HMS GLASGOW, a Type 26 Frigate in build for the Royal Navy on the Clyde, is starting to look shipshape.
The Type 26 represents the future backbone of the Royal Navy and eight of the class are planned, starting with HMS Glasgow. The UK Government say they are committed to eight of the type, this was outlined in the 2015 Strategic Defence and Security Review.
According to the Royal Navy:
“Just over half of HMS Glasgow is now complete or under construction, out of eight planned vessels in the class (all are named, three have been ordered, two are in build at Govan – HMS Cardiff is No.2).
Once the fore and aft sections are complete they will be joined on the hard in front of the block hall, before the bridge/main mast are craned into place. The completed ship will then be ‘launched’ by being lowered into the Clyde via a barge, then towed downstream to BAE’s yard at Scotstoun to complete fitting out.
The 26s replace the ‘souped-up’ anti-submarine Type 23s which will begin retiring from service later this decade after more than 30 years on patrol, while still to come are five Type 31 general duty frigates which have yet to be ordered/named and will replace their five Type 26 counterparts like for like.”
#HMSGLASGOW, the first City Class Type 26 frigate for the @RoyalNavy is currently being constructed in #Glasgow. The ship is built in two sections which are both taking shape at our facilities on the #Clyde. Here’s your first look at the forward section of HMS GLASGOW. #26on26 pic.twitter.com/Bn1yNxkEY2
— BAE Systems Maritime (@BAES_Maritime) January 26, 2020
The first steel was cut for Glasgow in July 2017 with the ship expected to be delivered in 2023 and in service by 2027. For a more in-depth look at the build of this vessel, head on over to SaveTheRoyalNavy here.
The Type 26 programme currently employs more than 1,200 people in the UK supply chain, with a number of contracts already in place for the manufacture of major equipment for the first three ships. In total, there are already 33 UK and international companies working in the supply chain to deliver the Type 26 ships.
Admiral Sir Philip Jones, previous First Sea Lord, said when the name of the first vessel was revealed:
“The Clyde was the birthplace of some of the greatest fighting ships the world has ever known and so cutting steel there today for the future HMS Glasgow is symbolic of a Royal Navy on the rise once again. As an island nation, we are utterly dependent on the sea for our security and prosperity and the City-class names have been chosen for the Type 26 to provide an enduring link between the Royal Navy and our great centres of commerce and industry. The name Glasgow brings with it a string of battle honours, stretching from the Arctic Circle to the South Atlantic.”
It will be the ninth HMS Glasgow in the Royal Navy’s history, dating back to 1707.
Ten years to get one in service, while China can build four destroyers in a year and properly arm them.
Granted this is first in class, but…
The slow rate of production always comes up when the T26 is featured, it is down to the £7b or more black hole in the defence budget and the MoD trying to spread the annual cost. They have a huge cash flow problem and are trying to avoid going bust.
Until the politicians provide a properly thought through and stable strategy with the funding to match then the MoD will be left trying to deliver a Roller for the price of a Mini. Of course the MoD needs to sort a few things out as well, but in my book good leadership is the best place start – which brings us back to politicians.
It’s nothing to do with the speed vessels are built on the Clyde, it’s the funding line provided by the MOD that limits the build rate. Vessels can be built quick or slow in England or the Clyde depending on the funds available.
Foreign aid projects can be very important. The current issue with those i the management of them, not the funding. It is all fine now though as apparently we will now have £350 million per week to spend on everything…
Also lets not forget that HS2 is over budget by many times the value of the aid budget…
It is about the money Andy, when 1 frigate costs over 1 billion, then it is very much about the money, military equipment has got a lot more expensive then it was 30 years ago.
Umm look at how the Italians churn out Frigates from design to launch on much smaller budgets, the chronic inefficiency in our process of buying,designing and building is the problem.
Yes, if you delay making decisions the cost goes up, because all the facilities and staff are still there waiting for some can kicking politician to stop trying to slopey shoulder a difficult decision onto the next numpty to sit in the chair..!
The Clyde yards are working to a timetable set by the MoD who are in turn working to political masters who all too often haven’t got a clue about engineering and the associated buysiness costs of delays. That and the fact that they don’t stay around in post long enough to learn the right lessons. Same goes for far too many of the senior civil service and to some extent the senior military as well. Timely decision making would save billions!
Oddly, there is a military maxim that was quoted to me often by military guys I worked along side, “A bad decision is better than no decision.” At least if you make a bad decision you have something to learn from and mitiagate – no decision and you are just along for the ride! My experience is that most of our decision makers are too busy trying to avoid a bad decision they fail to notice that they are being drive by outside events! It comes down to how people in the system are judged, make a bad decision and you get kicked, make a good decision and someone else takes the plaudits make no decision and no notices! So the low risk option is make no decision!
