Canadian Surface Combatant RFQ

[Halifax Tar]

The mission bay is going to be great, it will give the RCN a space to do all the random stupid shit they will designate for the CSCs to do outside of the ConOps, while actually thinking through safety implications of things like having UAVs with special fuels/batteries on board, extra boats, target boats etc etc. It's probably the best feature on a weird swiss army knife ship that doesn't even come with training bunks and is so packed full of stuff it's surprisingly narrow inside a lot of passageways.

It can also store a folded up helo so gives you the option of carrying a spare, or more likely, clearing a broken one out of the way until you can offload it somewhere.

You know and I know this mission bay is going to end up being an on board lay down area for big engineering parts

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

I would have thought it would become the ship's music venue for the evening jam sessions of the ship's musicians. Oh! And what a great place to store the crew's bicycles when going on an extended cruise. Extra gym space is also a bonus.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

You know and I know this mission bay is going to end up being an on board lay down area for big engineering parts

Leak some CAD drawing of these combined with the mission bay and see if the Chinese adopt it for the PLAN.

 

[GR66]

Leak some CAD drawing of these combined with the mission bay and see if the Chinese adopt it for the PLAN.

Very believable mock-up...right down to the wood added!

 

[Halifax Tar]

Leak some CAD drawing of these combined with the mission bay and see if the Chinese adopt it for the PLAN.

 

[Furniture]

It's interesting that in land warfare people understand that not every vehicle needs to be/should be a tank, but in naval warfare people want every ship to be a battleship/heavy cruiser.

Canada can not afford to buy, and maintain a fleet of modern heavy cruisers (96+ VLS cell ships). The CSC needs to be big and mean enough to make the enemy think the juice isn't worth the squeeze when it's alone, and be able to work with allied ships as part of a TG. Adding 64 more VLS to the CSC would just make it less versatile, and far more expensive.

If Canada/the RCN wants a missile cruiser, buy dedicated ones. They can sit in port most of the time like the capital ships of yore, while the CSCs do the yeoman's work of the navy.

 

[quadrapiper]

It's interesting that in land warfare people understand that not every vehicle needs to be/should be a tank, but in naval warfare people want every ship to be a battleship/heavy cruiser.

Canada can not afford to buy, and maintain a fleet of modern heavy cruisers (96+ VLS cell ships). The CSC needs to be big and mean enough to make the enemy think the juice isn't worth the squeeze when it's alone, and be able to work with allied ships as part of a TG. Adding 64 more VLS to the CSC would just make it less versatile, and far more expensive.

If Canada/the RCN wants a missile cruiser, buy dedicated ones. They can sit in port most of the time like the capital ships of yore, while the CSCs do the yeoman's work of the navy.

Not suggesting CSC should be redesigned.

Not sure how comparable additional VLS cells are to the older capital ships: outside of an additional x feet of hull, and y thousand feet of cable to run, there's no additional gun mount or magazine crews to house. Would the additional length make enough of a difference to operating costs to matter?

 

[Furniture]

Not suggesting CSC should be redesigned.

Not sure how comparable additional VLS cells are to the older capital ships: outside of an additional x feet of hull, and y thousand feet of cable to run, there's no additional gun mount or magazine crews to house. Would the additional length make enough of a difference to operating costs to matter?

I'm not an expert, but systems that are installed need to be maintained so it adds to the PM routines on ship, requiring more crew. It would also add to the cost, as the weapons systems themselves tend to be quite expensive.

You also lose the mission bay, which allows for alternate payloads like UAV/USVs, and other mission enablers. Which creates an opportunity cost, as you've got now got a ship highly specialized for a role that it is unlikely to ever fill.

We compare our ships against the USN, but when you look around the world, the CSC as ordered will be one of the most capable surface combatants in the world. The most capable combatants are in the fleet of our closest ally. A fleet that our new CSCs are being built to integrate with seamlessly.

 

[Edward Campbell]

It reminds me a bit of the first "frigate" - the River Class designed in 1941. Everyone knew that the corvette was only a stopgap which, happily, could be built in yards that could not produce a "proper" warship. The River class were a slightly larger (1,400 ton vs 1,000 ton) twin-screw corvette but were designated frigates in part to distinguish them from the Castle class corvettes which were also being designed and built.

The River Class, which were the "mothers" of the RCN's long-service Prestonian class frigates, were "real" warships that were designed for blue-water warfare. They were a mix of escort (corvette) and sub-hunter (destroyer) and Canada's RAdm Murray, Allied Commander-in-Chief North-West Atlantic, loved them for that and for their better sea-keeping and habitability - while the little corvettes were damned near unsinkable by the North Atlantic, even with poorly trained crews, those crews were physically exhausted after a couple of days at sea and hasty, inadequate training coupled with cruel living conditions made them prone to screwing things up.

