US Navy Virginia Class Nuclear Attack Submarines

Jeff Head said:

The Virginia Class submarines are one of the best examples of how a large military procurement should work. I was honored to have worked with General Dynamics Electric Boat on this project back in the nineties at the start.

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hmmm, then the more quiet between Seawolf or Virginia or maybe egal ?

I have read that
Actually one Virginia enter in service by year.
The Minnesota has been budgeted on FY 2008, enter in service 2013. 5 years of difference.
FY 2011 is the first year where 2 Virginia is budgeted, from 2016 2 enter in service by year.

The next for 2014, the 11th NORTH DAKOTA, from 2016 2 commissionned by year.
Definitely the more quiet sub with Seawolf, Astute and maybe Yasen for him no sure.

Wall Street Journal said:

GROTON, Conn., Oct. 29, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- General Dynamics Electric Boat will christen North Dakota (SSN-784), the U.S. Navy's newest and most advanced nuclear-attack submarine, at its shipyard here on Saturday, Nov. 2, at 11 a.m. Electric Boat is a wholly owned subsidiary of General Dynamics (NYSE: GD).

Katie Fowler, wife of retired Vice Adm. Jeff Fowler, is the ship's sponsor. The event's principal speaker is Vice Adm. Michael J. Connor, commander -- Submarine Forces.

The submarine North Dakota is the 11th ship of the Virginia class, the first U.S. Navy combatants designed for the post-Cold War era. Unobtrusive, non-provocative and connected with land, air, sea and space-based assets, North Dakota and the other Virginia-class submarines are equipped to wage multi-dimensional warfare around the globe, providing the Navy with continued dominance in coastal waters or the open ocean.

Electric Boat and its construction partner, Newport News Shipbuilding, have delivered 10 Virginia-class submarines to the Navy, and have contracts for eight additional ships.

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In addition to being the 11th Virginia class overall, the USS North Dakota is also the first Block III boat where the bow of the vessel has been significantly redesigned to save cost and increase flexibility and efficiency.

The 12 VLS tubes on current Virginia Class boats (the ten Block I and Block II boats) are replaced by two Vertical Payload modules that each hold six Tomahawk cruise missiles. These "six packs," share technology with the Ohio Class SSGNs where the large SLBM Trident tubes were converted to launch seven Tomahawk missiles each. This allows innovations on either platform to be incorporated into the otherduring major maintenance periods. This innovation will also be used extensively later, when the Ohio Class SSGNs are retired for new build VIrginia's will have their hulls lengthened to provide an additional four Vetrtcial Payload modules to signficantly increase their mssile carrying load and provide SSGN type capabilities spread out over more vessels.

In addition, the Bow Sonar array is going from an air-backed sonar sphere to a water-backed Large Aperture Bow (LAB) array. This eliminates the hundreds of SUBSAFE penetrations that help maintain required pressure in the air-backed system. The LAB Array has 2 primary components: the passive array, which will provide improved performance, and a medium-frequency active array. It utilizes transducers from the Sea Wolf class that are that are designed to last the life of the hull, reducing maintenance costs significantly.

Another 25 innovative design changes are incoprorated into the Block III bow redesign and altogehter, with the other chances, will cumulatively save $39 million in construction for each succeeding boat, as well as signifcant maintenance costs over the life of the ships.

I complete the interesting technical explanation of Jeff

Two advantages :
Modules can be prepared in advance and it is much easier and faster to insert than doing it separately for each missile.

FORBIN said:

I complete the interesting technical explanation of Jeff

Two advantages :
Modules can be prepared in advance and it is much easier and faster to insert than doing it separately for each missile.

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so these "six pack" magazines are presumably the same as those used in the SSGN conversion Ohio's right? Then in a hypothetical could the USN use one of these Virginia boats as a two shot ssbn?

TerraN_EmpirE said:

so these "six pack" magazines are presumably the same as those used in the SSGN conversion Ohio's right? Then in a hypothetical could the USN use one of these Virginia boats as a two shot ssbn?

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Same technology...but not the same modules. The Ohio modules are deeper and carry seven Tomahawks. They could not make the modules that large on the bow of the Virginia class boats...so they have 6-packs instead.

The plan calls for later Block of the Viirginias (beginning with Block V boats) to get a lengthened hull and add four more larger modules that can hold seven Tomahawks each. This will coincide with the decommissioning of the Ohio SSGNs. This will mean those future Virginias, probably 12 of them at least, will be hybrid attack submarines and guided-missile submarines SSN/SSGNs with a capability to carry and launchb 40 SLCMs each.

Now, the four Ohios can technically carry quite a bit more, being able to carry up to 154 SLCMs each times four SSGNs (meaning a whopping 616 missiles). But when one is out for maintenance, you lose a full fourth of that total. While 12 Virginia SSN/SSGNs will be able to carry 480 missiles total, they will be able to go more places, and either mainteance or any other damage or loss of a vessel will not have nearly as great an impact. And they may build more than 12...possibly18 or 20 of them.

Time will tell.

Okay so no violation of SALT. Although I am still betting this could offer other roles for example the potential for submarine launched UAVs a concept that has interest in SSGN, special operations equipment lockers maybe even USVs. Virginia class is really a versatile craft it has so much potential.

main thing about about Virgina Class especially the later boats is the cost and time it is taking to get them into service added to that the overall maintanence to keep them operating over the lifetime of these boats is all coming down

previously these kind of things were not that high on the agenda but now almost every military peice of hardware is designed and built to minimize cost, from Carriers to Aircraft

these newer classes are more efficient, more effective and can do the the job better than the previous class

say they built 20 Block II and III boats saving $50 million per boat, thats $1 billion saving, over 25 years that can be even higher, spread this type of work out over a entire fleet and you have a serious saving, enough to invest in other parts of the branches which could bring further innovations to designs, thats called development, improving and keeping on top of the game

plus SSN these days are not just hunter killers, they can do special opps, intelligance gathering, land attack and many other roles, we can see SSN is way forward for every major navy

asif iqbal said:

...the cost and time it is taking to get them into service added to that the overall maintanence to keep them operating over the lifetime of these boats is all coming down

these newer classes are more efficient, more effective and can do the the job better than the previous class

say they built 20 Block II and III boats saving $50 million per boat, thats $1 billion saving, over 25 years that can be even

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Yep. GD Electric Boat has always been very proficient. These large, expensive Virginia Class nuclear attack submarines show that such projects can indeed be delivered under budget, and ahead of schedule without sacrificing one bit of capability, quality or high technology.