"Queen to launch HMS Queen Elizabeth II carrier in July" Topic

"Queen Elizabeth will launch the Royal Navy's super-carrier named for her in Scotland in the summer.
The 65,000-ton HMS Queen Elizabeth is scheduled for launch at the Rosyth dockyard in Fife in July.

HMS Queen Elizabeth, being built by a consortium of BAE Systems Surface Ships, Thales Group and Babcock Marine, will be the lead ship of the Queen Elizabeth-class of aircraft carrier, the largest warships ever built for the Royal Navy and capable of carrying up to forty aircraft…"

From here.
link

Amicalement
Armand

That is one ugly ship – even for a carrier.

I've never been a navy man but am very excited about this as it shows a willingness to upgrade and upsize, something the MOD is loath to do, she looks the business and I'm sure she and here crew will do us proud, as for 'ugly ship' what yer want yoakley? them to paint yellow daisies around the bow and hang flower pots from the deck? She's a WARship and her main purpose is to help balance out world power and keep the peace. There is no real 'ugly' in war ordnance, just usefulness.

BTW she'll grow on you if you are a real Brit and if your not, do we care?( We can be as touchy about our goods as any other ;)

Finally .God bless. Her RM. Cheers

I guess I'm just use to the normal, single island carriers. Two islands just looks odd to me. Well, as long as she can go the distance, be effective, and can carry a decent strike group then who can really complain?

There are some design advantages to the Two islands, and also they are necessary because this is non-nuclear, Unlike the Yank or Frog ones. Therefore you need Air intake and exhaust stacks, have two separated stacks, allows for machinery compartments to be seperated and Damage Control more effective from a redundancy perspective.

Equally there will be advantages to have FLYCO, separate from the Command Bridge, as well as redundancy, if one has to be evacuated, and the Emergency Conning Position to be used or the Bridge can be used as a Secondary FLYCO if the 2nd Island is smoked out / hit / Fire / flood / hit by an Aircraf or Helo / Has AVCAT ed all over it from a leak etc.

Redundancy is a massive issue in Warships, you need to keep in the fight and single points of failure have to be engineered out or you are vulnerable to a single hit, and the rule of Naval Warfare is that you can count on being hit. So you need to be able to Take a Punch as well as to give one, and thats where Damage Control is vital, something the RN learned in blood in the Falklands.

Surface Naval Battles are like Bar Room Brawls only instead of Chairs you are chucking ASM's at each other, you've got to go down swinging and fight like a cornered Rat on steroids. The only way to win is to go in hard, and kerb-stomp the enemy into submission, no half measures.

I shudder to think what a SS-N-22 Sunburn would do if it slammed into a US CVN Island….

Now all they need an aeroplane that works. Sea Gripen, Rafale M?

Oh! no cats. that's dumb.

Catapults are unnecessary, they are mechanical, complex achilles heel , they add to launch delays and problems. A ramp is a simple, elegant and above all reliable method of launch, it has never gone wrong! I know for a fact that Steam Catapult has a significant failure rate, when you have 2 A/C at alert 1 and suddenly you cannot launch him or any of the other aircraft behind him, suddenly your Area Air Defence has a 50% loss in capability…

The Aeroplane Works, it's our Government that doesn't. We've had the 1st ones delivered for testing and developing doctorine, writing the manuals and getting the operational structures and training pipeline going.

link

Ground Crew Chiefs, and others are all over it…

And they are in production…

There is no issue with the Aircraft working, USMC is expect a Combat Worthiness for 40 A/C by Mid 2015 timeframe.
There are some programme issues with Software Coding, this will get addressed. The F-35 order books are too full for it to fall over, the number of pre-orders for an Unproven Aircraft is staggering. It will get across the line, be proved safe and then 30 years of refinement, upgrades and improvements will commence. By 2020 it will be a superb, world beater. Naysayers be damned, this is one hell of an Aircraft which ever of the 3 you choose.

They could use sea Harriers until the more advanced craft are available. There are experienced crews with the Harrier still in the navy as well as previously employed aircraft carrier crew.

It's daft to let that experience level dwindle away.

I also think you'll find that the ship is not being named after our present monarch.

WHY not nuke for power? Couldn't USA give a reactor?

Don't the Brits already have nuclear propulsion, in some of their submarine fleet?

The fact that it is conventionally powered would tell me that the RN expects this carrier to operate closer to home than the US carriers.

Cheers

They could use sea Harriers until the more advanced craft are available. There are experienced crews with the Harrier still in the navy as well as previously employed aircraft carrier crew.

