River Class (OPV) (RN)

Contains threads on Royal Navy equipment of the past, present and future.
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cockneyjock1974
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Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

Post by cockneyjock1974 »

xav wrote:Belgium's Latest OPV Pollux P902 Escorted and Monitored Russia Navy Submarine in EEZ
The Belgian Navy announced that the latest addition to its fleet, Offshore Patrol Vessel (OPV) Pollux (P902) escorted and monitored a Russian Navy submarine and a Silva class tug boat while they were transiting in Belgium's exclusive economic zone (EEZ).
...
Navy Recognition understands the submarine in question is Russia's new Project 636 (Varshavyanka) diesel-electric submarine (SSK) "B-261 Novorossiysk".
...
The Pollux OPV had taken over the ship of the Royal Netherlands Navy Zr Ms Johan de Witt LPD, who had followed the Russian submarine as it passed through their waters. After transiting in Belgian waters, Royal Navy OPV (River class) HMS Tyne took over and accompanied the Russian submarine into the English Channel.
http://www.navyrecognition.com/index.ph ... ew&id=3022

It is like a relay race Dutch pass the SSK to the Belgium who pass it to the British then likely French, Spanish, Portuguese etc...
Welcome to NATO lol.

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Re: RE: Re: Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers - News and Discussion

Post by Jdam »

Pseudo wrote:Remember folks even the USN only has 88
I'd largely agree with you, particularly if we end up keeping all seven of the River's for constabulary duties. Something bigger with a hangar more like the Khareef's would be preferable and a more reasonable way to spend £350m, but beggars can't be choosers and all that.
Is it still the plan to get rid of the rivers when the new ones come along?

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Re: RE: Re: Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers - News and Discussion

Post by Jessie »

Jdam wrote:
Pseudo wrote:Remember folks even the USN only has 88
I'd largely agree with you, particularly if we end up keeping all seven of the River's for constabulary duties. Something bigger with a hangar more like the Khareef's would be preferable and a more reasonable way to spend £350m, but beggars can't be choosers and all that.
Is it still the plan to get rid of the rivers when the new ones come along?
It's still an unknown, perhaps SDSR 2015 will shed some light on the future of the batch I rivers

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Re: RE: Re: RE: Re: Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers - News and Discussion

Post by Pseudo »

RetroSicotte wrote:
Pseudo wrote:
cockneyjock1974 wrote:Remember folks even the USN only has 88 surface escorts. We'll have 19 for two CBG's (if the whispers are true) pro rata including maintenance periods, we're holding our own. Ideally I would like 20 Frigs but we don't police 4/5ths of the globe anymore.
I'd largely agree with you, particularly if we end up keeping all seven of the River's for constabulary duties. Something bigger with a hangar more like the Khareef's would be preferable and a more reasonable way to spend £350m, but beggars can't be choosers and all that.
Had we gone for the Khareef's, I suspect it woulda been a lot higher than £350, given the "over a barrel" status BAE had the Government in for the OPV order.

That said, a class like that would be fun. I would post all about my ideas for it here but...well, not the thread for it.
IIRC the Khareef's were about £400m and we'd be deleting the Exocet's and Mica's from the design. So it should be doable at £350m, but yes, should be doable and the actual cost seem all too often to be entirely different things in UK procurement.

Maybe we should take this to the River thread.

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Re: Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers - News and Discussion

Post by RetroSicotte »

Not much to really discuss else, but remember the w Rivers to Brazil were only about £133m.

British Khareef would have been much much more then £350.

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Re: RE: Re: Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers - News and Discussion

Post by Ron5 »

RetroSicotte wrote:
Pseudo wrote:
cockneyjock1974 wrote:Remember folks even the USN only has 88 surface escorts. We'll have 19 for two CBG's (if the whispers are true) pro rata including maintenance periods, we're holding our own. Ideally I would like 20 Frigs but we don't police 4/5ths of the globe anymore.
I'd largely agree with you, particularly if we end up keeping all seven of the River's for constabulary duties. Something bigger with a hangar more like the Khareef's would be preferable and a more reasonable way to spend £350m, but beggars can't be choosers and all that.
Had we gone for the Khareef's, I suspect it woulda been a lot higher than £350, given the "over a barrel" status BAE had the Government in for the OPV order.

