asif iqbal
Lieutenant General
CV16 and CV17 are still giant carriers
A nice image.
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Technical preparations should be in place (already during the Soviet Union). But only time can give the answer.... what are the chances of upgrading/rebuilding CV-16 and CV-17 to be CATOBAR?
Consider this.Hi,
Now that PLAN has working catapults of its own, what are the chances of upgrading/rebuilding CV-16 and CV-17 to be CATOBAR?
Similar precedents would all the SCB-xx carrier upgrade programs that USN did with it's WW2 carriers.
Thank you in advance.
Consider this.
Upgrade CV16 or CV 17 may need drydock time of 2 or 3 years VS
using drydock time for building a new aircraft carrier.
Money spend on upgrading them to STOBAR VS using the same money for a new aircraft carrier construction.
Then there are human resources (design team, construction team, contractors, supply chain etc etc) which should be directed to bulding a new ship instead of use for upgrading.
Upgrading CV16 and CV17, they will get same existing number of AC in the navy
Building a new aircraft carrier, they will get existing number + 1 new aircraft carrier.
.I personally belive it would be foolish of the PLAN to abandon STOBAR carrier development even after 003 or a nuclear powered 004 becomes a thing, China's shipbuilding capacity is multiple orders of magnitude larger than the US, with many civilian shipyards easily capable and highly experienced with building ships of the size and displacement of the 002, however, only the jiangnan shipyard has experience building EM catapults needed for CATOBAR, the situation is even more dire for nuclear carriers, as no shipyard in China has experience dealing with nuclear reactors, and they require lots of specialized equipment to handle nuclear tech. In a high intensity conflict limiting ourselves to nuclear CATOBAR carriers will create an artificial limitation on the number of carriers we can pump out to project our force in blue waters. Considering the J-35 will be less payload and range constrained than the J-15 thanks to its lower dry weight, an improved STOBAR carrier with J-35 could easily be used in a pure air superiority role against super hornets and F-35BHi,
Now that PLAN has working catapults of its own, what are the chances of upgrading/rebuilding CV-16 and CV-17 to be CATOBAR?
Similar precedents would all the SCB-xx carrier upgrade programs that USN did with it's WW2 carriers.
Thank you in advance
I can easily see a 002A STOBAR carrier with IEP or CODAG replacing the current steam turbines and laser point defense systems planned for the 055A as well as other design improvements targeted at increasing operational efficiency for the J-35 in paticular and reducing build complexity.I personally belive it would be foolish of the PLAN to abandon STOBAR carrier development even after 003 or a nuclear powered 004 becomes a thing, China's shipbuilding capacity is multiple orders of magnitude larger than the US, with many civilian shipyards easily capable and highly experienced with building ships of the size and displacement of the 002, however, only the jiangnan shipyard has experience building EM catapults needed for CATOBAR, the situation is even more dire for nuclear carriers, as no shipyard in China has experience dealing with nuclear reactors, and they require lots of specialized equipment to handle nuclear tech. In a high intensity conflict limiting ourselves to nuclear CATOBAR carriers will create an artificial limitation on the number of carriers we can pump out to project our force in blue waters. Considering the J-35 will be less payload and range constrained than the J-15 thanks to its lower dry weight, an improved STOBAR carrier with J-35 could easily be used in a pure air superiority role against super hornets and F-35B