Page 34 - Australian Defence Magazine April-May 2021

34 SEA POWER HUNTER CLASS TABLE 1 HUNTER CLASS AIC PARTNERS
APRIL-MAY 2021 | WWW.AUSTRALIANDEFENCE.COM.AU
SUPPLIER
CURRENT SCOPE
SAAB Australia
Contracted partner for Combat Systems Integration – provision of Labour services to support preliminary Australian Interface activities (non design related)
Lockheed Martin Australia
Contracted partner for Combat Systems Integration – provision of Labour services
Thales Australia
Undertake taskings as a member of Team Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW). These tasks support activities as part of the ASW working groups with the CoA.
Rhode & Schwarz (Australia)
On-site labour services working within the Communications team as the Reference Ship Design Communications supplier. Minor tasking to address the impact of Australianisation/other systems that differ from the reference ship design.
Ultra (Australia)
Undertake taskings as a member of Team Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW). These tasks support activities as part of the ASW working groups with the CoA.
Boeing Australia
Undertake taskings as a member of Team Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW). These tasks support activities as part of the ASW working groups with the CoA.
Taylor Bros
Engineering support for ship outfit design
Rolls-Royce Australia
Power & Propulsion SME support to Platform Engineering
Table from P2-3 of BAE Systems Maritime Australia public AIC Plan, updated by BAE Systems Maritime Australia March, 2021.
“What we’re doing on Hunter will have a direct relevance to what’s being asked to be done on the Hobart,” Lockhart said. “The Hobart Class, because it will be back in the wa- ter first, is that a way of reducing what we end up with or risk reducing what we end up in Hunter. What do we learn through this whole commissioning process and ultimately sea trials and the new capabilities of the Royal Australian Navy would do that through that program.”
Lockhart also hopes to have the manufacturing contract for the first batch of three ships in 2022.
“We’re in the throes of that right now, we’re pulling to- gether the schedule and cost analysis, we’re pulling together the requirements and we’re fairly hopeful that we’ll be able to get the batch one manufacturing contract in December 2022 on ship one to move from prototyping to manufac- ture,” Lockhart confirmed to ADM.
SONAR
AIC
As mentioned earlier, the ‘Australianisa- tion’ process is happening across a number of key systems. Details of the contracts placed with Australian businesses as at February 2020 can be found in the public AIC plan released by BAE Systems Aus- traliaMaritimeSystemsandcanbeseen in Table 1 above.
Both Ultra and Thales are working together on the sonar fit out for the ships with the pair recently signing a col- laboration deed to work on the systems and design changes needed. Unlike the UK program where the two companies work at arm’s length, they are much more closely aligned on this program.
Ultra is proud to have received initial contracts leading to the provision of its S2150 Hull-Mounted Sonar (HMS) sys- tem for the Hunter class Frigate, according to a statement from the company. This HMS is also being supplied to the Canadian Surface Combatant (CSC) and UK Type 26 Frig- ate programs. The S2150 sonar is part of the world’s most advanced HMS product family, providing a novel digitised array, active and passive ASW surveillance and classifica- tion, torpedo detection, mine and obstacle avoidance, and an intuitive HMI to optimise operator effectiveness.
“ACCORDING TO BAE SYSTEMS MARITIME AUSTRALIA, THE COMPANY HAS PLACED MORE THAN 40 CONTRACTS WITH OTHERAUSTRALIANBUSINESSES.”
Ultra will also supply the S2170 Surface Ship Torpedo Defence (SSTD) sonar sys- tem to the Hunter Class Frigates. S2170 is an integrated, sense-to-effect solution which offers a comprehensive capability to maximise survivability in torpedo en- gagements. The system employs a towed array sonar and cutting-edge acoustic processing techniques to detect and clas- sify torpedo threats, as well as integrated
According to BAE Systems Maritime
Australia, the company has placed more than 40 contracts with other Australian businesses including BlueScope Steel AIS for steel plate, Infrabuild Steel Centre for structural steel, Adelaide Profile Services for steel processing and precision cutting, Intertek’s Adelaide Inspection Services for non-destructive testing, MG Engineering for mini ship blocks, TQCSI-Yaran for audit and certification services and Altrad for blast and paint. And further contracts are on the way, for prototyping and Batch 1.
This of course does not reference the 1,400 or so compa- nies that BAE Systems Australia Maritime have approved for partnership through the ICN Gateway and their own international supply chain partners.
towed and expendable countermeasures. The S2170 sonar has over a decade of service in the Royal Navy, is on board Royal NZ Navy Anzac Frigates and will also be supplied to the Canadian Surface Combatant (CSC) Frigates. This system is a permanent fit to the Hunter and CSC programs unlike the UK that rotates the system between ships.
“Ultra is proud to supply core ASW capability to Hunter Class Frigate,” Scott Peak, Vice President Business De- velopment at Ultra Maritime said to ADM. “Commonality across the Australian, Canadian and UK Frigate programs facilitates collaboration across key centres of Five Eyes sonar expertise within Ultra. For the Hunter Class Frig- ate, we are excited to deliver world leading integrated ASW