Warships whose commissioning is on hold will test a solution to a “class design defect” affecting all the littoral combat ships at Naval Station Mayport, Navy officials have concluded.
The Navy decided last month to stop taking delivery of new LCS because of a problem in the ships’ system for merging power from multiple engines to move the vessels at the rapid speeds they’re designed for.
The decision left vessels that had already completed Navy acceptance trials littoral combat ships that were built to be the USS Minneapolis-Saint Paul and USS Cooperstown waiting at a Wisconsin shipyard while engineers drafted plans to fix a problem in a mechanism called the combining gear.
With Ships Commissioning Delayed, New Mayport LCS to Test Answer to Class Design Defect
The USS Minneapolis-Saint Paul is launched into the Menominee River from Fincanteiri Marinette Marine in Marinette Wis., on Saturday, June 15, 2019. (Rick Gebhard/The Eagle Herald via AP)
16 Feb 2021
Warships whose commissioning is on hold will test a solution to a “class design defect” affecting all the littoral combat ships at Naval Station Mayport, Navy officials have concluded.
The Navy decided last month to stop taking delivery of new LCS because of a problem in the ships’ system for merging power from multiple engines to move the vessels at the rapid speeds they’re designed for.
The USS Gerald R. Ford’s new systems are crucial to justifying the expense of what’s now a four-vessel program intended to replace the current Nimitz class of aircraft carriers.
Navy’s Priciest Carrier Ever Struggles to Get Jets On, Off Deck Bloomberg 1/9/2021 Tony Capaccio
(Bloomberg) Aircraft takeoff and landing systems on the USS Gerald R. Ford remain unreliable and break down too often more than three years after the $13.2 billion carrier was delivered, according to the Pentagon’s top tester.
The latest assessment of the costliest warship ever built “remains consistent” with previous years, director of testing Robert Behler said in his new summary of the program obtained by Bloomberg News before its release in an annual report.
“Poor or unknown reliability of new technology systems critical for flight operations,” including its $3.5 billion electromagnetic launch system and advanced arresting gear, could “adversely affect” the carrier’s ability to generate sorties, he said.