Posted on 07/20/2011 9:39:59 AM PDT by fredhead
It's the last thing the Navy and the crew aboard the warship San Antonio wanted: Just when they thought they'd finally resolved the last of the vessel's engine problems, the diesels again are in need of repair.
In the latest of a long series of breakdowns that have kept the young ship out of the fleet for years, the Navy said Tuesday that all four of the San Antonio's engines experienced problems while the crew was training off the coast of Virginia last week.
(Excerpt) Read more at hamptonroads.com ...
What do you want to bet they put some kind of “green” engines in there?
I presume the vessel has Government Motors diesels with perhaps Microsoft software controlling them?
dunno about Navy ship powerplants but John Deere uses WinCE on the large combines for nav and Paccar uses it for the engine controls of its trucks (Kenworth, Peterbilt).
D*mn.
And I worked real hard back in the mid-1970’s to get a ship named San Antonio.
After looking at this ship’s “Leadership” I am NOT inpressed. Looks like a bunch of “soft-handed” “Perfumed Princes”.
In late 1970 I was serving onboard the U.S.S. Westchester County LST-1167 and we were on the LST ramp at Chin Hae South Korea when we got orders to pick up a Marine rifle company, a motor –T platoon and their vehicles, and an LVT platoon and their vehicles in Okinawa and deliver them to Subic Bay. With our crew that was over 500 men. The squadron said not to worry, because we would still be back in Yokosuka in time for Thanksgiving. A similar message was repeated throughout November, December, January, February, and into March when the U.S.S. Fredric finally showed up in the Tonkin Gulf to join the Amphibious Ready Group it was supposed to leave the west coast with. This was the first 1179 class LST to deploy and broke down in every port from the west coast to Vietnam.
The great advantage to me was I got qualified as an Officer of the Deck for Fleet Steaming, since we operated with other ships in formation. At 25 of course I did not see it that way at the time.
It’s a Cheby from the West Side - I got 5 guys what can work on it right now, hombre...
I noticed that a lot of Air Force planes seemed to break down in Las Vegas, Australia, London, etc. They almost never got delayed for maintenance in Iceland, Greenland, or the middle east.
The article states that Northrop Grumman is the shipbuilder. That is true. However, NG bought Avondale shipyard (near New Orleans) after Katrina. NG, until recently, owned Newport News Shipbuilding here in VA where they build the aircraft carriers and subs. The Navy doesn’t get lemons from NN. Maybe it’s something to do with NOLA?
Replace the four “diesels” with two Pielsticks.
And Symantec debugging it all.
I admit I know nothing about this do I'm actually asking an honest question.
• Freedom (LCS 1)
• USS San Antonio (LPD 17) Class
• USS Wasp (LHD 1) Class
• USS Makin Island (LHD 8)
• USS Whidbey Island (LSD 41/49) Class
• USNS Lewis and Clark (T-AKE 1) Class
• USNS Bob Hope (T-AKR 300) Class
• USNS Henry J Kaiser (T-AO 187) Class
• USCG Polar Class Icebreakers
• USCG High Endurance Cutters
• USCG Medium Endurance Cutters
• USS Ohio (SSBN 726) Class
• USS Seawolf (SSN 21) Class
• USS Los Angeles (SSN 688) Class
All these ships have Fairbanks Morse Engines. Why do other ships not have the same problems?
So, is the fix as simple as changing out the diesel engines for a Cummins or other more reliable powerplant?
NOLA
The construction contract was awarded on 17 December 1996 to Northrop Grumman Ship Systems of New Orleans, Louisiana and the keel was laid down on 9 December 2000. The ship was launched on 12 July 2003 and christened on 19 July by Texas Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. She was originally scheduled to be commissioned 17 July 2002, but was delayed by poor performance at the Avondale shipyard, which resulted in her being towed from New Orleans to the Northrop Grumman shipyard at Pascagoula, Mississippi, in December 2004 for completion. The ship was unable to move under her own power at that time, despite have been christened more than a year earlier.
The crew took delivery and moved aboard three days before Hurricane Katrina hit in August 2005. Work was delayed further when the ship became a base for regional relief efforts, including accommodations for some shipyard workers, the National Guard, Navy diving and salvage personnel and government officials. The ship’s final cost was $840 million over budget.[3]
I was on two boats built in NNS&DD. I got offered a slot on the USS Seawolf, but turned it down. Two things I learned in my time:
1. Some ships are just lemons (and NNS&DD built better boats than EB). A boat I will not name, built in EB at the same my first ship was under construction in Virginia, has spent most of the last 20 years giving tours and visiting friendly ports because it is too loud to do any actual submarine work.
2. Never ever go to the first of a class. Some buddies that went to the Seawolf were miserable. They lived in crappy housing, spent half their time in dress uniforms doing dog and pony shows and went way, way behind schedule.
I served on a first of it’s class, the USS Nimitz. Of course I checked on board 5 years after it was commissioned. All the bugs worked out. My other two ships were carriers (or you would say targets), JFK and Ike.
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