our Navy remains a symbol of the United States of our dedicated and skilled
sailors of our technological genius and our massive but control military
strength which patrols the oceans of the world on a mission
ford-class super carriers are being built to replace some of the United
States Navy's existing nimitz-class carriers from 2016 the ships of this
class are expected to be in service with the US Navy until 2065 the carriers have
been envisaged to be more efficient and future-proof the first ship of this
class is USS Gerald R for CBN 78 it's the costly a single military asset in
the world there are lots of speculations and misinformation about its cost a
proper detailed research is required to put things into perspective in this
video this analyzed why Gerald r4 cost more than thirteen billion dollars the
first platform of every class of weapons cost the most this is because of the
fact that a huge amount of research has to be done and totally new technologies
have to be developed once the first platform is finished the next sets can
be constructed by simply copying the technologies of the first also the
construction processes are streamlined and cost get reduced as more the same
things are built Ford being the first of its class has been so costly to
construct John F Kennedy CBN 79 and Enterprise CBN 80 the next ships in this
class are expected to cost significantly less
Ford uses extensive automation and this is jacked up initial acquisition cost
but this will help to reduce the future operating cost for example Ford class
carriers total only twenty six hundred sailors about seven hundred fewer than a
Nimitz class considering the 50 years lifespan of the carrier this will
translate to billions of dollars in saving this will also mean that there
will be a lesser chance of any issues or accents due to human errors the viewer
may note that recently US Navy has suffered a series of setbacks due to
collisions caused mainly due to human error nimitz-class carriers launch
planes using steam actuated catapults the system requires a lot of steam
piping a large condensate return and tons of freshwater they tend to require
quite a bit of maintenance plus with steam catapults the majority of the
force gets transferred to the airplane at the beginning of the stroke in a jolt
this puts stress on an airframe and thus reduces the life span of the
multi-million dollar planes ford-class uses electromagnetic aircraft Launch
System iman's the first to do so the system uses linear induction motor with
an electric current to generate a magnetic field that field then propels a
carriage down a trend since the power delivery is linear it negates the
deficiencies of the steam catapult this will also be more suitable for launching
next generation fighters as well as drones
the current system installed in nimitz-class carriers relies on
hydraulics to catch the landing aircraft but the system stops the aircraft with a
sudden jolt this also puts stress on the airframe and degrades the life of
aircraft especially lightweight crafts like UAVs but Ford uses very advanced
electromagnetic landing gear because of which the deceleration and final stop of
the aircraft are smooth the heart of any aircraft carriers are the nuclear
reactors which provide the required power ford-class has newly designed
reactors to bechtel a 1b nuclear reactors are installed on each
ford-class carrier each one of these is capable of producing 300 megawatts of
electricity triple the 100 megawatts of each nimitz-class the huge power supply
enables for future expansions like inducting laser guns also compared to
the nimitz-class reactor the ford reactor have about half as many valves
piping major pumps condensers and generators which reduce maintenance cost
and lower space requirements
Ford has very advanced integrated active electronically scanned array search and
tracking radar system the dual band radar DVR uses a multi-tier dual band
tracker which consists of a local Axman tracker a local s band tracker and a
central trainer the central tracker merges the two signals to provide a
comprehensive situational awareness this new system has no moving parts
therefore minimizes maintenance and Manning requirements also the island is
kept smaller by replacing 6 to 10 radar antennas with a single six based radar
the x-band tracker is optimized for low latency to support its mission of
providing defense against fast low-flying missiles while the s-band
trackers optimized for large area cover so radar is an all arounder and is one
of the best in the world