Links to some of my "never were" models

[Marty]

H-39 from Revell kit:

http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dl...geid=183623&ck=
http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dl...geid=183862&ck=

H-39 alternate version:
http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dl...geid=186321&ck=

15" Scharnhorst 42A from Revell kit:
http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dl...geid=163144&ck=

12 gun four turret North Carolina mod from Revell kit:
http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dl...view=thumbs&ck=

CVNX balsa concept ship:
http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dl...view=thumbs&ck=

Graf Zeppelin OOB:
http://home.bellsouth.net/p/scripts/commun...loc=103&ck=&ck=

1978 CGX Strike Cruiser concept ship:
http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dl...view=thumbs&ck=

CVF Concept ship:
http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dl...view=thumbs&ck=

"Missile Barge" Arsenal ship concept ship:
http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dl...view=thumbs&ck=

[Nick]

Nice pics! What's the idea behind the Missile Barge Arsenal ship?

Nick B)  

[Captain Canada]

That's alot of boats !

Looking good, Marty. I espescially like the Graf Zep and the Burke, as well as the missile barge. My only complaint is that your camera sucks....so I can't see all the details !

 

[Marty]

    Thanks guys!!!! Sorry about the crappy camera but the budget's a little tight right now!!!!

The "missile barge" is the IMEX 1/450th scale Toyoma cargo ship heavily modified. The concept is to take a merchant hull, pack it to the gills with missile tubes using Tomahawk, Seaslam and etc. standoff missiles, no fancy electronics just "on demand" remotely targetted firepower. "Shoot and scoot" to the max.  It's a concept that gets discussed every few years and it could be done in the $100Million range(NOT counting missiles) as opposed to $1.4Billion "stealth" cruisers.

The technology has reached the point that targetting and terminal guidance can be done remotely, the firing platform doesn't have to be the targetting platform. Instead of a fancy "super ship" like CGX or CG-21 or DDX or LCS or whatever we're calling it this week, we could build a bunch of these hulls and give a Marine unit some REAL firepower. A CVN "Alpha-strike" can deliver at most 144 weapons. The Ohio SSGN conversion 164 weapons. A surface action group, maybe 120 weapons. LCS will be able to deliver maybe 60 weapons plus a gun system. This ship could deliver 400 weapons and stay on station forever with a small crew and helicopter replenishment.

Marty

[Hobbes]

The Americans had plans for an 'arsenal ship' a few years ago.
It didn't go anywhere for a couple of reasons:
- the idea was to have a very small crew and save on personnel cost. But that leaves the ship vulnerable (no defensive weapons, not enough people for damage control). By the time you add enough crew to get the ship through an emergency, you have enough people to crew a destroyer.
- the arsenal ship would be seen as a high-value target, requiring comprehensive defences. This adds to the cost again.
- the cost of the missiles is something to think about when you've got 500 tubes to fill (at $100k+ - maybe even $250k for a Standard missile, $500k-1 mill. for a Tomahawk)
- it's not very flexible. It requires a second ship (with an Aegis combat system) to do the targeting, and the arsenal ship itself is single-role: unlike a destroyer, you can't use it for patrols, etc.
- merchant ships may be inexpensive, but they can't take as much damage as a naval ship.  

[Marty]

Good points about the Arsenal ship design. It's intended as a fire support platform, an "Arsenal" for other ships and Ground Forces to draw on, not as a front line combat unit. Kind of like floating artillery. As for the missile costs, a missile costs "X" dollars regardless of what platform it's carried on, this issue is hull costs. The US Navy is projected to drop below 200 hulls shortly against a perceived need for 600 hulls. We're building a grand total of seven ships this year, so we need less expensive ships and a lot of them. The "missile barge is one way to do it.

Marty

[Nick]

Just to add to this, the missile barge project is the key to America winning WW3 against the Chinese in Invasion by Eric L. Harry.

Ignore the laughable plot where China manages to ally with or occupy all of Asia and North Africa up to the Turkish border (stopped only by an EU army), most of Russia, Japan, New Zealand, Australia, half the Pacific, all of South America and the Caribbean in the space of 10 years and still the USA hasn't fired a shot in anger and is reducing its armed forces.

