Canada's new C6A1 Flex General purpose MG

When ppl talk about a broken procurement system, it's because they don't understand the issues driving procurement timelines to be long. The truth of the matter is that the Federal Accountability Act (Conservatives, circa 2006) doubled the duration of the average defence acquisition by adding all sorts of extra governance hoops, long rounds of mandatory industry engagement, independent third party reviews, more frequent and time consuming visits from the OAG, and all other manner of bureaucratic nonsense. Add to that the fact that DND's staff levels has been reduced by over 1/3 since 1998, but program workload has more than doubled after the decade of darkness ended. David Perry published a great article about this last year - worth the google. Before a project can deliver anything, the government changes and everything gets put on hold while the new government produces a defence white paper that likely cancels all the old projects and makes the department start over.

Rigorous product testing and long in-service support tails aren't the problem, they are essential. In military hardware, durability and reliability are the single most important characteristics of the gear - the forces use their stuff VERY hard and if it fails because it's shoddy, defective, or cheap - our soldiers die. That's not a broken procurement system, that's called a debt we owe our men/women in uniform - and industry has to help pay that debt to the people that protect the system enabling them to exist and make profit.

or you could just contract with the Ontario Provincial Liberal government to build a 'gas plant' to generate hydro .. then fail to get zoning (as contractually specified) -- not even put a shovel in the ground - have the contract cancelled... and get $812 million (more than 3/4 Billion dollars) from Dalton McGinty. Then arrange to get all the hard drives with email and records about the deal erased. Another perfectly normal government procurement process ...... in Ontario!!
 
You should try to calculate the lifetime cost of your commuter car.
From driving off the dealer's lot to when you call kidney car or kars for kids to come tow it off your driveway.
Don't forget the windshield washer fluid too.
 
Getting off topic a bit but how that moron McGinty never ended up in jail is a travesty of our so called judicial system. We don't have a justice system in this country anymore we have a rehabilitation system, I guess they figured McGinty didn't even need to be rehabilitated!!!! Now the real travesty.....the Liberals were voted in for a second mandate with a majority gov't................LOL
 
And we thought Quebec highway contracts were corrupt?
Dalton the Guilty takes the cake, and leaves slices for Orville Redenbacher to savor.
I'm surrounded by wind turbines, and wondering how much I'm better off paying my current hydro bill without those gas plants.
 
Figures. The Liberals will also spend 230 million per super hornet and 4.5 billion per new frigate when they start building them late next decade. The navy typically negotiates it's maintenance contracts after the building contract so even more money.
 
lol The "upgraded" C6A1 eh? A plastic buttstock, bolted on quad rail around the forward barrel and a pic rail welded onto the feed tray for almost $30K per machine gun is what it is.
FN could have supplied brand new C6's from factory at a 1/4 the price each. How much money do you actually think a new pic rail welded feed tray, plastic buttstock and a ####ty bolt on quad rail would cost each? The remaining $23K per gun? lol
I'm not sure what support was included in that astronomical price tag when it's CAF Weap Techs on DND man power hours who work on the guns when they have issues.
Even factoring in spare parts, that's a lot of damned money. I'm also not tracking on what "training" support means which is factored into the price. It's GPMG. The same one our Techs have been working on and kept running for 30+ years. It's not a new space age rail gun that we need to re-train our entire support system to maintain.
Colt's the only player in town for Canada who can meet the contract requirements, our mandates dictate we need to purchase in Canada first over any other. Colt could have charged $60K per gun and there was no other competition or options available and DND still would have signed the deal.
We got hosed.
 
TB: your layman's view demonstrates a shallow understanding of what DND is paying for.

For starters, the issc tail of any military procurement is over 70% of the cost. That's a standard rule of thumb in the industry. Acquisition cost might be all you care about, but you will never come close to abusing your gear to the level DND will over the 40+ yrs these will serve.

