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[nhp651]

It was announced on BBC LOCAL NORTH WEST NEWS this afternoon that the costs of building the new aircraft carrier HMS QUEEN ELIZABETH have soared so far by at least 1 BILLION POUNDS  POSSIBLY MUCH MORE

Why..........so that new aircraft can land on it's flight deck

what sort of numpty designs an aircraft carrier where more modern aircraft can't land on it's flight deck.........like designing a trawler tha cant carry nets and fish, .

Surely, had the government thought about it before hand they would have seen this and made it compatible with the Harriers which they have just scrapped........errr........ saving 1 billion pounds......................is this government taking the preverbial..............or does the left hand not know what the right hand is doing.......

NOW..........CALM DOWN DEAR,

[6705russell]

By eck Neil ya doing some moaning today!   

[nhp651]

Nowt else ta doo....finished me lifeboat, and not got onto the next one yet, lol

[Bryan Young]

Never mind about the ruddy aircraft carriers. Have you seen the new price of a tinlet of "Humbrol"? At £1.75 for a 14ml tinlet my admittedly shaky maths puts that at about £70 a litre which translates to over £150 a pint! Good grief. I hope I'm wrong. BY.

[omra85]

Your hopes have come true, Bryan   

Danny

[john s 2]

Your totally right Neil. Once again the government altered its Goal posts. So the Carrier becomes unsuitable
for its Planes. To me it does seem a lot of money to carry out adaptions. Possibly part of this cost is for the
maintenence equipement to service and repair the new planes? One would hope that at least the landing
systems were compatible. No doubt someone with more knowledge can explain. Thanks John.

[pugwash]

John I can think of three main components to be bought and fitted that cost a packet - catapults (seriously expensive)
arrestor wires system ( the wires are just the tip of the iceberg its the pulley and hydraulic system under the deck that really costs)
and the mirror landing system (also expensive together with building the platforms off the flight deck for the LSOs to operate from,  also we may
have to go to the yanks to buy it - I know we invented the system but do we have anybody capable of building a 21st century MLS)
All Very expensive and the ship will have to be re-designed in these areas but a £1b????? I just don't know where they get their figures from.

Geoff

[class37]

the way this is shaping up, I wonder if anyone checked the small print to see if engines, propellers and rudders were included, or perhaps these will have to be bought as extras, and big holes made in the hull to allow the propshafts and rudders to be fitted.

no, surely not.
the sort of idiot who would make that short of c**k up is the sort of idiot who'd buy an aircraft carrier with no catapaults or arrester wires.

mmmmm
let me think about this !

looks like another MOD procurement success - makes you wonder how they ever managed to buy anything that works !

[Colin Bishop]

The carriers were originally intended for the short/vertical takeoff version of the Joint Strike Fighter but that aircraft has now become much more expensive than anticipated. The conventional takeoff version is supposed to be considerably cheaper thus saving money but it requires the cats and traps to be fitted to the carrier. Obviously the thinking was that the extra cost of the carrier adaptations would be offset by not having to buy the more expensive version of the aircraft.

Having said that, the whole thrust of the defence 'review' has attracted almost universal condemnation from just about all quarters. A bad bargain all round.

Colin

[john s 2]

Thank you Gentleman. Now im realizing what is the extra costs. John.

[Yarpie]

Having served in two fixed wing aircraft carriers, much of the foregoing is true. Somehow, it was inevitable that the cost would spiral given MOD's record lately.

However, with proportionately more politicians in jail for fiddling than errant citizens, it really is not surprising that taxpayers hard earned money is frittered away so carelessly.

The sooner we commit more of these career politicians to incarceration, the better off we all shall be.

I find it quite ironic that next week I will be encouraged to tick a box each (out of five candidates) for my preference as an MP. I find it difficult enough to nominate just ONE of them, let alone FIVE.

RIP Guy Fawkes.

[nhp651]

in other words colin............one half doesn't know what the other half is doing.........we really are in a sad way in this great country of ours.............i feel embarrased at times to own up to be british

[malcolmfrary]

This is what happens when you give over your aircraft defense industry to a foreign power.  They scuppered the TSR2 for the F111, and then dumped the F111 back in the '60's.  Hopefully nobody will want to invade us for the next 20 years or so.  Of course, if they do, we might wind up with honest politicians.  An intriguing, if unlikely, thought.

[john s 2]

Silly question . But is the flight deck long enough? Also will shape need altering? At the end will it need a ski
slope up? Whats the chance of retraining our politicians and letting them take the carrier to Sea. John.

[Colin Bishop]

If it's any consolation try Googling the French carrier Charles De Gaulle. One problem after another and the flight deck had to be extended too.

Fixed wing aircraft don't benefit from a ski jump as they have to be catapulted off the ship at much higher speeds than would be the case of a Harrier type aircraft. The benefit of the ski jump was to enable the Harrier to get airborne with a greater weapons load than would be the case if the flight deck was flat.

It will be interesting to see to what extent, if any, an angled flight deck configuration is introduced and where the catapults will be located. The original idea of the angled deck was to allow aircraft to be ranged up forward for parking or ready for take off while at the same time being able to land aircraft without the risk of them piling into those already on deck.