I have to say I despise Dominic Cummins but he’s is correct about how we buy stuff its a total disgrace.Look how quickly Italy designed built and launched its first PPA ,its embarrassing how we go about getting new ships.
To be fair the Horizone frigate programme was a complete disaster. Only 4 frigates being built for the two navies, whilst the RN got 6 T45’s…
Yea but we were involved in that before we pulled out.
Yes I know. The simple point I was making is that its not only the UK MoD that gets it wrong.
It is not hard to be correct about criticising the way we buy things. It is plain to see there are issues. However it is how you fix it that needs thinking properly about. Cummings has not really come up with anything of note on that particular point, he is just ranting at the overall problem, which lets face it we have been doing on here for years… The biggest single issue is the politicians as they are the ones ultimately in charge. They are utterly out of their depth and unqualified for the task. That is what we somehow need to fix. (We could fix it by putting experts in the cabinet rather than ex journalists but that is never going to happen)
What’s irritating is the lack of learning and this applies to all government projects, how many are over budget, most. The people in charge of buying stuff need to be professionals who know what they are doing and this is as much to do with the civil service as political interference.
The civil service do as they are told by the government. They may advise the cabinet on things but ultimately the cabinet have total control over thei departments. The problem is that the MPs have virtually zero knowledge about the things they are in charge of and so either do not take the time to understand the decisions they are making and simply take what they are told by their departments at face value or they know the problems but want to make a name for themselves and end up making poor decisions possibly because they know they are unlikely to be in charge when the crap hist the fan.
There is nothing in the law of our country that says independent experts can not be in the cabinet (it does not have to be sitting MPs).
You know the River B2’s where specifically requested to take as long as they did by the MoD right?
I think this may be a little bit more accurate than my post above, but you get my gist.
Technically we will have the upper hand no doubt, but against numbers like this and at the speed they can be replaced at.
“The Type 055 destroyers are the largest surface combatant currently being built in the world with a length of 180 meters, a beam of 20 meters and a draft of 6.6 meters for a full load displacement of about 13,000t (compared to the US Navy’s Ticonderoga-class cruiser and the Flight III Arleigh Burke-class destroyer both at 9,800 tons or the Royal Navy Type 45 at about 8,500 tons). Their official PLAN designation is “10,000-ton class destroyer.” while the US Department of Defense has been calling them “cruisers” since 2017.”
https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2019/12/china-launched-the-24th-type-052d-6th-type-055-71st-type-056-vessels-for-plan/
China launched 9 Destroyers last year – that’s the difference between Night and Day compared to other Countries, obviously for China money is no object.
Its easy to scale up when you didn’t have much to start with, your not dealing with ongoing maintenance and refits. We also don’t know what shortcuts are taken to rush them into service, if you look at their Fighters for example they’ve had to used a substitute underpowered engine because the intended engine has a tendency for rapid unplanned disassembly, this reducing their performance and meaning they are too heavy to take off from a flight deck with even half their full weapon load (shades of the Soviet Harrier that couldn’t take off if it was carrying any weapons).
Id agree that their Smorgasbord of quick Warship Construction will place a huge burden in the future regarding maintenance and refits etc,plus when its time for them to be replaced that will have to take place in a short timescale too but without China’s Economy crashing in a spectacular way that shouldn’t pose much of a problem.Also when you look at pictures of Chinese Warships they always look pristine if not immaculate,you never see one looking tired or scruffy.
They might not bother with profits if midlife updates; I could imagine China just churning out ship after ship and selling on the older ones once they reach 15-20 year age. Benefits them in 2 ways; the PLAN gets a constant stream of ships and their industry thrives with constant stream of orders.
Meant to say “refits” not profits. Stupid autocorrect!
Exactly right. Money spent on major project returns, and fairly quickly, to the government. About 30% returns almost immediately. Long term things like skills and expertise improve, communities benefit and good quality employment increases. Cutting often leads to downward spirals, and cutting existing capabilities saves very little.
That’s becasue a) they’re all brand new, and b) they do not have a lot of global comittments taking them all around the world. When these points become less true they’ll start looking tired and scruffy.
I take it thishttps://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/british-frigate-shadows-chinese-destroyer-in-english-channel/ one must have got a bit lost then 1
I don’t think it’s just the money(unless we halve the Foreign Aid Budget and stop handing hundreds of millions to India and China). They don’t have Unions, Health and Safety etc. sticking their heads in.
I think you will find that unions, health and safety are there not just for the shipbuilders, but the crews. I am assuming you want to attract crews to ships and not go back to your namesakes time?
Have you been on any military sites recently Andy? I left the RN in 2013. I had a en suite cabin with a double bed, wifi, very modern and to a good standard. Hardly a wasteland. Some sites still need work, but most main operating bases, RN Army or RAF have a very high standard of single living accommodation and married quarters. Don’t believe everything you read in the press.