 

[NavyShooter]

TBH, as much as we might want to reach up and punch above our weight with a massive load of VLS cells, I have to ask the question.

"Will we ever fire them in anger?"

I was on CHA during the Libya Fracas, and we did not use any of our heavy armament in response to actual attacks.

I know that the world is changing, but realistically, how likely are these ships to launch outside of trials and workups?

Now...also looking at the 32 cell pack, if there's an additional SeaCeptor on top of that, and there's some quad pack ESSM, then there is actually a heck of a lot of localized firepower.

I don't know what our intended VLS loadout would be, but I'll suspect that it would be fairly 'general purpose'...and here's how I would see that:
-8 x Quad ESSM (32 missiles)
-4 x ASROC
-20 x SM-X (2/3/6/etc)

That would be a fair bit of capability, with enough depth of field to reach out quite well in long range air defense for 12-18 targets (Pk open source says 60-90% single shot effectiveness according to google.)

Looking at the current state of RUS naval aviation, they seem to be launching less than 10 bombers at a time to launch missiles at Ukraine. Generally 2 missiles per bomber. So, if RUS decided to attack a CSC, it could probably launch 20-ish missiles at a time. Suppose it was a combined attack, and there was a sub launch and surface launch of an additional 8 missiles, (not unreasonable) then you have 28 missiles in the air. All fired at a single target.

Outer layer air defense would fire 20x SM2 (SM6/etc) and let's say that the shoot down rate is 15/20. 75% Pk, which fits into the given window.

That leaves 13 missiles still inbound into the inner layer - and if they launched 26 ESSM (pair launches) at the incoming, you'd end up with almost a 100% kill rate - even if there's a leaker or two, you've still got SeaCeptor.

So.

Looking at the current 'worst case' scenario, you have the ability to defeat, with a single, lone CSC, the inbound threats from a combined surface/sub-surface/air launch from RUS, using a 'big push' as they do now with UKR.

However.

Sustainment - the ship would be down to 6 ESSM and SeaCeptor....so....a follow up attack would be problematic.

However, based on the current 'turn around' time for RUS attacks on UKR, the ship would have a day to get somewhere where there's an ally to assist, or to get somewhere that has spare missiles to load up.

I've watched a USN ship load BGM-109's in less than 10 minutes per cell.

Getting 250 miles to a port where there's missiles waiting on the jetty is a 10 hour transit, then load missiles for 4 hours, and back on station 250 miles out is another 10 hour transit.

The problem is, what's happening during the 24 hours 'off station' - and that's where allies come in, and those allies (especially our big one to the south) have deep missile magazines, and could, legitimately, stave off a daily attack like that 3 days in a row before heading off-station to reload.
So, ammunition management becomes important. I've been pondering this based on which ships I've been seeing reported as shooting down Houthi drones and missiles. There is a point at which those ships had to head off to reload.

In anything less than a 'worst case' missile strike, our CSC's could stay on station for multiple days dealing with the threats being encountered today.

 

[YZT580]

TBH, as much as we might want to reach up and punch above our weight with a massive load of VLS cells, I have to ask the question.

"Will we ever fire them in anger?"

I was on CHA during the Libya Fracas, and we did not use any of our heavy armament in response to actual attacks.

I know that the world is changing, but realistically, how likely are these ships to launch outside of trials and workups?

Now...also looking at the 32 cell pack, if there's an additional SeaCeptor on top of that, and there's some quad pack ESSM, then there is actually a heck of a lot of localized firepower.

I don't know what our intended VLS loadout would be, but I'll suspect that it would be fairly 'general purpose'...and here's how I would see that:
-8 x Quad ESSM (32 missiles)
-4 x ASROC
-20 x SM-X (2/3/6/etc)

That would be a fair bit of capability, with enough depth of field to reach out quite well in long range air defense for 12-18 targets (Pk open source says 60-90% single shot effectiveness according to google.)

Looking at the current state of RUS naval aviation, they seem to be launching less than 10 bombers at a time to launch missiles at Ukraine. Generally 2 missiles per bomber. So, if RUS decided to attack a CSC, it could probably launch 20-ish missiles at a time. Suppose it was a combined attack, and there was a sub launch and surface launch of an additional 8 missiles, (not unreasonable) then you have 28 missiles in the air. All fired at a single target.

Outer layer air defense would fire 20x SM2 (SM6/etc) and let's say that the shoot down rate is 15/20. 75% Pk, which fits into the given window.

