GHOST in the news

Saw a short piece on Fox News this morning, about the Juliet Marine project craft, GHOST. (I tried to add this to the original thread from a couple years ago, but forum wouldn't let me. ?)

The news piece used a snip from the latest PR video (link) and also mentioned that the US Navy was buying one of them to evaluate. The last bit was news to me.

http://www.julietmarine.com/news.htm

 

If they made a stitch and glue version, ElGringo would have his wish.

 

Pretty cool, but not exactly cheap at 7 million. I wonder if they really have supercavitation working for them. The speeds in shown in the film don't look like much more than 30 or 40 knots. Making a SWATH go fast is tough due to the high wetted surface area. Getting a cavitation bubble around the hull would help reduce that, but I don't think that is going to happen at those speeds.

 

Not expensive at all when compared to current similar projects...SOCOM's new CCMs are in that price range, for example.

That said, I expect the 7 million is either optimistic or is for the very bare-bones platform only...

 

A nice bug out craft for a survivalist millionaire.

 

I guess in the world of military hardware 7 million doesn't get you far. I think that number was just a base price for the civilian version.

 

Looks like Juliet Marine is making another push to sell the concept, possibly due to the Navy's RFI related to small surface combatants.

National Defense Magazine: http://www.nationaldefensemagazine....ralCombatShipWillBeModifiedIfNotReplaced.aspx
The Navy called for input from “experienced shipbuilders, ship design agents and large system integrators on how their ship design supports the roles and missions of a small surface combatant.” Proposals were to include information on whole-ship design and cost drivers of mature, commercially available technologies and vessels.

“The Navy is interested in estimated cost and schedule information for designing, building, testing and delivering the first ship and a notional class of 20 small surface combatants,” the RFI stated..
The article has several paragraphs about Ghost and includes:
Companies that responded to the RFI insist they can accomplish the LCS missions for far less. Juliet Marine Systems CEO Greg Sancoff said the company’s Ghost stealth patrol boat could outperform both existing ships for just $10 million a copy.

Business Week article: http://www.businessweek.com/article...st-boat-will-be-hard-sell-to-u-dot-s-dot-navy

Sea Power article: http://www.seapowermagazine.org/stories/20140728-ghost.html
Juliet Marine has been in high-level discussions with a foreign nation interested in 25 Ghosts for potential sale $300 million. Sea Power article http://www.seapowermagazine.org/stories/20140728-ghost.html

 

*chuckle* The Navy is quite clear that the SSC needs to be more capable in several areas than are the LCS'...and that most assuredly means "bigger than LCS" too.

But that said, Navy does not really know yet what they want to do. Might end up building some sort of "high-low" mix that could include vessels like the GHOST, Halter's FMC (Ambassador III), an armed version of JHSV, and so on. Lots of noodling going on these days, trying to figure out how to build decent capabilities in the era of shrinking budgets and the incredible shrinking US Navy.

 

This may be a longshot BMcF I read a post that you used to sail a B-Lion cat can you look in on my post on multihulls
Thanks
onekiwi

 

Tell me how this is better than a helicopter which goes much faster over air or water?
Watching the ghost boat moving through the water, I thought that thing is an easy target!

http://www.militaryfactory.com/aircraft/detail.asp?aircraft_id=705
Like this, 192 mph range 863 miles

I really hope our government will not waste money buying this slow toy boat easily targeted by a missile - rocket.

 

Missiles such as these

 

There is and always will be a requirement for various and sundry "small craft" assets in the US military. That is particularly true, but not exclusive to, the Navy special warfare folks. Further, those operators have specific requirements for vessels that have varying degrees of stealth featured.

 

Design Push

This reminds me of the M-craft, or the Air-ride. You have a political push of a constituents technology and cannot understand the Navy's reluctance to take your opinion of its capabilities as facts. That being said I like the concept if it is really enveloping the swath hulls with air, it may overcome the slow speed nature of swath. But the video fails to show that, are any independent studies done yet?