The Chinese use supertanker hulls for aircraft carriers, have a hundred submarines and 2 million-men armies and 7000+ aircraft in the Caribbean alone and all this while occupying 3/4 of the world and invading the US thru the Gulf Coast. America sits tight and lets the Chinese advance as far as Washington DC while trying to build 3 of these 500,000 ton Arsenal Ships which can fire 16,000 missiles every 6 minutes repeatedly at least 5 times....
Nuclear weapons are deliberately not used because of effective anti-missile defences used by both sides.

You know, I really can't understand why I've still got this book on my shelves?

Nick B)  

[viper29_ca]

OK....if an arsenal ship would be a high value target and need defences, other than interceptor aircraft, how would that make it any different than an aircraft carrier?

A modern day aircraft carrier wouldn't be able to defend itself alone at all. Few Sea Sparrow, RAM, and/or Phalanx. Sorry, I would rather be on a destroyer...least I have some longer range SAMS to use.

Now that being said....the Arsenal ship could be put into the same environment as a carrier, surrounded by cruisers, destoyers, frigates and subs......but with one exception!!....all you would need is one Aegis cruiser or destroyer...this is an arsenal ship right??? Say what??? 400 missile tubes??? Have 100 Standard long range SAMs on board, that once fired the Aegis boat would take control of....and the Arsenal boat has its own effective defences. Same could be done with an AWACS AC if need be.

Only thing the Arsenal ship would need would be some close in defences, RAM and Phalanx.....no biggie. Phalanx has its own radar, RAM is all aspect heat seeking, basically a folding fin sidewinder!!

[Hobbes]

Eric L. Harry  

Hull cost is a factor in favor of the arsenal ship, but the cost of the loadout can't be ignored. If you've got $1B in missiles, and you can put them either on one big ship that has little or no self-defence, or on six fast, well-defended smaller ships, what would you do?
The cost of the loadout is a problem for another reason. Even today, the USN has trouble filling all of its VLS cells. It just doesn't have enough money, and adding 4 ships with 500 cells each isn't going to improve that situation.
A practical arsenal ship needs missiles that are an order of magnitude cheaper than current naval missiles.

Viper: an arsenal ship would also need to be defended from submarines.  

[Joe C-P]

Hey, somebody's actually building ship models around here! Marty, you're showing up us shippie-types.  

I've seen some of them before, on other sites, and always enjoy your work in bringing floating what-ifs to life. Your creativity is inspiring.

Have you considered getting a cheap tripod on which to mount the camera? That'd help with the photos.

As for the Arsenal Ship, multi-tasking is the way of the future. Ships need to support multiple missions, since there are fewer and fewer of them. Litorral warfare and ground support are also growing in importance, and a ship can carry far more shells than missiles, even advanced guided extended-range 155mm shells. Damage control also requires a certain minimum crew.
In a way, a carrier is an Arsenal Ship, using long-range self-guided weapons systems to project power. It's more flexible as well, since the weapon loadout can be changed faster and more easily than reloading missile tubes.

[Marty]

    Thank you Joe!!!!

I'm not building them to show anyone up, basically I'm trying to build some of the fascinating designs I've seen. I've got a few in progress, some day soon there'll be a BBH concept ship, an LHX and at least two more CVNX builds plus a 1/350th CVNX. Eric Mante is pretty far along on a 1/350th Montanna and Gerry is working on a secret project so there is some interest in "what-if" ships building. Mike Bartel and NNT have produced a few nice resin kits but that's beyond my budget right now. Your Altnaval pictures and Bobby's 1/1200th scale models are awesome.

It's too bad that the Warship Projects board has been down so much, that group really had it together as far as online design resources. I'm hoping that we can interest some of the model builders on this site in doing ships, I think that once we get them to try one  they'll catch fire with it, the creativity and talent is certainly here to do it. Altering a hull is about the same as altering a fuselage and altering the superstructure and weapons fits are at least as intricate as aircraft and armor.

A tripod and a new camera is definitely on my short list of things to buy in the near future.

I'm glad you like the models!!!!

Marty