Constellation-class Guided Missile Frigates

[TopHatter]

On the French and Italian ones there's 4-man cabins for enlisted crew, officers depending on rank anywhere from 4-man cabins to double and single berthing.

Sounds like the berthing on the Zumwalt-class destroyers.

I wonder how much of that will be taken away from the Constellations though.

On the Italian ones every head includes a bidet.

But not the French ones?

[kato]

But not the French ones?

Never seen any picture of a head on a French FREMM.

From the few videos i've seen showing a cabin on the French version they feel a lot more cramped than the polished-up Italian frigate Alpino that Fincantieri showed off in the US. For a 2-man officer cabin think comparable to the junior officers' staterooms on US Destroyers designed in the 40s and 50s (i.e. on a Fletcher or similar).

[TopHatter]

Never seen any picture of a head on a French FREMM.

From the few videos i've seen showing a cabin on the French version they feel a lot more cramped than the polished-up Italian frigate Alpino that Fincantieri showed off in the US. For a 2-man officer cabin think comparable to the junior officers' staterooms on US Destroyers designed in the 40s and 50s (i.e. on a Fletcher or similar).

I have a feeling that's what the U.S. will go with, smaller, more cramped etc.

Still, they seem to have finally moved away from the massive berthing compartments of the past.

[TopHatter]

Navy’s Frigate Program Pushing Hard for 2026 Delivery of USS Constellation

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. —The Navy is pressing full bore to ensure that its new guided-missile frigate joins the fleet on time, the ship’s program manager said.

“We’re pushing hard with our industry partners to deliver that ship in 2026,” said Captain Kevin Smith, program manager, Constellation Class Frigate, speaking to an audience at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space Expo in National Harbor. “A lot of hard work has gone into the design, the production readiness, and now we’re actually building it up in Marinette, Wisconsin.”

A frigate, in modern terminology, is “primarily an escort for high value units that don’t have their own self-defense,” Smith said. “It’s also to help offset some of the work of the large surface combatants like the cruisers and destroyers. It is a primary anti-submarine warfare platform, just like the FFG 7 [the Perry class frigates which have been decommissioned].”

“I am very happy with the performance we’re seeing thus far,” Smith said. “Obviously, we did change to a different variable to sonar a few years ago. … The performance is astounding. … Its integration with the [SQQ]-89 [antisubmarine warfare system] is going to be huge for the United States Navy and will be welcomed by the fleet.”

Smith also said the Aegis Baseline 10 combat system and the Enterprise Air Search Radar will give the new ship “a lot of capability.”

Fincantieri Partnership

The future USS Constellation (FFG 62) is one of three frigates under contract to Fincantieri’s Marinette Marine shipyard, the others being FFGs 63 and 64, under a 10-ship contract, including options. Smith said construction of FFG 62 will start soon and he expects the option for FFG 64 to be awarded this year as part of a four-ship buy.

The Navy worked with Fincantieri to design an advanced construction pilot, “to really exercise all of the capital improvements, all of their workflow processes, all of their instructions, all the way through the value stream … from materials planning and getting the work orders to the workforce, making sure all those are understood.”

The frigate’s Aegis Combat System and SPY-6 Enterprise Air Search Radar are being integrated at the Lockheed Martin test lab in Moorestown, New Jersey, and at Wallops Island, Virginia. The propulsion plant and machinery control systems will be tested at a land-based test site in Philadelphia.

Need for Skilled Workforce

Smith said the Navy is working closely with Marinette Marine in strengthening the company’s supply chain and develop and retain its skilled work force “to make sure we have a good strong industrial base workforce to build these frigates for the next decade and decades to come. We need that as part of our industrial base risk reduction.”

The program manager also discussed the challenges of recruiting a skilled work force, in response to a question from Seapower.

“How do you build a community that people want to live and grow and raise families and be shipbuilders?” he asked rhetorically. “We have people on our staff that have experience in that. The other part is working with Marinette on how we can really build the workforce. There’s training, there’s investments on how they can get people to come work and stay and then be retained.”

“Some shipbuilding people come out of high school … and they stay there a year, maybe two,” Smith said. “But if they don’t make it past two years, they’re not going to stay. So how do we get people to stay for longer than a year or two? And how do we how do we really get them excited about shipbuilding?”

“You may read about some of the things Colombia [the Columbia-class ballistic-missile submarine program] is doing,” continued Smith. “We’re looking at doing the same exact thing … to think about Wisconsin … There’s other jobs out there that maybe are better … but we’re working on a lot of those things with the company and kind of coaching them with some of this funding we got from Congress. The big message here is I would predict that this company is going to be around for a long time and we need to get into the shipbuilding business long term as far as a prime and then we’ll be able to count on them for decades.”
________

[JA Boomer]

Another program in serious trouble, over budget and behind schedule. The Constellation-class seem like they will be very capable ships, comparable to a Burke with an improved combat system and radar but a greatly reduced missile capacity.

