Thread 63989066

All better than Iran

>shows off concepts
>slides date to 2001
What did anon mean by this

>>63989107
Where do you see 2001

I coomed.

>>63989140
The fact each squadron gets 6-9 of them as well

>>63989066 (OP)
This idea is not new

>>63989107
Not OP
Nice to know that escort carriers got an update.
It's a good plan to have on the shelf for if rapid expansion is required.

>>63989172
Considering that the USS Langley (CV-1) was a converted bulk carrier vessel, yeah I'd say it isn't.

>>63989066 (OP)
We also have the ESB-3 which is a very real thing, and not a concept.
I don't think most people really understand just how useful a $660 million converted Alaska-class oil tanker can be, when it can host Ospreys and Sea Dragons along with an operational command center and logistics hub that can do 24/7 mine clearing.

>>63989265
Actually a fuckton of carriers of all navies in WW2 were conversions of cargo ships, liners or whatever.

>>63989330
I think people just shit on the idea that unless its top of the line its nothing
Essentially everything has to be this hyper expensive macho looking machine or else its seen as useless and subpar
Gotta be new and shiny

>>63989066 (OP)
What is this like a workaround of our lack of shipbuilding facilities in case we get into a hot war with China?

>>63989340
Big ships for big flat tops.

>>63989345
Logistically, it's extremely cool. It has modules that can change it from a minesweeper to an operations hub, it can serve as a mobile command post, it contains enough fuel and food to supply many ships, you can put Apaches or Ospreys on it, Sea Dragons with mine sleds, etc. Nobody else has anything like it.
The only thing it can't really do is support F-35Bs

>>63989350
Literally this is what I'm fucking talking about

>>63989373
That last part is why I can imagine some heads dont like it

>>63989374
Don't those sluts have a VSTOL variant? That can work on a ramp carrier right?

>>63989390
I think

>>63989066 (OP)
Welcome back escort carriers

So say for whatever reason we needed to slap a bunch of these things together. where do we get aircraft for them?

>>63989431
I mean
Its easier to make planes than ships
Even if you just needed helicopter carriers

>>63989431
There's a lot of points of US industry you can criticize, but we make a lot of planes

>>63989340
No it was mostly Japanese and pre-war American/British carriers. Cruisers were probably used to convert most carriers not cargo ships. Saratoga and Lexington were cruiser conversions. I think several of the Jap ships were cruiser conversions. Enterprise and Yorktown and onward were all carriers built from scratch except for small escort carriers.

>>63989469
There were way more escort carriers made from cargo ship designs than all aircraft carriers made by all countries during the war. The US built over 100 alone.

>>63989479
escort carriers like I said. Not fleet carriers.

>>63989486
By your own definition, most cruiser conversions wouldn't really count because they are light carriers. The ones that became fleet carriers were either battlecruiser or battleship conversions.

>>63989380
>That last part is why I can imagine some heads dont like it
they'll get what they get to a degree, escort carriers in WW2 were limited to F4Fs and derivatives long after they were replaced by F6Fs on fleet carriers. They will still fill a role

>>63989510
Yeah exactly.
Again the military is full of jackasses with the pockets lined up with arms dealer money
So unfortunately I don't think well see converted carriers

What are the odds once we get Small scale modular nuclear reactors to a decent point they'll throw one on the Lewis B Pullers so they can try some stuff out.

>>63989330
>>63989345
It's more so that converting existing tankers into carriers makes sense as a stop-gap method in wartime or because of convenience and it's comical to watch Iran tout their aircraft carrier being great while being a conversion because they're actually incapable of making an aircraft carrier from the ground up

>>63989340
these small Japanese flattops are peak, they should've converted a lot of liners to CV's before the war started but they got on that program too late.

Many of Japan's converted aircraft carriers were not usable as fleet carriers because they lacked hydraulic catapults to compensate for their slow speed, and the idea of using them as convoy escorts or hunter-killer groups was also delayed.

