Defensenews has a story about a proposal from Huntington Ingalls (HII) to use their LPD hull for a dedicated Ballistic Missile Defense Ship, but it also has a photo of a model purported to be HII’s concept for the Offshore Patrol Cutter.
The ship looks conventional. It makes no apparent attempt at “stealth.” It appears to be essentially a flush-deck design with a small step down aft of the flight deck. It has single conventional tripod mast, mounted immediately behind the bridge. It appears to have twin shafts and rudders of the conventional type. The 57mm is mounted a deck above the foc’sle, presumably to keep it dry and give it a better minimum range over the bow.
Chuck Hill's CG Blog 
Had to zoom in to near-bluriness, but it appears to mount a Mk.38 25mm atop the hangar facing aft.
It’s interesting the stacks are staggered. Not as severely as on the Spruance or Ticonderogas; maybe a better term is “offset”(?) Do you think this is due to powerplant layout? Seems interesting since the OPC has foregone the possibility of gas turbines… I suppose offsetting could have to do with separating the engines for reducing risk of one casualty knocking out all power.
Also, the mast and upperworks have some pretty impressive antennae and arrays, so if this is more than notional, she will be quite the sensor platform, but, alas, not much space or weight appears to be reserved for any serious weapon system to prosecute a target which has been found, identified, and tracked…
In addition to the 57mm the specs called for a Mk38mod2 25mm and two remote control .50s.
I’m pretty sure that the specs include redundant propulsion in some form. I assume the offset stacks reflect two engine rooms. The fact that they appear the same size suggest that the machinery in each engineroom is the same. Easiest and cheapest solution would be one engine and one ship service generator in each engineroom, but it might be more complex.
Hope I’m wrong, but comparing the length of the model H-65 to the apparent length of the area that might be the hangar it looks like it is too short to handle helicopters much larger than the H-65.
There is LITTLE need to use a big and expensive hullform as baseline for a smaller and hopefully less expensive ship of a TOTALLY different type, i.e. DDG. These models (and what the USN is saying about them) is nothing more business HYPE!
That rant having be said, I like the HII proposed OPC. I don’t know whether HII will have a good bid price? And I don’t trust them to build a good ship (class).
Lee,
Of the contractors submitting, who DO you trust?
Somehow I missed this report on the OPC from USNI:
There has not been much media coverage of the OPC. Hopefully that will soon change.
He makes excellent points. Sadly, they are so powerful, they make the liklihood of “my” design seem very unlikely to see a welding torch, let alone be launched into the water…
OK, thought of 2 responses:
1) Todd shipyard (whom Vigor bought) had plenty of capacity at one time to build bigger ships and participate in large programs. I think the industrial and skilled workforce capacity is there, but just needs some re-building.
2) If the US continues to restrict itself to the “big 5” shipyards, the US will continue to miss out on opportunities for new, innovative ideas. And the X-bow idea fits the requirements of the OPC particularly well. It’s harder on a smaller ship to do boat and helo ops in heavier seas without some innovation in the design. The benefit of lower crew fatigue with the smaller staffing the CG is looking for is huge, and increased fuel economy helps ops, budget, and space utilization.
I also wonder if this will truly be a one-source contract, or if the CG will do like the FRCs and purchase a certain number from the winning shipyard and then put the remainder out for bid? If so, that would mitigate the risk/apprehension of selecting a smaller yard for the work.
I would love to get some dimensions, but doing some quick calculations comparing the length of the H-65 model on the deck (assuming it is in scale) with the total length of the model in the picture, assuming the picture is not too distorted, this is a pretty large ship–larger than a 327 and perhaps as large as a 378. (Would not bet my life on my calculations, but had to make the attempt.)
HII may not let any cats out of their bag? Have they built any ship near OPC dimensions? is this a plus up from SAAR V hulls or minus for DDG-51?
isn’t that too long for the OPC?
Closest thing HII makes is the National Security Cuttter. In the original “Deepwater”. plan the OPC looked like a shortened NSC. there is still some family resemblance here, but not nearly so much.
I was expected the OPC to come out at about the size of a 327, 100 meters and a bit less than 3,000 tons.
