US Navy Launches Massive Ford-Class Carrier Test

The U.S. Navy is starting a 26-month test and technology integration phase for the recently christened USS Gerald R. Ford, the first in a series of next-generation Ford-class aircraft carriers slated for commissioning in 2016.

 

 

The testing plans for the 77,000-ton USS Ford are prolonged and more labor intensive because the first-in-class ship includes a wide range of new systems and technologies, said Rear Adm. Tom Moore, Program Executive Officer, Carriers.

 

 

"We're in the infancy stages of the 26-month test program. The test program is a little bit longer than it was for Nimitz-class carriers because of the number of new developmental systems on board. The early returns are that the program is going well," Moore said.

 

 

The Ford program has been the subject of scrutiny and criticism by lawmakers, analysts and watchdog groups for cost growth and reliability issues of some of its technologies. Navy officials point out that at least $3.3 billion of the Ford's $12.8 billion cost are part of what's called non-recurring engineering costs to design and produce a first-in-class ship with new technologies.

 

 

The Ford-class carriers are slated to replace the existing Nimitz-class carriers on a one-for-one basis in coming years as the Nimitz carriers come to the end of their service life. Since carriers have a life span of up to 50-years of service, Ford-class carriers are slated to remain in service until the year 2110, Moore said.  

 

 

With this future in mind, the Ford-class carriers are being built with three times the electrical power generating capacity compared to Nimitz-class carriers, Moore said. The USS Ford will have four 26-megawatt generators bringing a total of 104 megawatts to the ship. This helps support the ship's developing systems such as its Electro-Magnetic Aircraft Launch System, or EMALS, and provides power for future systems such as lasers, and rail-guns, Moore added.

 

 

The ships are engineered with a redesigned island, slightly larger deck space and new weapons elevators in order to achieve a 33-percent increase in sortie-generation rate. The new platforms are built to launch more aircraft and more seamlessly support a high-op tempo.

 

 

The new weapons elevators allow for a much more efficient path to move and re-arm weapons systems for aircraft. The elevators can take weapons directly from their magazines to just below the flight deck, therefore greatly improving the sortie-generation rate by making it easier and faster to re-arm planes, Moore said.

 

 

He added that a decision was made to delay the launch by about four months in order to allow the shipbuilders -- Newport News Shipbuilding, a division of Huntington Ingalls Industries -- extra time to get more integration work done on the dry dock before putting the ship into the water.

 

 

"We've got four of the nine 1,100-ton air conditioning plants. We have 29 of 33 fire pumps up and running and we have tested the electric plant. We're doing diesel engine testing. We've turned over about 100 compartments to the ship's force who is now working on board the ship," Moore explained.

 

 

The USS Ford's EMALS, or electro-magnetic catapult system is being tested and built for the ship. Unlike previous Nimitiz-class carriers which use a steam-catapult, EMALS uses an electro-magnetic field and a series of cascading magnets to propel and then launch aircraft, Moore explained.

 

 

"By having this electrical pulse come down, you are pulling the aircraft down to the catapult to launch it. You can dial in the precise weight of the aircraft. As you accelerate the aircraft down the catapult, you can accelerate it to the precise speed it needs to launch," Moore said.

 

 

Unlike steam catapults which use pressurized steam, a launch valve and a piston to catapult aircraft, EMALS uses a precisely determined amount of electrical energy. As a result, EMALS is designed to more smoothly launch aircraft while reducing stress and wear and tear on the airframes themselves, he added.

 

 

"By the time the aircraft gets to the catapult it is at the right speed. Minimizing stress on the airframe, over time, reduces maintenance," Moore added.

 

 

On the ship, EMALS will be engineered such that any of the ship's four catapults will be able to draw power from any one of three energy storage groups on the ship, he said.

 

 

Although the catapult troughs for the USS Ford's EMALS system are now being built and integrated with the overall system, the technology has been in the process of extensive testing at a Naval Air Warfare Center facility in Lakehurst, N.J. 
 

The EMALS catapults there have launched 200 aircraft flights from their system, including launches of an F/A-18 Super Hornet and F-35.  In addition, the catapults there have launched more than 1,500 dead loads where they put a weight on a sled and shoot that off with the system.

 

 

Meanwhile, on the ship, the below-deck EMALS equipment has been installed. This consists of a series of transformers and rectifiers designed to convert and store electrical power through a series of motor generators before brining power to the launch motors on the catapults, Moore explained.

