Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!ucsd!ucbvax!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!att!cbnews!military From: budden@manta.nosc.mil (Rex A. Buddenberg) Newsgroups: sci.military Subject: Re: news tidbit regarding the Enterprise Message-ID: <8128@cbnews.ATT.COM> Date: 11 Jul 89 01:28:08 GMT Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM Organization: Naval Ocean Systems Center, San Diego Lines: 34 Approved: military@att.att.com From: budden@manta.nosc.mil (Rex A. Buddenberg) Everytime the combat system in a ship reaches a stage of obsolescence, this debate happens. The only real difference is in the case of E, it's refueling, not the combat system. For background, the electronics in a ship tends to turn over about every ten years. For those ships past their mid-lives, this fact is catching up, and we didn't understand it well enough 20 years ago so the hulls weren't built with electronics system growth in mind. Propulsion systems tend to age much more slowly -- we've Coast Guard cutters that retired at ages like 45-50 years with the original plants in them. The history of FRAMS, SLEPs, Midlife Maintenance Availabilities, etc, is quite interesting. In many ways, the qualities of the original design are proven at this point -- a successful ship can be rebuilt successfully. And some just don't rebuild well. Carriers, because of their large enclosed volume, tend to be pretty amenable to SLEPs -- indeed you can run both the old and the new combat system side-by-side if need be. Submarines, on the other hand, are very difficult to update. Carriers are retired at ages like 45 years; submarines at 20 years. In most cases, the hulls are not worn out (icebreakers are an exception). It's just too damned expensive to update the ship -- better to start over. But watch, this is a luxury that we can't afford; I predict we'll see surface ships lifespans lengthen somewhat over the next couple decades. To get back to the Enterprise, the pricetag is only part of the problem. Carriers inevitably come with lots of politics attached. Rex Buddenberg