Vessel which will provide 6 vessels for these various duties that the larger Multi-Purpose Vessels might struggle in the littorals. These ships are under 1,000t and will be built by a non-NSS yard.

The Mid-Shore Multi-Mission Vessel project seeks 6 vessels for the Canadian Coast Guard. The primary mission of these vessels is to aid in core functions of the Canadian Coast Guard, including: navigation, ice-breaking capability, ecosystems and marine science activities, hydrographic missions, in addition to search and rescue services.

An idea of what these kinds of ships might look like.

Totally forgot about these. Thank you. 600DWT smaller but very similar to the Bartlett, sort of like the old Sir James Douglas which was 564ton

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

Hey! I didn't know the Coast Guard had Gate Vessels.

 

[Swampbuggy]

So my next question is the Canadian Patrol Corvettes are going to be built by who? Irving has not capacity, Seapan is busy for years that leaves... Davie or smaller yards in Ontario. Or perhaps a combo of them.

Or we go overseas and do it Dutch style, combat systems in Canada, hulls from Romania/ Korea

Maybe the first 2-4 hulls built in SK, then fitted out here, but with some kind of further partnership between one of our current yards and Hyundai, for instance, to build the rest here. It would be sweet to see that included in a whole pitch from SK that already has tanks, artillery, missile batteries, subs and possibly some kind of IFV, not to mention fighter trainers.

If they’re serious about wanting to get into various military production JV’s with Canada and are providing full IP transfer/access, I think it would be a mistake to not cast as wide a net as possib regarding scope of equipment.