Australia get's HMS Eagle in 1973

What if Australia had Bought the HMS Eagle in 1973 and did the Planed upgrade Eagle that were cancelled in 1968 it would have cost them around £7 million . Australia also bought the 48 Phantom FG1s The Royal navy had order for her and her sister the Ark Royal .
How would this change the position of Australia over the next 20 -30 years .

300px-09_HMS_Eagle_Mediterranean_Jan1970.jpg
 
Could they afford it and crew it would be a good question. Even today, the Royal Australian Navy struggles to have full crews for its vessels. The Eagle would need two thousand crewmen or more. That's tough to find IMO.
 
I wounder if Singapore would of help crew and man her with New Zealand joining in . The 1968 Refit would of extended the Eagles life to 1988 at less .
 

Clipper747

Banned
The RAN would've had F-4J's with P/W engines. They already had experience with the F-4E and it's systems. The P/W engine was by far superior to the underpowered RR powerplant.
 
The RAN would've had F-4J's with P/W engines. They already had experience with the F-4E and it's systems. The P/W engine was by far superior to the underpowered RR powerplant.

The RR Spey turbofans of the F-4K (Phantom FG.1 in British terminology) were more powerful than the Pratt and Whitney turbojets used by American F-4s. I would imagine that Australia would want the Spey-powered versions, as they had greater thrust for getting off a carrier and better fuel economy at lower speeds.
 
I wounder if Singapore would of help crew and man her with New Zealand joining in . The 1968 Refit would of extended the Eagles life to 1988 at less .

Singapore and New Zealand wouldn't bother. What you'd have to do is drop the crew requirements from the 2,500 she had in the 1960s to 1,800 tops. If you can do that, you'd have something. But other than that, you'd have too many problems crewing it. Australia would probably actually be better served by the HMS Victorious, which was scrapped almost immediately following a refit in 1969, and would be a considerable improvement on the HMAS Melbourne in both age and condition, and could be made to work with the Skyhawks and Trackers the RAN used at the time. Victorious is too small for the Phantom, but you could use the Hawkeye on it, and an air group of Skyhawks (or Crusaders), Buccaneers, Trackers, a couple Hawkeyes and Wessex helicopters would would quite nicely indeed.
 
Why are you people trying to foist old worn out carriers onto us, with their massive crews and distorting force structure? What did we ever do to deserve this punishment?
 

Clipper747

Banned
The RR Spey turbofans of the F-4K (Phantom FG.1 in British terminology) were more powerful than the Pratt and Whitney turbojets used by American F-4s. I would imagine that Australia would want the Spey-powered versions, as they had greater thrust for getting off a carrier and better fuel economy at lower speeds.

http://wiki.scramble.nl/index.php/McDonnell_Douglas_F-4_Phantom_II

"...the Spey equipped Phantoms were slower (especially at altitude), had a lower service ceiling and a worse rate of climb than the J79 powered versions."


It goes on to say that they RR powerplants offered better fuel efficiency and range.
 
I wouldn't take that wiki article as gospel. I noticed that it had RAF Phantoms replaced with Tornado F2, rather than the F3 and that the RN only got 24 F4K and the RAF 28, rather than the other way around. Nor would I take the brochure figures as a great indication of how the plane will perform in combat, after all not many dogfights occur between unarmed aircraft doing mach 2.1 at 60,000'. The Speys may lack in the top end but their performane envelope would be muh fatter, particularly when loaded with weapons and at lower altitudes where most combat takes place.

Just another word on the necessity of the Spey, the RN-FAA spec included the capacity to return to the deck with a full load of unexpended bombs on board. The USN dropped their unexpended bombs into the sea. So the RN really needed that extra low down thrust and bleed air for the BLC, way more than they needed those few extra feet of altitude or .2 of a mach.
 
The crew required for HMS Eagle is too much, and even if she was purchased for scrap value, there wouldn't be the money for the refit and aircraft to fly off her.

The budget has just been blown by the purchase of the F-111 and is about to be blown further by the ordering of a pair of FFG-7's.

The RAN would have been better off spending the money to either convert HMAS Melbourne to Sydney spec as an Amphib or to upgrade Sydney to Melbourne spec as a second carrier.
 
Why are you people trying to foist old worn out carriers onto us, with their massive crews and distorting force structure? What did we ever do to deserve this punishment?

We're trying to thwart Australia’s rise as the world’s premier superpower, don't you know?

What if Australia had Bought the HMS Eagle in 1973 and did the Planed upgrade Eagle that were cancelled in 1968 it would have cost them around £7 million . Australia also bought the 48 Phantom FG1s The Royal navy had order for her and her sister the Ark Royal.