IMO the USN navy missed the boat (pun intended). Post Arleigh Burke Flight IIA they should have produced a cruiser with a less radical design than the Zumwalts to take the new SPY-6 radar and a frigate designed to be naval truck: no AEGIS, no phased array radar, and a healthy VLS capacity (112 tubes).

[Monash]

Another program in serious trouble, over budget and behind schedule. The Constellation-class seem like they will be very capable ships, comparable to a Burke with an improved combat system and radar but a greatly reduced missile capacity.

IMO the USN navy missed the boat (pun intended). Post Arleigh Burke Flight IIA they should have produced a cruiser with a less radical design than the Zumwalts to take the new SPY-6 radar and a frigate designed to be naval truck: no AEGIS, no phased array radar, and a healthy VLS capacity (112 tubes).

Well at least it doesn't seem to be having the issues they had with the LCS. They'll get a good ship in the water a couple of years later than planned. OF course they might even have been delivered on time if the Navy was allowed to use foreign shipbuilders, either to deliver part of the anticipated production run or otherwise for basic construction with fit out being completed in the US.

[JA Boomer]

Well at least it doesn't seem to be having the issues they had with the LCS. They'll get a good ship in the water a couple of years later than planned. OF course they might even have been delivered on time if the Navy was allowed to use foreign shipbuilders, either to deliver part of the anticipated production run or otherwise for basic construction with fit out being completed in the US.

That's fair, it will be a capable, all-spectrum combatant. I think it's biggest design flaw is low missile capacity, which is in large part hindsight based on the missiles currently being expended in the Red Sea.

I still think a high end cruiser and a lower end frigate would have served the USN better, but the Constellation-class certainly won't approach the LCS debacle.

[Monash]

I believe the idea was and is to (A) Have something that can supplement ABs as escorts for CVBGs etc and /or (B) can replace ABs on missions where the frigate's sensors and loadouts etc are judged to be sufficient for the job at hand.

As far as Yemen and the Houthis situation goes? Neither ABs or Constellations are really what's needed to resolve the situation there. All they can do is run interference. The only real solution would require boots on the ground. And probably Arab/Egyptian boots at that, not US ones.

[JA Boomer]

I believe the idea was and is to (A) Have something that can supplement ABs as escorts for CVBGs etc and /or (B) can replace ABs on missions where the frigate's sensors and loadouts etc are judged to be sufficient for the job at hand.

As far as Yemen and the Houthis situation goes? Neither ABs or Constellations are really what's needed to resolve the situation there. All they can do is run interference. The only real solution would require boots on the ground. And probably Arab/Egyptian boots at that, not US ones.

Agreed. But my takeaway is that war is unpredictable, and especially in the vast pacific, more VLS tubes is always preferable. With only 32 mk41 cells and a single RAM, no wonder the Navy is looking at options to re-arm at sea again.

All I'm saying is a high/low mix with more VLS tubes would be preferably, if not realistic.

[Monash]

Agreed. But my takeaway is that war is unpredictable, and especially in the vast pacific, more VLS tubes is always preferable. With only 32 mk41 cells and a single RAM, no wonder the Navy is looking at options to re-arm at sea again.

All I'm saying is a high/low mix with more VLS tubes would be preferably, if not realistic.

The problem is hull size. You want the VLS capacity of an AB? You have to build a hull of a similar size. 32 cells is still a potent threat and the Constellations are supposed to have very good sensors so what the US Navy will be getting is more eyes on the sea for their buck.

[JA Boomer]

The problem is hull size. You want the VLS capacity of an AB? You have to build a hull of a similar size. 32 cells is still a potent threat and the Constellations are supposed to have very good sensors so what the US Navy will be getting is more eyes on the sea for their buck.

I disagree about about hull size - at least in regards to beam. Some of the AB bulk is attributed to radars and combat systems that a workman frigate wouldn't require. Regardless, steel is much cheaper than radars and electronics, and these frigates could be built cheaper and faster than the Constellation-class.

The nearest analogy I can think of is the South Korean KDX-II design. They would be an operational successor to the Perry-class.

Again, you can't change course now, but with hindsight, the USN would have been better off in 2025 if in 2004, instead of LCS and Zumwalt, they had pursued direct Tico and Perry-class replacements, which also would have allowed AB construction to stop. Recognizing that I am handwaving away typical US defense design and procurement problems .

Note: I may be being a little too hard on the Constellation-class. If they can be produced for half the price of an AB and require 67% of the crew (per wiki), that's a win - my pipe dreams and alternate realities aside.

[JA Boomer]

Double post - sorry!

[JA Boomer]

IMO, the USAF and USN suffer because they rush technology to the front line. Invariably, the technology takes longer to develop than planned, older resources are stretched beyond their intended services lives, and the newer tech is brought into service without full capability. Sometimes an interim technology procurement may benefit the warfighter, while the newer tech develops. The Army has done a good job of risk reduction since they cancelled the Commanche IMO.

