New Canadian Shipbuilding Strategy

[Czech_pivo]

Why not both?

That would fit the Canadian model to a 'T'.

 

[Kirkhill]

Neither of these options make sense to me.

A battery powered corvette in the 2000 - 3000 tons range would be no different than a diesel/AIP submarine. You'd be capable of running for two or three days at loitering speed, with maybe four to six hours of sprint here and there in it, before having to recharge on diesel/AIP. Do we see this as the operating pattern of those CDC? I don't. So what would be the point of such system (other than let the government claim that they are reducing their carbon footprint)? Is it so they would be silent for ASW? The CDC are (from what is currently publicly available) not the sub-hunters, the HAL's and River's are. Besides, if you want to make them quiet, there are other ways that are simpler and cheaper.

On the other hand, if the idea is to develop a ship that can be quickly put together, much faster than the high end ones, to quickly come into service, with much built and designed in Canada and capable of fast ramping up of production if need be, don't go for the complex AOPS systems. Stick to simple, proven and effective. My own choice would be two diesel - two shafts - two VP props, but if you want a bit of redundancy, I could accept four diesel (two to each shaft) running two shaft in a CODAD configuration, still with VP props. This is the route that the Iver Huitfedt and Type 31 took and you can see how much faster they were to build compared to the Type 26, or European FREMM's.

The CDC are not ships on which to re-invent the wheel.

All that kit that you are harvesting from the Halifaxes, does it have to be put back into 12 new hulls? And if so does it require new hulls of the same dimensions as the Halifaxes?

Or could it be distributed across a larger number of smaller hulls that could be brought together to reproduce the full suite of capabilities when they sail in company?

 

[Czech_pivo]

Neither of these options make sense to me.

A battery powered corvette in the 2000 - 3000 tons range would be no different than a diesel/AIP submarine. You'd be capable of running for two or three days at loitering speed, with maybe four to six hours of sprint here and there in it, before having to recharge on diesel/AIP. Do we see this as the operating pattern of those CDC? I don't. So what would be the point of such system (other than let the government claim that they are reducing their carbon footprint)? Is it so they would be silent for ASW? The CDC are (from what is currently publicly available) not the sub-hunters, the HAL's and River's are. Besides, if you want to make them quiet, there are other ways that are simpler and cheaper.

On the other hand, if the idea is to develop a ship that can be quickly put together, much faster than the high end ones, to quickly come into service, with much built and designed in Canada and capable of fast ramping up of production if need be, don't go for the complex AOPS systems. Stick to simple, proven and effective. My own choice would be two diesel - two shafts - two VP props, but if you want a bit of redundancy, I could accept four diesel (two to each shaft) running two shaft in a CODAD configuration, still with VP props. This is the route that the Iver Huitfedt and Type 31 took and you can see how much faster they were to build compared to the Type 26, or European FREMM's.

The CDC are not ships on which to re-invent the wheel.

What are the chances that these CDC's could be sold to friends/allies who might be in need of this sort of capability?

 

[Colin Parkinson]

What are the chances that these CDC's could be sold to friends/allies who might be in need of this sort of capability?

Any ice-strengthening built in the design would likley not appeal to most customers.

 

[Lumber]

Any ice-strengthening built in the design would likley not appeal to most customers.

Ice strengthening is not part of the plan for CDC. Based on what I've seen, these will be major surface combatants, albeit smaller ones, expected to serve in the blue waters around North America (although given where they've seen AOPS and MCDVs, there's no doubt we'll see them sent literally everywhere).

 

[Kirkhill]

When the US finally retired their Bofors 40mm's from use in the AC-130, that spoke volumes about the long-term sustainability of that weapons platform. It had an 80+ year run (probably closer to 90?) that's really only exceeded by the M2 Browning. If the US isn't able to source parts to keep them running, then maybe we shouldn't either.

That said, there's nothing majorly wrong with the 57mm Bofors, which certainly would be a sustainable system for use on future ships. Even if you simply do a hand-loaded upper deck only mount with no deck piercing magazine/loading system, it'd be a pretty good capability to have. 120 (+1) rounds in a dual purpose mount?

You can always go half-way on the deck piercing issue.

https://www.marinehist.dk/orlogsbib/h/StanFlex.pdf

StanFlex - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

That's what the Danes did when they decommissioned a class. They created a standard container size and a standard well size with standard plug ins.

The cost of the weapons and sensors was thus severed from the cost of the ship.

 

[Navy_Pete]

Neither of these options make sense to me.

