The centerpiece of the new Flight III Arleigh Burke-class destroyers—the AN/SPY 6V Air and Missile Defense Radar (AMDR) by Raytheon [RTN]—is on track to begin developmental testing this summer at the Pacific Missile Range Facility in Hawaii, a Navy program official said Wednesday.
“I think we have all of the usual challenges for a system that is going through the EMD (engineering and manufacturing development) phase…but no unusual challenges,” Capt. Mark Vandroff, program manager for DDG-51 shipbuilding, said during a briefing at the Surface Navy Association symposium. “It’s on schedule.”
Compared to the legacy AN/SPY-1D radar, AMDR is slated to be more than 30 times more sensitive and can handle more than 30 times the targets, according to Raytheon.
After tests in Hawaii, the AMDR radar will be installed at Surface Combat Systems Center at Wallops Island, Va., to give the service a land-based test and maintenance facility where the fleet can practice operating the radar, Vandroff said. Delivery of the radar to the shipyard is slated for the 2019 or 2020 timeframe to make it on the ship in time.
“Right now, I think we will get it there on that date or before,” he added.
Meanwhile, shipbuilders Huntington Ingalls Industries’ [HII] Ingalls Shipbuilding and General Dynamics [GD] Bath Iron Works are finalizing the Flight III contract design, Vandroff said. Because the AMDR radar requires more power and cooling than the AN/SPY-1D currently on Arleigh Burkes, the builders must make changes to the hull design to accommodate new generators, cooling plants and the radar itself.
“There’s stuff that takes up a lot of room,” he said. “We’re going to be moving some stuff in design to fit it all in.”
The Navy has 14 DDG-51s under contract with ships split between Ingalls and Bath Iron Works. Ten of those vessels, spanning fiscal years 2013 to 2017, were awarded in multiyear deals to the two shipbuilders. However, because Congress added an third Arleigh Burke-class destroyer to the 2016 defense appropriations bill, the service will either have to issue a new contract for the ship or add it to an existing contract, Vandroff said.
“When it’s going to happen, not ready to talk about that yet,” he said. “We’re still looking at our options for the exact acquisition strategy and contracting strategy.”
One of the three ships procured in 2016 will become the first Flight III destroyer. However, the service has not yet determined which hull will be the first to incorporate the new radar and design changes. The Navy plans to buy 13 Flight III DDG-51s.
Ingalls Shipbuilding has four Flight IIA Arleigh Burkes under construction, while Bath Iron Works has three ships in the works, he said.
The first of those ships, DDG-113, will be delivered to the Navy in 2017, Brian Cuccias, president of Ingalls Shipbuilding, said Wednesday morning.
“What’s unique about this series of Arleigh Burke is there was a five-year gap from the last ship we delivered and the restart of the program, on the DDG-113,” he said. “We have re-established a great DDG program team, and we’re moving very well into serial production.”