That said, a class like that would be fun. I would post all about my ideas for it here but...well, not the thread for it.
Your government required warship shipbuilding to be consolidated under one company as a requirement for the placing of the QE order so any "over the barrel" was not of Bae's doing. Your government wanted the monopoly so if you're going to bitch, bitch at the correct folks.

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Re: Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers - News and Discussion

Post by Ron5 »

RetroSicotte wrote:Not much to really discuss else, but remember the w Rivers to Brazil were only about £133m.

British Khareef would have been much much more then £350.
Why on earth would anyone outside of Russia or China, want the RN to buy a Khareef instead of a Type 26?? SMH.

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Re: RE: Re: Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers - News and Discussion

Post by Pseudo »

RetroSicotte wrote:Not much to really discuss else, but remember the w Rivers to Brazil were only about £133m.

Yes, but it's equally worth remembering that they were sold on the cheap and almost certainly at a loss because Trinidad and Tobago had backed out of the deal.
British Khareef would have been much much more then £350.
I'm not suggesting Khareef's exactly, I was simply saying something with a hangar and used the Khareef's as an example because they're a development of the River design that I would think to be about the right size even though the Forth class would have substantial differences such as the deletion of some of the armament.

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Re: Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers - News and Discussion

Post by shark bait »

Whilst the Khareef may look appealing, there wouldn't be room for a British crew onboard as I believe British standards of accommodation is much higher than Oman's

Rivers aren't great, but they aren't terrible either. They should be fine for releasing a frigate or auxilary from the Caribbean. Lack of hanger is a downside, but a ship that small can't effectively operate a helo anyway because it's too small. Theres hardly any room for maintenance, stores or fuel, same story for the Spanish BAM. If we wanted something that can operate a helo well on patrols we would be better off sending auxiliary's as we already do, or a proper frigate.
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Re: RE: Re: Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers - News and Discussion

Post by Pseudo »

shark bait wrote:Whilst the Khareef may look appealing, there wouldn't be room for a British crew onboard as I believe British standards of accommodation is much higher than Oman's
It's a good job that no one is suggesting we build Khareef's. What was suggested was River class OPV's with a hangar that would likely bear some similarity to the Khareef's because they're a based on the River design and have a hangar.

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Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

Post by shark bait »

A Khareef is pretty much a river with a hanger though. I think the ship would have to be substantially bigger than a river to operate a helo well, am by the time you've done that you may as well just take a T26 and leave off the heavy weapons.

I would like to see an additional 3 T26 that are a such, could call it a patrol variant or something. Then there is the option to upgrade later if there is ever the demand.
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Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

Post by ~UNiOnJaCk~ »

shark bait wrote:A Khareef is pretty much a river with a hanger though. I think the ship would have to be substantially bigger than a river to operate a helo well, am by the time you've done that you may as well just take a T26 and leave off the heavy weapons.

I would like to see an additional 3 T26 that are a such, could call it a patrol variant or something. Then there is the option to upgrade later if there is ever the demand.
Albeit a River with more firepower than a $500 million USN LCS!

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Re: RE: Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

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shark bait wrote:A Khareef is pretty much a river with a hanger though. I think the ship would have to be substantially bigger than a river to operate a helo well, am by the time you've done that you may as well just take a T26 and leave off the heavy weapons.

It is similar enough, but I would tend to think that it'll be the 3" gun, eight Exocet, dozen Mica and Smart-S radar and associated systems that wouldn't necessarily be on a Super River that'll contribute more to the cost than anything else.

I can see the point that an OPV is too small to operate a helicopter properly from, but I would still contend that it'd be a nice option to have if it's not going to cost a huge amount more than is already committed to the Forth class.
I would like to see an additional 3 T26 that are a such, could call it a patrol variant or something. Then there is the option to upgrade later if there is ever the demand.
We'll potentially have seven OPV's before we start building Type 26, I don't really see much point of three toothless Type 26's except to defer the cost of arming them, in which case I would put the case that the MoD would be better off paying to have them fully armed when constructed because it'll just cost more and take more time if you do it at refit. They'd certainly be a waste of money if you're just going to have them doing constabulary duties that an OPV would be perfectly capable of.

