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Jim WH wrote:

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The Indians managed to get a SeaKing to work off a barely modified Leander. Hell MARCOM operated SeaKing off the modified St Laurent class, and that weighed in at just over 3,000 ton deep (after refit). Personally I'd never propose operating a heavy (<10 ton) helicopter off a ship less than 2,500 ton, it's still possible.
Of course, I'd propose a somewhat lighter equipment fit for a C3 type vessel (CAMM, 76mm gun, a couple of 12.7mm RCW, a light MFR, UUV/RHIB launching equipment, ? light TAS), and I'd propose a Future Lynx rather than a Merlin. It'd need a naval architect to actually work out plausibility, but it strikes me that such a fit could be built into a c.2,000-2,500 ton ship with a minimum crew. Speed may well be the trade-off, although c.20 knots can be achieved with comparatively little power.

Why limit yourself to 2000-2500tons though Jim. Vospers have already indicated a variant of their Khareef OPV hull north of 3000 tons for a C3 offering. Using the new Dutch OPV as a yardstick (3750tons) there would appear to be justification for a hull certainly in the 3500ton bracket. A diesel fit for 25knts (as discussed for Khareef) would certainly be enough to keep pace with the amphibs, at least, in reasonably miserable seas which should be good enough to be useful in fleet deployments.

In terms of crew weapons and propulsion fit count as heavily as anything else so simplifying those areas will have positive benefits in keeping the ships complement down. The question has to be asked as to why C3 would need a VLS and CAMM?. A refurbed Phalanx off a decomming T42 would be an order of magnitude over anything currently in the patrol fleet in terms of anti-missile defence!. C2, built on a common hull with C3, could be the variant sporting VLS and SSGM etc and that vessel, tasked with force protection/MIOPS, would need little more than what FLynx could offer.

Jim,

-anecdotally, there is some advantages for MCM being smaller rather than larger. Although - that being said - C3 will probably be more hands-off than previous generations of MCM

REMUS and SEAFOX are the future of MCM in the RN and not 2093 in a signature attenuated hull. Its a mistake in my book, but, its happening now. I'm told that mechanical sweep gear isnt even mounted in the Hunts routinely anymore. If all were doing for MCMW in the future is a Nintendo routine with UUV's and target-plinking with Seafoxes then the vessel capable of operating UUV's in the poorest conditions and embarking the largest complement of drones is champ - both of those factors point to a larger hull rather than a small one!.

As Kevin so clearly indicates - for patrol ops - in a heavy sea and, especially, for aviation ops under less than ideal conditions then the larger hull is optimum. Seeings as C3's principal taskings will include storm season in the West Indies and the always fun southern oceans a vessel with the best seakeeping pratically viable is going to be a natural winner.

Your point about the willful myopia of politicians is obviously a time-served one, however, I think that the criminal ignorance of defence by the rank-and-file in the Commons works for the RN here. Most politicians wouldn't know whether 3500tons is a big boat or not - certainly contrasted to the T45's they would seem quite 'dinky'. For any with the nouse to leaf through a Janes quickly there are precedents easily cited in Scandinavia, the US and Europe for circa 3000ton patrol vessels - the Dutch and US design solutions both sharing much in common with what we'd term our C3 requirement.

The key to C3 is crew size: crew are the most expensive part of a ship (taken over it's whole life), and they're also becoming something of a rare commodity. Ergo, if the size of the C3's crew needs to bve kept to a bare minimum. On principal, I'd be aiming for a crew of less than 45 (a Hunt class' compliment).

Concur absolutely with the caveat that room for quite a few transients should be designed in - disaster recovery and friendlies evac type missions seem to be more and more the remit of RN patrol taskings. Setting the hull up to adapt to such challenges should be something achieveable on the larger sized hull concepts.

In keeping with the low crewing requirement the warfare dept needs to be kept to a routine minimum. Some form of 3D surface/air search set is a necessity for a vessel that will be undertaking MCMW ops in potentially exciting areas and adding a few extra units to the current 996 replacement buy would seem the most sensible way to address that across C3 and C2 perhaps with C3's inheriting equipment off decomming Dukes etc. Apart from the standard EO kit there would seem little necessity for anything else in sensor terms.

I disagree that C3 would need to contribute to ASW or AAW ops as, IMO, MCMW is going to keep C3's plenty busy supporting future fleet ops. A Phalanx for immediate defence, backing up softkill, is all that these vessels should need. Given the likely taskings, and a circa 3500ton hull, I'd like to see a Mk8 forward mounted as the platform would seem to be ideal, i.e a bit more expendable than anything else, for gunline NGFS in a fleet context. Also for anti-drug/anti-piracy work a bloody great 4.5" shell splash can be very pursuasive to those charging off in a go-fast boat.

Regarding C2: to my way of thinking C2 needs to be be somewhat more capable than C3 (it was described by the project team as a 'choke point escort' IIRC), which implies a somewhat more sophisticated sensor and weapon suite. And if the C3 design is big enough to accept the C2's kit, then I'd submit that C3 is unnecessarily large.

I'd agree that C2 needs to be more LCS wheras the C3 needs to be National Security Cutter, if we borrow from the US model, somewhat ironically though I have seen a proposal from Northrop Grumman to build a 'warfighter' variant of NSC to fulfill the LCS tasking more cheaply than the current LCS-1 or LCS-2 designs. Same reasoning I use - build lots of basic hulls to the same general layout/machinery fit just have one batch austere patrol hulls and the second batch as 2nd-rate combattants. Save money on both classes with volume orders and save more on your ops/training budget by running one course to train crew for both!.

See what Vospers would do for an initial order of 16 hulls 8/8 split of C3/C2 with a likely third follow on batch of C3's.

Jim

First off, you've got LCS and NSC a bit mixed up. LCS is going to be the USN's principal MCM of the future, and it's preferred littoral patrol vessel. NSC is is really only designed for maritime security operations. NSC is also a good deal bigger than the LCS (NSC 4,300 tons versus LCS 2,500-2,700). If anything C3 is closest to being a British LCS, and NSC has no direct equivalent in UK planning (sensibly IMHO).

Again, respectfully, I disagree there. IMO the size of the vessel, within reasonable limits, does little to designate its primary function. By that I mean that its perfectly feasible for a 2500ton vessel to be a warfighter wheras a 4000ton vessel is a patroller. MCM tasking aside the LCS is going to be the littoral presence of the USN in potential threat zones. NSC is going to be tasked with longer duration operations in more benign threat environments.

To me that's got LCS pegged as littoral warfighter (our C2) and NSC as oceanic patrol vessel (our C3) - MCMW confuddles the issue a bit, but, if you look at it there is no reason why NSC could not operate UUV's and drones every bit as successfully as LCS. The crossover is interesting between the two as well as you get the space and margins in NSC to offer potential as an LCS-roled hull, but, the smaller LCS designs would not seem to offer as much potential going the other way as economical long-endurance patrollers.