Well you’ll be glad to know things have moved on a very very long way from 1984
Neither is human rights!
It is going to be very hard for the west to combat China. After all they effectively have 1.5 billion people available as slave labour.
Don’t forget that China doesn’t have all the environmental regulations and competitions when building ships or anything else. They don’t have unions or local politicians to deal with either.
Maybe the ‘truth’ is somewhere in between Nigel. Ten years is far too long particularly when one considers the rapid pace of technology nowadays-many of their systems have been superseded by the time they hit the water. Have a look at cell phones in ten year old movies to see what I mean!
And they still aren’t a true blue water Navy.
Depending on your point of view. The point being, they will be within the next decade at the current rate of build.
“As of 2018, the PLAN has two combat-ready aircraft carriers, the Liaoning and Shandong, with the third under construction. It is projected that China may possess five or six aircraft carriers by the 2030s.”
“In addition, there are those who think China already has a blue-water navy, such as British naval historian and professor, Geoffrey Till,[9] and also, Professor David Shambaugh who believes that the PLAN has transitioned from a green-water navy to that of a “limited” blue-water navy.[33] According to Todd and Lindberg’s classification system, the PLAN is a rank four “regional power projection navy”.[19][20]
Since 2008 the PLAN has conducted anti-piracy missions in the Gulf of Aden on a continuous basis.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue-water_navy
They are now without a doubt .
China can get away with paying it’s ship workers and sailors peanuts, I could imagine the average wage and package a Chinese sailor receives doesn’t compare to what a RN rating receives in pay pension and benefits.
We want more, As to the time to build yes its disgracefull, but I suspect its partly due to cash flow from the defence budget
Hi folks hope all are well. This good news, however the time to build does appear long. Can anyone advise why as a nation we aren’t able to speed up the process without compromising on quality. I get the impression from global events that we need to be a bit faster on delivery of such high end cutting edge tech ships. We have first class Carriers, being escorted by old frigates.
Nonetheless, this is good for the Navy and demonstrates to our allies our commitment to be at the head of the game.
Hi George, we can built these fast. We could build 1 every 18 months. It’s a choice to build at this rate.
Many thanks Andy. It’s just the current climate may need to speed the build rate.
Of course it exists, we have just built 2 x 65k ton aircraft carriers, we can still highly complex frigates and the finest nuclear powered submarines know to man. What age are you living in.
Got a bit of a wingey chip on his shoulder does old Andy.
Simple. HMG has inflicted cuts upon cuts & kept the forces short of the funds to expidite a faster build rate. They freely make positive noises about “growing” the fleet when there’s nothing in place to do that, it’s at the smallest size it’s been for centuries, major weapons systems are allowed to “gap” for years, there’s not enough ships or crews to cover our peacetime commitments & we drag our fet to replace old ships such as here.
We’re one of the richest countries in the world, critically dependant of secure sea trade, a prmanent member of the UN security council, yet can’t be bothered to tax the richest so we can maintain even the minimum armed forces we need. It’s open season for any aggressive authoritarian country when those with responsabilities decay into apathy.
As a nation we are very capable of building these in a shorter time. It comes down to money, ultimately. Regarding that there are 2 factors.
1) Because defence is not properly funded, the Navy can only order small numbers of ships. 8 Type 26s instead of 13, 6 x Type 45 destroyers instead of the originally planned 12, etc.
2) Because the build number is now so small the government stretches the build time out over several years to retain the industry skills, otherwise we face our shipyards closing down.
2.1) In the same vein as above, to keep within the stringent annual budgets the build is stretched, so a £1.2billion frigate will only cost a small fraction of that year on year.
In reality, it comes down to the political will to fund defence, of which there seems to be little. If we properly funded our defence then we could churn out a Type 26 every 18 months or so, and the order quantities would be higher so no risk of losing shipyards due to lack of work.
Let’s hope in a few weeks time we will be able too.
“Two HS2 whistle-blowers have told Sky News they feel there should be a public inquiry into the spiralling cost of HS2 and that the taxpayer has been deceived.
A third executive has suggested the project goes back to parliament before progressing.
It comes after the National Audit Office found on Friday that HS2 did not allow for uncertainties when estimating initial costs.”
https://news.sky.com/story/whistleblowers-say-public-have-been-deceived-over-cost-of-hs2-11918771
Did not allow for uncertainties!!!!
That is such a basic feature of any cost estimating process it can only be deliberate, frankly, that bit alone stinks dishonesty of some sort.
The biggest problem we face in this country is that we get scared of the true cost of big techie projects, so there is always a pressure to come up with a cost that can get through the decision making process – hence big projects are always over budget and late (time = money…).
My memory was that there was a huge contingency in the original estimates.
