Merwe-class Guided Missile Frigate

The Merwe-class Guided Missile Frigate (Lielupe-class in the Excalbian service) is a naval warship developed in Knootoss together with Excalbia for the KNOMA (Dutch: Knootiaanse Marine), the navy of Knootoss, and the Imperial Navy of Excalbia. It is a guided missile frigate designed to operate as an escort in a larger battle- or carrier group, acting as a stealth element that can deliver air defence and anti submarine capabilities.

Developed in 2018, it integrates technologies already in use in the navies of both countries, as well as several new ones, combining Knootian weapons systems, electronics and software with Excalbian stealth technology. It is the first frigate in the service of the Imperial Navy and the first 'stealth' surface ship in the service of the Knootian Marine.

Design and Production

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In early 2018, as part of Emperor David IV’s efforts to reinvigorate its Western Atlantic alliances, he directed the Imperial Navy’s Admiralty to reach out to the Knootian government in support of New Boston Shipbuilding’s bid for the Knootian Marine’s tender to design and build a new generation of guided missile frigate. As talks proceeded, the project became a joint development between the KNOMA and the Imperial Navy. This allowed the incorporation of the Imperial Navy’s Mark V and Mark VI technologies, such as foamed alloy construction, modular integrated electric drives and various stealth features.

Contracts were signed in mid-2018, with the KNOMA and the Imperial Navy acting as the contracting parties, with the contracts being granted to an ad hoc conglomerate that included New Boston Shipbuilding as the primary contractee, along with the Helder Shipbuilding Consortium responsible for the Luipaard-class, among other ships, with Lichtenburg Advanced Naval Systems BV and Lichtenburg Avionics acting as major subcontracting parties. New Boston took the lead in a multinational design and development process.

The price of the vessels did rise during the development process. The original 2018 tender had called for a vessel costing no more than 700 million Atlantic Ducats, though the New Boston bid already budgeted ∂ 850 million, albeit promising greater capabilities than the original tender had called for, especially in the area of stealth and low RCS.

Development costs for the class rose further when an amendment by the New People's Party (NVP) was accepted by the Knootian Staten-Generaal in mid-2018, responding to the news that much of the cost savings would be realised by assembling the vessels at New Boston's shipyard in Ajuba, in Epheron. The Conservative and Social-Liberal parties cited national security and employment as reasons for insisting that much of the assembly be done at the Helder shipyards instead, despite the attendant increase in labour costs and inevitable renegotiation of contracts.

Trouble with the LANS-20 MASER threatened to cause further budget overruns and delays, inevitably prompting the class to be launched with the understanding that the MASER would need further field testing before its use could be standardised. This brought the final costs for the first ship, KMS Merwe, up to 1.15 billion Atlantic Ducats. The first keel, for the Merwe, was laid in late 2019 and the ship was launched in Spring of 2022.

Having absorbed development costs, future ships of the class are expected to be much cheaper, with the KNOMA expected to commission a total of 39 of the class. The export price is therefore set at $999 million Universal Standard Dollars.

Propulsion

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The engine is a 40 Mw EcoTech Generation III modular IED (Integrated Electric Drive) driven by diesel-and-gas turbines, delivering 53.000 total HP. It can run at lower speeds in 'stealth mode' by relying exclusively on the gas turbine, to reduce noise pollution and vibrations.

All turbines are required to provide sufficient electricity to power the LANS-20 MASER and propel the ship, with naval electrical power systems allowing the ships to quickly reroute power from non-essential systems.

Four filtered exhaust pipes are horizontal and rear-mounted to help reduce the ships' profile. Engine power drives two four-blade, variable-pitch propellers. It has a flank speed of 32 knots (59 km/hour) and a cruising speed of 26 knots (48 km/hour). Its range is 6.900 km km at cruise speed.

Electronics

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The Merwe class is equipped with a small LA FX-class 3D multipurpose air/surface radar from Lichtenburg Avionics with a CAESAR Fire Control System (FCS) by SuperComputer to guide its missiles. It uses the X band for fire control and missile guidance. Though it provides excellent resolution, it has a fairly short range and has a tendency to work poorly in adverse atmospheric conditions. It is also easily jammed by targeted interference (Electronic Warfare), should it be detected and countered by an opposing force.

Instead, the vessels rely on the presence of larger, non-stealth vessels that are actively searching with radar, such as the Waarden-class Air Defence Cruisers of the KNOMA, to feed it data about target locations via encrypted ship-to-ship communications. This allows the Merwe-class vessels to remain unobserved and rely on its small radar system only for defensive purposes and guidance-to-target.