Not any more. The RN sold its Harriers to the USMC to be used as spares:

link

I know the Daily Mail doesn't have much of a reputation, but it's spot on here. Sad for the RN, a nice boon for the Corps. I think that should have gotten people to think… if the Marines want it then there must really be something to it.

First 14 F-35s are or are about to be confirmed for delivery 2018:

bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26124894

Wait you are telling me they built a 65, 000 ton warship and it is not nuclear? Why. That v is one less logistical problem at sea. Hard enough to do refueling and resupply at sea. Why add the problem of refueling the ship itself. Plus why limit the distance it can travel without refueling. I know planes need fuel and you need supplies, bu t still. The British have nuclear subs don't they? Explain this to me.

WHY not nuke for power? Couldn't USA give a reactor?

Cost of setup and design.

Every nuclear-powered ship class has a different plant design. This means that you'd need to build a dedicated Aircraft Carrier training plant, in addition to the plants needed for the carriers. That's a lot of extra training staff and cost, while the gas turbines are effectively all the same. Don't need a separate training system for carriers versus DDs versus FFGs, everyone goes to the same school and uses the same trainers.

The US did a similar analysis for the America-class landing ships, and found that the cost of oil would need to be over $140 USD a barrel (in 2008 dollars) for most of the life of the ship before nuclear power would be the cheaper alternative.

I still think that the split Islands looks ugly.

"There is no issue with the Aircraft working, USMC is expect a Combat Worthiness for 40 A/C by Mid 2015 timeframe.
There are some programme issues with Software Coding, this will get addressed. The F-35 order books are too full for it to fall over, the number of pre-orders for an Unproven Aircraft is staggering. It will get across the line, be proved safe and then 30 years of refinement, upgrades and improvements will commence. By 2020 it will be a superb, world beater. Naysayers be damned, this is one hell of an Aircraft which ever of the 3 you choose."

The cockpit design is going to make it a real b----. The high sill means that you don't have visibility in the landing pattern. The low-set seat limits visibility over the nose. Remember, the original concept was that a Helmet Mounted Sight linked to cameras distributed on the fuselage would allow the pilot to "see through" the body of the aircraft. That system simply didn't work and was cancelled. However, the basic airframe design was set in stone by that point, so nothing could be done about visibility from the cockpit.

Criticisms of the cockpit visibility are from experienced pilots who flew the aircraft.

It won't have to travel much farther than the Med or gulf so the huge extra cost of nuclear couldn't be justified.

Bloody Good News, She's been a long time coming!

I just hope that if Her Majesty asks the obvious question:

"Erm, tell me Admiral, one wonders were the bloody aircraft are, do tell?"

He will have the balls to say:

"Good question Ma'am – one best directed to the Treasury if I may say so"

you've got to go down swinging and fight like a cornered Rat on steroids. The only way to win is to go in hard, and kerb-stomp the enemy into submission, no half measures.

No change there then – standard RN SOP for the last 500 years I'd say….

Perhaps, to avoid that embarrassing question, they'll just introduce it to the queen as our "largest through-deck cruiser" in history.

That's what I'd do

Just because you think you only have to go to med or gulf doesn't mean you will. What happens if you end up in the Falklands or in the Yellow Sea. Just means your fleet train has to be larger. Did they spend money on the fleet logistic vessels? Or did they give that up for the overpriced planes.

Always liked the advantage nuclear power gives you. Means you can cruise off shore to any one you want. Ships are going to require more energy in the next 20 years for lasers and railguns not less. Then again maybe in 20 years we end up with something like the 1st Dreadnought where all prior ships are obsolete.

Shades of the Nelson and Rodney – that is one ugly ship! It would have been a match made in heaven if the X-32 had won the VSTOL competition… Sorry my British compatriots, but not esthetically pleasing ;-)

To me, seems like doing bean counting for such a large vessel doesn't make a lot of sense.

The strategic advantage alone of a nuke carrier is worth making them, since you don't need a fleet of resupply oilers to escort it, and if necessary, it, and a nuke attack sub escort could get to any point on the globe much more quickly than with conventional vessels, if needed.

The Royal navy has shrunk to a largely defensive arm. The fact is there is no way we can project a strong force much beyond the northern hemisphere. The fact is if the Falklands happened now, or in the foreseeable future, we couldn't do anything about it (don't tell Tango!). Also the Yellow sea is something we simply don't think about.

Oh!. We know my friend… we know.
But take into account that our military condition is more than deplorable! (smile).
With a fishing boat is enought for you Brits! (smile).

Amicalement
Armand