Chuck,
At 3,000 ton’s you can get something such as the Holland class Offshore patrol vessel, which comes in at approximate 3,750 tons. The SIGMA Corvette comes in at 10514 variant that the Royal Indonesian navy is using comes in at 2,365 tons. We all know the 327’s came in at 2,216 tons, and the 327’s today would roughly be comparable to the SIGMA 9813 corvette that the Royal Morrocan Navy is using at 2,075 tons.
Nicky there are different kinds of displacement. The displacement you quote for the 327s was “standard displacement.” Its full load was highe,. 2,750 in 1945 and 2,656 in its post war guise.
The post war 327’s at 2,656 tons would equate to what Indonesian Navy is using, which is the SIGMA Corvette/Frigate, and it comes in at 2,365 tons. The Corvette or Frigate around the world that would come close to the 327’s displacement would be France’s Floreal class Frigate, which comes in standard at 2,600 tons and fully loaded at 2,950 tons. The other is Italy’s Lupo class Frigate, which comes in at 2,506 tons standard and fully loaded at 2,986 tons. If were sticking to the 3,000 ton displacement limit, we can get in with the Royal Malaysian Navy and go with the Gowind Corvette, which comes in at 2,500 tons.
Maybe the Future OPC should have some Corvette capabilities for any future Growth and Future wars. Looking at Corvettes such as the SIGMA corvette and the Holland OPC, it may be worth the US Coast Guard’s time to do an in-depth study on what would a Future OPC look like and what missions will it perform within the next 20 to 50 years. It may have the ability to plug and play with Wartime missions and Maritime security missions.
Give it a rest. Stop making the same posts over and over and over. And I’m sure we are already studying the needed requirements for the OPC, don’t you think? But thanks for making the suggestion, because until now I’m sure the Commandant wasn’t giving it any thought at all. We are not the Navy, our day to day missions are not the same, a heavily armed cutter will not be able to effectively conduct our day to day missions effectively. Some day it might finally sink in. You’re not in the Coast Guard, you don’t understand ship design, living, working and serving on a ship at sea.
What, You want to make the US Coast Guard look like the Canadian Coast Guard.
Our Cutters are already armed appropriately for the missions that we currently have with the exception that I believe the NSC should have kept a 76mm as a main gun, but the Navy supplies our weapons and they are phasing out the 76mm. They chose the 57mm for the LCS instead of the new improved OTO Malera 76mm. So we get the 57mm because that’s the gun system the Navy decided to go with.
When are you going to stop day dreaming that the Coast Guard is a front line fighting force? We support the Navy when needed, it’s not our mission to fight the Navy’s battles. These warships you keep pushing have poor range, many of them are lacking in sea keeping qualities and are cramped designs. Our Cutters operate for the most part alone on extended patrol missions conducting law enforcement, search and rescue etc. often in very difficult seas in harsh environments and in remote areas where constant underway replenishment from a Naval auxiliary is not possible. Do you understand yet?? What are we supposed to do with a ship that’s fitted for war with poor range, not so great sea keeping to operate in places like the Bering Sea. How effective will a patrol be if we have to keep running for a refueling every few days??? You are not in the Coast Guard, I AM. You’ve never served in the military you have no practical experience or training other than surfing the internet. You don’t understand our missions, and what is required to meet our mission objectives.
Not to mention heavily armed ships cost more to operate, require much larger crews, constant weapons training to maintain combat efficiency, taking time and funding away from the missions that we are sent out to sea to perform. In case you haven’t noticed we don’t have the funding or manpower for all of that. Funding for NSC’s 7 and 8 is suspended and we are in sequester with our work force being shrunk. You seem oblivious to all of these issues. Your posts give the impression that you believe we have unlimited resources and work force to acquire fancy new toys like heavily armed warships, to perform Coast Guard missions.
And stop making comparisons to the Canadian Coast Guard. They are a civilian maritime service without any law enforcement authority. Very different than what we do, they aren’t supposed to be armed at all.
The good news is that NSC #7 is in the FY2014 budget request, but unfortunately only two FRCs.
I missed that .That is great news!
Of course our own DHS Secretary could just shoot NSC #7 down again.
Since it is included in the DHS budget, and it almost all of our AC&I budget, I don’t think that will happen.