27 March 2001

Major equipment selections announced for Type 45

'By JNI Editor Kathryn Shaw

BAE Systems, Prime Contractor for the UK Royal Navy's (RN's) new Type 45 destroyers, has announced an extensive range of contracts and equipment supplier selections for major subsystems. Some £250 million (US$367m) of systems contracts have been awarded for the first batch of three ships.

The RN plans to have a class of 12 Anti-Air Warfare destroyers to replace the ageing Type 42 destroyers from late 2007. The primary role of the class is air defence, although it will also have an anti-submarine warfare (ASW) capability. The 7,200-ton ships will be fitted with the UK variant of the Principal Anti-Air Missile System (PAAMS), for which a trinational £1.3 billion full-scale engineering development and initial production contract was signed in August 1999.

Under a £1.2 billion Demonstration for Manufacture contract awarded last December, BAE Systems, working in conjunction with the Defence Procurement Agency (DPA), is responsible for the design, development and delivery of the ships, along with elements of support. Apart from PAAMS, BAE Systems Prime Contract Office (PCO), based in Bristol, is responsible for almost all major equipment selections. The following contracts were awarded:

• A team of BAE Systems Combat and Radar Systems (CaRS) and Alenia Marconi Systems (AMS) Integrated System Division (a partnership known as Team 45) has been awarded a c£50 million contract to supply the Combat Management System (CMS) for the first three ships. The CMS will take existing command and weapons system applications from the current Type 23 and Type 42 ships, while integrating new commercial off-the-shelf hardware and software. The Type 45 CMS will integrate the activities of PAAMS, and co-ordinate and control the activities of the other sensor and weapons. Within the CMS contract, Team 45 will be responsible for supplying the Command System, the Video Distribution System, the Secondary Data Display, the Command Support System and tactical Datalink for the first three ships, and the shore-based development sites.
  
  
• Team 45 (led by AMS), has also been awarded a £7 million contract to provide a Fast Ethernet-based Data Transfer System (DTS), which will connect the various elements of the combat system - including the weapons and sensors. The first DTS should be delivered by July 2001.
  
  
• Thales Communications (with BAE Systems Avionics and Raytheon) has been chosen by the PCO to act as prime contractor and systems design authority for the Fully Integrated Communications System (FICS) in a contract worth £38.1 million. The FICS will also use existing technology, reducing risk and expenditure. Like the CMS and the DTS, the FICS will be an open systems design to enable cost-effective upgrade throughout the ships' in-service life.
  
  
• Northrop Grumman and Rolls Royce plc have been a awarded an £84 million contract to supply 12 25MW WR-21 inter-cooled recuperated marine gas turbines for the first six ships. Northrop Grumman is prime contractor for the WR-21 engine programme, with overall responsibility for engineering and systems integration; Rolls Royce is designing and developing the gas generator and power turbine. The order for the full six WR-21 shipsets has been placed on the grounds that an identifiable cost benefit existed in placing a larger order.
  
  
• ALSTOM Power Conversion Ltd has been selected to supply the direct-drive Integrated Electric Propulsion (IEP) system for the first three ships, in a deal worth around £40 million. The contract includes 20MW advanced induction motors, pulse-width-modulated converter devices, 20MW alternators, 2MW diesel generators and ships service transformers.
  
  
• The Platform Management System (PMS) will be supplied by Litton Marine Systems, teamed with Rockwell Automation. The PMS provides machinery control and surveillance facilities, as well as damage surveillance and control for the ship. Also, for the first time, the PMS provides direct information interfaces for other major systems via the DTS and FICS Local Area Network.
  
  
• Raytheon Systems Ltd (RSL) has been selected to supply the Navigation System and major components of the Integrated Bridge for the first three ships in a contract worth £12 million. RSL, supported by Raytheon Marine GmbH and SML Technologies, will provide the navigation radars, Electronic Chart, Display and Information Systems, Inertial Navigation subsystems and a Data Distribution subsystem.

Procurement activities are underway for other key elements of the Type 45 combat system, with a number of other contracts due to be awarded by the PCO later this year, including:

• Successor Identification Friend-or-Foe (SIFF - sole-source with Raytheon);
• Electronic Support Measures (ESM - tenders received last December);
• Meteorological and oceanographic (METOC) equipment (tenders received in early March);
• Sonar;
• and Electro-optical gun control system (tenders received in mid-March - check).

The procurement strategy for the small calibre gun and Quick Pointing Device remains under study.

The ships will be fitted with the 4.5in Mk 8 Mod 1 medium-calibre gun system for shore bombardment, supplied to the programme as Government Furnished Equipment (GFE). Other GFE items will include the Outfit DLF and Outfit DLH decoy systems.

The Long-Range Radar (LRR) for the Type 45 ships is the S1850M from AMS, a modified version of Thales' SMART-L radar. The LRR, which extends the ships' range of air surveillance, it is to be supplied as part of the PAAMS contract, along with the SAMPSON Multi-Function Radar, also an integral part of PAAMS. The PAAMS system also consists of the 48-silo SYLVER Vertical Launch System (VLS) that can launch the Aster 15 surface-to-air missile (SAM) and the longer-range Aster 30 SAM.

In addition to the sonar systems, the Type 45's ASW capability will initially be provided by the Lynx HMA Mk 8 helicopter equipped with Sting Ray anti-submarine torpedoes. The ships will also be equipped to carry the Surface Ship Torpedo Defence (SSTD) system, which is being procured from the DPA Torpedo Countermeasures project team.

The Type 45's combat system was designed with through-life considerations in mind, to accept various combat system enhancements should the RN request them. Such options include:

• An improved Electronic Warfare (EW) suite incorporating an active jammer, and improved EW command and control;
• An extended-range gun or additional VLS cells (to provide a land attack capability);
• An SSTD decoy launcher;
• A torpedo launcher;
• An Inner-Layer Defence System, such as the Phalanx close-in weapon system; and
• Surface-to surface guided weapons, such as the Harpoon surface-to-surface missile.

These systems will not be on the first-of-class. There is, as yet, no requirement or funding for them.

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