A battery powered corvette in the 2000 - 3000 tons range would be no different than a diesel/AIP submarine. You'd be capable of running for two or three days at loitering speed, with maybe four to six hours of sprint here and there in it, before having to recharge on diesel/AIP. Do we see this as the operating pattern of those CDC? I don't. So what would be the point of such system (other than let the government claim that they are reducing their carbon footprint)? Is it so they would be silent for ASW? The CDC are (from what is currently publicly available) not the sub-hunters, the HAL's and River's are. Besides, if you want to make them quiet, there are other ways that are simpler and cheaper.

On the other hand, if the idea is to develop a ship that can be quickly put together, much faster than the high end ones, to quickly come into service, with much built and designed in Canada and capable of fast ramping up of production if need be, don't go for the complex AOPS systems. Stick to simple, proven and effective. My own choice would be two diesel - two shafts - two VP props, but if you want a bit of redundancy, I could accept four diesel (two to each shaft) running two shaft in a CODAD configuration, still with VP props. This is the route that the Iver Huitfedt and Type 31 took and you can see how much faster they were to build compared to the Type 26, or European FREMM's.

The CDC are not ships on which to re-invent the wheel.

Actually way less range compared to subs, because the power demand they are looking at it higher, without any of the reasons subs do it to be quieter, as the entire ship isn't submerged so you can minimize noise transmission a lot easier from engines on a surface ship.

It's innovative I guess, in that no one does it because it's a dumb idea for a problem that doesn't exist that can be done cheaper/easier and more reliably without introducing combat vulnerabilities, but that's what happens when you get a bunch of operators working on project requirements for a project with no actual approvals or required under the GoC whitepaper (or sailors to crew them, or infra to support them, or training facilities to produce more crews, or people to do that much more 2nd/3rd line work, or....).

If they want to troll, way easier to just drop a shaft and putter around on a diesel-electric motor, just a question of how to estimate ship demand load so you can supply both without underloading the diesels. I think we did a pretty decent job on that with the MCDV propulsion plant design.

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

just a question of how to estimate ship demand load so you can supply both without underloading the diesels. I think we did a pretty decent job on that with the MCDV propulsion plant design.

Are you saying that because you think they did a bad job of it on the AOPS?

For those who don't know: Diesels don't like to run underloaded. It leads to all sorts of problems in the long run. In fact, Diesels like to run at steady speeds near their upper limits. And if you do that while generating electricity you don't otherwise need, then you have to somehow "zap" that extra electrical power, if you know what I mean (since "zap' is not a technical term).

 

[Kirkhill]

Singapore prepares to launch first multirole combat vessel

Singapore is set to launch the first of its new multirole combat vessels (MRCVs) in October, marking a major milestone in the Republic of Singapore Navy's (RSN's) fleet...

www.janes.com

Singapore's corvette version is ready to launch.

They are swapping 6x 600 tonners for 6x 8200 tonne motherships.

Details of Singapore’s MRCV emerge from the shadows - Naval News

For the first time, accurate scale models of Singapore’s new Multirole Combat Vessel (MRCV) have been shown during IMDEX Asia 2025.

www.navalnews.com

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

All that kit that you are harvesting from the Halifaxes, does it have to be put back into 12 new hulls? And if so does it require new hulls of the same dimensions as the Halifaxes?

Or could it be distributed across a larger number of smaller hulls that could be brought together to reproduce the full suite of capabilities when they sail in company?

Many questions here.

First: No, whatever is harvested from the HAL's does not have to be put back in the same size hulls. The CDC's are not meant to be Halifax's replacements.

Second: No, the hulls don't have to be the same size. In fact, from the general description, they ought to be slightly bigger than the old steamers, but smaller than the HAL's. Without knowing the final specs, I would suspect they would end up having a 57mm main gun on the foc'sole, with a 8 holes VLS system behind it but forward of the bridge, giving you 32 ESSM's, then two twin (not quad) launchers for Harpoon (or NSM) on the superstructure aft of the bridge and mast, then a small hangar for RPA, on top of which you would get a RAM launcher, and on either side of which you would get a pair (one each side) of remotely operated small caliber guns (either 25 or 30 mm). This means the 12 HAL's would give you 12 radar sets (the Sea Giraffe cannot act as the "primary' combat radars like the SMART-S does, unfortunately) and 57 mm main guns, but 24 sets of ESSM and Harpoons. If you wished to use the CWIS instead of RAM launchers, then you would get 12 also.

No. Distributing the HAL's harvest over a large number of smaller hulls would not let you reproduce the full suite capability when sailing in company. That's because one of the main capability of the HAL's is ASW using a large helicopter and tail, which the CDC's are not getting.

