By Geoff Fein
When the two forward ship service diesel generators (SSDG) on USS Freedom (LCS-1) stopped working earlier this month during her maiden deployment, the effort to repair the SSDGs showed the Navy’s approach to maintaining LCS, according to a Lockheed Martin [LMT] official.
“Because of the reduced crew, you need a different sustainment approach for a ship like LCS, and the Navy understands that,” Paul Lemmo, business development director for Lockheed Martin, told Defense Daily yesterday
What the Navy has done is set up interim support contracts with both LCS teams, he added.
Besides the Lockheed Martin-Marinette Marine team, General Dynamics [GD] and Austal USA have built an all-aluminum hull trimaran variant of LCS. The USS Independence (LCS-2) was delivered to the Navy and General Dynamics and Austal USA are working on their second ship, the Coronado (LCS-4).
Lockheed Martin and Marinette Marine are in the midst of building their second ship, the Fort Worth (LCS-3).
“For the next two to three years, we are responsible for supporting the ship,” Lemmo said. “What we’ve done is design a sustainment approach where we are available to support the ship on its deployments when it goes into port.”
When the two forward generators (Nr 1 and 2) went down, Lockheed Martin already had a team in Colon, Panama.
“The good news there, it didn’t affect the operation of the ship,” Lemmo said.
Freedom was heading to Panama for a scheduled refueling. “We were able to fix [the SSDGs] in port,” he added.
Freedom is outfitted with four SSDGs, but can operate on just two, according to the Navy.
The four SSDGs are built by Isotta Fraschini, part of Fincantieri.
Lemmo noted that the SSDGs have been in operation for a couple of years.
“These were the first things that got lit off…in about March ’08, maybe a bit before that,” he said. “We are starting to see some of the routine maintenance things.”
A lot of the preventive maintenance sailors normally do on a ship, with a smaller crew like on Freedom, that work might get pushed ashore, Lemmo said.
“But it isn’t pushed ashore when you return from a 90-day deployment,” he said.
The maintenance work will be done while the ship is in theater during port visits. “There will be a team on the ground waiting to do it.”
“On this deployment, we had a team on the ground in Panama to do a maintenance availability,” Lemmo said. “Fortunately, we were able to repair the generators at that point as well.”
Lemmo added that the maintenance technicians might not necessarily be Lockheed Martin employees. “It could be a company we hire. Whatever the best most affordable way to support the ship is what we are responsible for figuring out in our support contract.”
In addition to demonstrating they could respond to repair calls, Lockheed Martin also proved out distance support for Freedom, Lemmo added.
“For example, with the generator [the crew] were able to get reach back and talk with technicians and get help with issues,” he said. “That will be a key component of this ship–to have distance support and on shore maintenance availabilities. That will all be [done] so that we can keep the crew at 40.”
Lemmo said there have been some lessons learned from this effort. One example is maintenance that might need to be done more frequently than during the port stops, and vice versa.
That’s the whole learning process, he added. Part of this deployment is telling the Navy how Lockheed Martin will sustain LCS.