MoD reveals design of Royal Navy future warships

A brand new shiny ship has been revealed by the UK's Ministry of Defence (MOD).

The design of the Royal Navy's latest warship has been revealed by the Ministry of Defence. The announcement on the Type 26 Global Combat Ship has been described by officials as a "significant milestone" in a programme which will support "thousands of UK shipbuilding jobs".

Basic specification images show sleek stealth features, familiar to modern warships, making them harder to detect. The ship will be 148 metres long with a displacement of 5,400 tonnes. Continue reading the main story “ Start Quote The Type 26 will be the backbone of the Royal Navy for decades to come” Peter Luff Minister for Defence Equipment, Support and Technology The MoD has been working with BAE Systems since 2010 to determine the basic design for the ship. Detailed specifications of the vessel will now be examined. Vertical missile silos for a range of weapons, such as cruise missiles, will be housed on board along with a medium calibre gun.

The hangar on board will house a Merlin or Wildcat helicopter and there will be extra space for unmanned drones, underwater vehicles or other specialist equipment.

www.bbc.co.uk...

Interesting that extra space has been made for the dreaded drones. They are the future. I wonder If they will include underwater drones? Brazil is apparently interested in buying some of these beauties as well, so could provide a lot of killing machine making jobs for years to come in the UK.

reply to post by Peruvianmonk


It is actually a pretty damn impressive bit of kit there. I would also be surprised if underwater drones (or variations of) were not included in this.

I have a bit of a love hate relationship with armaments like this. On the one hand, i hate warfare and the suffering it causes. On the other hand, it is an interesting topic and some of the stuff these days is impressive - no other way of looking at it! Plus, i am realistic to know that we actually need this stuff (sadly).

These ships will be modular as well, with different specs for different mission types, such as ASW, Air Defence or what have you...It also seems we are going to replace the Type 23's on a one for one basis, unlike the Type 45's where we ended up with 6 in the end.

Quite an exciteing time and backs up what I have been saying for a while, namely that the UK Military, rather than being slashed and burnt, is actually being reconfigured. Emphasis seems to be focussing on the Navy, which as an island nation should be our priority.

Originally posted by stumason

Emphasis seems to be focussing on the Navy, which as an island nation should be our priority.

Good, it is about time. Lets face it, the Navy and Air Force should always be our main focus as an island nation. Forces should be prevented from getting to us, rather than the focus being on land forces (ie, fighting forces when they get here). At the end of the day, as a small nation, if forces ever landed we would be in serious trouble. Far better preventing them ever getting here in the first place.

Next phase, reinvigorated Airforce!

reply to post by Flavian


Indeed. Remember, at the height of our Imperial power, we had a Navy that was the single largest employer in the World yet had an Army smaller than what we have now.... Go figure..

As for the Air force, well, it's all going to be unmanned this and that, so that brings into question whether an independent air force is even needed. The Army Air Corps could run the drones they need and the Fleet Air Arm can run the ones they need. The RAF seems a bit redundant, but it has been that way for many years. Prestige and the little thing called the Battle of Britain make sure it retains it's position though.

Wow looks like the "Ministry of Magic" may have lent a hand

Engineers working on military projects not only create machines for death, destruction and humanitarian missions, but things of mechanical beauty.

reply to post by MDDoxs


By and large, the Navy has found the bulk of it's operations in the past 30 years as Humanitarian or Anti-smuggling.

Whilst they might be "warships", they do quite a bit of good around the world.

reply to post by stumason


True, True. In my haste to type i left out their other purposes. However you may have missed the point of my post, to describe how elegant the engineering of advanced military equipment can be.

I have edited my original post to better describe the roles these ships play

reply to post by MDDoxs


Ah, yes I did get that bit. Just wanted to make sure we know the Navy is more than just a bunch of Sea Dogs out to pillage and plunder .. I have a soft spot for the Senior Service

The aesthetics of the ship[ are lovely though. The concept design is likely to change, but I really like it's lines.

reply to post by stumason

It also seems we are going to replace the Type 23's on a one for one basis, unlike the Type 45's where we ended up with 6 in the end.

It is early days, budget constraints may well lead to less of these newbies being delivered.

It does look like a beauty from this image.

www.mod.uk.../NR/rdonlyres/E375C7CE-9E64-4695-836B-6CC26B460950/0/BC5077110102_type_26.jpg& alt=Type%2026%20Global%20Combat%20Ship

reply to post by Peruvianmonk


Ironically, the Type 45's were cut during the spending bonanza by the MoD under Labour, but in typical short-term thinking, they thought that as each T45 had the capability of a few of the T42's they needed less... Talk about putting all your eggs in one basket! They might be more capable, but building less means fewer to sink!

On that note though, the MoD (very quietly) announced last month that a 7th Astute will be built, as opposed to the original 6 ordered.

Impressive, but can it do a 360 on the Thames while the Queen stands aboard and waves?

reply to post by Peruvianmonk


Why does it look like a 2000-era video game enemy boat? Can't the military add some style to it, some (excuse my sudden urge into more beautiful designs) curves? Why it's all straight angles? Curves would let water and air flow better.

