Each frigate undergoing life extension LIFEX refit has a hull survey and repairs, the Sea Wolf missile system was replaced with Sea Ceptor and a wide range of other upgrades and refurbishments. Other important additions are the foundations and cabling needed to take the Naval Strike Missile system canisters to be embarked at a later date and the news S bow-mounted sonar.
While delivering an important capability boost, the work has mostly taken longer than expected, each vessel is has effectively been a unique project. As each ship was stripped down and surveyed, different levels of hull corrosion, structural problems and equipment deterioration were revealed.
Work on the ship that was launched in included more than steel hull inserts and 11, weld repairs — a total of 5km of welding. Around 8 km of new cable and m of new pipework has to be installed. The Upper Auxiliary Machinery Room UAMR is on the main deck level and is more easily accessible via deckhead soft patches but was also completely stripped and much equipment re-sited.
Newly refurbished, Sutherland can expect to work just as hard in an even more threadbare fleet and serve well into the s until replaced by by a Type 26 frigate.
The uk is a wealthy nation, where has all the money been blown that could otherwise have been used to prevent the dither and delay in earlier ordering. However I would really like to know the true TOTAL cost of this particular four year long refit information which was, quite noticeably, not stated in the NL article…. Trouble is that the nation is mostly owned and controlled by the Elite and these small percentage of Super wealthy like to keep it that way.
