Likewise, it’s impossible to say what a late-flight Constellation might be doing toward the end of the class’s service life, potentially 60 years from now. When USS Arleigh Burke commissioned into service, no one expected that, a generation later, Burke-class destroyers would be among the world’s best missile-defense platforms, capable of shooting down all but the most powerful ballistic missiles mid-flight. In the medium term, this redesigned fleet would support the Navy’s ambition to operate in a more “distributed” way-that is, spreading out more, smaller ships over a greater area in order to complicate enemy targeting. As a result, a frigate crew could be as small as 150. In a bid to prevent runaway growth in payroll, the Navy designed the Constellation with a high degree of automation. The number of hulls could go way up-the 2020 plan projected a nearly 400-ship fleet by 2040-while the average displacement of an American warship might shrink as 7,300-ton frigates complement 9,700-ton destroyers. “Submarines and frigates-that’ll be your combination.”Ī crash frigate build could reshape the U.S. Hendrix for one said he expects the Constellation and the new missile-heavy Block V version of the Virginia-class submarine to take on greater importance if the Navy wins the political support for a major expansion. The shifting balance of power could motivate the administration to double down on frigates. ![]() In May 2013, the Department of National Defense opened the 'Frigate Acquisition Project', calling for the acquisition of two brand new frigates for the Philippine Navy with the contract price of Php 18 billion (around US437 million as of May 2013). The Biden plan came together before the Pentagon’s recent acknowledgement that the Chinese navy now possesses the world’s biggest front-line fleet-355 hulls, compared to the U.S. Development A scale model of HDF-2600 Frigate during ADAS 2018 First stage bid. The White House under President Joe Biden is forecasting production of just 20 Constellations, but the Navy under the previous administration had proposed acquiring as many as 76 frigates over the next 30 years, with production peaking at four a year in the mid-2020s. How much the Constellation design changes probably depends on how long the frigate remains in production. That’s exactly what the service did with the Burke class when it added six missile cells and a helicopter hangar to the Flight IIA version of the destroyer. “A change of this nature would unnecessarily delay detail design by causing significant disruption to ship designs.”īut it wouldn’t be unprecedented for the Navy in coming years to take the time and incur the expense slightly to enlarge the Constellation design to produce a Flight II version of the frigate with the additional missiles. The Navy in its hurry to get Constellation into the water dismissed calls to add missile cells. ![]() “This will require a resizing of the ship, readdressing stability and seakeeping analyses and adapting ship services to accommodate the additional 16 VLS cells,” the service stated. The sensor suite includes Thales NS110 Air and Surface surveillance radar, Thales STIR fire control radar, Thales Mirador optronic director and Atlas Elektronik hull-mounted sonar and a low frequency towed array sonar.The Navy has mulled adding another 16 VLS cells for a total of 48, but stressed in a 2019 paper that the addition might require changes to the hull resulting in an extra 200 tons of displacement. The MEKO A200 frigates are also armed with 2×2 MU90 Eurotorp torpedoes for ASW targets. The class will be heavily armed with a Leonardo 127/64 LW 127 mm main gun (possibly with VULCANO ammunition), 16x MM-40 Exocet block 3 anti-ship missiles, 32x VLS for MBDA VL MICA NG surface to air missiles (the ship is the first platform and customer for this new missile). Brooke -class ships were nearly identical to the Garcia class, except the second 5-inch/38. The first unit was commissioned in 1966 and the final sixth unit was decommissioned in 1989. The 3700-ton frigates are powered by a CODAG (combined gas turbine and diesel) propulsion system, which includes a GE LM2500 gas turbine and two MTU 16V 1163 TB93 diesel engines that give the ship a top speed of 28 knots. The Brooke class was a United States Navy frigate class based on the design of the Garcia class, but with the addition of the Tartar Guided Missile System. The frigates are 121 meters long, have a beam of 16.4 meters and a draft of 4.4 meters. These frigates are known for their flexibility in design, allowing different navies to customize them to meet their specific requirements. The MEKO A200 design is based on the MEKO family of warships, which are modular and adaptable vessels designed by the German shipbuilding company Blohm+Voss (now part of ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems).
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