The oldest of the Royal Navy’s ballistic missile submarines, HMS Vanguard is currently in Devonport undergoing major refit and refuelling. There are strong indications the project is in trouble and she will be unable to return to service at the start of 2020 as originally scheduled, with knock-on effects for the 3 remaining boats that maintain the nuclear deterrent.
HMS Vanguard arrived in December 2015 for her second Long Overhaul Period and Refuel (LOP(R)). Her three younger sisters, HMS Victorious, Vigilant and Vengeance have completed their first LOP(R) at Devonport which averaged about 42 months. As we reported last year, Vanguard is unique in having an unplanned second nuclear reactor refuelling as a precautionary measure. The subsequent three boats will have a second LOP but fortunately, it has been discovered they will not require refuelling.
At the time of writing, the project is in its 44th month. Vanguard is the oldest boat and the additional unplanned refuelling may partly explain why this refit will take longer than the preceding boats. Reliable sources told the Financial Times at the end of last year she was still “in pieces” and the MoD had “low confidence” that Vanguard would meet her originally planned return to the fleet in 2020. Effectively putting the project into ‘special measures’, experts from the Submarine Delivery Agency (SDA) were drafted in to support Babcock in 2018.
During her first 35-month LOP(R) which took place between February 2002 and Jan 2005, Vanguard received the new Core H reactor. This new core design, which has subsequently been installed in her sister boats and on the Astute class submarines from the outset, was designed to avoid the need to refuel at all during their lifetime. Vanguard is therefore the first submarine to have the Core H removed and replaced, a task that was not envisaged when it was designed.
The work on Vanguard is the fifth LOP(R) undertaken at Devonport but each refit is a major engineering feat with unique challenges. Submarine repair is never easy due to the cramped spaces and restricted access while the internal systems are more densely packed together than on a surface ship. At the start of the project, Babcock estimated there were over 25,000 individual engineering tasks that would require 2.5 million man-hours. 2.3 Km of cable to be installed, 32,000 litres of paint applied and 26,000 items of ship’s equipment overhauled. 7,000 welds have to be surveyed and repaired, failure of just a single weld when the submarine was at depth could be fatal and inspection must meticulous.
The poor decision by the Cameron government in 2010 to delay starting the Dreadnought programme to replace the Vanguard-class by five years will apply great stress on the boats towards the end of their lives. Vanguard’s current LOP should be her last major refit until she is replaced by HMS Dreadnought sometime in the early 2030s. This project is effectively a life extension that will have to see Vanguard through another 10-12 years of service. Launched in 1992, the boat will be 38 years old by 2030, she was laid down in 1986 so parts of the boat’s structure will, by then, be 44 years old. Ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs) by their nature are highly complex and it is critical they remain mechanically sound and retain their stealth, neither of these attributes is improved with age.
Should Vanguard’s refit run on into late 2020 or 2021, then it will force the other boats to take on extra patrols that were not scheduled in their lifecycle planning. HMS Victorious is the next boat due to have a LOP and her material state cannot be ideal as it is 11 years since she completed her last long overhaul in July 2008. In this situation, the RN can be thankful it has four boats to maintain the Continuous at Sea Deterrent, but the tyranny of keeping at least one boat on patrol is always a balancing act. Of the remaining two boats, one must be preparing to go on patrol and the other boat maybe in a short-medium overall period in Faslane.
As the chart above shows, each part of the Royal Navy’s submarine programme is interdependent. With just a single facility capable of building submarines (Barrow) and a single dockyard able to refit or dismantle submarines (Devonport), flexibility is limited. Delays to any part of the programme have potentially serious knock-on consequences. As we reported last month, delays to the construction of HMS Audacious and the 3 other Astute-class boats at Barrow may impact the delivery of the Dreadnought class boats, forcing Vanguard and her sisters to keep going. Maintaining older submarines is an increasingly difficult and expensive business, adding risks to the boats going to sea and further cost pressures for the MoD. These problems also provide fuel for anti-Trident campaigners who say “look it’s all too difficult and expensive, we should just give up and unilaterally abandon the nuclear deterrent”. Let us hope Babcock and the SDA is able to quickly grip the issues and return Vanguard to operations as soon as possible. It is vital that the CASD chain, UK defence priority one, remains unbroken long into the future.
Main image: Babcock
Paragraph 1; boast => boats
There’s also a form instead of from and an overall instead of overhaul.
Apologies, typos fixed!
We originally were building 5 ballistic missile submarines, we should build 5 Dreadnoughts for emergencies and so that crews might have better family life’s and spend less time at sea thus retaining more highly skilled submariners and the submarines might not wear out as quick.
Successive Governments put all their eggs in one basket by making Devonport the only place where Nuclear subs could be re-fitted Some sort of limited capability could have been maintained at Rosyth, Instead all of Rosyth’s infrastructure for Nuclear subs has been removed.
