On Thu, 07 Jul 2005 23:38:20 -0400, Steven Shelikoff
wrote:

Sea Fighter's sea trials included, in part, extensive certification
testing ranging from maneuvering, cruise performance, and propulsion
trials -- where the ship achieved a continuous cruising speed in excess
of 50 knots -- to vibration, sound, and stern ramp operation trials.

How about some pictures of this machine?

On Fri, 08 Jul 2005 10:13:03 +0000, Shortwave Sportfishing wrote:

How about some pictures of this machine?

http://www.strategypage.com/gallery/...s_20052816.asp

Scroll down for photos.

Steven Shelikoffwrote:
Sea Fighter's sea trials included, in part, extensive certification
testing ranging from maneuvering, cruise performance, and propulsion
trials -- where the ship achieved a continuous cruising speed in excess
of 50 knots -- to vibration, sound, and stern ramp operation trials.


"Built to commercial standards"?!?!! Sorry, IMHO that's just plain not
good enough. Warships have to meet demands and endure stresses that
commercial vessels get near. I also have grave doubts about the
suitability of aluminum for a warship, has the Navy already forgotten
it's rather gruesome lessons about how easily aluminum burns?

OTOH I'm glad to see the Navy & Coast Guard getting new advanced
equipment. They need it.

Shortwave Sportfishing wrote:
How about some pictures of this machine?

A Google image search turned up:

http://www.chinfo.navy.mil/navpalib/.../ship-fsf.html
http://www.onr.navy.mil/media/view_i...ID=91&SubID=81
http://www.onr.navy.mil/media/view_i...ID=93&SubID=81

http://www.quantumhydraulic.com/imag...eafighter1.jpg
http://www.quantumhydraulic.com/imag...eafighter3.jpg

On Fri, 08 Jul 2005 07:01:02 -0400, thunder
wrote:

On Fri, 08 Jul 2005 10:13:03 +0000, Shortwave Sportfishing wrote:

How about some pictures of this machine?

http://www.strategypage.com/gallery/...s_20052816.asp

Scroll down for photos.

Thanks - I already found them. I was actually curious why only the
news link and not some pictures of the beast. Seems kind of silly.

Interesting concept. The only problem is that it looks like it will
actually work which will mean that the office committee trolls in the
Pentagon will screw it up by adding more requirements to it's design
making it a total waste of time.

"thunder" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 08 Jul 2005 10:13:03 +0000, Shortwave Sportfishing wrote:

How about some pictures of this machine?

http://www.strategypage.com/gallery/...s_20052816.asp

Scroll down for photos.


I want two of them. Now. drool

Around 7/7/2005 8:38 PM, Steven Shelikoff wrote:

http://www.titan.com/investor/press-...id=30&select=5

Just in case the link doesn't work:

U.S. Navy's Littoral Surface Craft -- Experimental (X-Craft)
Successfully Completes Sea Trials

Mission Flexible Ship Achieves 50-Knot Certification Qualifying Speed;
Fastest large-craft in the U.S. Navy

They are being built about 15 miles from me on Whidbey Is, and they've
been running one here in the Puget Sound; I've seen it go by our house
at least a couple times on it's way to and from Admiralty Inlet.

It's big. It looks like a shoebox on pontoons. It's fast - Very fast.
It's noisy at speed, and it lays down one heck of a big wake.


--
~/Garth - 1966 Glastron V-142 Skiflite: "Blue-Boat"
"There is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing
as simply messing about in boats."
-Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows

"Garth Almgren" wrote in message
...
Around 7/7/2005 8:38 PM, Steven Shelikoff wrote:

http://www.titan.com/investor/press-...id=30&select=5

Just in case the link doesn't work:

U.S. Navy's Littoral Surface Craft -- Experimental (X-Craft)
Successfully Completes Sea Trials

Mission Flexible Ship Achieves 50-Knot Certification Qualifying Speed;
Fastest large-craft in the U.S. Navy

They are being built about 15 miles from me on Whidbey Is, and they've
been running one here in the Puget Sound; I've seen it go by our house at
least a couple times on it's way to and from Admiralty Inlet.