Hi Trevor,
Contingency and uncertainty are different things from a costing perspective. In simple terms Contingency allows for the escallation of cost through identifiable factors such as currency fluctuations and should be relatively straight forward to identify and build into the estimates.
Uncertainty, is stuff you cannot reasonably specifically identify e.g. accidents or some director clearing off to Brazil with the money! This is obviously a challenge to allow for, but any project especially one as large and complex as HS2 should include some sort of allowance because the bigger the project the more likely you are of getting hit by the unexpected – remember there is a very large supply chain for HS2 as well!
I’ve done a little bit of cost modelling in my time and especially in the early stages a simple rule of thumb would at least give you something to work with. After that you undertake a parameteric study of similar projects in the past e.g. Channel Tunnel to see what the unexpected cost them! No excuse for ignoring uncertainties its grossly unprofessional at best…
Given this is tax payers money I’d be looking for the individual reasonable for deciding to leave it out – or if it was some huge oversight, I’d be looking to the director reasonable for costing. He or She should at least know what cost heading are included in the process… If there is no one person responsible? That’s where I’d start to put things right. Every director gets specific and clearly defined responsibilities and authorities and if they prove not to be up to the task then they go. They get paid enough I’m sure.
OK, bit of a subject change, Nigel, but I hold the gut feeling this should go ahead. How do you quantify the benefits of this type of infrastructure scheme over the extreme lifetime of a railway. Did the Victorians fully envisage the extent to which they’d dominate the industry, let alone believe we’d still be utilising their fundamental system in the 21st century.
We have talk of how much better value we’d get from upgrading sections of the current network. Well, let me see: we have endured the ongoing faux pas that is electrification & signalling of same, rolling stock not quite up to requirement, unions, etc ad nausium. All way over cost and in-service date. These costs are inevitable, for whatever the reasons, and are in any case amortised over the long term.
Foriegn Aid is essential, but add it up over similar timespans; hardly to mention that the interest we pay on government borrowing swallows up the current costing every three years – good ‘value’?
I could go on (and on…) but must not lose sight of the fact that this is actually the wrong forum!
Cheers
andy – the subject of the fate of the T22’s has been pretty well covered on here.I know nothing of dodgy deals etc but they were put on the market when there was lots of choice in second hand Warships,it might have been difficult to give them away.At least some got a second wind rather than be used as target practice.Chile only ended up with 1(ex HMS Sheffield) to go with the 3 Type 23’s.Gunbuster has said they were very hard on Fuel and Manpower intensive,it would take a great leap of imagination and a large budget to convert them as you say.In a war situation when you are running out of Hulls maybe but not in peacetime.
The fact that you have even suggested buying back a T22 and bye some feat of magic they can be upgraded with the very lastest weapons and avionics, and at not much expense , says to me you haven’t got a foot in the real world Andy.
What I always struggle with is why our ship yards seem so reliant on HMG. We’re supposed to be at the cutting edge of manufacturing technology, BAe is one of the largest defence contractors on the planet, yet it appears to be the UK government that needs to fund improvements in manufacturing at BAe. The BAe Hawk was a glaring example over 1000 orders yet no replacement product so zero on the profits from the Hawk were reinvested in a successor. No other industry would survive if they operated in this way.
Largely, I believe, because our shipyards produce high end, high quality ships for extortionate prices.
Most countries with decent sized navies build their own ships; US, UK France, Russia, Japan etc… those that don’t generally buy from elsewhere and can’t afford our £1billion+ warships. So for the most part there is not much export potential due to price. So the shipyards are reliant on orders from HMG, which are getting thinner and thinner with each generation of ships.
Exception to this at the moment is Type 26, which Canada and Australia are both buying, though even then its build on license so not built in the UK. Type 31 may have a good export potential. The more built means the cheaper they get and the quicker they can be built. Which means that even if our first batch were only lightly armed, a second or third batch could be up-armed as the cost of building them would be less.
But hang on… BAe has a design centre, it could produce cheaper designs for export if it chose to. The only UK company that offers off the shelf design for vessels is BMT but they don’t own a ship yard. So it appears BAe have zero interest is building vessel for foreign governments. If the British government had gone with a foreign design for the T26 BAe wouldn’t have had the T26 design to offered to Canada or Australia. And you look at the Leander, BAe’s T31 offering its effectively a stretch Khareef which was a VT design. With BAe showing zero interest in building for foreign navies there’s no choice but for the British government to continue to prop up their yard.
Pretty sure BAe do build ships for foreign governments, they just build them in that countries shipyards rather than the ones in the UK. Beauty of being international.
The sad thing about the snails pace of construction, if the MOD had ordered these ships when originally planned, as opposed to stretching things out slowing the construction rate down, these ships could have been a possibility for the US navy’s future frigate program.
Blame spreadsheet
I’m predicting that the type 26 will be chosen.
