PLAN Aircraft Carrier programme...(Closed)

Engineer · Jan 27, 2014

Jeff Head said:
Why yes, there is. There are decades and decades of use of steam cats by every major navy in the world that has operated CATOBAR carriers and examples of them, which the Chinese even have a copy of, and people who have operated them. Where there are no such copies, documentation, indivduals, etcs of EMALS.

There does not need to be. What there is however is a LOT of experience and documentation out there on how to do it.

How to build them. How to use them. How to operate them. How to maintain them. etc. etc. Where there are no such things for EMALS.

No, actually because of the mass of experience, knowledge, and documentation that exists on steam catapults...including an examnple of one that China has in its possession...theey most certainly would not be starting at square zero for steam cats vs. electromagnetic ones.

Well, they may do that...but I am not at all certain of it. And I am also much more prone to listen to and give a LOT of weight to old salts like Popeye who have actually had years of experience at sea working with these things. They know what they are talking about when they suggest that the Chinese should get on with it and that steam catapults are maybe the way to go to cut their teeth.

But time will tell...and probably realtively soon (like the next 4-6 years perhaps).

That's like using massive amount of documentations on steam locomotives as premise to argue against skipping ahead to electric locomotives. Furthermore, those massive amount of experience, knowledge and documentation for steam catapults are only relevant for the US. China has no experience in building one, no knowledge in operating one, and no documentation that can be derived from any operational experience. While China may obtain manuals and documents from others, those are no substitute of actually operating a physical catapult. This is a similar idea as having documents on aircraft carrier operation being no substitute from actually operating a carrier.

latenlazy · Jan 27, 2014

bd popeye said:
Exactly.

China did have the HMAS Melbourne and possibly another carrier's catapults to look at. That would be USS Shangri La(CVA-38) which was scrapped in Taiwan in 1988. That ship was heavily cannibalized to support repairs aboard Lexington (CV 16). She may or may not have retained her catapults prior to scrapping..

But at the same time the old news that China couldn't master the complexities of building their own steam catapult to satisfactory performance (I presume the biggest challenge was scaling the performance to their needs) and the preponderance of material suggesting that they've decided to just forgo steam and go straight to electromagnetic are highly suggestive.

Jeff Head · Jan 27, 2014

Bltizo said:
latenlazy and I have already mentioned the doubts about just how useful old catapults from that era may be (rather, may not be), for developing a steam catapult powerful enough for the PLAN's demands.

I believe you are underestimating the Chinese engineering capability.

With all the documentation that is out there, including operating manuals. With an in hand working sample of a catapult mechanism, the engineers in China should be able to scale up the mechanism to handle the aircraft they would want to launch.

I believe the Chinese have worked on both avenues, and are probably still doing so.

There are other mitigating factors for both.

They have to be able to produce and them maintain the steam necessary for the steam cats (which should not be that difficult a problem) and then have durable enough equipment to be able to iterate and cycle the mechanism all of those times represented by high tempo launch operations.

With EMALS, they have to have the advanced electro-magnetic system necessary to do the same, and the mechanism to handle it. I believe they will have to have a very efficient nuclear reactor and an all electric system to make it work, and that will hold them back as much as the EMALS system itself.

IMHO, they will work both of these avenues and go with whichever one their full system is ready to tackle the problem and they feel most comfortable with putting to sea for handling long term high tempo aircraft operations.

Because that is the end game here. Not the high tech...not the prestige...but reliably putting combat aircraft into the air from the carrier deck over and over and over again for years. Once they can do that first...then they will worry about using higher tech perhaps to squeeze a few more percentage points out of it.

bd popeye · Jan 27, 2014

Bltizo said:
I doubt China could have garnered a very close look at a carrier scrapped in Taiwan... at least not during that region of time.

And I think latenlazy and I have already mentioned the doubts about just how useful old catapults from that era may be (rather, may not be), for developing a steam catapult powerful enough for the PLAN's demands.