 

[Kirkhill]

This video is also worth a watch. It mentions the MRCV but also the smaller littoral vessels. Mention is made of USVs and UUVs that together with the mothership concepts seem to presage some of what we are hearing about the RN's Cabot and the Nort Atlantic bastion. Reference is also made to having to work closely with police and civil agencies.

Independence-class littoral mission vessel - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Kirkhill]

Many questions here.

First: No, whatever is harvested from the HAL's does not have to be put back in the same size hulls. The CDC's are not meant to be Halifax's replacements.

Second: No, the hulls don't have to be the same size. In fact, from the general description, they ought to be slightly bigger than the old steamers, but smaller than the HAL's. Without knowing the final specs, I would suspect they would end up having a 57mm main gun on the foc'sole, with a 8 holes VLS system behind it but forward of the bridge, giving you 32 ESSM's, then two twin (not quad) launchers for Harpoon (or NSM) on the superstructure aft of the bridge and mast, then a small hangar for RPA, on top of which you would get a RAM launcher, and on either side of which you would get a pair (one each side) of remotely operated small caliber guns (either 25 or 30 mm). This means the 12 HAL's would give you 12 radar sets (the Sea Giraffe cannot act as the "primary' combat radars like the SMART-S does, unfortunately) and 57 mm main guns, but 24 sets of ESSM and Harpoons. If you wished to use the CWIS instead of RAM launchers, then you would get 12 also.

No. Distributing the HAL's harvest over a large number of smaller hulls would not let you reproduce the full suite capability when sailing in company. That's because one of the main capability of the HAL's is ASW using a large helicopter and tail, which the CDC's are not getting.

Are we sure that we will need a large helicopter?

How about a combination of smaller UAVs and larger UUVs?

 

[Navy_Pete]

Are you saying that because you think they did a bad job of it on the AOPS?

For those who don't know: Diesels don't like to run underloaded. It leads to all sorts of problems in the long run. In fact, Diesels like to run at steady speeds near their upper limits. And if you do that while generating electricity you don't otherwise need, then you have to somehow "zap" that extra electrical power, if you know what I mean (since "zap' is not a technical term).

I haven't ever sailed on one, so have no idea, but from the design reviews I was on the concept seemed reasonable for the plant load. The hard part of that is whether or not you get anywhere near it in actual operation, especially when you have major demands like the upper deck heating elements that won't be used at all for most of the actual sailing they are doing, but seem important for in the Arctic (and guess Antarctic). With all the diesel issues they have had, probably take a while of them operating properly to figure out if it actually delivered.

That's the issue the CPFs ran into on the DG load calcs; the actual routine sailing load was higher than one diesel was sized for because of some extra pumps got added on during the design when they ran out of cooling capacity, but way too low for two DGs. But the system was designed so that two DGs could handle the full combat load, including with a full dump from 0 to 100% with a pretty demanding max frequency droop, so the actual engines were oversized for that as well. I can't remember the actual figure, but the actual engines were rated for around 20% more than the generator end, so even in decoking runs the engines themselves weren't running at 100% (but the generator end was).

You get some weird compromises for diesels with combat requirements, but the modern engines are much better at lower loads, and there was some rationalization on the requirements to carry a load dump, so the replacement Cats are a pretty evenly matched DG set. Poking around on the CPFs 30 years in revealed a lot of things in the design intent that were completely different than 'as delivered', so a big LL for CSC was to make sure all the compromises done during design spiral get documented and key things like design intent for the ship reflects the 'as delivered', not the 2015 wishlist.

Anyway, for some kind of diesel-electric plant with combatant requirements, I think you can build in more flexibility and have a few different sized generators to better match the different load situations because you get a lot more variance with also supplying propulsion. A few bigger propulsion DGs and some smaller auxiliary DGs makes a lot more sense, and can still build in some redundancy for combat survivability without going too crazy. MCDVs had no real weapon systems, so 4 identical DAs worked well generally, so the issues were more around the choice of diesels and some other weird design decisions (like salt water coolers in switchboards).

 

[Nvlgzr]

What are the chances that these CDC's could be sold to friends/allies who might be in need of this sort of capability?

Zero. Back in the day of St Johns Shipyard we tried to sell Halifax’s with little interest. I vaguely remember Irving was trying to sell AOPs too. We can’t compete on price or schedule. Other than CMS330 we bring little to the table in the way of components or systems. Most allies already have their own shipyards and many manufacturer components that are needed by us and other allies.