Or George Osborne. Shoving the military pensions into the MoD core budget meant that money that could have gone into more ships or new weapons systems is now spent in pensions instead.
leave my pension alone !
Not saying that the pensions should be touched. I’m saying that before 2010 the MoD and military pensions did not come out of defence core budget. They were moved into MoD core budget as “creative accounting.” This was in order to cit defence spending while still “officially” spending over 2% on defence as per NATO requirement.
I’m saying that this should have stayed outside the core budget. Or at least the extra money transferred into MoD budget going forward to allow for both pension spend and actual defence spending.
And mine!
I’d never dream of touching military pensions, only to remove them from MoD core budget and back into normal pensions, or failing that leave them in the MoD core budget but then increase annual spending by the amount of the pension fund so that it isn’t taking from the other budgets within MoD.
So if the pension fund were £1billion per year, we should increase money for defence by at least that much.
aren’t the australian ones likely to be in service before ours?
Perhaps we could get the Chinese to build them! They would do it for less and quicker!
The build rate is truly a national embarrassment. It is all about our politicians not taking RN funding seriously. We should be building 13 T26s and 7+ T31. Also 4 large Destroyers/cruiser for carrier defence would be good idea.
Also we should upgrade the ships that we already have to their full capabilities. Extra VLS for T45, Sea Ceptor for QE class, also anti-ship missiles for all T45s, CIWS for our auxiliaries. But of course this will not be done because our politicians will not pay for it.
I wonder how may hull we have lost due to the slow build rate? more than a few I would imagine Rob N.
As for “But of course this will not be done because our politicians will not pay for it.”
I have an awful gut feeling that we will pay for it one way or another in the not too distant future, especially with the current war games being conducted between Russia and China.
America has already taken the hint, UK/Europe need to do the same. You don’t build a surface fleet of this magnitude without good reason!
Fantasy plans like that are always bouncing around with no consideration for reality. We need to be looking at realistic solutions, not lists of whatever we fancy.
What you’re suggesting would likely cost in the region of at least £10-12bn just to build, not to mention the thousands of extra sailors needed and the investment in industry to actually build all of that in a reasonable time frame.
Be realistic. Based on standing commitments, the RN doesn’t need any more area air defence platforms, so those cruiser-destroyers can go. Likewise another 5 T26s is excessive, but another 1 or 2 would be enough to offer significantly greater ASW coverage. T31 offers a great opportunity to free up high end assets from mundane duties. Build 12, have squadrons of 4 based at home, in the gulf, and in Singapore, operating on the same principle as the nuclear deterrent of 1-2 active, 1 training, 1 refit. Strike VLS and AShMs for T45 and SC on the carriers are surplus to requirements, but a large SC farm on the T45s and an ASROC weapon for T26 are essential.
That’s £10-12bn for your build plan vs about £3-4.5bn for what the RN actually needs from its escort fleet. If we DID get that fantasy amount of money, the difference would be better spent on more submarines, not cruiser-destroyers.
A case of priorities. We blow 15Bn annually on Questionable Foreign Aid each year which make the blood boil.
Oh you mean as much as HS2! As for growing the navy it would take time to build the ships and that time could be used to recruit and train their crews.
Gone are the days when you can rearm in a couple of years – we have to meet future threats today by planning ahead. I am not apologetic for daring to suggest our navy be properly equipped and funded. More often then not a strong deterrent stops conflicts – weakness encourages aggressors. In recent times Russia has annexed part of Georgia, the Crimean Peninsula, effectively taken control of Easter Ukraine. Meanwhile China is intent on raking over the South China Sea despite international law not supporting their claims. So I would say it is time for us to take our collective heads out of the sand…
What I cannot understand is that we are not a poor country – it is just a matter of priorities. If we chose to do what I suggest above we could. Instead we spend billions on ring fenced foreign development etc…
There is a major reason why the Chinese have annexed the South China Sea. It has a lot to do with feeding 1.6 billion mouths. They have effectively fished out the Bohai Sea, parts of the Yellow Sea and the area around Hainan. Fish is a staple of their diet, so they have basically annexed the resources. There has already be scraps between Philippino and Vietnamese fishermen, resulting in the Chinese sending the “coastguard” vessels. The Philippines recently conducted an exercise around some of their reef and atols using a combined arms task force. It won’t be long before the PLAN have one of their carrier task groups sailing the area. This will significantly ramp up the pressure the Chinese can exert on the countries surrounding the South China Sea. Which of them have the guts let alone the means to deter the Chinese from over-fishing these waters as well?
I wonder if this will go ahead as planned in 2020.
Makes for a very interesting year ahead!