I served for 20 years with the USN and still....oh well.

The basic technology of a steam cat has remained the same for over 60 years. Did you know that only one of the six USN retired CVs still has it's catapults installed? That would be Kitty Hawk. The rest have been removed ,refurbished and are standing by to be used to repair catapults on active Nimitz class ships. In fact the cats have been removed from Midway which is a museum ship.

Those "old steam catapults" on Shangri La could launch these bad boys....

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A-3D SkyWarrior also know as a the Whale.. she tipped the scales at 39,000lb(17690kg) and a max take off weight of 82,000lb(37195kg). This one is pictured aboard an Essex class CVA. J-15 max take off weight is 33000 kg (72752 lb)..

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Is China developing an EMALS catapult.? I think so. When will we see it in operation? Who knows for sure??..

Engineer · Jan 27, 2014

Jeff Head said:
Will they have steam or EMALS cats? I personally believe it is most likely that they will be steam, though it will depend entirely on what they have ready at the time and what they are the most comfortable with. I do not think they will go EMALS unless it is an all electric system, which means probably a nuclear powered aircraft carrier, which is why I lean towards them first being steam.

The Queen Elizabeth class has IEPS, but not nuclear powered. There is no relationship between the two technologies.

Jeff Head said:
2 x STOBAR conventional: Start both in 2014, Launch both in 2017, Commission both in 2019
2 x CATOBAR conventional, steam cats: Start in 2018 and 2020, Launch in 2022 and 2024, Commission in 2024 and 2026
2 x CATOBAR nuclear, EMALS cats: Start 2022 and 2026, Launch in 2026 and 2030, Commission in 2030 and 2034

That's a massive waste of money. First, money has to be spent on bringing steam catapult technologies to fruition, on infrastructures such as manufacturing facilities, on designing ships that specifically use steam catapults, and on training people to use the technologies. Then, all these efforts are wiped, and the process repeats for EMALS. To make matter worse, money has to continuously be expended just to maintain those obsoleted steam catapults.

If PLAN starts with steam catapults, PLAN would have to stick with steam catapults for the next 100 years. If PLAN aims to have EMALS eventually, then PLAN has to start with EMALS. There is no in between as it is simply unaffordable.

latenlazy · Jan 27, 2014

Jeff Head said:
They have to be able to produce and them maintain the steam necessary for the steam cats (which should not be that difficult a problem) and then have durable enough equipment to be able to iterate and cycle the mechanism all of those times represented by high tempo launch operations.

With EMALS, they have to have the advanced electro-magnetic system necessary to do the same, and the mechanism to handle it. I believe they will have to have a very efficient nuclear reactor and an all electric system to make it work, and that will hold them back as much as the EMALS system itself.

Best not to overlook the considerable work China has put into mastering linear motors. I would argue they have greater expertise in that field than in steam technologies.

Blitzo · Jan 27, 2014

bd popeye said:
I served for 20 years with the USN and still....oh well.

The basic technology of a steam cat has remained the same for over 60 years. Did you know that only one of the six USN retired CVs still has it's catapults installed? That would be Kitty Hawk. The rest have been removed ,refurbished and are standing by to be used to repair catapults on active Nimitz class ships. In fact the cats have been removed from Midway which is a museum ship.

Those "old steam catapults" on Shangri La[/] could launch these bad boys....

A-3D SkyWarrior also know as a the Whale.. she tipped the scales at 39,000lb(17690kg) and a max take off weight of 82,000lb(37195kg). This one is pictured aboard an Essex class CVA. J-15 max take off weight is 33000kg..

Is China developing an EMALS catapult.? I think so. When will we see it in operation? Who knows for sure??..

Fair point, and I did know that the A-3 could be launched from the older catapults (although my mention of catapults from "that era" was more directed towards the HMAS melbourne, whose catapult was much weaker, and I was under the impression, older too).