>>63989950
I guess

>>63989431
World's largest aerospace manufacturing sector goes brrrrrrr

>>63989066 (OP)
>concepts for Converted Cargo Ship Carriers
Aren't Mercy and Comfort already cargo ships?

>>63989950
These are brand new purpose built Alaska-class oil tankers, they're not anything special besides purpose-built mobile expeditionary bases

>>63990309
>World's largest aerospace manufacturing sector goes brrrrrrr
More like hrrrmmmm
It's a well tuned machine just quietly humming along and indistinguishable from background noise unless you pay attention.

i like iran's with the ballistic missiles on the deck. us putting dark eagle or prsm on a deck in a similar way would be useful.

in many ways, i think converted carriers and arsenal ships (q-ships) are often a better option than very expensive and high value units that will just be attrited in a peer war (or you're massively over-matched), since modern munitions are so capable and lethal, or you can't lose said high value units to less capable forces because they won't be around to use against peers.

>>63989066 (OP)
>>63989134
These are Bush era concepts which eventually sort of half informed whet ended up being Expeditionary Sea Bases(ESBs).

ESBs are Alaska Class oil tankers with the tanks chopped out and a flight deck built above. They are extreme budget aircraft carriers for supporting special ops shit in the middle of fucking nowhere. The lower deck gives you waterline access and lets you stack a huge amount of random crap so you don't constantly need to fly in supplies. The flight deck lets you operate a bunch of rotary wing aircraft, including Ospreys. The forward structure is a large enclosed hangar for the aircraft.

The design philosophy is pretty obvious if you start looking at them closely. Air defenses? No, too expensive. Military damage control standards? No, too expensive. Elevator to get stuff from the lower deck to the flight deck? No, too expensive, cut out a section of the deck and use a crane. Crew? Small and mostly civilian. It's an oil tanker with the minimum modifications needed to make it useful in some low intensity military contexts.

Why? Because you get a 80,000 ton ship which costs less than a frigate.

i also think the armed offshore trawler concept would still be useful. you can put on himars-tier for anti-ship and land attack, mobile sam systems for aaw, or bolt on anti-shipping missiles, depending on what you want to do at the time.

basically a light corvette.

>>63990784
>ESB 4.png
something tells me you got the number wrong desu

>>63990834
Hey, retard. What's the most expensive bits of a ship?

I'll give you a clue. It isn't the hull.

>>63990997
you might not know this, but shipbuilding in the us is utterly terrible, and using himars, nasams, or even an abrams wheeled onto the stern, is the expensive part all done.

>>63991032
No it isn't. Unless you like salt water in your electronics. You would have to marinise those systems.

>>63991130
they just need more swabbing, no biggie. whilst they're better designed for it, i remember when they put lav-25s on helo carriers for added defense. driving one on the back of a trawler turns your trawler into a coastal or offshore patrol boat.

during wartime, there's never enough ships, and ww2 was full of armed trawlers, q-ships, repurposed carriers and many coastal defense ships/boats, and in higher numbers than the purpose-built blue water warships..

>>63990784
Ngl looks bettet than Iran's

>>63991130
So far as i'm aware the ESB's are already meant to be command centers, at that point it's just a case of finding somewhere on the ESB to sit a containerized weapon system and hooking it into what the ESB already has sensor suite wise.

>>63991813
ESBs are minimal floating docks designed for GWOT-era global policing, they have jack shit for radar as you might notice so what "sensors"?

>>63992725
Not necessarily, they're forward expeditionary bases that can do logistical support way cheaper than what we currently have. Yeah, they can be used for GWOT-era global policing, but what they're really useful for is supporting island chain activities out in the middle of the pacific when the Chinese keep blowing up runways and we need to keep sending in crews to repave them and restock them with fuel overnight.
A few of these are going to be the MVP for keeping the Chiggers on Chiner's ass in the fight.

>>63990784
It's mainly for escorting convoys and as a mobile repair base. During battles, it is useful as emergency landing carriers.

>>63989172
No, it isn't.