Blackstone
Brigadier
Are supercarriers like the Ford-class CVNs too expensive to field? Is the USN better off with something like 3 modernized Nimitz-class CVNs as opposed to two Ford-class CVNs?
US Navy Ford Class nuclear carriers
- Thread starter Jeff Head
- Start date
I sure don't!
sorry for nitpicking, but didn't you mean multiplying by 1.5? this would correspond to Augustine's Laws
"His study of 81 major projects finds that final costs exceed pre-R&D estimates by an average of 52%."
by the way the article I linked is dated 24 Jul 2012 and considers $11.76b for CVN-78, while the price ceiling was recently announced to be $12.887b:
https://www.sinodefenceforum.com/aircraft-carriers-iii.t7304/page-40#post-365316
LOL herebut yes 12,8 the second 11.3 bill* " almost cheaper " hehe, less 1,5 bill obviously the first is always more expensive.
*
As i have posted on the Ford threat much more expensive for buy as the last Nimitz the Bush 13 bill vs 7 in 2009.
But during her service life of 50 years less expensive 27 bill vs 32 because
less personnal/maintenance for catapult for a total of 40 /39 with buying price, same.
But obviously people see buying price mainly and are very surprised ... logic.
One advantage for USN no RCOH in fact 3 years in more disponible.
... FORBIN it's just a current estimate, while
"The ship is scheduled for delivery to the Navy in June 2022."
which is like seven years from now; now going back in time,
FY08 budget $10,488.9b Estimated procurement cost of CVN-78 according to
Table2. Changes in Estimated Procurement Costs of CVNs 78, 79, and 80
in your source
don't know what you mean ... I've tried to say any "comparison" seven years ahead doesn't sound terribly reliable to me, since by going seven years backwards, I see an error of ... 12887/10489-1 ... 23%; but I'm not a fortune teller
The difference
Page 5
Jura The idiot
General
The difference
Page 5
thanks LOL
I used to post these
Background and Issues for Congress
documents in
US Military News, Reports, Data, etc.
but I don't recall any reaction at all, not a single comment (sorry if I forgot somebody/something!) ... so I quit ...
kwaigonegin
Colonel
Similar question has been asked for a thousand years...eventually they will because things don't get cheaper. Just like a raptor is a hundred times more expensive than a Mustang even accounting for inflation etc ships are no different.
However with that being said the answer is no... The ford is exactly what was ordered and the price tag is what it is. It's not about making more nimitzs etc..... Unless there is a total revamp of the entire shipbuilding industry and a full overhaul of the entire American labor workforce and manufacturing economy the Ford or any ships for that matter costs exactly what they they suppose to cost.
The USN is not going to maintain a 10 CSG force as we know it today forever... It will eventually go down to 9, 8 etc however 50 or 100 yrs from now new class of ships will be available and resources pour into them instead....and our children or grandchildren will probably ask these same questions again on those new class of vessels.
IMHO the Ford class is probably the last of it's kind as we know carriers to be. Whatever new class that comes after the very last Ford carrier retires is probably not going to be 100k ton flat top like we've known CVNs to be....
Of course that's way over a hundred years from now so It doesn't bother me if I'm proven wrong since I would've turned to dust long ago.
Blackstone
Brigadier
You made some good points, Kwaigonegin, but allow me to nitpick a bit. Physics is the problem with fewer and fewer carriers, even with super duper ones like the Ford Class. Ford-class CBGs rule the waves, but only near places they sail. Fewer carriers means less control in the world's increasingly volatile waterways. Fords are peerless to be sure, but they don't sail any faster than WWII ships. So, is America better off with fewer and far more expensive flatops, and be assured they outclass any two CVs they sail against, or with greater numbers of less expensive, less capable CVNs (that are still better than other CVs out there) and cover more waters?
What are those 'increasing' waterways? Because I can't think of anything that became more dangerous to sail in the past 30 years? Sea monsters were born in that time or what?
US Navy will be peerless with it's overall power in my lifetime (few decades from now) I assume as I can't see anything that would become more powerful other than Martians perhaps?
kwaigonegin
Colonel
Well like i said ford is a natural progression of the Nimitz class and while expensive the cost is also a natural progression as well.
Purposely making a new class of 'less capable' CVN would not only be a fatal mistake but put your entire force structure in operational limbo. A CVN is a CVN is a CVN and the Ford class fits the bill.
Unless we harken back to the days of whips and chains, I think you'll be hard press to built a vessel utilizing present day technologies while maintaining and surpassing the capabilities of say CVN 77 for that much cheaper that what the ford cost.
It would be foolish for the USN to say build 20 Liaonings or 20 CdG type carriers instead of 4 or 5 Fords. They have to totally rewrite, retrain and reorganize the entire war fighting strategies and operational doctrines of the entire Navy.... And knowing how money politics work these days in the government/pentagon etc I wouldn't be surprise if a CdG size carrier would end up costing probably almost as much as a FORD anyway... LOL but 10x less capable.
Brumby
Major
There is a disconnect in strategy between the decreasing composition in the airwing of the modern carrier vs. the 80's and increasing tonnage plus the intended inherent ability to ramp up sortie rates with the new technologies (EMALS and AAG). In a high intensity conflict environment, with attrition and already a smaller carrier airwing, the ability to generate higher sortie rates may become a moot point because there might not be sufficient serviceable aircraft to effect it. It appears to be case of over gearing your capacity (not overall but individually) by building the Ford class. One might argue that one is building the capacity for surge like conditions but the counter point is where are the carrier airwings coming from if the numbers had already dwindled?
I am looking forward to the following report that would be released in the next few days that would actually address such questions.
Blackstone
Brigadier
Google piracy in West Africa, SE Asia for a little education on increasingly dangerous/lawless waters.
I don't think carriers have ever been assigned piracy/drug smuggling/policing duties. On the other hand, anti ship ballistic missiles could be a distinct threat IF a real system ever makes it to the real world. I am not saying such a system is not doable. But I would like to see a tiny amount of actual testing before I totally revamp the architecture of the navy. With all the criticism of US weapons, it is strange to see AShBM missiles relegated to the status of near invincibility without so much as a single end-to-end test using space based cueing sensors and moving targets 1000 Km's from the launch point. This is significantly more difficult than launching a subsonic cruise missile using the same approach. A terminal hypersonic warhead is not going to be looking around to fine tune its' navigation (assuming it isn't blinded by a plasma sheath from re-entry heating) and sheer inertial kinetics means it isn't going to be dodging any interceptors. A very challenging technology like this will need to be tested as thoroughly as the missile defense systems the US has been developing over the past 3 decades.