The USS Ford is able to generate 13,800 volts of electrical power, more than three times the 4,160 volts that a Nimitz-class carrier generates, Moore said.

 

 

The EMALS system is also engineered to work in tandem with the USS Ford's new Advanced Arresting Gear, or AAG. Unlike the existing hydraulic system used on current aircraft carriers, AAG is a mechanical electrical system with a cable that spins a water twister, Moore explained.

 

 

Similar to EMALS, the AAG is also designed to reduce stress on the airframe during the landing process.

 

 

"The idea is to provide a smoother run out and slow down in a more constant manner. What AAG will do is allow you to have a reduction in the force on the airframe as you arrest the plane," Moore said.

 

 

Once this 26-month test phase is complete, the USS Ford is scheduled to go through what's called builder trials and acceptance trials designed to make sure everything works before the ship enters service. The acceptance trials involve an independent inspection and survey of the ship, Moore said.

 

 

Once that takes place, the Navy will take the ship for a six to eight month post-shakedown period and certify the flight deck.

 

 

Moore said he expects the USS Ford to be ready to deploy as part of a battle group by late 2018 or early 2019.

 

Navy Leaders Defend Ford-Class Carrier Program

Senior Navy officials are responding to critics of the service’s planned Ford-class of aircraft carriers claiming that substantial technological leaps, manpower reducing efficiencies, and a long-term strategic need for the carriers outweigh cost overruns and delays.

Scheduled to enter the water this fall and begin service in 2016, the USS Ford is engineered with a suite of improved technologies compared to its predecessor, the Nimitz-class carriers. Some of these improvements include a larger flight-deck, dual-band radar, upgraded nuclear power plants, increased automation and an electro-magnetic propulsion system, said Rear Adm. William Moran, deputy director for the Navy’s Air Warfare Division.

“The efficiency with which we can load and unload weapons and move aircraft is vastly improved – just in the way it’s designed to be able to move the aircraft. A bigger flight deck with more space to operate is going to make a big difference,” Moran said. “It is hard to imagine what we are going to do with the Ford years from now.”

The Navy’s Ford-class carriers are slated to replace as many as 10 Nimitz-class carriers as they reach their 50-year lifespan over the coming decades.

“The big thing is there is increased capability and margin for future growth and follow-on systems. You and I can’t imagine what in 30-years people are going to want to integrate on an aircraft carrier. We have a design in place that will allow those folks to be able to say ‘we have the space, weight and electrical capacity,’” said Capt. Bob Cady, aircraft carrier branch head for the Navy’s Air Warfare Division.

Navy leaders also emphasized the ever-increasing strategic value of being able to project power and forward-position air assets with the forthcoming Pacific pivot within the defense strategy.

“As we saw the beginning of the end of life for the first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, [former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld] challenged the Navy to put in as much new technology as possible to really revolutionize the way we operate aircraft carriers in the future. We put in a lot of technology,” Moran said.

Budget issues

Navy priorities in the FY 2014 budget request include $945 million to finance design and construction of the John F. Kennedy (CVN 79), the second planned carrier in the Ford-class, as well as $588 million to build the Gerald. R. Ford (CVN 78).

Government watchdog agencies such as the Government Accountability Office have cited cost concerns, delays and schedule slips regarding construction of the USS Ford. A March GAO report cites valve shortages and construction issues with the ships steel plating for the flight deck.

The report also cites substantial cost-increases with the USS Ford program construction since 2008. Navy developers describe the overall $13-to $15 billion cost of the Ford in terms of a “first-in-class” 

technology, meaning costs for the follow-on ships, such as the USS Kennedy, will be much less.

“We want to demystify the myths of cost of first-in-class. The first time you roll out a new technology it’s pretty expensive. Then, over time, you are able to bring those costs down. We fully expect the costs of the USS Kennedy and the next USS Enterprise( CVN 80) – these costs will be significantly reduced as we learn from 78 {USS Gerald Ford},” said Moran.

Navy developers said the USS Ford’s cost also include vital, one-time developmental funds able to inform the entire fleet of Ford-class ships.

“We’re always concerned about the impacts of budget cuts and budget drills, but we’re working our way through them and we feel pretty good about where Ford is today.”

New technology

Although the Ford’s flight deck was recently completed in Newport News, Va., there is much more work to be done on construction before the carrier can set sea. While many of the dimensions to the Ford-class are similar to the Nimitz-class in terms of size, weapons and overall length, the Navy officials refer to the Ford-class carriers as a “complete redesign of the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier, in both ship design and systems.”