Submarine detection capability is achieved through a hull-mounted Active Search Sonar and housing for a towed array.

Armament

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LA51C VLS

The Merwe-class is equipped with two blocks of six by six cells of centrally placed LA52-Compatible Vertical Launch System (VLS) developed by Lichtenburg Avionics. A total of 72 cells capable of carrying Anti-Air Warfare (AAW), Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) and Land Attack/Strike variants, as well as quad-packed chaff decoys. Launch is guided by the CAESAR Combat Management System by SuperComputer. Smaller missiles, like chaff, may also be quad-packed into a single cell, bringing the total potential number of missiles up to 288.

The LA51C VLS system is essentially a retrofit of the Mk 57 VLS system, maintaining similar dimensions (1x1x7,93 m for a single launcher) and being able to fire missiles from the same vertical canisters (0.71 by 7.18 metres). It is also backwards compatible with the Mk 41 VLS. It is a ‘hot launch’ system, requiring that the missile propel itself out of the launching cell using its own engine, rather than relying on ‘cold launch’ ejection systems. Guidance is then further supported by the ships’ radar systems, as well as tracking systems internal to the missile. The system of four canisters is hardened, armoured and isolated from the inner decks.

Missile load-out depends on the mission profile. Because vibration degrades the quality of stored missiles over time, Merwe-class ships may take to sea with a reduced complement of missiles if they are not required by the mission parameters.

Lichtenburg 660/533 torpedo launcher

The Merwe-class is fitted with Lichtenburg Consortium 660/533 torpedo launchers on the port and starboard sides forward of the command citadel. These are capable of firing 660mm (28") torpedoes used by the Elementen-class nuclear-powered attack submarines, dubbed the “66-klasse”. These include 20kt nuclear-tipped torpedoes, 550 kg high explosive anti-battleship/carrier variants and similarly sized sea-launched anti ship missiles (SL ASM) and unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs).

Alternatively, these tubes are converted to a 533 mm (21") diameter, to enable firing of a more universally used calibre, which is also used by the KNOMA’s Zeedier-class diesel-electric submarines and the submarines and smaller surface vessels of many other nations.

The launcher is fed using a conveyor belt system, but each locked, armoured storage compartment for a torpedo and/or Sea-Launched Anti Ship Missile must be manually opened for a final visual inspection prior to (re)load. Armoured storage spaces allow for a complement of 14 torpedoes or ship-launched anti submarine missiles of either size.

LANS-20 MASER

The LANS-20 is a downscaled, less ambitious version of the 80MW ZMI MASER systems that were fit to the original batch of Waarden class Air Defence Cruisers. These long range Line-of-Sight energy weapons are the result of a 2022 partnership between the KNOMA and Lichtenburg Advanced Naval Systems, using advancement of technologies between 2005 and 2022, particularly the advancement in battery technology and naval electrical power systems to quickly reroute power, allow reasonably-sized systems to support the weapons systems antenna.

The LANS-20 MASER system is capable of converting electrical energy to radiated energy and focusing it on a target. It uses High Power Microwaves (HPM) that release radiofrequency waves, creating beams of electromagnetic energy over a broad spectrum of radio and microwave frequencies (in narrow and wide-band), causing a range of temporary or permanent effects on electronics within targeted systems, degrading, neutralising, defeating or destroying an adversarial capability

The benefits of this weapons system over kinetic alternatives include speed of light attack, broad beams for wide area coverage, low collateral damage, scaled effects based on waveform parameters and determination of intent by non-lethal means as an intermediate force capability.

The weapons systems are presently still unpredictable due to the many variables that effect performance. Ambient weather conditions, power settings, duration of exposure and distance from target all affect the effects, which may range from temporary interference, persistent interference or damage. Determining likely damage under given conditions is a statistical or probabilistic event.

ZKAS 30mm CIWS

A ship's bow mounts a ZKAS-G (Dutch abbreviation for ‘Very Short Range System, G variant’) 30mm CIWS, a point defence weapon system for detecting and destroying short-range incoming missiles and enemy aircraft.

The ZKAS-G 30mm CIWS has performance that is comparable to similar systems, featuring a 30 mm six-barrel rotary cannon, capable of firing 4,300 rounds per minute in bursts of up to 1,000 rounds over an effective / flat-trajectory range of 3,000 metres. The turret has a 360° traverse and can elevate between -25° and +85° and is guided by X-band search radar, enhanced by multiple hypothesis and integrated probability algorithms.