“Leaked map shows China plans to invade S. Taiwan after taking Kinmen, Penghu”
https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/3861097
Hopefully this wont take place,the price for an Invasion of Taiwan would be catastrophic,not just for the South China Sea but it would have repercussions Worldwide.On a planning note I guess they have studied the Japanese capture of Singapore.
I’m pretty certain China have looked at multiple ways of taking Taiwan. The major difference now, is that they have the capability to land troops on any part of the island. But perhaps more importantly can now position a carrier task group and a number of subs on the east of the island used as a blocking force against the US Navy. Granted they aren’t on par with the US, but they can put enough in the way to make it difficult to reinforce or prevent an invasion.
Less than 5 years ago China was not in a position where they could effectively encircle the island and cut off any support leading to it. The Chinese always plan for the long haul and at some point in the future, they’ll have all their pieces in place!
And if you haven’t noticed the general public would rather see all this extra cash go on the NHS and education, or adult social care, a few new Frigates doesn’t affect the lives of millions of people, but the money does. I’m extremely pro defence, and I think 2.5% of GDP is sensible for defence. But we have to be realistic. The Russians or the Chinese are not going to be sending fleets of warships over the North Sea anytime soon. War is not good for economic grow!
Correct. China is a massive, effectively continental, sized country. Take the USA out and NATO already has 3 major carriers one of them nuclear, plus a large number of escorts. We are not going to war with China (why?), and were China to make a significant aggressive move somewhere then subsequent sanctions would cripple the wellbeing of its people. What is the point of it attacking anybody? It’s massively attacking it’s own people of course, not least it’s Muslim. We are not in the business of matching China’s defences. We would be better trying to improve our terms of trade and reducing our demand for cheap Chinese tat. (And my wife’s Hughiewotsit phone was rubbish)
They annexed the South China sea, destroyed reefs by building artificial islands with air & naval bases on them in an area claimed legitimately by several other closer nations. We’ve not done much in the face of that & a sudden grab of territory elsewhere in the region, not least Taiwan, is possible.
“Build 12, have squadrons of 4 based at home, in the gulf, and in Singapore, operating on the same principle as the nuclear deterrent of 1-2 active, 1 training, 1 refit.”
Apologies, but that too is probably excessive. We probably have more ships than we need. Half the frigate force and the manpower for them should go up.
Of course, the powers that be have studied this more than us, so we should probably just let them get on with it. We have nothing to offer.
Fair comment, you could potentially make it work with just 9 frigates in squadrons of 3. However, in the context of my argument, of having to actually justify expenditure instead of making wishlist, the argument is there for a large T31 order. Tensions with Iran and the seizure of a British tanker demonstrates a clear need for an enhanced, permanent presence in the Gulf. Likewise, China is constantly raising tensions in the SCS and Pacific; as a member of RIMPAC, and with so many allies in the region, the UK has a demonstrable need for a permanent presence in the region. The fact that the army current has the heaviest presence (Brunei) in a primarily naval theatre is hilarious.
I have to disagree with your last comment. The various powers that be often have their own agendas and personal beliefs that directly class with the requirements of defence, usually money. Contrast that with us: generally speaking, anyone on UKDJ must have at least a passing interest in and knowledge of UK defence issues. Yes, often you get fantasy fleets or intense fatalism, but you also get a lot of sensible suggestions from people that genuinely care
“Perhaps we could get the Chinese to build them! They would do it for less and quicker!” Don’t be infantile about this as the UK shipyards are good at what they do. Look at expensive systems and government with it’s officials! Hull build is 30%. Let’s get all the better and cheaper systems and weapons from China A! It would not happen.
Unfortunately you did not spot that my comment about China building them was not a serious comment. It was there to illustrate a point. The point was that it is taking us too long to build T26….. However I do not think we should rule out some of our defence work going to yards outside the UK if they offer us a good deal and they can do the work to the same standard.
OK, fair enough. But tax clawback must alway be taken into consideration which means no and we must rule out build outside the UK. We have fallen into this idea originally because of eu rules.
To add. They cannot offer us a good deal. if they can, we need to ask how much are they being subsidized to undemine us. It really is not on.
I have seen what Chinese shipbuilding is like.
If the yards building military units are similar to the ones building commercial vessels then the vessels will last about a year before welds fail, equipment seizes up, bearings fail, valves disintegrate and the pipework turns into a pile of rust.
The standard of work is appalling. Almost all the commercial operators will not use Chinese spares because they fail after a few months.
I have freinds in the oil industry and were directly involved in the shipbuilding industry (VT’s who intruduced the most modern cutting equipment at Woolston) who have been to China and South Korea and seen their practices which are not good. Even in a domestic field in which we buy from UK shops who source from China, UK named (not made) brands, they are now crap! Kettles being just one of many items. Tools, even the humble rubbing in iron made by OX (china), brickies tell me they are sh*ite. They don’t last and produce a poor finish. Just a couple of examples of millions of items that come fromt hese places and we put up with it.