It's big. It looks like a shoebox on pontoons. It's fast - Very fast. It's
noisy at speed, and it lays down one heck of a big wake.


--
~/Garth - 1966 Glastron V-142 Skiflite: "Blue-Boat"
"There is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing
as simply messing about in boats."
-Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows

This thread put three frames me in mind of the "FastCats" built for B.C.
Ferries here in British Columbia, back in the '90s. Not the tonnage but

Three were built and one, or maybe two, were put into service but the heavy
wake and noise forced them to reduce speeds to 20 knots, more or less what
the conventional ferries were making, and decreasing hull efficiency,
increasing fuel and maintenance costs, but carrying fewer vehicles and
passengers. $400 mil in the making, sold on the auctioneers block for a mere
$13 million. For all three. To the builders.

Some pics on this site as they were (third frame down) and some drawingboard
proposals being studied.

http://www.sfu.ca/casr/mp-navalsc3.htm and
http://www.sfu.ca/casr/mp-navalsc4.htm

Don

DSK wrote:

"Built to commercial standards"?!?!! Sorry, IMHO that's just plain not
good enough. Warships have to meet demands and endure stresses that
commercial vessels get near. I also have grave doubts about the
suitability of aluminum for a warship, has the Navy already forgotten
it's rather gruesome lessons about how easily aluminum burns?

One may see you have no understanding of what Bureau and Classification
Society rules are, and how they do/don't affect NAVSEA design &
construction. Good naval architecture is good naval architecture. Of
mutual necessity commercial Class standards are higher, not lower, than
naval ones. A massive and slow 60,000 DWT cargo vessel operated by a
crew of 26 civilians, insured by private interests with high stakes,
and subjected to all the rigors of continual trade is much more robust
and more highly regulated than a light, fast subchaser of comparable
length displacing 7,000 DWT & built like a yacht with a crew of 400 to
operate her (that is, if you call what Navy guys do "operating"g).
You also may wish to learn a bit about what sort of contruction and
alloys are required to build practical surface combatants capable of
sustained high speeds and rapid battle manuevers (most of them
classified & some would amaze you). Combustibility of 6000 series Al
used for the superstructures of the other ships you refer to is among
the least of its problems to live with or overcome. Exfoliation,
electrolysis, cracking and other things head but do not complete its
challenges in typical combatant construction. Having an aluminum hull
eliminates some of its chief problems.

It was obviously a very wise business victory for the yard to have won
a combatant contract vessel build that includes Class approval, when
high speed cats are coming into their own commercially (with the
expected fits & starts) in a flagging American building industry that
has been languishing on its deathbed for 40 years. It must've taken
some real stroking & massaging at NAVSEA and a lot of cooperation
elsewhere to do this.

You should be jumping up & down that one yard in your marine-wise very
down-and-out country may have something relevant to do.

OTOH I'm glad to see the Navy & Coast Guard getting new advanced
equipment. They need it.

I want to know what kind of ASW vehicle fits into a container & is ramp
deployable. Maybe it's some new independent fish? (Maybe we shouldn't
ask in public.)

Old Boat Goat wrote:

This thread put three frames me in mind of the "FastCats" built for B.C.
Ferries here in British Columbia, back in the '90s. Not the tonnage but

Three were built and one, or maybe two, were put into service but the heavy
wake and noise forced them to reduce speeds to 20 knots, more or less what
the conventional ferries were making, and decreasing hull efficiency,
increasing fuel and maintenance costs, but carrying fewer vehicles and
passengers. $400 mil in the making, sold on the auctioneers block for a mere
$13 million. For all three. To the builders.

Do not be fooled by initial and short-term trends and ventures. Every
pivotal commercial vessel development has had a difficult pioneering
phase involving acceptance, a lot of sorting out, and other things.
This is the rule, not the exception, and someone has to be brave enough
to take the early risks and lose them. It has been this way for
centuries. Every time, the public and pundits said: "Yep, that was a
nice try but we aren't gonna see any more of them."