054/A FFG Thread II

[AndrewS]

The PLAN have now effective or will soon effective replace most of their legacy ships with modern ones.

The focus now which is the new 5 year plan is pure numbers. They need numbers or in other words more VLS cells.

If you assume that any future conflict in the pacific with the US includes at least JSDMF forces, then you need to churn more numbers of green-water ASW FFG (the 054A) to handle their subs and more light-destroyers (052D) to quickly ramp VLS cell counts. This line of thinking makes sense.
Type-055 are capital ships and not the main-workhorse so no need to ramp up their numbers as much as the 052D.

At the same time, they don't want to lose sight of the future which is why they are con-currently building the next FFG, a true blue-water FFG for escort roles. We might also see some beginnings of Type-052D replacement, a mid-size DDG. I don't think there will be a 052E. It's possible the next 20 052D might feature some upgrades but maybe not signficant enough to be dubbed 052E.

VLS cells matter from the point of view of defence, as the cells are too small for large, long-range hypersonic missiles

So offence is a better strategy
That means better reconnaissance, air superiority and long-range hypersonic missiles presumably launched from land

 

[sndef888]

50 054As may sound like a lot at first but now that I think of it it sounds fairly reasonable.

With australia firmly becoming a US puppet, and submarine proliferation across asia including taiwan, China needs good, numerous and affordable ASW assets, and 054A, even though it's not the most optimised or modern design can fill that need quite well

 

[AndrewS]

50 054As may sound like a lot at first but now that I think of it it sounds fairly reasonable.

With australia firmly becoming a US puppet, and submarine proliferation across asia including taiwan, China needs good, numerous and affordable ASW assets, and 054A, even though it's not the most optimised or modern design can fill that need quite well

If you assume that the Chinese Navy is going to build an equivalent blue water fleet as the US, that means 11 supercarriers plus 10 LHDs

If you go with 3 frigates per CSG and 2 frigates per ESG, that's 50 Frigates already

I reckon there's also space for another 30 Frigates for operations within the 1st Island Chain. So I'm speculating that there will be a future class of 30 fast frigates which are better able to keep up with the carriers

 

[iantsai]

Photos of the first Pakistan Navy 054AP:

 

[5unrise]

Photos of the first Pakistan Navy 054AP:
View attachment 79480
View attachment 79481

So there is only four YJ-12 missiles on the ship. All sources I read so far says eight.
There is definitely the room for a 2x4 configuration, despite the larger size of the YJ-12. The Type 051B destroyer has a 4x4 configuration. I wonder if the others will be added later, or why they might have chosen to do with four.

 

[iantsai]

So there is only four YJ-12 missiles on the ship. All sources I read so far says eight.
There is definitely the room for a 2x4 configuration, despite the larger size of the YJ-12. The Type 051B destroyer has a 4x4 configuration. I wonder if the others will be added later, or why they might have chosen to do with four.

A quad missile configuration occupies only some more vertical space, and each missile weights about 3 tons. All four more missiles and the racks may weight about 20 tons. This won't lift the barycenter much and it's technically feasible.

I think it's not an unsolvable problm if they want a 2X4 configuration.

 

[5unrise]

The above is a photo of the Type 51B destroyer, which is designed to and do carry 16 (4x4) YJ-12 canisters. Clearly, you can mount them in units of 2 canisters, and the remaining ones are not present in the photo. It's possible that the PNS Tughril has the other two double canisters of YJ-12 stored somewhere in the ship, and can be installed when they are needed. Might need to go to port to do it.



The clamps on top of the canisters on the Type 51B seem to be for gripping additional ones, when they are installed. I also saw the same clamps on the Type 54 AP.

 

[Tam]

This issue should not be questioned and doubted again.

 

[blindsight]

So there is only four YJ-12 missiles on the ship. All sources I read so far says eight.
There is definitely the room for a 2x4 configuration, despite the larger size of the YJ-12. The Type 051B destroyer has a 4x4 configuration. I wonder if the others will be added later, or why they might have chosen to do with four.

The 054A/P can definitely carry eight of them, but nobody says it has to do it all the time...

 

[Gloire_bb]

This issue should not be questioned and doubted again.

it most certainly should?
Two ships are substantially different in size, and they're different in the first place.