Thursday, September 26, 2013

HMAS Canberra.




Thanks to Tom for correcting me!

18 comments :

  1. That Ski jumps not gona see much use for a while.

    Nice to see HMS Daring out and about, don't know if being sat next the Canberra makes the canberra look small or the Daring look large.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I remember the first time I saw Daring and Dauntless. I am familiar with most RN ships. And I know how big a ship is from its spec's, that is I can visualise it. But when I first that pair for the first time I though "F*ck me they are big!" What would really show the size of the Canberra and Daring would be an Anzac or T23 in the picture. Then you would really get an idea of scale. These modern stealthy ships are hard to scale by eye from pics because there are few visual markers. Even when this is one like the Mk8 on Daring from a distance it makes no difference. Further Daring's bridge windows are big which totally kills any attempt to size her up.

      Delete
  2. Bloody shame, the mistral class LPHD was going for under 500M USD, whilst I believe the slightly larger Canberra class is about 1.25B each, and were probably brought with the idea of running F35s(which cost even more)... Lets say they run 16 F35s off of the two ships 16*162M=2592+2500=$5,092M USD.

    What would be more useful 2 canberas and 16F35 or 6 Enlarged Mistrals @500Mea, 4 T-AKR310 type ships (250Mea korean made), and two marine landing platforms built cheaply in a country like korea(with margin)?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. because Australia wants a viable defense industrial base, instead of having S. Korea build everything for them.

      Plus, Mistrals are built to civilian specs and have almost NO defensive armament and NO Ski jump :)

      Delete
    2. Firstly I must correct you, the 'Canberra' class ships are being built in Spain by Spanish builders using a Spanish design. Secondly the Mistral Class ships offered to Russia came with a technology transfer agreement and were outfitted with defensive weapons. Thirdly to my knowledge Australia does not have a 'large ship' construction industry, financing one to build a dozen or so large ships every 30-40 years would create a massive financial burden on the Australian Defence budget making Australia less safe than if they had just brought their large auxiliary ships from another country.

      Delete
    3. The RAN didn't want the ski jump as it robs them of helicopter spots. But it is part of the ship's structure and so they had to have it. The ski jump fitted to the RN's HMS Hermes, Invincible class, and incoming QEC is a separate structure from the deck. In effective it is just a deck house.

      Delete
    4. Well they didn't need to pay extra to have a skijump they don't want that takes up a helicopter (and what they don't tell you 1 potential CWIS slot) slot! They could have brought an (enlarged) mistral which goes for about 500M (40% of the canberra) and comes with technology transfer.

      Delete
  3. Why?
    Super Hornets loaded with 6500 lbs of external payload can take off in 1000ft.

    With a sky jump the distance can be reduced dramatically and if the use EPE engines with 20% more trhust they will carry even more ordinance and gas.

    Camberra class carrier is 750 feet long.



    ReplyDelete
  4. If the super hornets can do that then it is quiet impressive, but that would probably relegate them to being launched from the elevator which would make it quiet impractical. So I really do think that the idea of the ski-jump was for F35s...

    ReplyDelete
  5. Yes they can do it.
    www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-_OWMDN64M&feature=youtube_gdata_player

    In air defense configuration they can even do it in less space
    www.youtube.com/watch?v=pz2Cl3TnRyM&feature=youtube_gdata_player

    BTW the elevator is big enough for SH and helicopters.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That is impressive, however I still see a few issues:
      1.) The takeoff requirements would still force them to use the rear to launch (limitting sortie rates)?
      2.) The political will is probably to run F35Bs and not hornets which were only supposed to be a stopgap when the F35 was delayed (which I think was before they even ordered this ship, indicating that they wanted F35s).
      3.) I think the value of 16 such planes at the expense of most of the rotorcraft is probably not a good tradeoff and I doubt they would be of much use given the sophistication of todays Air-defense, if they wanted to invest in such naval aviation then the opportunity came when russia was trying to get rid of two CVs, however it may be possible to acquire a second hand nimitz-class carrier (which have alot of life left in) and retrofit it as necessary(especially given US interest of maintaining influence in the indian ocean and pacific).

      Delete
    2. Not necessarily. If the SH uses EPE engines with 20% more thrust won't need to use the entire airfield, pretty much like the Sukhoy or J-15.

      www.youtube.com/watch?v=lB1S8JEyaYE&feature=youtube_gdata_player

      www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLXgK3QFvLM&feature=youtube_gdata_player

      Delete
  6. Getting the hornet off the ship would not be a problem.....now getting it back on, theres the rub.

    ReplyDelete
  7. That's the easiest part, They have even more room to landing that the landspace in a big carrier. For the arresting gear they can use an small magnetic one one similar to the one used by the USMarines in their improvised airfields

    http://www.ga.com/advanced-arresting-gear

    ReplyDelete
  8. It's a nice ship and too bad that they could have gotten the Dokdo class LPH instead of the Juan Carlos I LPH. The Ski jump is useless to them unless they are getting F-35B's for Air cover.

    ReplyDelete
  9. For air cover they can use their Super Hornets combined with few F-35B, off course if they decide to buy few of them, but that would be a waist of money. Better to combine advanced super hornets and some drones in the future.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. the B is a better jet.....

      Don't see no internal carriage on the ASH, or a built in EO-DAS system and a built in SniperXR pod......

      Delete
  10. Compare the size of the landing space for the big carriers with the total space you have in the small carriers. Pretty much the same.

    http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/254/8/7/aircraft_carrier_size_comparison_by_zhanrae30-d5ec7ch.jpg

    ReplyDelete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.