That leaves 13 missiles still inbound into the inner layer - and if they launched 26 ESSM (pair launches) at the incoming, you'd end up with almost a 100% kill rate - even if there's a leaker or two, you've still got SeaCeptor.

So.

Looking at the current 'worst case' scenario, you have the ability to defeat, with a single, lone CSC, the inbound threats from a combined surface/sub-surface/air launch from RUS, using a 'big push' as they do now with UKR.

However.

Sustainment - the ship would be down to 6 ESSM and SeaCeptor....so....a follow up attack would be problematic.

However, based on the current 'turn around' time for RUS attacks on UKR, the ship would have a day to get somewhere where there's an ally to assist, or to get somewhere that has spare missiles to load up.

I've watched a USN ship load BGM-109's in less than 10 minutes per cell.

Getting 250 miles to a port where there's missiles waiting on the jetty is a 10 hour transit, then load missiles for 4 hours, and back on station 250 miles out is another 10 hour transit.

The problem is, what's happening during the 24 hours 'off station' - and that's where allies come in, and those allies (especially our big one to the south) have deep missile magazines, and could, legitimately, stave off a daily attack like that 3 days in a row before heading off-station to reload.
So, ammunition management becomes important. I've been pondering this based on which ships I've been seeing reported as shooting down Houthi drones and missiles. There is a point at which those ships had to head off to reload.

In anything less than a 'worst case' missile strike, our CSC's could stay on station for multiple days dealing with the threats being encountered today.

the notion of using missiles to knock down drones seems like a bit of overkill to me and self-limiting as well. A single swarm of drones would deplete the entire magazine. It would seem to me that until a useable lazar system is available that a reversion to old-fashioned guns might be an appropriate weapon with the acknowledged problem of this being a close-in solution. Comments?

 

[NavyShooter]

I would agree - but, based on the open-source info, it seems that US/UK are using missiles to engage drones that the Houthis are launching.

 

[Underway]

I would have thought it would become the ship's music venue for the evening jam sessions of the ship's musicians. Oh! And what a great place to store the crew's bicycles when going on an extended cruise. Extra gym space is also a bonus.

There's a gym already in the plans. No need for extra. The flight deck is huge.

But please, we already have to share the ship with NWO's don't make it more miserable by taking away space for being an actual human being.

 

[Underway]

TBH, as much as we might want to reach up and punch above our weight with a massive load of VLS cells, I have to ask the question.

"Will we ever fire them in anger?"

I was on CHA during the Libya Fracas, and we did not use any of our heavy armament in response to actual attacks.

I know that the world is changing, but realistically, how likely are these ships to launch outside of trials and workups?

Now...also looking at the 32 cell pack, if there's an additional SeaCeptor on top of that, and there's some quad pack ESSM, then there is actually a heck of a lot of localized firepower.

I don't know what our intended VLS loadout would be, but I'll suspect that it would be fairly 'general purpose'...and here's how I would see that:
-8 x Quad ESSM (32 missiles)
-4 x ASROC
-20 x SM-X (2/3/6/etc)

That would be a fair bit of capability, with enough depth of field to reach out quite well in long range air defense for 12-18 targets (Pk open source says 60-90% single shot effectiveness according to google.)

Looking at the current state of RUS naval aviation, they seem to be launching less than 10 bombers at a time to launch missiles at Ukraine. Generally 2 missiles per bomber. So, if RUS decided to attack a CSC, it could probably launch 20-ish missiles at a time. Suppose it was a combined attack, and there was a sub launch and surface launch of an additional 8 missiles, (not unreasonable) then you have 28 missiles in the air. All fired at a single target.

Outer layer air defense would fire 20x SM2 (SM6/etc) and let's say that the shoot down rate is 15/20. 75% Pk, which fits into the given window.

That leaves 13 missiles still inbound into the inner layer - and if they launched 26 ESSM (pair launches) at the incoming, you'd end up with almost a 100% kill rate - even if there's a leaker or two, you've still got SeaCeptor.

So.

Looking at the current 'worst case' scenario, you have the ability to defeat, with a single, lone CSC, the inbound threats from a combined surface/sub-surface/air launch from RUS, using a 'big push' as they do now with UKR.

However.

Sustainment - the ship would be down to 6 ESSM and SeaCeptor....so....a follow up attack would be problematic.

However, based on the current 'turn around' time for RUS attacks on UKR, the ship would have a day to get somewhere where there's an ally to assist, or to get somewhere that has spare missiles to load up.

I've watched a USN ship load BGM-109's in less than 10 minutes per cell.