So, to elaborate on my post above, in some alternate version of the 1990s, the USN realizes they had a good platform in the Arleigh Burke-class, but it requires helicopter stowage. They like the current frigate, destroyer, cruiser force structure, and realize the Spruance, Perry, and Ticonderoga-class ships will need replacement after 30 years of service. And they know their ships mainly conduct blue water operations, far from home and resupply.

So, they forgo Arleigh Burke Flight IIA, littoral combat ship, and Zumwalt-class destroyers, and develop a family of warships:

20 CG-74 Cruisers
-Displacement: 14,000 tons
-Length: 180 meters
-Beam: 22 meters
Propulsion:
-4 x gas turbines
-4 x diesel engines
Sensors:
-AESA S-band air/surface long-range search radar
-AESA X-band fire control radar
-Navigational radar
-2 x CIWS fire control radars w/ I/R & E/O
-4 x electronic warfare arrays
-Hull mounted active/passive sonar
-Towed array sonars
Weapons:
-2 x 5” deck guns
-216 Mk 41 VLS cells
-2 x 30-round missile CIWS launchers
-3 x 35mm CIWS cannons
-2 x quad torpedo launchers
-8 x 40-round decoy/mortar launchers
-2 x naval helicopters
-2 x RHIBs

40 DDG-79 Destroyers
-Displacement: 10,000 tons
-Length: 160 meters
-Beam: 20 meters
Propulsion:
-3 x gas turbines
-3 x diesel engines
Sensors:
-AESA S-band air/surface long-range search radar
-X-band fire control radar
-4 x missile fire control radars
-Navigational radar
-2 x CIWS fire control radars w/ I/R & E/O
-3 x electronic warfare arrays
-Hull mounted active/passive sonar
-Towed array sonars
Weapons:
-5” deck gun
-146 Mk 41 VLS cells
-2 x 30-round missile CIWS launchers
-3 x 35mm CIWS cannons
-2 x quad torpedo launchers
-8 x 40-round decoy/mortar launchers
-2 x naval helicopters
-2 x RHIBs

60 FFG-62 Frigates
-Displacement: 6,000 tons
-Length: 140 meters
-Beam: 18 meters
Propulsion:
-2 x gas turbines
-2 x diesel engines
Sensors:
-S-band air/surface long-range search radar
-Missile fire control radar
-X-band fire control radar
-Navigational radar
-2 x CIWS fire control radars w/ I/R & E/O
-2 x electronic warfare arrays
-Hull mounted active/passive sonar
-Towed array sonars
Weapons:
-5” deck gun
-80 Mk 41 VLS cells
-2 x 30-round missile CIWS launchers
-3 x 35mm CIWS cannons
-2 x quad torpedo launchers
-8 x 40-round decoy/mortar launchers
-2 x naval helicopters
-2 x RHIBs

These ships would have started coming off the line in 2000, eventually replacing the Arleigh Burke Flight I and II ships in what would be current day. The USN would have also been R&Ding distributed, unmanned, and stealth platforms during this time, and new ship designs are now taking shape to replace the current fleet.

Obviously, the War on Terror, typical US defense procurement, and political whims make this scenario dreadfully unlikely. But I like designing ships, haha.

[Monash]

Might have happened the problem with your list of course is that by now (2025) the last of the Ticonderoga's are on their way out (and in reality the navy has wanted to retire all of them for a few years now. The first gen AB's are also gone. So in your scenario? By now I think you'd be seeing ongoing production of third gen AB's and 2nd gen 'improved' versions of your frigate design or even an entirely new frigate design.

However there's one critical capability I think the US and allied navies have overlooked for far too long and it's in this role where I believe something with a hull size 'like' the LCS could be important. And that role naval mine clearing. There are numerous domestic and foreign ports that would benefit from having one or two mine clearing vessels on station in time of war. Since they also would (or should) pack light surface and anti-air armament when not used in their primary role IMO they could substitute for larger, more expensive vessels on anti-piracy & counter smuggling patrols etc.

[JA Boomer]

Might have happened the problem with your list of course is that by now (2025) the last of the Ticonderoga's are on their way out (and in reality the navy has wanted to retire all of them for a few years now. The first gen and AB's are also gone. So in your scenario? By now I think you'd be seeing ongoing production of third gen AB's and 2nd gen 'improved' versions of your frigate design or even an entirely new frigate design.

Well, the USN would have:

-Replaced the Spruance-class pretty much as they did
-Replaced the Perry-class with a far more suitable design and avoided the LCS debacle
-Avoided the Zumwalt-class debacle
-Replaced the Ticonderoga-class on schedule instead of paying massive amounts to limp ships along
-Avoided having to restart Arleigh Burke-class production, force technology integration and rededign for Flight III
-Started to replace the Arleigh Burke Flight Is (which are actually all still in service with no end in sight)

The USN would currently have a modern, effective, and common surface fleet. With five years remaining before a replacement force structure (with distributed, unmanned, and stealth design features) would need to start replacing ships.

Fun to think about.