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Re: RE: Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

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Pseudo wrote: We'll potentially have seven OPV's before we start building Type 26, I don't really see much point of three toothless Type 26's except to defer the cost of arming them, in which case I would put the case that the MoD would be better off paying to have them fully armed when constructed because it'll just cost more and take more time if you do it at refit. They'd certainly be a waste of money if you're just going to have them doing c.onstabulary duties that an OPV would be perfectly capable of.

We might have 7 yes, but neither of them are excellent at anything. Their not excellent at being cheap and their not excellent at patrols. That's why I would like to see something better.

Also for my patrol T26 I didn't mean it would be toothless, there is just little need for an anti air system when patrolling the Caribbean, or circling the Scottish islands for example, ideally we should just have more frigates doing a proper job, I was just thinking of a creative cheaper model .
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Re: RE: Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

Post by marktigger »

shark bait wrote:
Pseudo wrote: We'll potentially have seven OPV's before we start building Type 26, I don't really see much point of three toothless Type 26's except to defer the cost of arming them, in which case I would put the case that the MoD would be better off paying to have them fully armed when constructed because it'll just cost more and take more time if you do it at refit. They'd certainly be a waste of money if you're just going to have them doing c.onstabulary duties that an OPV would be perfectly capable of.

We might have 7 yes, but neither of them are excellent at anything. Their not excellent at being cheap and their not excellent at patrols. That's why I would like to see something better.

Also for my patrol T26 I didn't mean it would be toothless, there is just little need for an anti air system when patrolling the Caribbean, or circling the Scottish islands for example, ideally we should just have more frigates doing a proper job, I was just thinking of a creative cheaper model .
so what happens if it has to be diverted from the Caribbean to somewhere there is an Air or sub surface threat that has been "Gapped" in order to save money?

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Re: RE: Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

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shark bait wrote:
Pseudo wrote: We'll potentially have seven OPV's before we start building Type 26, I don't really see much point of three toothless Type 26's except to defer the cost of arming them, in which case I would put the case that the MoD would be better off paying to have them fully armed when constructed because it'll just cost more and take more time if you do it at refit. They'd certainly be a waste of money if you're just going to have them doing c.onstabulary duties that an OPV would be perfectly capable of.

We might have 7 yes, but neither of them are excellent at anything. Their not excellent at being cheap and their not excellent at patrols. That's why I would like to see something better.
Well, my initial point was that thirteen frigates might be enough if we kept all seven River's. Sure more Type 26's would be great, but it seems budgetary extravagance is off the menu.
Also for my patrol T26 I didn't mean it would be toothless, there is just little need for an anti air system when patrolling the Caribbean, or circling the Scottish islands for example, ideally we should just have more frigates doing a proper job, I was just thinking of a creative cheaper model .
The thing is Frigates are even less excellent at being cheap, particularly where running costs are concerned. For instance, in 2013 it was reported to parliament that excluding crew costs on average a Type 23 cost £21.5m a year to run, while a River cost £2.9m.

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Re: RE: Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

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marktigger wrote: so what happens if it has to be diverted from the Caribbean to somewhere there is an Air or sub surface threat that has been "Gapped" in order to save money?
Admittedly that is the issue with the concept, to be honest its not one I've fully sold myself on yet, a proper frigate would of course be better.

In my mind it work similar to the general purpose version not taking anti sub patrols, the patrol variant just wouldn't do such tasks.
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Re: RE: Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

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Pseudo wrote: The thing is Frigates are even less excellent at being cheap, particularly where running costs are concerned. For instance, in 2013 it was reported to parliament that excluding crew costs on average a Type 23 cost £21.5m a year to run, while a River cost £2.9m.
I'm not so sure that with 7 patrol vessels, 13 frigates would be enough since the rivers are so less capable.

I think by the time you extend a river and stick a hanger on to make it usefull, you have yourself a light frigate (and I really dislike light frigates) your almost at the cost of a real frigate, especially when costs building operating a new class are considered.