Getting 250 miles to a port where there's missiles waiting on the jetty is a 10 hour transit, then load missiles for 4 hours, and back on station 250 miles out is another 10 hour transit.

The problem is, what's happening during the 24 hours 'off station' - and that's where allies come in, and those allies (especially our big one to the south) have deep missile magazines, and could, legitimately, stave off a daily attack like that 3 days in a row before heading off-station to reload.
So, ammunition management becomes important. I've been pondering this based on which ships I've been seeing reported as shooting down Houthi drones and missiles. There is a point at which those ships had to head off to reload.

In anything less than a 'worst case' missile strike, our CSC's could stay on station for multiple days dealing with the threats being encountered today.

You have 24 Sea Cepters, those come quad packed. I don't see Canada ever using ASROC either. Those things are honestly kinda meh. More likely were goint to be using a UAV that carries a torp in the future instead of an ASROC if you ned that sort of distance.

 

[KevinB]

The issue is most ships these days don’t have a very effective C/UAS gun system. It’s either the 20mm Vulcan on the CWIS or a larger gun that isn’t meant for that role.


WRT the Red Sea engagements.
For the most part the Houthi aren’t trying to target the combatants- so they are passing targets out of reach of the guns, and no effective means other than ADM to engage.

 

[Navy_Pete]

You know and I know this mission bay is going to end up being an on board lay down area for big engineering parts

A really big on board lay down area!

In all seriousness, there are some propective layouts that have been specced out and it's really well thought out (by the Brits). Things like extra Rhibs for OPERATORS!! (have to write it like they say it) doing MTOG or whatever, UAVs/UUVs and maintenance kit, HADR, extra helo are all options, with the space actually being designed to include things like TEU tie down points, ratings for equipment, extra fire suppression etc.

Instead of jamming shit into nooks and crannies that causes other issues, it will actually have a dedicated area up front.

The stores setup generally is pretty good, and they've considered things like storing TP, extinguishers, paper and other normal things that we have onboard that also don't have any actual storage and tend to plug up the uptakes, capstan compartment, or whever else. Which is all good news, as the ship is packed solid with kit inside.

 

[Halifax Tar]

A really big on board lay down area!

In all seriousness, there are some propective layouts that have been specced out and it's really well thought out (by the Brits). Things like extra Rhibs for OPERATORS!! (have to write it like they say it) doing MTOG or whatever, UAVs/UUVs and maintenance kit, HADR, extra helo are all options, with the space actually being designed to include things like TEU tie down points, ratings for equipment, extra fire suppression etc.

Instead of jamming shit into nooks and crannies that causes other issues, it will actually have a dedicated area up front.

The stores setup generally is pretty good, and they've considered things like storing TP, extinguishers, paper and other normal things that we have onboard that also don't have any actual storage and tend to plug up the uptakes, capstan compartment, or whever else. Which is all good news, as the ship is packed solid with kit inside.

I would love to see the Log spaces layouts.

 

[dapaterson]

I would love to see the Log spaces layouts.

By "Log spaces" I assume you mean "whatever was leftover after the operators fulfilled their dreams and ignore sustainment".

 

[Navy_Pete]

I would love to see the Log spaces layouts.

Pretty similar to what we have on the CPFs and other ships for things like drawers and dedicated racks from what I remember seeing on a quick 3D model tour, it's just more that they included dedicated storage for things that are now onboard but just where ever you can fit them.

I'm sure we'll take a 5 lb bag already loaded for 10 and go for 15 lbs anyway, but if we had something like a forward logistic support that had the information needed and resources to do things like know the parts needed for upcoming PM and have it available at the next port, it would save a lot of pack ratting. Also, not passing around things like the RAM pads, which seem to stay in triwalls and get passed around ship to ship in the uptakes, which probably leave them moldy, useless messes by the time they are needed.

That's actually pretty easy to do, if you have PM routines that include itemized bills of materials (BOMs). At the moment, it's entirely manual, and the class desk folks were more interested in creating virtual dashboards then adding that kind of info to current PM as we update them (or giving us reports letting us know that the ISSC verified that yes, the 1000s of parts we know are obsolete are in fact, obsolete, vice suggesting alternatives)

 

[Rainbow1910]

The issue is most ships these days don’t have a very effective C/UAS gun system. It’s either the 20mm Vulcan on the CWIS or a larger gun that isn’t meant for that role.

Depending on what ammunition options the RCN purchases, the 5"/64 OTO-Melara has ample capability to destroy drones at a reasonable/long range and with good rate of fire. The USN has been using KE-ET 5" ammo to destroy drones in the Red Sea apparently as most of them are fairly flimsy and slow.