Originally posted by swan001
reply to post by Peruvianmonk

 

Why it's all straight angles? Curves would let water and air flow better.

The straight lines and angled surfaces are used to deflect radar signals to give the ship an element of stealth. These angles are also coupled with radar absorbing paint and many other classified gizmos.

Looks pretty sleak to me.

reply to post by MDDoxs


I don't like its look. You should see an f-35: it has curves, it's awesome.

Originally posted by swan001
reply to post by MDDoxs

 

I don't like its look. You should see an f-35: it has curves, it's awesome.

Yes the F-35 does have a more curvy look to it, yet it remains "stealth". Could be a matter of scale.

You dont want to make a warship look to pretty haha

reply to post by MDDoxs


And the F-35 is a plane.....

Kind of like saying that your car looks ugly, but as they can make your conservatory look nice then why did they not do so with your motor?

If this is anything like the T-45 though, then there won't even be any rivets exposed to minimised radar visibility. Even the doors are designed in such a way as to minimise their radar cross section. That said, there is only so much you can do with a 200ft long ship.

I believe the T-45 has a cross section which gives a return similiar to a trawler sized vessel, so it's more for misdirection than actual "stealth", although the same could be said of a B2. It has a cross section the size of a tennis ball..

It always made me wonder then, if that was the case, why enemy radar operators don't look out for tennis ball sized objects doing mach 2....

From wikipedia on stealth technology.

The most efficient way to reflect radar waves back to the emitting radar is with orthogonal metal plates, forming a corner reflector consisting of either a dihedral (two plates) or a trihedral (three orthogonal plates). This configuration occurs in the tail of a conventional aircraft, where the vertical and horizontal components of the tail are set at right angles.

Stealth aircraft such as the F-117 use a different arrangement, tilting the tail surfaces to reduce corner reflections formed between them. A more radical method is to eliminate the tail completely, as in the B-2 Spirit. In addition to altering the tail, stealth design must bury the engines within the wing or fuselage, or in some cases where stealth is applied to an extant aircraft, install baffles in the air intakes, so that the turbine blades are not visible to radar. A stealthy shape must be devoid of complex bumps or protrusions of any kind; meaning that weapons, fuel tanks, and other stores must not be carried externally. Any stealthy vehicle becomes un-stealthy when a door or hatch opens. Planform alignment is also often used in stealth designs. Planform alignment involves using a small number of surface orientations in the shape of the structure.

For example, on the F-22A Raptor, the leading edges of the wing and the tail surfaces are set at the same angle. Careful inspection shows that many small structures, such as the air intake bypass doors and the air refueling aperture, also use the same angles. The effect of planform alignment is to return a radar signal in a very specific direction away from the radar emitter rather than returning a diffuse signal detectable at many angles. Stealth airframes sometimes display distinctive serrations on some exposed edges, such as the engine ports. The YF-23 has such serrations on the exhaust ports. This is another example in the use of re-entrant triangles and planform alignment, this time on the external airframe. Shaping requirements have strong negative influence on the aircraft's Aerodynamic properties. The F-117 has poor aerodynamics, is inherently unstable, and cannot be flown without a fly-by-wire control system.

Ships have also adopted similar methods. The Skjold class patrol boat was the first stealth ship to enter service, though the earlier Arleigh Burke class destroyer incorporated some signature-reduction features.[17][18] Other examples are the French La Fayette class frigate, the German Sachsen class frigates, the Swedish Visby class corvette, the USS San Antonio amphibious transport dock, and most modern warship designs. Similarly, coating the cockpit canopy with a thin film transparent conductor (vapor-deposited gold or indium tin oxide) helps to reduce the aircraft's radar profile, because radar waves would normally enter the cockpit, reflect off objects (the inside of a cockpit has a complex shape, with a pilot helmet alone forming a sizeable return), and possibly return to the radar, but the conductive coating creates a controlled shape that deflects the incoming radar waves away from the radar. The coating is thin enough that it has no adverse effect on pilot vision.

en.wikipedia.org...

reply to post by stumason


I know the F-35 is a plane

And yea good point why dont they just look for the tennis balls travelling mach 2 or a ball floating on the ocean

With all this stealth technology i wonder if a focus on sound based radar systems will be more heavily developed. Anything mechanized makes a sound the trick is tracking it through sound proofing or distinquishing it from background noise.

Originally posted by swan001
reply to post by Peruvianmonk

 

Why does it look like a 2000-era video game enemy boat? Can't the military add some style to it, some (excuse my sudden urge into more beautiful designs) curves? Why it's all straight angles? Curves would let water and air flow better.

Beauty or Aesthetics play no part -
No they are designed to destroy the waves and plough on through their targets on behalf their corrupt and archaic mind set leaders who are but puppets for the will of evil old men who have no loyalty but to their dark agenda

Apart from that they are OK and good toys for Kids who never grew up