Frigates aren't cheap but they are at least excellent pieces of equipment, a river is neither.
Frigates give us a strong international presence and make us a powerful ally, a river can do non of that, neither could a river with a hanger.



Right now the vessels of the royal navy are very capable and very expensive, which means we have a small fleet. It is easy for people to see this a recognise that a two tier fleet, with some smaller slightly cheaper frigates, can go some way to increasing numbers again. It boils down to a simple quality vs quantity argument. However having a high quantity is not as good as having high quality. Right now our escort fleet is excellent, ready to be deployed anywhere and take on any challenge with high survivability, the same cannot be said for a light frigate.

A light frigate cannot go anywhere and survive, it does not bring power or credibility to the British armed forces, it just brings numbers, and the numbers are not worth much if they cannot pose a credible deterrent to an adversary. Why do I think they are not credible? simply because they are too small. The T26 is designed to be big because that's how large it needs to be to fit all the war fighting kit on-board, and operate it effectively. Trying to duplicate that on a small ship will lead to compromise, which will lead to weaknesses. There will either be not enough kit to provide a full defence, or not enough stores to hold that defence for example.

I can recognise there is a need to relieve frigates from simple constabulary patrols, but this can be fulfilled by a much simpler and cheaper vessel than a light frigate. I would rather the patrol vessels be dirt cheap vessels like the border force cutters and Scottish fisheries vessels. Moving up, for work abroad I really like the SD Victoria. Ultimately the type of ship does matter, the price does. It need to be dirt cheap, cheaper than the rivers, and than divert the cash into the real ships and get as many frigates a possible. (16 is reasonable IMO)

The royal navy tried a lightly armed cheaper frigate, the type 23, but quickly decided it wouldn't be able to hold its own so it developed into the excellent ships they are today.

It might seem like ive gone off on a bit of a tangent, but I just cant get on board with the idea of spending extra money on patrol boats. Just keep them as a cheap boat!
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Re: RE: Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

Post by Pseudo »

shark bait wrote:I'm not so sure that with 7 patrol vessels, 13 frigates would be enough since the rivers are so less capable.
The point is that the River's aren't a replacement for more frigates, they're there to do the low intensity stuff that you'd otherwise have to assign a frigate to, so that the frigates are available for tasks that they're better suited to.
Frigates aren't cheap but they are at least excellent pieces of equipment, a river is neither.
It would seem to me that River's are significantly cheaper when you stop focusing solely on build cost and start considering the big bill, lifetime costs. OPV's aren't meant to be on par with frigates, they're meant to do the low intensity work that is a waste of money to have frigates doing.
I think by the time you extend a river and stick a hanger on to make it usefull, you have yourself a light frigate (and I really dislike light frigates) your almost at the cost of a real frigate, especially when costs building operating a new class are considered.
No, you have a slightly larger OPV with a hangar. When you consider that the three vessels of the Khareef Class (which would be about the same size and a good place to start on the design since it is a development of the River Class itself) cost £400m in 2007. I think that it's reasonable to expect that they would have been significantly cheaper were it not for the installed armament that an OPV wouldn't require. We're now spending £350m on three Forth Group River's. I simply consider the utility that a hangar provides is probably worth the expense since we're going to buy three new OPV's anyway we might as well get ones that can support a helicopter because that will allow them to perform a greater range of tasks which in turn means that those tasks won't have to be performed by a frigate or other larger vessel with higher running costs.

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Re: RE: Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

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Pseudo wrote: The point is that the River's aren't a replacement for more frigates, they're there to do the low intensity stuff that you'd otherwise have to assign a frigate to, so that the frigates are available for tasks that they're better suited to.

I think its a sensible thing to be doing that. However its the auxiliary fleet that is pulling its weight and picking up the slack, so its relieving the auxiliaries not so much the frigates. (Although in some instances maybe not, a river will not be much good replacing a bay class in the gulf). With the extra rivers the escort fleet will still be over stretched, and that's before we have 2 carriers in the ocean.


I would also not compare an Omani vessel to a royal navy vessel, It might have been built in the UK, but I highly doubt it would be something the royal navy would accept.