Yeah the government seem to like putting all our eggs in one basket! Rosyth should build our big ships like FFS, we will need more large RFA and Royal Navy ships in the near future, but England losing its Royal Navy ship building is beyond me! Scotland and England should both build RN ships, but I suppose England has Submarine manufacturing, shame we can’t export submarines.
The Australian’s are investing in modern new facilities to build their type 26 frigates ,They will probably build them faster and to a higher standard using these facilities. We should be doing the same and not just in one place but all over the country, We need these ships sooner rather than later. England should not loose out, like I have said putting all you’r eggs in one basket is a recipe for disaster. Devonport is a victim of its own success . It has too much work and does not have enough skilled manpower to cope , some of its re – fit work could go to other yards which are struggling to stay in business. help keep the skills alive for the future
I still think the frigate factory enclosed dock hall should be built on the Clyde so that we have World class facilities in which to build the Royal Navy’s frigates and destroyers. We have the Rosyth to assemble the F.S.S. ships and other large ships for the R.N. and R.F.A.. And no, England should definitely not lose out, the Type 31 should be built at Cammell Lairds on the Mersey.
Yeah maybe Appledore could have done some of the mine hunter refit work instead. Even frigate refit work if it was financially viable. Shame we lost the Tyne swan and hunter yard demolishing their last cranes not long ago! Belfast the Clyde, Tyne, Merseyside and the rest all had major ship building! it’s juat a handful of yards now that are always threatening closure! the Clyde will survive because it has to even if we build OPVs that weren’t wanted! More frigates or even corvettes would be better than dam OPVs we need more escorts.
Nuclear Z berths aren’t exactly cheap to maintain or popular to build. There’s also the odd sentiment of not wanting England to lose out, yet you want to take away work from Devonport? The logical second site would be in Scotland, probably Rosyth where there used to be nuclear berths.
The reality is that the fleet (and especially the submarine service) is too small to sustain more than a couple of building and maintenance facilities long term. The issue isn’t that we need another facility, it’s that we delay programmes, lose skills, and spend more money for less gain. We need smarter governments, not more yards
Are you sure that the refit won’t just be abandoned?
OK, full conspiracy mode,what if all boats had an irreparable fault?
@Grubbie shhhh….that’s a state secret. Don’t you know that Russian trolls regularly monitor this site?
Maybe we should get our subs and American made missiles Made in China. They seem to make everything else we use! Probably turn out cheaper and built to a higher quality too.
At best the deterrent is one time use. The Yanks won’t give us additional missiles/maintain or upgrade systems unless we are in a war alongside them rather than go off on a frolick of our own against their wishes.
We British just got rid of loads of our nuclear warheads reducing the numbers to 160 or less! We don’t need extra missiles (trident delivery system) from USA we had and have all we need says the government but I’m not sure, we should have more just incase and fill our submarines again! No point half arsing it when we are spending the money anyway, And we share a pool of trident missiles with USA. Remember we only Fill half our Vanguard Subs with missiles these days!! Atleast we still make our own nuclear warheads though.
And by that comment alonenismproof you know virtually nothing about the nuclear deterrent, it’s programme and defence matters in general. Sad, but expected.
Much as I enjoy being voted down, you destroy your case by voting down questions.
The British people decide how much defence expenditure they want to payfor ,not the RN.
The reason why I ask this question is that it wouldn’t be the first time the MOD has got itself into an iretrevable mess and they don’t tend to fess up until several billion have been wasted.
You don’t ask questions, you spout bullshit and anti-British nonsense.
The British people don’t decide anything of the kind. The ruling administration does that, and the last three administrations have decided defence is towards the bottom of their priorities, starting with the “peace dividend” and the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Those of us who lived [and served] during the Cold War know full well the importance of credible defence and one of the factors borne in mind by the opposition was the threat of unacceptable damage from a retaliatory strike by CASD, hence the importance of maintaining a credible deterrent.
We can only hope the noise about real increases in defence spending actually come to something.
This is just another symptom of 30 years of deliberate defence slashing.
An increase to 3% of GDP is vital, prior to the next SDSR.
It’s long overdue to ( excuse the pun) turn the boat around chaps!
Has anyone else noticed how Whitehall’s money saving ideas always end in greater expenditure long term? Most of those who make these rash decisions have retired to a comfortable life working (sic) one day a week for some multi-national corporation and never face the music.
Absolutely Barry, spot on mate.
If we still had Royal Dockyards owned by MOD Navy, instead of These Private Companies with little or no Experience running The Dockyards we may not have so many problems Refitting HM Ships & Submarines and lack of spares
And today, over 3 years after the original post, it’s reported that Babcock are using glue in place of screws to attach insulation!