Shipbucket

Thanks ace and I hope nobody thinks I am blowing them off with my bow decision, I have incorporated pretty much everything else.

Its great to have so many knowledgable poeple provide comments!

Well, nothing revolutionary but I hope this settles the main spaces. I punted on the bow weapon for now, I did however draw the internals based on the B1-B mounted HELLADS referenced earlier and it looks like a fit. That was just get get some scale going, my weapon is far more powerful so there will be more stuff but I have more room too.

I don't think there is enough clearance for the AIM in that act space from the keel. The difficulty I am having is that I need the intakes/exhausts to to do to that aft structure above the flight deck so that it doesn't interfere with the boat deck. Its not so much a problem with the FFLX but on the FFGX the deck will be open strainght through to allow the carrying of more craft to support its MIO mission. In this drawing I moved the boat deck forward as well as the CONREP station and SVTT tubes (the two doors in front of the boat deck). I don't think that is anywhere neer optimal placement for the king post but it allowed me to move the intakes forward. I don't want to flip the generators because then the exhaust will have to move forward and I really think I need another small mast where the exhaut would go.

Lowering the MT30s one deck would give more space to route exhausts, would that screw with my center of gravity too much?

Anyway, I reduced the size of the diesel engines and provided a new cutaway to get some more hull shape comments. I reduced the angle of the sides of the underwater hull and I hope I wasn't too extreme.





Out of curiosity how much leeway to I have in routing exhaust/intakes? Obviously straint up and down for shortest distance is optimal, and I image extreme angles are not good for flow. Is this correct?

You get better range with beam-weapons by placing them higher, BTW. Also, a the laser housing stands to get damaged or destroyed in heavy waves.

I don't know why you seem to be having trouble accepting this.

The range increase would is negligable on this vessel due to its size and l and would coincide with a crippling reduction in firing arc as already stated. We literally just had this conversation a half dozen posts ago. I do not deem the trade off beneficial at this time.

We have disgussed the bow mount at length, I have provided examples of other bow mounts and taken precautions based on comments to minimize what is already a very minor threat (bow waves). For now I am sticking with it, we will see what happens once I get to the weather decks.

I suggest trying to think outside the box a bit, this is after all a ship from a decade in the furure, have a bit of fun with it. I would love to see your personnal alternative

Well lad, we will wait for the first storm you will meet. And don't even try to operate in North Sea, it is 24/7 storm zone of fun.

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Nobody expects the Imperial Inquisition!

Yeah I heard once that one of the older naval ship of the royal Norwegian Navy got there entire bow bend in a bad storm. And these ships are build to withstands thing like that.

Been there done that, and have rode out two hurricanes in my years. I have taken blue water over the bow once and it wasn't in the North Sea or hurricanes but rather in the Adriatic in a random storm.

Bow waves happen. There is nothing you can do about it. But to pretend they happen routinely or with force enough to routinely damage major equipment is goossly overstating the threat. If we take this to its logical conclusion nothing should be mounted on the main deck at all. The Norwegian examples given were for ships going max speed without even attempting to avoid storms. And it goes without saying North Sea storms are not indicadive of 99% of the operationg area of such a ship, especially an American one in current seas.

Take a look at the LCS-2. Yeah its 57mm is 12 meters off its bow but it also has a bow shape that offers it no protection from waves. The hull angles mean no part of the ship will absorb energy before it hits the mount. So far no problems.

I appreciate the comments guys and I took many of your suggestions including reducing the angle of the bow and moving the mount back some. You guys are acting like I am ignoring you, I most definetly am not but I get the impression some are not listening to what I say. So lets lot repeat the same thing over and over and agree to disagree for now. There is much more to this ship than its bow weapon.

EDIT: So when thinking about my LCS-2 comment above it dawned on me that perhaps my proifle drawing without any bow shading is giving a bad impression as far as the shap of the bow goes. Specifically that some might assume that the the bow tapers as it gets to the top instead of flares, which would provide far less protection against waves like the LCS-2 bow.

This is an unfinished drawing and still has the old VLS loadout but perhaps it will shed some light on the actual shape



Basically the hull sides meet the forcasle deck and then continue at the bow end to provide a flare that will enclose a small space so there is maintenance access to the underside of the mount. This simultaniously provides a sheild from direct wave action unless you literally dip the bow. I hope this provides some clarity.

Ok maybe from other angle ... if this bow mount is such wonderful and marvelous place for weapon, why nobody put it there. There must be a good reason. I'm not educated shipbulider, not even a sailor but as I only travel couple of times on board ferry in bad weather over Baltic. And thats hard a comparison to North Sea or North Atlantic. For me it is the worst possible position for any weapon, stability, salt water, waves ... unable of use of this weapon in not that bad weather. Even my logic say this is a very, very bad idea. Especially when you want to use a very complex and fragile weapon system like laser.

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Nobody expects the Imperial Inquisition!

1.) There is no reason to assume fragility. The Phalanx is probably the most finicky POS on a USN platform and I have shown it being placed directly on the bow (granted higher) and it is routinely placed on protruding platforms on carriers that are directly exposed to the elements. Salt is universal, you can't get away from it no matter what. Salt spray is actually worse than straight up waves as waves wash off deposited salt while spray just deposits more on top.

2.) The bow on most smaller vessels is taken up by other things, generally anchors. I have moved this to the deck below

3.) Most main weapons systems have bulky magazines that need to be in direct contact with the launcher (sometimes the the magazine is the launcher, see VLS). This means there simply isn't any room in the bow to accomodate all this. This weapon has no magazine, it just has to have power run to it. That being said bow guns are pushed as far forward as their foodprint will allow often times because the advantage in firing arc is readily apparent for direct fire weapons, and it also reduces the transmission of vibration from firing from some of the more sensitive systems in the superstructure.

4.) There really is very little stability difference between the tip of the bow and some main gun placement like the LCS-2s 57mm that is only twelve meters aft of that. I have acknowledged that there is more instability there, but its not what you think. If you were to take a 5 degrees (that is a lot) pitch the Ml110 on my design will move two meters up, the bow weapon four. Yaw is not a real concern for vessels moving forward, and roll is going to be shared equally by ever mount on that deck. If stability were really an issue then all the calls for me to elevate the weapon the superstructe would not make sense as you take a lot more roll than pitch and the higher you are the greater the effect of roll on stability.

Thats just a few things. There are pros and cons. This is a new concept, blanketly applying the rules of other weapons because that is how its always done is not a good route to go.

I really don't understand how placing a weapon at the very front of the ship, so that most of the ship blocks its firing arc, constitutes an improvement. In fact, that's somewhat the exact opposite. You get a clear arc to the front quarter of the ship...and that's it.

I think the problem is that you're assuming that you just plop a weapons system down somewhere and it's done. You can redesign the superstructure so that it has a clear 75% arc coverage while sitting on top of the bridge, for instance. Look at how most small ships have their CIWS emplacements, for example. Really, I don't get how this isn't intrinsically obvious instead of the mental gymnastics you're doing to justify this.
*proceeds to slam head into desk until desk is destroyed*

"thinking outside the box" is often code for "I don't want to be bothered to think, so here it is and accept it"