Aren’t the French 15 months behind in designing submarines for Australia.?? That’s just the design stage!! 15!!! Some not inconsiderable sums have already been paid to the “nationalised”(!!!) French company. This something of a scandal is a bit analogous to the French/Indian affair over their Rafale contract mess….
I would not be that smug. Astute went over time and over budget and they are still not making them fast enought.
1: Slow rate is inevitable to keep the workforce active until T45 replacement comes. Only 14 tier-1 escorts each with ~30 years life = 2-3 years drumbeat is the only answer (and RN is not even fully manning those 14 hulls).
2: From recent official documents, it was shown that the 1st T31 will “go into service” on 2027, the same timing as the 1st T26 “commissions”. Also the document confirms, all 5 T31 will be “handed over” to RN by 2028 but no commission date for the 5th hull.
I cannot stop thinking, by investing (the now inflated) 2B GBP cost of 5 T31 into T26, we would have had 3 more (in total 11) hulls. And, with 6+11 = 17 Tier-1 escorts, the building drumbeat of “Tier-1 escort shipyard” must have been faster, and hence cheaper.
What document is saying the T31 is going to cost £2bn now? And equating £2bn to 3 T26s seems well off as well
1: I could not find it now, but it was reported in Janes (and navalnews) that, the program cost of T31 is 1.98B GBP, while 1.25B of which will go to Babcock. In UK budget document in 2018, T31 cost was written as 1.5B GBP (= 1.25 build and 0.25 others), so it looks 32% increase.
2: The total cost for 8 T26 is suggested to be 8B GBP. Detailed designing and initial build costs (in-efficiency from lack of learning curve) “usually” amounts to 3 unit cost equivalent (at least in French FREMM, it was 3 unit cost equivalent, officially stated). 8Bn / (8+3 unit cost) = 700M GBP per unit.
# add.
In other words, I’m guessing the cost needed to add 1 more hull is ~700B GBP. Not saying T26’s average cost is 700M GBP. These two are different number.
If the first three T26s are to cost a total of £3.7 Billion, I doubt the remaining 5 will be lower then £1 Billion each.
Meirion X-san
I also think the remaining 5 will cost £1 Billion each. It includes all the cost of keeping the shipyard open until T45 replacement.
But, with that industrial background supported by the “£5 Billion total”, addition of hull 6 and 7 (and even 8 if possible) will not cost £1 Billion each. This is what I meant.
This is the same to that, 5 River B2 cost of £650M in total. It does not mean “1 more River B2” will cost £130M. Significant fraction (not open) of the £650M was to keep the T26’s workforce.
So should we out source design?
Do we trust French figures?
Not sure. But the number is very reasonable for me.
– learning curve is well-known issue. BMT is using the learning curve of British T12M Leander-class frigates cost curve in the paper for frigate design.
– Detailed designing is a few years work of hundreds of design engineers. It is not just blue print, it is of parts list, schedule, and verification plan. Very different from concept design, which can be lead by a dozen of engineers.
# Actually, this is the main reason newly designed Arrowhead 120 was abandoned and Danish design was introduced as “Arrowhead 140” (although its bow shape is not “arrow” at all) by Babcock.
Do we want French built ships?
I don’t think so.
Anyway the story is unrelated to French build (I understand none is proposing it here), just using British T12M Leander class’s fact and French FREMM fact as a reference to clear what is the initial and detail-design costs, which makes “cost of adding 1 more” a bit cheaper than “average cost”.
The slow build rate can result in cheaper and more ships in the long run due to economies of scale with Canada, Australia and maybe the USA. It also leaves the door open for a future type 26 factory.
Ten years to build a frigate. Not enough of them anyway. Shame on us when the T23s they’re to replace are already clapped out. Hopefully T31s will begin entering service before this T26 eventually becomes ready. This is an apalling way to maintain a fleet. Nelson will be spinning in his grave.
Still, probably most fun he’s had in two centuries.
Alright. Competition time. Which bit of the T26 are we looking at in this photo?
Is it the paid for bit….
Superb 🙂 – I think you’ve won the competition with the first entry.
To be fair on the recent Michael Portillo Rail Journeys programme and on HMS Glasgows twitter feed construction looks more advanced than in this pic.
This is the bow section, the previous pictures were of the stern section I think. So I am guessing they started the stern section first, which looked more advanced…
Cut a bit of steel … 10 years to enter service…..shocking……!!
That’s the UK Government for you. Happy to spend 106 billion on a rail road and 6 biollion on a paint job for the houses of parliament too. Questions needs to be asked about this too.
why 4 years from delivery to in service?
I’m guessing First of class Snagging lists,teething troubles,certification issues and the inevitable Red Tape,4 years seems excessive even for that though.
Those elastic bands for the weapons are tricky technology to perfect I hear.