If we are comparing numbers between types, I find it useful go by crew size as crew size and operational costs are strongly related.

Image
River is 36,
T26 is 118,
Therefore those 3 rivers could afford us an extra T26, which I think would be much more valuable to the UK.

Its a shame the situation has played out as it is, but based on my methodology I would opt to sell the original 3 rivers.
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Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

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What does your model say with this input of 679 complement? (included the preceding para from an interview with the head of Fleet Air Arm because it is also interesting; medium being smaller than Chinook, which however have a huge swept area with their propellers):

"Studies are being carried out by the U.K. Defense Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) to see if the ship can operate safely with more landing spots than the six currently planned. Harding suggests that by adding a further four landing spots, the ship will be able to lift a company-sized unit of troops (up to 250 soldiers) in a single group lift using medium helicopters. “This is possible,” Harding said. “We just need to decide how we paint the lines on the flight deck.”

Significant work has gone into reducing the manpower levels of the ship. Current crew complement for the vessel alone is 679 sailors, compared to 3,200 for a Nimitz-class carrier of the U.S. Navy. Harding said such savings were possible through the use of greater automation. He described the weapon-handling system as similar to that found in an “Amazon.com warehouse.”["]
Ever-lasting truths: Multi-year budgets/ planning by necessity have to address the painful questions; more often than not the Either-Or prevails over Both-And.
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Re: RE: Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

Post by Pseudo »

shark bait wrote:If we are comparing numbers between types, I find it useful go by crew size as crew size and operational costs are strongly related.

Image
River is 36,
T26 is 118,
Therefore those 3 rivers could afford us an extra T26, which I think would be much more valuable to the UK.
I'd say that it's not a great exchange if it means that two other Type 26's regularly have to be deployed to tasks that could have been accomplished by River's because then you've got the expense of paying for 354 crew members to do a job that could have been accomplished by 108 along with having two less Type 26's available for more suitable duties such as participating in exercises, escort duties etc.

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Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

Post by marktigger »

could we get more for our money if the competition was opened up?

so Appledore, the dutch,the spannish, the germans , Australians, the americans even the Koreans could bid and it wasn't BaE intimidation deciding what is built?

I'm not a huge fan of using the RFA ships as pseudo frigates but do think there is mileage in them supporting smaller vessels on stations like West Indies guard ship carrying the disaster relief package and elements that enhance capabilities .

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Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

Post by rec »

marktigger wrote:could we get more for our money if the competition was opened up?

so Appledore, the dutch,the spannish, the germans , Australians, the americans even the Koreans could bid and it wasn't BaE intimidation deciding what is built?

I'm not a huge fan of using the RFA ships as pseudo frigates but do think there is mileage in them supporting smaller vessels on stations like West Indies guard ship carrying the disaster relief package and elements that enhance capabilities .
Yes, I think we could and I wish we would, For example by having 10 Type 26s, and building under licence at another yard (camil Laird, Harland and Wolfs, Appledore) a Dutch or Danish frigate and opv design. Yes I really it then becomes hi/lo mix. But some continental ships seem to be better armed than ours. I was always impressed witht he Dutch Lenaders post refit, they still retained a gun ( a 3inch and not a 4.5 inch, ) had 8 harpoon as opposed to 4 exocet, and still carried a Lynx and 2 sets of STWS.

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Re: river I/I.5 and II patrol vessels

Post by shark bait »

marktigger wrote:could we get more for our money if the competition was opened up?

so Appledore, the dutch,the spannish, the germans , Australians, the americans even the Koreans could bid and it wasn't BaE intimidation deciding what is built?

I'm not a huge fan of using the RFA ships as pseudo frigates but do think there is mileage in them supporting smaller vessels on stations like West Indies guard ship carrying the disaster relief package and elements that enhance capabilities .
We could, I'm sure BAE could build them quicker and cheaper for us, but we are in an unfortunate position where we had to buy some ships that we don't really want or need.

Its the result of that national shipbuilding strategy, where they forgot to put in the stratagey, and only included the contract with BAE.

We could do with a real stratagey which would stop cockups like this!
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