It might benefit China if they got their hands on a USN CV's catapult... but then again, there's not that much rationale for developing steam cats, and actually quite a bit of rationale for avoiding it -- Engineer makes a good point, that developing a useful steam catapult means developing a massive knowledge and infrastructure base as well, which would only subsequently be made virtually obsolete once EMALS enters service.

bd popeye · Jan 27, 2014

Great post Bltizo.. thanks..

My whole frustration is the same as anyone that has been following CV-16 for many years.. nine years in my case. Is the incredible slow speed and release of any information about the ship and any future PLAN CV.. It is frustrating to me.

I also get tired of reading that the PLAN is going slowly on this programme because it's all new to them. Please.. They need to step up the pace a tad if you ask me. ..get the show on the sea..

Just like right now in China is the Spring Festival.. so that means we will not get any useful info about the PLAN CV programme for 6 weeks and probably more. Oh well.

Engineer · Jan 27, 2014

Jeff Head said:
I believe you are underestimating the Chinese engineering capability.

With all the documentation that is out there, including operating manuals. With an in hand working sample of a catapult mechanism, the engineers in China should be able to scale up the mechanism to handle the aircraft they would want to launch.

That same argument would apply for EMALS as well and does not highlight steam catapult as being easier to master.

Jeff Head said:
They have to be able to produce and them maintain the steam necessary for the steam cats (which should not be that difficult a problem) and then have durable enough equipment to be able to iterate and cycle the mechanism all of those times represented by high tempo launch operations.

There are also the issues of creating an opened sealed cylinder and a tightly loose fit piston. There is no such insanity with EMALS.

Jeff Head said:
With EMALS, they have to have the advanced electro-magnetic system necessary to do the same, and the mechanism to handle it. I believe they will have to have a very efficient nuclear reactor and an all electric system to make it work, and that will hold them back as much as the EMALS system itself.

The difficulties are actually in the electric system itself, not in the type of power source. As an example, shrinking the generators you found in a civilian power plant to 1/10th of their original size while maintaining efficiency.

Jeff Head said:
IMHO, they will work both of these avenues and go with whichever one their full system is ready to tackle the problem and they feel most comfortable with putting to sea for handling long term high tempo aircraft operations.

Because that is the end game here. Not the high tech...not the prestige...but reliably putting combat aircraft into the air from the carrier deck over and over and over again for years. Once they can do that first...then they will worry about using higher tech perhaps to squeeze a few more percentage points out of it.

If PLAN isn't ready, then PLAN shouldn't be building a CATOBAR carrier. It's that simple.

Jeff Head · Jan 27, 2014

Engineer said:
That's a massive waste of money.

No, it is not.

If you build two 70-80,000 ton carriers and use them each for fifty years, you will recoup the expense of every single item you have invested in on those carriers. You will not have wasted a dime.

Then, fifty years from when they were launched, you roll two of the new nuclear powered, EMALS carriers into their position and continue on.

Anyhow, we will know soon enough what the PLAN intends. They will do what they do, and they will do it for their own reasons, which will no doubt be for the benefit of the national interest of the PRC as viewed by the PRC leadership.

I expect:

1st, we will know soon whether they go for two STOBAR carriers in the near term, or if they go for a High-Low risk type build.

2nd, depending on that choice, we will next know when they will introduce EMALS into their carrier development, either now, or later when they do introduce CATOBAR, if it is then, or later after 1st starting with steam cats. We can discuss it more then, when we know more.

As I said, I expect they will introduce whatever they are most comfortable with having developed to the point at the time that will put their aircraft into the air most reliably for high tempo operations...and I expect they are working both paths right now to try and get to that goal.

PLAN Aircraft Carrier programme...(Closed)

Engineer

Major

latenlazy

Brigadier

Jeff Head

General

bd popeye

The Last Jedi

Engineer

Major

latenlazy

Brigadier

Blitzo

Lieutenant General

bd popeye

The Last Jedi

Engineer

Major

Jeff Head

General