The Ford-class carriers will fit at least 75 aircraft, compared to at least 60 on the Nimitz, according to Navy statistics. This allows for an increase in what the Navy calls the sortie generation rate, or ability to fly missions from the ship. Also, the Ford-class carriers add about four feet to the width of the flight deck, allowing for additional space.

The configuration of the ship itself is engineered so that it is less visible to adversaries, Moran said. He cited the Ford’s new, more-capable nuclear reactor engineered to propel the ship. Ford-class carriers will also use an Electro-magnetic Aircraft Launch System as opposed to a steam catapult.

“In design it has fewer moving parts, less maintenance, and it’s more automated,” Moran said. “You can dial up the amount of force that is used to launch an aircraft off the front end of the ship. You can do that with steam, but steam has got this shot to it. With a steam catapult there is a lot of steam going into the launching of that aircraft, so the aircraft is under a lot of stress. The EMALS system is more of a controlled force. The hope is we will reduce the fatigue and stress on the airplane so they will live longer.”

When it comes to catching or slowing down arriving aircraft, the Ford-class carriers are equipped with advanced arresting gear consisting of energy absorbers, power conditioning equipment and digital controls designed to replace the existing Mk-7 arresting gear, according to Navy officials.

The Ford-class carriers also have an advanced dual-band radar (DBR), a flat panel array system built on a mast on the ship’s island, Moran said. The DBR combines a range of different radar capabilities such as air-search, surface-search and air-traffic control, he said.

“From our perspective on the aircraft carrier it buys you a cleaner island, less big things up there rotating around and there’s about seven systems is what this replaces. Those functions are now being covered by dual-band radar,” Cady said.

Officials claim the new radar, EMALS and other next-generation technologies will allow the Ford-class carriers to reduce the manpower requirements for the ship by as many as 800 crew members compared to the Nimitz-class.

“One of the biggest cost-drivers with all the services is manpower – and it is all the tail that comes with it -- retirement, health care benefits. We’re trying to make things more affordable by trying to reduce the manpower requirements needed to support weapons systems – this is a classic case of that,” said Cady.

Navy's new gender-neutral carriers won't have urinals

The U.S. Navy's new class of carriers will be the first to go without urinals, a decision made in part to give the service flexibility in accommodating female sailors, the Navy says.

The change heralded by the Gerald R. Ford class of carriers – starting with the namesake carrier due in late 2015 – is one of a number of new features meant to improve sailors' quality of life and reduce maintenance costs, Capt. Chris Meyer said Wednesday.

Omitting urinals lets the Navy easily switch the designation of any restroom – or head, in naval parlance – from male to female, or vice versa, helping the ship adapt to changing crew compositions over time, Meyer said.

The Navy could designate a urinal-fitted area to women, of course, but the urinals would be a waste of space. Making the areas more gender-neutral is a relatively new consideration for the service, with most of its current carriers commissioned before it began deploying women on non-submarine combat ships in 1994.

But it wasn't the only reason for the move.

Urinal drain pipes clog more than toilets and therefore can be smellier and costlier to maintain, Meyer said.

"There's a lot more at play in the design objectives than (making the toilet areas) gender-neutral. We're saving money in maintenance costs, and we’re improving quality of life," said Meyer, manager of the Future Aircraft Carriers Program for the Naval Sea Systems Command.

Other quality-of-life updates, according to Meyer:

– Sleeping areas, or berthings, generally will be smaller, designed for fewer people per room. On current carriers, some berthings have more than 100 sailors each. On the Ford carriers, the number will be closer to 30 to 50 each.

– Heads will be attached to berthing compartments. Currently, many sailors have to traverse a passageway between a berthing and a head, meaning sailors who’ve just woken up have to dress up more for a trip to the head than they would if it were adjacent.

The new Ford-class features were first reported by the Navy Times.

Some sailors said that they're happy to lose the urinals because they're hard to clean and maintain, the Navy Times reported this week.

The Ford class is the future replacement for the Nimitz class. The Ford carriers are designed to allow more aircraft sorties, but with about 660 fewer crew members, according to the Navy.

The first three Ford carriers are scheduled to debut between 2015 and 2027, at a total projected cost of $37 billion. That cost includes non-recurring engineering expenses and research and development costs for the first carrier, the Navy says.