NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The addition of a third Virginia-class submarine to the fiscal 2020 budget proposal won’t cause significant disruption to the industrial base because the program has given enough lead time before the sub needs to be built, the program’s manager said May 7 at Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space exposition.

Capt. Christopher Hanson, the U.S. Navy’s Virginia-class program manager, acknowledged that the decision years ago to increase procurement from one sub per year to two caused “some vendors [to] struggle,” but that the industry is able to handle a third sub because enough lead time has been built in. The addition won’t cause a shock in the production line, Hanson said.

By adding a third sub to the budget, the Navy sends a “very clear signal of what’s coming,” allowing vendors to adjust and prepare, he added.

“If they get a clear signal, they will invest,” Hanson said. “That clear signal is hard to measure, but you definitely see the results in the vendor base.”

This request will allow the Navy to immediately get orders out to the vendors so they can fill those orders. And it’s not anything they can’t handle, Hanson said, arguing that they are simply asking the industrial base to deliver 11 subs instead of 10 over the next five years.

The Navy is still striving to get construction time of Virginia-class subs down to 60 months, although it has recently stalled in the area of 66 to 68 months. Hanson said the goal is still 60 months, although he acknowledged it was not a guarantee. “Would I bet my life on 60 months? Probably not.”

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The Zumwalt-class of destroyers is experiencing a series of milestones as its program continues to refine its role in the fleet, according to a May 7 briefing at Sea-Air-Space 2019. The third and final DDG-1000 Zumwalt-class destroyer was just christened in the last couple of weeks, setting it up for a 2020 delivery. The DDG-1002 was christened on April 27, Capt. Kevin Smith, DDG-1000 program manager, said. The program also conducted the first live missile firings using the Zumwalt Combat System on April 26.

The program is looking into implementing a maritime strike version of the Tomahawk missile, and they are also looking at the SM-6 Block 1A, the captain said.

The Navy expects the DDG-1000 to take on a different role in the fleet compared to how it was originally envisioned. It was slated as a ship that could operate in the littorals, but now the Navy is shifting it to a more blue-water focus, Smith said.

“We are now an offensive surface strike platform — more blue water,” he said. “The Navy made a decision to go that way.”

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The Navy’s Unmanned Maritime Systems program office is juggling the development of a lot of unmanned surface and underwater vehicles right now, and they expect numerous big developments for several programs in the next year or two.

Capt. Pete Small, Unmanned Maritime Systems program manager, told attendees at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space symposium May 6 that a new draft request for proposals was recently released for a medium unmanned surface vehicle (USV), and the Navy was “aggressively” moving forward with that program.

The Navy is also accelerating a large USV program, and an analysis of alternatives for that effort will wrap up by the end of this year, Small added. The program hopes for a fiscal 2020 start for that platform, and Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson personally wants to see the project bear fruit “ASAP,” the captain said.

On the unmanned underwater vehicles (UUV) side of the house, the extra-large UUV Orca recently finished the design phase. It will feature a modular payload and the Navy hopes to take delivery at the end of calendar year 2020, with buys continuing through 2022, Small said.

The Snakehead large-displacement UUV is expected to complete its critical design review this quarter, and the Navy hopes to have it in the water by fiscal 2021.

And the Razorback, slated for the fiscal 2020 timeframe, would be hosted on a submarine and the Navy is developing a torpedo tube-launched version. The Navy recently issued a request for information on that project and received some responses from industry.

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Construction on a version of the Littoral Combat Ship for the government of Saudi Arabia is on track to start by the end of this calendar year, according to a Navy official.

Ghadeer Halim, deputy program manager for International Small Combatants (PMS 525), said after a presentation from her program office at Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space symposium May 6 that the current plan calls for the construction of four LCSs for the Saudi government with the option for four more for a possible total of eight ships.

Lockheed Martin was awarded a $282 million contract for design and materials for the construction of the four Multi-Mission Surface Combatant ships back in November.

The ships will differ from the U.S. Navy LCS in that the module will be permanent and fixed rather than replaceable with a different module.

The United States and Saudi Arabia came to an agreement on an $11.2 billion deal back in 2015 that included a modified version of the LCS.

The ship would be based on Lockheed’s Freedom-class LCS, one of two different LCS types. (Austal USA builds the Independence-class.)

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The U.S. Navy and Raytheon conducted a joint test of the Excalibur N5 munition with an eye toward firing it from Arleigh Burke-class destroyer Mk 45 guns, according to a Raytheon official.

The Navy has not made a decision on whether to buy the Excalibur N5 for use on ships, but the test — which took place last September at Yuma Proving Ground in Arizona — was a key step forward for the program, said John Hobday, head of Coyote & Rapid Development Programs for Raytheon, in a briefing at Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space symposium on May 6.

The Excalibur N5 is based on the M982 Excalibur used by the Army, and it would use the same key parts. It is GPS guided, and Raytheon says it has double the current Mk 45 range (26 nautical miles versus 13).

The N5 reuses the guidance and fusing components from the Block 1B version of the Excalibur.

The Navy is “evaluating where they stand on it,” and Raytheon has provided the Navy with all the necessary information, Hobday said.

The test involved six shots and the accuracy of the rounds and handling were evaluated.

“Excalibur N5 answers the Navy’s need for a sea-launched, precision-guided projectile,” said Sam Deneke, Raytheon Land Warfare Systems vice president, in a statement. “N5 doubles the range of the Navy’s big guns and delivers the same accuracy as the land-based version.”