Colin

[Peter Fitness]

Never mind about the ruddy aircraft carriers. Have you seen the new price of a tinlet of "Humbrol"? At £1.75 for a 14ml tinlet my admittedly shaky maths puts that at about £70 a litre which translates to over £150 a pint! Good grief. I hope I'm wrong. BY.

Bryan, £1.75 per 14ml = 12.5p per ml. There are 1000ml in a litre so that works out at £125 per litre of paint. An Imperial pint is roughly 568ml, so a pint of paint would be approximately £71 - not as much as you thought, so you can go out and stock up on Humbrol before the price goes up again

Peter.

[Shipmate60]

The carriers were designed and costed for the proposed aircraft.
It was done on the "cheapest is best" costings where she was to be fitted for but not with the catapult system.
The catapult system is a "state of the art" linnear accelerator" brand new system and not the old tried and tested steam catapult.
This is just 1 area which the changed configuration of the Air Wing will add costs.
Any decisions that will change the configuration at this stage will be expensive.
As Colin has said, will she have the "ski ramp" fitted or removed completely.
Any major change will also have stability considerations, so a major change at flight deck level can have knock on effects to components such as size and location of ballast tanks etc, all expensive mods at this stage.
It is all too easy to just blame Mod, but the MoD is a government department and subject to the whims of politicians who never Globally Cost anything, just Headline Cost.

Bob

[Brian_C]

Bryan, £1.75 per 14ml = 12.5p per ml. There are 1000ml in a litre so that works out at £125 per litre of paint. An Imperial pint is roughly 568ml, so a pint of paint would be approximately £71 - not as much as you thought, so you can go out and stock up on Humbrol before the price goes up again

Peter.

    looks like they wont be using humbrol paints on the new carriers,, wow thats a lot of tinlets 

[RaaArtyGunner]

    looks like they wont be using humbrol paints on the new carriers,, wow thats a lot of tinlets 

Not to mention they could build a carrier out of the empty tinlets
 

[Circlip]

Strange how everybody and their dogs have all the retrospective answers to who should have thought what should have been done. Hindsight is a great teacher.

  Why do "Mods" cost so much? Cos they CAN. Years ago, the company I worked for was asked to quote for the supply of support framework for equipment on the T class SSN's. We lost out because the controlling subcontractor didn't believe we could make them so cheaply.

  Regards  Ian.

[Bryan Young]

Bryan, £1.75 per 14ml = 12.5p per ml. There are 1000ml in a litre so that works out at £125 per litre of paint. An Imperial pint is roughly 568ml, so a pint of paint would be approximately £71 - not as much as you thought, so you can go out and stock up on Humbrol before the price goes up again

Peter.

Peter, and here was me thinking that a pint was bigger than a litre by around 2.5x. Which to my reckoning still comes out in the region of £170 per pint. Makes petrol look like a bargain. BY.

[RaaArtyGunner]

Whilst this applies to OZ no doubt it is relevant to the UK.

Quotes are supposed to be the cheapest price you think you can carry out the work for.

Whereas a variation/extra to a contract is usually cost plus, which means what all your costs are you plus your reasonable profit but in reality it is the highest price that you can justify plus profit.

It is normal practice to win a contract by being the cheapest, usually after fully reviewing what variations/loop holes you can claim for over and above the contact price at cost plus, because  that is what you make a profit on. Contractors are in it for the variations and or omissions that they can claim for not the initial contract amount, this is more so in design and construct contracts.

The fault however lies with whoever writes and provides the tender/brief documents because nowdays the can't be bothered to dot the 'i's and Cross the 'T's after all it is only money whereas doing it properly is hard work. Not to mention that they know that contractors/tenderer's staff are proficient in discovering deficiencies in tender documents.

Hence why the cheapest quote at the end of the day is invariably the dearest.

[Peter Fitness]

Peter, and here was me thinking that a pint was bigger than a litre by around 2.5x. Which to my reckoning still comes out in the region of £170 per pint. Makes petrol look like a bargain. BY.

Petrol is no bargain by any reckoning. 1 Imperial gallon is roughly equal to 4.55 litres: petrol here in Australia is hovering around $1.50 per litre which is over $6.80 per gallon. However, I believe that it's considerably dearer in the UK.

Peter.

[nhp651]

twice the price over here peter at £1.48 a litre.....at around  2.2 dollars a pound ...we in pommyland are geting severely ripped off, especially as our equiv salaries are about half that of oz.

[derekwarner]

RaaArtyGunner says "Not to mention that they know that contractors/tenderer's staff are proficient in discovering deficiencies in tender documents"

This is really a double edged sword......  ...a number of years ago...I was tasked with preparing an enquiry specification for the hydraulic flushing of water glycol systems in our local steel industry....however an element of my task was to ensure a rock bottom price, but No Extras   could be claimed

So I diligently prepared the specification....then what happens?........ obvious collusion between 3 specialist hydraulic contractors as the all submit near identical quotations.... but at twice the estimated real cost

I was directed to withdraw the enquiry specification.......another superior  re-let a watered down version of my enquiry.....the same 3 specialist hydraulic contractors all submit near identical quotations...but at approx 1/2 of their original quotations 

A contract was let... ...the work completed & then the contractor applied for & won for all sorts of extras which bought the final cost to near that of the original quotation  ........Derek