The Navy is wrapping up its investigation into the root cause of a combing gear casualty that led the USS Milwaukee (LCS-5) to be sidelined in December, and a report detailing its findings could be published within a matter of weeks, a Lockheed Martin [LMT] official told reporters Thursday.
Less than a month after the commissioning of the Milwaukee, its crew discovered metallic debris in the port and starboard combining gear filter systems, and the ship lost pressure and had to be towed to Joint Expeditionary Base (JEB) Little Creek-Fort Story, Va., for repairs.
The service and Freedom-variant LCS prime contractor Lockheed Martin launched investigations into the incident, said Joe North, the company’s vice president of littoral ships systems.
The analysis is “still ongoing and the Navy is probably going to get report out about that in the next few weeks,” he said during a conference call. “So until they are done looking at it, we are just providing input as far as systems operate [and] how the design was put together.”
It will be up to the Navy to determine whether the failure represents a larger, class-wide issue, he said.
The Freedom-class took another hit this month, when the USS Fort Worth (LCS-3), which is currently deployed to Singapore, suffered a casualty to its combining gears during an in-port period. The Navy said the issue was due to a failure to follow established maintenance procedures.
North said the incidents were not related. The first two Freedom-class ships were constructed with gears from MAAG and General Electric, but after the company went out of business, RENK became Lockheed Martin’s gear supplier for a-class ships from the LCS-5 and onward, he said.
There is no plan to change the way the combing gears are tested, because that process is vetted by the Navy to meet its standards, he added.
Despite a memo from Defense Secretary Ashton Carter directing the Navy to cut its LCS program of record to 40 ships in the fiscal 2017 budget, Lockheed Martin is proceeding with plans to execute a 52-ship program of record, North said.
Twenty of those ships will be a more lethal version that will be designated as frigates. The company is currently doing engineering studies to figure out how the frigates could best utilize the open space on the vessel usually filled by mission module equipment, he said. “We’re still going to do engineering probably through 2016, if the budget is there.”
The company is also awaiting the outcome of negotiations between the U.S. government and Saudi Arabia about the potential sale of four multi-mission surface combatants that would be based on the Freedom-class design.
International interest for the LCS remains “at a pretty significant level,” North said, although he declined to specify which countries are in discussions with the company.
Lockheed Martin and shipbuilder Marinette Marine have delivered three Freedom-class vessels so far, and will launch its sixth LCS, USS Sioux City (LCS-11), during a Saturday ceremony in Marinette, Wis.
Austal produces the Independence-variant LCS.