054B/new generation frigate
- Thread starter Blitzo
- Start date
IEPS maybe. There is a paper from naval engineering university about an IEPS frigate equiped with 21MW GT. Coincidently 076 use 21MW GT based IEPS. I suspect that application on a LHD is a fisrt step trail in naval ships, mid sized IEPS combat ship like frigate is the natural next step, then large ship like DDG.
What has been seen in China's adoptation of IEPS is marinetime 3000t class administration ship > coast guard ship > 076. Start with less demanding and small civilian ship, then move on to large but less dynamic load demanding naval ship, then high dynamic load demanding midium combat ship, then large and large etc.
Yes. I guess the next FFG will keep the hull shape and size but move to IEPS.
The Type-054A/B should have adequate speed for every mission, with the exception of escort for fast aircraft carriers.
But given that China currently only has 3 aircraft carriers, that's only a requirement for 6? Frigates which are faster than the Type-054A/B.
That is not enough to justify an entirely new (and expensive) ship class, not when they already have a mature Type-052DL design which is fast enough, is still in production, and is pretty affordable.
And realistically, it will be at least another 3 years before additional aircraft carriers come into service, so they could continue with Type-054B production for some time.
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Assuming that the Type-057 Frigate is designed to operate with fast aircraft carriers, and that there will be 9 aircraft carriers by 2035-2040, that would be a requirement for 18? Type-057. That does sound like enough ships for a separate class.
Given the pace of Chinese aircraft carrier construction, my guess is that they will build two Type-057, learn all the lessons, and then build a batch.
My guess is that there is also enough production (~20 Frigates every 5 years) that they could sustain 2 Frigates in production:
1. A high-speed Type-057 Frigate to operate with aircraft carriers, with somewhat higher capability.
2. A lower-speed Type-054B Frigate for every other mission. (Along with the older Type-054A Frigates)
I suspect they haven't decided yet, and will wait until they can compare both Frigates in actual usage (and against a notional Type-052D successor as well)
32VLS for HQ16 is not a very deep magazine. Another 16VLS would been good without increasing ship size too much
It was clear from the onset the propulsion will be what it is when you have the designation "054B". If it was something else the number would be different.
VLS is not all armament of the ship.
It's almost ignored at this point, but ammo count on 054B is 64, not 32 missiles.