Babcock has signed a five-year contract with the Ministry of Defence to provide input into the detailed design for the new AUKUS submarines, which will replace the Astute Class from the late 2030s.
This is also the chosen design that Australia will use to build their new fleet, following the announcement from the Australian, United Kingdom and United States Governments regarding the optimal pathway for acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines under the AUKUS pact.
Babcock’s contract scope includes applying experience of complex submarine in-service support and maintenance, to build this into the design to maximise the submarines’ availability throughout its service life.
Babcock CEO David Lockwood said:
“Babcock plays a critical role in submarine programmes, supporting submarine availability in the UK and internationally. The importance of applying our extensive knowledge and long-standing experience is being recognised through this contract award to ensure that the new Class delivers the operational availability through life that the Royal Navy requires. In addition, we look forward to providing ongoing support to help deliver capability for the Royal Australian Navy under the AUKUS agreement.”
Defence Secretary, Grant Shapps said:
“This multi-billion-pound investment in the AUKUS submarine programme will help deliver the long term hunter-killer submarine capabilities the UK needs to maintain our strategic advantage and secure our leading place in a contested global order. I’m committed to backing our defence industry, because it’s only with the mission critical support of businesses like Babcock that the UK can develop the advanced equipment our Armed Forces need to defend the British people in a more dangerous world.”
Defence Secretary, Grant Shapps
Just sounds so wrong
Does not instil any confidence
He is just the political front man, the premise behind this is very sound and will have been scooped into the project management process ages ago. It’s actually a very good idea so definitely nothing to do with Grant Shapps.
So none of the announcements made, for example under Ben Wallace, were anything to do with him either then.
How do you come to that conclusion ? BW was a superb secretary of defence, he stuck to his guns and got a hell of a lot done. But I guess they decided enough is enough and appointed Grant Crapps instead.
PMs hate people who look very competent in their jobs certainly for too long, for obvious reasons.
If you reckon one SSforD is a political frontman then logically all SSforD’s are political front men. Ben Wallace was competent but he didn’t set the world alight and I just think Shapps should be given a chance. If he turns out to be an idiot we’ll know. 😏
Reminds me of “Life of Brian”- He’s not the defence secretary, he’s just a very naughty boy!
Ausralia needs these new subs ASAP. USN & RN subs covering in part until this ne sub arrives. It’s a plan, but the RN needs more funding for growth back to a size it should never have been cut beyond.
What Frank62 said! 👏👏👏
Great if you can increase manpower.Here lies a problem.
Probably won’t have to hear it for long, he has only ever been a filler till someone more competent comes along. Trouble is competence isn’t exactly easy to find in the Govt, or indeed politicians generally. And Rishi just wants YES Men which probably the only area in which Shapps is competent.
A very interesting approach to scoping out the project design requirements by involving the maintainer to have input at the design stage. It’s not exactly a common approach to engineering design in U.K projects.
Best simulate example I can think of is the Swedish Grippen which was designed from the beginning to be easily upgradable and simple to maintain / service in the field by a minimum number of support crew.
Designed by a small core team…..
The problem with most UK projects is the bloated early stage project definition.
That us the fault if getting management consultants to specify the design and staffing tree.
You end up recruiting 10x the number of people you need and we get too stuck into detail before scoping and defining broad concepts.
Understand your counsel/skepticism, but believe principals comprehend that this is a multinational freight train that has left the station, is currently gathering speed and has a schedule to keep. 🤔🤞
Agree, it’s the main pillar of the most important new military alliance of the 21st century is based on and it’s backed by three of the richest countries on earth. It won’t be allowed to fail and budgets will be found. The US will continue to pile on political pressure and money and no British or Australian government will want to be seen to walk away.
Well said.Babcock has all the experience required for this project.
I know little about the spec of the boat, but there are certain fixed macro parameters that will guide it. How deep, how fast, how quiet and how much power is required to do those things. It’s going to have a PWR3 reactor, so that is a governing factor. It has to be operated by a smaller crew than a US boat and be a modular design so we can fit our weapons, sonar etc and the Australians can fit US ones,
What makes this boat far more complicated is that Australia wants US weapon systems in what is fundamentally a U.K. boat so we will have to deal with a 2nd and 3rd set of influencers. So it will be complicated, but BAe and RR have over 60 years experience with dealing with the US and it’s not a bad relationship.
Mountbatten, Rickover and Baker were the 3 giants who steered the US/UK nuclear submarine projects in infancy, they left a very strong ethos of cooperation and mutual respect (trust me it is a very two way process).
To me the key to landing this is twofold, we need to appoint an engineering Giant to be in overall charge of the project and back them to the hilt, plus we need to keep Australia in the real world.
I can say it is going to be challenging, the U.K. build very good boats, yes they are smaller than US ones and are slightly less heavily armed but have superb sensors and are very quiet. And ours are way more comfortable, crew space in US boats is rather snug.
Did not realize Mountbatten was instrumental in RN SSN development. Known for WW II exploits on this side of the Pond. Baker? RN or USN?
Mountbatten was 1SL for the formative years of the UK nuclear sub programme and was a very forward looking man with great drive.
Due to the rather unsporting behaviour of the US post war regarding the McMahon act the UK had to go it alone with Nuclear developments. We actually started developing a Nuclear reactor for a submarine in 1948 but us was way down the priority list. But by 1957 we were on track to have our 1st home built SSN ready by 1963.
Then 2 things happened Sputnik scared the crap out of the US and they needed allies on side. And we exploded our own H bomb which made the McMahon act obsolete. It also helped that when the US analysed the samples they obtained from our Test they found out that we had actually built a more efficient H bomb than the US had (same bang but less fissile materials).
