I think a bunch of us here are hung up on your question. I suspect deleting the gas turbine and installing more diesels would save money. So would leaving a big hole where the mk 41 would fit (they are kinda expensive for what they do). Reusing the old gun wouldn't necessarily save money if a bunch of ammo would have to be ordered plus its magazine requires manpower whereas the T26 is fully automatic. There's no torpedoes on the T26 to delete, they've already been ditched one of the cost cutting purges. So what else could go? beats me.jimjo wrote:To be honest, I can't really see how a new design is going to be much cheaper than taking a T-26 hull, swapping the CODLAG system for a CODLOG, squeezing the MK41 VLS down to maybe 16 cells, not bothering with torpedo capability and using the T-23's 4.5 inch gun. These would effectively be the GP T-23's we have now (give or take a few capabilities), but with brand spanking new hulls.
Sounds to me like that would still be a very capable frigate platform without risking a new design that could end up just as costly as a T-26 but with a crappy LGP capability. Only benefit I can see to designing an entirely new vessel would be to maintain our national ship designing capability.
Just speculation of course, I'm not a military shipbuilder. Hopefully the supposed shipbuilding strategy coming next year will outline what direction we are going and why.
I suspect the design team will burn through a few hundred million to only find they can't design anything that's appreciably cheaper to build that meets RN specification/standards.
Maybe, and I'll throw this out as a random thought, seeing a major lifetime expense is the crew and a major thrust of any new design would be a much smaller crew (skinny manning), maybe instead of designing a new ship, they should spend their time designing systems that don't need manpower. If google can build a driverless car, the clever lads and lasses should be able to design a sailorless T26. Or one with say half the crew.