Does it? Let’s look at some other first in class’s of the RN:
Type 45 HMS Daring: Launched Feb 2006, Commissioned July 2009 (~3 years)
Type 42 HMS Sheffield: Launched 1971, Comissioned 1975 (~4 years)
Type 23 HMS Norfolk: Launced 1987, Comissioned 1990 (~3 years)
Type 22 HMS Broadsword: Launched 1976, Comissioned 1979 (~3 years)
So does 4 years really seem that excessive for that?
Your looking at Launch date to commissioning,as far as we know HMS Glasgow will take 4 years from handover to being in Service,it depends on how you define handover in this case – is 2023 the commissioning date or is it 2027 ?.
How ever much we would like to see an increased speed in production let alone an increase in ships this government is never going to allocate the funds as defense of the nation doesn’t come across as a vote winner for them, not that any other party would have been any better. Unfortunately during the leadership election for the conservative party the one that would of funded more defense we didn’t get, so unfortunately this is where we are.
I was gutted when Boris beat Hunt; the latter would have boosted defence spending considerably. Probably would have got a better Brexit deal too.
There is no doubt in my mind that Hunt would have been a better choice as Prime minister for the country & would of financed the Armed forces with a lot more money.
He was promising to boost defence spending by something in the region of £15 billion a year if I recall. That would give MoD a budget of £55billion a year, or 2.75% of GDP.
Even if the actual amount reduced to £10 billion it would be been a massive boost. Hell, even £5 billion would make a big difference. Any of those numbers would allow for real investment in and growth of the armed forces, rather than simply scraps from the table to stave off cuts for another year.
I believe contract discussions have started for the 5 batch 2 ships. We’ll know how serious the government / parliament is about defence by the build rate for those ships. Will it be slower, the same or heaven forbid faster…
As usual, I ain’t holding me breath…
This isn’t linked to the T26, but this last week history has been made.
Elbit have announced that their Iron Fist active protection system for vehicles has defeated a 120mm armour-piercing fin-stabilised discarding sabot (APFSDS) projectile officially for the first time.
In the world of armoured warfare this is game changing!
It looks pretty clear that the T26 is being delayed until after the T31s are delivered. The navy simply doesn’have the budget to build both classes at the same time.
This is entirely down to HMG’s lack of funding
The Conservatives are ideologically into a smaller state with minimum public spending, so every public service has had its budget slashed over the last 10 years, with defence one of the hardest-hit.
They rely on the gullible public, led by the raucous Tory tabloids, o blame the MOD, the navy, the admirals, the shipyards, anyone other than the real culprits, the ruling party.
It is worth remembering that Blair took over when defence spending was 2.6% of GDP and nine years later it was still over 2.5%. The Conservatives have run it down from 2.5% to a real figure of 1.8% in one decade. No wonder we can’t afford warships or the crews to man them, the big-ticket legacy items like Dreadnought, the CVNs, Lightningi have gobbled up most of the procurement budget.
An interesting tactic seems to be to run something to a point when it either breaks or nearly breaks and then to great fanfare add some more funding which doesn’t quite get it back to where it was.
Time for a laugh …
Is the guy on the top in yellow actually Tomkinson from ‘Ripping Yarns’, constructing his 1:1 scale model?
(I’ll get m’coat …)
Does the picture show the day shift? I hope they have a few more on nights…
The picture was published Sunday morning, so they’re probably at church.
They are on a tea break
It’s worth noting its not 10 years to build a T26.
The first T26 was started in July 2017 whilst they were still building the Batch 2, so would think the yard was at capacity split between the final Batch 2s and first T26. With the focus on ensuring the Batch 2s met the required time cost and quality. This would account for some of the speed of the build. Yes you could have increase the speed of the T26 but then that would have created a temporary capacity problem whilst the B2 were finished, option to fulfil this would have been overtime or temporary staff. Neither ideal and both possibly increasing cost.
The first T26 is to be handed over in 2023 by the time its handed over the government will have paid for a large % of the ship. It would be logical to conclude the first ship will also be the most expensive with lots of upfront cost for tooling, one off engineering cost etc, with following ships getting incrementally cheaper. Slowing the build of the first ship spreads this cost.
Steady drumbeat is what we need, in my experience if the workforce thinks there’s no follow on orders then its more likely to try and extend the work it has. That just drives up inefficiency and drives down productivity.
Can anyone tell me have all 6 Type 45s ever been to sea at the same time , would not getting these fixed be a faster way to a bigger fleet , sooner?
If I was putting money on it is say definitely not.
No but that’s not because they’ve been broken, but because putting your entire destoryer fleet to sea at the same time is a great way of guarenteeing that in 6 months when all are refueling and have their crews on leave you won’t have any of them available to respond to unforseen crises.
And they want to leave The Union