Also, buying from FN would not be as cheap as you think. Their ISS quote will be higher as they are overseas and you would have to stand up a Canadian subsidiary to even bid under the industrial and technological benefits program forced into DND by ISED (formerly industry Canada).

Next, spending the money in Canada means over 70% of the cost eventually flows back to the gov through various levels of taxation, not so if you send the $ to Belgium. Not to mention you keep about 150 manufacturing workers off welfare. That has a cost avoidance benefit too.

Gov procurement is complicated and often overly simplified in the press. Few people understand it, and those that do considered this to be a fair deal for a strategic domestic lmg mfgr and support capability.

DND did have other options, by the way. They could have gone Foreign Military Sales to the USA for less cost per gun, but after the value calculation, that takes all the above into account, they chose Colt as a better value. A good thing in my opinion.

It's important to note they future buys will come in cheaper, you only set up the mfgr line once.
 
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Figures. The Liberals will also spend 230 million per super hornet and 4.5 billion per new frigate when they start building them late next decade. The navy typically negotiates it's maintenance contracts after the building contract so even more money.

Fwiw, the frigate cost you mention (60B for 15 CSC ships) is the allocated budget to the program. There is no contract to build anything, only a design contract with ISL. They may also not be frigates, they might be destroyers. Depends what ship they settle on.

The $60B is for more than ships. For example, it includes the missile buy and guidance package. The budget is set to buy a better missile than the POS Harpoon agm84's in the frigates. As much as half the acquisition cost coukd be a new missile system comparable to tomahawk, which is about time for a g8 country like Canada.
 
Fwiw, the frigate cost you mention (60B for 15 CSC ships) is the allocated budget to the program. There is no contract to build anything, only a design contract with ISL. They may also not be frigates, they might be destroyers. Depends what ship they settle on.

The $60B is for more than ships. For example, it includes the missile buy and guidance package. The budget is set to buy a better missile than the POS Harpoon agm84's in the frigates. As much as half the acquisition cost coukd be a new missile system comparable to tomahawk, which is about time for a g8 country like Canada.[/QUOTE

Foreign navies are building new modern ships of similar type (Just one hull) at 250-500 million a pop. 4 billion for all the weapons and systems on board one ship that's still quite a stretch of the imagination. The Liberal gravy train is back.
 
Fwiw, the frigate cost you mention (60B for 15 CSC ships) is the allocated budget to the program. There is no contract to build anything, only a design contract with ISL. They may also not be frigates, they might be destroyers. Depends what ship they settle on.

The $60B is for more than ships. For example, it includes the missile buy and guidance package. The budget is set to buy a better missile than the POS Harpoon agm84's in the frigates. As much as half the acquisition cost coukd be a new missile system comparable to tomahawk, which is about time for a g8 country like Canada.[/QUOTE

Foreign navies are building new modern ships of similar type (Just one hull) at 250-500 million a pop. 4 billion for all the weapons and systems on board one ship that's still quite a stretch of the imagination. The Liberal gravy train is back.

What foreign 1st world navies are buying a ready to deploy 4000T+ surface combatant for under $2B? Source?

Arleigh Burke's are the general standard in this range and top out over $2B on a steady and efficient production line in a continuous build program, not including armament.

I wouldn't want to sail into harm's way in a modern fight on a $500m ship. Thats like Indo-Pakistan Navy pricing where sailors aren't worth spit and volume Trump's quality.

We paid way more than that for the frigates in the early 90's. Since then there has been inflation and far far better and more expensive tech that goes into a ship.

The current frigates were costed in 1985 constant year dollars at $9.54B not including armament.

A Chevy 4 door sedan sold for around $7000 in 1985, to put that in perspective.
 
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What foreign 1st world navies are buying a ready to deploy 4000T+ surface combatant for under $2B? Source?

Arleigh Burke's are the general standard in this range and top out over $2B on a steady and efficient production line in a continuous build program, not including armament.

