German Navy Experiences 'LCS Syndrome' In Spades As New Frigate Fails Sea Trials (arstechnica.com)

schwit1 shares a report from Ars Technica, highlighting the problems the Germany Navy is facing right now. It has no working submarines due to a chronic repair parts shortage, and its newest ships face problems so severe that the first of the class failed its sea trials and was returned to the shipbuilders in December. From the report: The Baden-Wurttemberg class frigates were ordered to replace the 1980s-era Bremen class ships, all but two of which have been retired already. At 149 meters (488 feet) long with a displacement of 7,200 metric tons (about 7,900 U.S. tons), the Baden-Wurttembergs are about the size of destroyers and are intended to reduce the size of the crew required to operate them. Like the Zumwalt, the frigates are intended to have improved land attack capabilities -- a mission capability largely missing from the Deutsche Marine's other post-unification ships. The new frigate was supposed to be a master of all trades -- carrying Marines to deploy to fight ashore, providing gunfire support, hunting enemy ships and submarines, and capable of being deployed on far-flung missions for up to two years away from a home port. As with the U.S. Navy's LCS ships, the German Navy planned to alternate crews -- sending a fresh crew to meet the ship on deployment to relieve the standing crew.

Instead, the Baden-Wurttemberg now bears the undesirable distinction of being the first ship the German Navy has ever refused to accept after delivery. In fact, the future of the whole class of German frigates is now in doubt because of the huge number of problems experienced with the first ship during sea trials. So the Baden-Wurttemberg won't be shooting its guns at anything for the foreseeable future (and neither will the Zumwalt for the moment, since the U.S. Navy cancelled orders for their $800,000-per-shot projectiles). System integration issues are a major chunk of the Baden-Wurrenberg's problems. About 90 percent of the ship's systems are so new that they've never been deployed on a warship in fact -- they've never been tested together as part of what the U.S. Navy would call "a system of systems." And all of that new hardware and software have not played well together -- particularly with the ship's command and control computer system, the Atlas Naval Combat System (ANCS). schwit1 adds: "Perhaps most inexcusable, the ship doesn't even float right. It has a permanent list to starboard."

Comments

LCS

[arth1]

In case anyone wonders what LCS stands for, it's "Littoral Combat Ship". Not that everyone knows what that means either, but it boils down to a jack-of-all-trades ship that's intended for close-to-shore operations, and not the deep seas.

And yeah, they're the F-135s of the ocean. Overpriced, delayed, problems doing some expected things, and loved by those who love Swiss army knives, entertainment systems and all-you-can-eat buffets.

Re:LCS

[Anonymous Coward]

LCS syndrome backgrounder.

LCS is "Littoral Combat Ship". This is an idea that seemingly has some merit, but the ships have had many problems.

There is a tendency in the US armed forces to keep making things bigger, and fancier, and thus more expensive. The biggest navy ships (aside from aircraft carriers which are a special case) are the destroyers, which cost something like $2 billion per ship. They need a lot of crew as well, and thus are expensive to operate.

So the Navy started thinking that the Cold War was over, maybe we don't need every ship to be super awesome, and it would sure be handy to have a lot more ships. If you need a ship to interdict drug shipments, a destroyer is serious overkill... Thus the LCS.

The LCS was supposed to cost around a quarter of a billion dollars (i.e. 1/8 as much as a destroyer), have a small crew due to lots of automation, and be able to do several different jobs. Oh, and be able to operate in shallow waters and even rivers (thus the "littoral" in the name). The "do several different jobs" part was going to be due to swappable "mission modules". You have lots of mine-sweepers, don't need so many, and need one more anti-submarine ship? Take a mine-sweeper LCS into port, pull off the mine-sweeping mission module, dock on the anti-sub module, and swap crews.

Also, two shipyards submitted one design each. And the Navy decided not to choose one, but to request roughly equal numbers from both shipyards.

Critics pointed out that these ships were not nearly as tough as older designs. Also they were designed with rather limited attack options (including a total lack of "over the horizon" attacks). The whole point of the LCS is that you can send them off by themselves to do odd jobs, but against any opponent stronger than a drug smuggler they would get in trouble fast.

And China and Russia are starting to look like we could end up at war with either or both. The LCS was designed to fight drug smugglers and maybe speedboats but not modern navy ships.

On top of the problems with the design, the ships themselves have been trouble-prone. Engine trouble, corrosion problems, all sorts of issues.

And of course they cost way more than promised, about double. So they are about a half billion dollars or 1/4 the cost of a destroyer. Also, they need more crew than the original plan. And, the fast swapping of modules doesn't seem to work very well, so current plans are to build the ship, attach one module, and that ship will use that module for its whole service life.

Now the US Navy has decided that they really need a new "frigate". They are calling it "FFG(X)", i.e. new experimental frigate class. This would be a ship less expensive and capable than a destroyer, but more capable than an LCS (definitely designed to be able to fight modern navy ships). The companies making the LCS ships are saying "hey, we can up-gun these things... just bolt on more weapons and stuff." But now the ships would be way over design weight, and one of the good things about them, the fast speed, would be compromised.

So the Navy is looking at other options for the frigate.

You know you can trust me because I'm a total armchair expert who has never been in the navy and doesn't know what he's talking about. But I read a lot of stuff. Anyway IMHO any acceptable frigate must have VLS cells... that's "Vertical Launch System" and the LCS ships were designed without them. Destroyers have lots of these. If the new frigate has a few, they can be loaded with a mix: some missiles for attacking targets on land, some missiles for defense against attacking aircraft, etc. A frigate with air defense, ship to ship defense, and some land attack missiles can be sent off on missions by itself. Even better if you send a couple of them to watch each other's back, I guess. The point is to keep using the Navy standard VLS modules and missiles, not some wacky new standard peculiar to the new frigate.

Read more about the FFG(X) proposals:

Re:Das Boot

[gfxguy]

Wikipedia:

The littoral combat ship (LCS) is a dual-class of relatively small surface vessels intended for operations in the littoral zone (close to shore) by the United States Navy.

No, I shouldn't have had to look it up. This is a nerd site - we know RAM, ROM, IC, STEM, we don't all know all the U.S. Navy lingo.

Re:Das Boot

[religionofpeas]

That explanation still does not explain what exactly the 'syndrome' is.