First, how is Australia going to man HMAS Eagle? Her normal peacetime lead-out was around 2500 men and pushed almost 3000 in times of actual conflict. Australia would have struggled to outfit that requirement even before conscription was abolished in 1972 let alone afterwards. Modernisation could have brought the manpower numbers down but not by much.

Second, she may cost £7 million in 1973 but that because by 1973 she had been stripped of virtually all of her useable parts with the exception of her propulsion which was also in dire need of upgrade. The ship is going to require a massive and costly rebuild. Even then you're only going to get maybe 15-18 years out of her, taking you up to the late 80s at best.

Third, how does Australia afford 48 already over expensive British F-4 Phantoms? That number alone is going to kill the RAAF unless by special agreement they are the ones who get to take over the operation of the Fleet Air Arm.

Forth, and this goes out to anyone out there who knows the answer but does the RAAN even have a dry dock facility big enough to accommodate a ship of that size? I know that when they were offered the Oriskany it was one of the reasons that they turned it down in OTL.

I wounder if Singapore would of help crew and man her with New Zealand joining in?

I think its unlikely that two smaller nations would want to help pay for and man what would essentially be an Australian warship

What you'd have to do is drop the crew requirements from the 2,500 she had in the 1960s to 1,800 tops

Given the age of the systems and the scale of the rebuild required its just not probably going to happen. A reduction of maybe 300 is reasonable but after that you really need a new carrier.

Australia would probably actually be better served by the HMS Victorious, which was scrapped almost immediately following a refit in 1969. Victorious is too small for the Phantom, but you could use the Hawkeye on it, and an air group of Skyhawks (or Crusaders), Buccaneers, Trackers, a couple Hawkeyes and Wessex helicopters would would quite nicely indeed.

Lovely Vic was very old and very used by the time of her retirement and was only going to serve until the mid 70s before she was scrapped anyway. She was also incredibly manpower intensive for her size, needing around 2100 crew in peacetime and 2400 on actual operations.

Also, the Hawkeye was never able to land on HMS Victorious. Her deck simply lacked the clearance to land them safely (and the arrestor gear lacked the strength) while the ships catapults were too small to launch them back into the air. The Hawkeye couldn't even land on the French Clemenceau class and I’m not even sure that they ever dared try to land on either Eagle or Ark Royal for some of the same reasons.

Additionally, I don't think Australia could operate a Fleet Air Arm as diverse as Crusaders, Buccaneers, Trackers, Hawkeyes and Wessex now, let alone in the 70's. Such a large variety would make air operations on such a small ship as HMS Victorious difficult and even counterproductive.

Keep it simple stupid. As stated in the other thread a centaur class carrier would be far better for Australia’s needs: More or less the same size in terms of deck space, hangar space, munitions storage and exactly the same aviation fuel capacity. All this for a ship that had a peacetime crew of around 1300-1400 and a wartime crew of no more than 1600. Also originally designed to act as auxiliary troop carriers they could carry up to a maximum of 2100 personnel should the need arise.

The RAN would've had F-4J's with P/W engines. They already had experience with the F-4E and it's systems. The P/W engine was by far superior to the underpowered RR powerplant.

U.S. navy Phantoms were able to land and take off from Ark Royal but both lacked the engine power and the take off angle of attack to get airborne with any meaningful load out. RN phantoms had to have a telescoping forward landing gear in order to give them a higher elevation on take off. That said, F-4J's with P/W engines AND the telescoping undercarriage may be enough to do the trick

Russell
 
When I said £7 million for the HMS Eagle that would be for the Refit she was going to have in 1968 but never received to handle the Phantom FG1s ,other wise the ship was given to the the RAN .Along with the aircraft she had in 1971 .
Final Air Wing 1971[4]

* 899 sqn. 12 Sea Vixen FAW2
* 800 sqn. 14 Buccaneer S2
* 849 sqn. D flt. 4 Gannet AEW3, 1 Gannet COD4
* 826 sqn. 6 Sea King HAS1
* Ships Flight 2 Wessex HAS1 (SAR)
 

MacCaulay

Banned
Why are you people trying to foist old worn out carriers onto us, with their massive crews and distorting force structure? What did we ever do to deserve this punishment?

Well, at least you're not like the RCN, which is getting used British subs in real life...

...christ, 3 out of 4 of them aren't even capable of getting out of the dock!
 
Why are you people trying to foist old worn out carriers onto us, with their massive crews and distorting force structure? What did we ever do to deserve this punishment?

I was trying to give the RAN a carrier that would able to go until the late 1980's with out another major refit .
 
The rebuilds the Vic and Eagle got were supposed to last 15 years or so, so the Vic lasts until 73 and the Eagle until 81 at best. However I think the Ark would have to be cannibalised for the Eagle to last that long, which probably have been a better chioce by the govt.
 
Top