After the US/UK Mutual Defence Agreement was signed Mountbatten was instrumental in kick starting our 1st boat by 3/4 years by getting the US to sell us a complete Westinghouse Reactor for HMS Dreadnought. What really helped was that he was a great friend Admiral Rickover so things went very well.
For more detail have a read of this.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/US%E2%80%93UK_Mutual_Defence_Agreement#:~:text=It%20allows%20the%20US%20and,by%20far%20the%20most%20comprehensive.
As for Rowland Baker (later Sir) he wasn’t a Naval officer but an RCNC naval constructor (designer). IMHO he was probably the most innovative Naval designer of the mid 20th Century.
And he was a brilliant project leader.
During WW2 he was seconded to the US bureau of Ships and was the key instigator of the initial designs for the LCT, LSD and LST. He was also one of the few folks who could deal on a 1 to 1 basis with Higgins (of Higgins boat fame).
Post war he was loaned to Canada as they wanted to be able to design and build their own Warships rather than just buying RN ones. He set up, trained and mentored the original Canadian ship design team and was largely responsible for the designs for the very Canadian Frigates of the 50’s/60’s.
In the late 50’s he came back to the UK and got put in charge of the 1st UK SSNs and then project leader for the Polaris project.
If you ever get a chance read his Biography he was a very down to earth, rough spoken and direct man but with a brilliant brain and massive drive.
Fascinating details re Mountbatten and Baker. Thanks, always appreciate learning relevant history. 😊
Would also be quite useful if ITAR was modified for Brits and Aussies in a manner identical to that for Canada. Hmmm…copy, paste, print. Generously estimated to be a 10 minute process, at least before it hits the Senate, then a gestation period equivalent to elephants.
Weapons fit will be interesting and I am interested in what if any compromises might be entailed by the relative UK/US choices. I assume tubes will be standard between the required weapon systems torpedo and Vertical, correct? If not what difference will there likely be. Sensors and mission systems will vary quite a bit no doubt, not sure how extensive that affects overall design I wonder. I thought I read a good while back that even the French supplied boats would have UK sonar but my memory may be erroneous there.
Or you get too management heavy, with not enough doers. Like today, everyone wants to be a program manager/project officer. Rather than in a STEM role. I see both Babcock and BAe have taken on a massive influx of apprentices due to the upscaling in manufacturing, so hopefully other companies will take notice.
That reminds me of the old TSR2 story of the first planning meeting for it having so many attendees it was immediately adjourned by the chairman with the instruction to trim the numbers only for more to turn up for the next one. I only mention it because I heard an identical story regarding a pre war aircraft project so seems it was rather common in the UK.
This idea on the other hand sounds very sensible however, the Spitfire was fantastic yes but no consideration for maintenance or access meant it was a pig and costly to maintain and keep operable. Whereas the MB5 by wars end in light of that experience was designed with access and maintainability in mind from the beginning yet still was a brilliant aircraft in its own right too. If such considerations are considered at the design stage with similar success here it will be of great benefit.
The one thing that this build has that will simplify this design is that the Hot end will be a straight forwards copy of the Dreadnoughts PWR3, coolant, propulsion and ancillary systems. No ones got time to design a new one 😉
So it really comes what the customers requirements are, 3 things are certain, they will carry a number of the US VPM, it will be bigger than Astute to accommodate those and increase crew facilities plus it will be modular to accommodate U.K. and RN kit.
The other thing that simplifies it – it us very big. So very much easier to fit things in.
I’d also imagine that the rapid shrinking of server systems makes that even easier as what we’re racks in Astute will be 2U modules in AUSUK
The biggest issue will be stopping AUS trying to cram everything they can thing of into the platform and then wonder why it
– costs a fortune; and
– isn’t practical
There is a lot of recent history for that.
It’s interesting and in some ways I wish I was younger as the challenges will be immense.
Just read a bit on today’s article and it makes things a bit clearer.
The ambitious timeline set by the Ministry targets the deployment of the first UK submarines by the late 2030s, which will subsequently replace the existing Astute-Class vessels. Australia will receive its advanced submarines in the following decade, by the early 2040s.
So we get to determine a lot of the spec before Australia and to be fair the size of the PWR3 and length of the VPM determine the diameter of the pressure hull. So if we take it for granted that U.K will want a fatter, shorter hull than the US and an Astute size crew it shouldn’t be too difficult to come to a baseline design.
We will both use VPM, 21 inch Torpedoes, use USV’s and require similar crewing. So base design has to have the space for U.K or US weapon handling systems (unless we ditch Spearfish), and I’d design it from scratch to be possible to insert and extra plug in hull section for extra VPM.
The interesting conversations will be about the sensor fit and the long running UK/US argument regarding the location of the Hydroplanes (bows or Fin/Sail).
I suppose they may want somewhere to store the Barbeque and deck chars as well, but that is something they can figure out down under when outfitting their own 🥴
And I have no idea if the Australian Navy is dry or not these days or are they like the Yanks ? So beer store or not 🤔
Totally agree, in principle. Another legacy of Big Ben’s enlightened leadership?
I agree with that.
I just hope the high level spec team is small and a couple of Babcock best people are feeding in.
👍
Cross your fingers and pray.
No not really, it’s built on the shoulders of giants the relationship between the RN/USN hierarchy from the late 1950’s laid the foundations of an enduring respect and cooperative atmosphere.
Folks always think it was a one way process, but it wasn’t the U.K. was way ahead in sonar, sound deadening and motive propulsion.
BW was a great and clear thinking Politician but the groundwork was done decades ago.
Yes whatever the political differences one has to say the military cooperation (with a few exceptions) has been incredibly successful probably the most sustainably so in history. Great mutual respect.
Babcock and Submarinemaintenance?…shares in Superglue will take off.