I wouldn't want to sail into harm's way in a modern fight on a $500m ship. Thats like Indo-Pakistan Navy pricing where sailors aren't worth spit and volume Trump's quality.

We paid way more than that for the frigates in the early 90's. Since then there has been inflation and far far better and more expensive tech that goes into a ship.

The current frigates were costed in 1985 constant year dollars at $9.54B not including armament.

A Chevy 4 door sedan sold for around $7000 in 1985, to put that in perspective.

Take for example the Absalon class or it's none Ro/Ro equivalent Iver Huitfeldt we're looking at very affordable, compatible ships and suit all our needs. 225-325 million US. Equipment extra but even then 4.5 billion for a ship and all the gear minus the life maintenance costs is out to lunch.

We could even do very well with 10 Iver's and 2 Absalon's. Very good for upgrading equipment too. The whole point of the class was to reduce costs and improve the design and building process to save on costs. These would be great because the design is sound, will be viable well into the future. Similar story for South Korean and Spanish ship building.

If we go for this yet unproven Combatant smart/stealth tech future ships the 60 billion for 15 is easily going to jump to 100 billion. Cost and schedule overruns. And we wouldn't even see those ships until the 2030's and the Frigates we have now will have died out before being replaced.
 
Lol. I give up. Yeah let's buy that junk and watch Navy recruiting dwindle to zero.

Go read Strong Secure Engaged and pay attention to the naval task group concept, interoperability with the usn, etc.

DND isn't looking for cheap, Canada is looking for first class kit that will save lives when the shooting starts.

And by the way, the Spanish design is still in contention. It's not a $500M ship, more like $2B cdn or more for the basic vessel.
 
Lol. I give up. Yeah let's buy that junk and watch Navy recruiting dwindle to zero.

Go read Strong Secure Engaged and pay attention to the naval task group concept, interoperability with the usn, etc.

DND isn't looking for cheap, Canada is looking for first class kit that will save lives when the shooting starts.

And by the way, the Spanish design is still in contention. It's not a $500M ship, more like $2B cdn or more for the basic vessel.

The Absalon and Iver are top notch at this point. It's not second line gear and to keep it's systems top of the line those ships are very easy to upgrade and keep up to date and they are very inter-operable with other navies especially the USN. As it stands now what we have is not.

The whole point of the Dutch ship building strategy was they made it more efficient, reliable and dynamic. You could spend 5 billion on a ship hull if you wanted to but if it's a mess of a program you're over paying for what will likely be junk. Perfect example all of the problems with the F35 program which will still take years to correct.
 
Have you ever worked in shipbuilding?

A Hull is dirty cheap. The expense is the fitout, including maneuverable propulsion, gas turbines, combat system, ECM package, APA radars, litoral 3d radars, fire controller, MASS systems, etc.

Irving will probably build the physical hulls for under $20M each.

Those sk ships are produced in Korea where labour is cheap, there are no Enviro laws to speak of, etc. They are also not expeditionary ships, they primarily operate litorally and close to home. The rcn can't buy them even if they want to in Canada. And the navy doesn't want to - those are less capable than a post-felex cpf.

Whatever is bought will be made in Canada, with 5-eyes comms and combat systems, and will be capable of deep strike land attack, asw and area air defense. That's a $2B plus ship with a $2b+ missile acquisition program.

It's not liberal largesse, it's what the RCN needs to be a blue water expeditionary navy.
 
Have you ever worked in shipbuilding?

A Hull is dirty cheap. The expense is the fitout, including maneuverable propulsion, gas turbines, combat system, ECM package, APA radars, litoral 3d radars, fire controller, MASS systems, etc.

Irving will probably build the physical hulls for under $20M each.

Those sk ships are produced in Korea where labour is cheap, there are no Enviro laws to speak of, etc. They are also not expeditionary ships, they primarily operate litorally and close to home. The rcn can't buy them even if they want to in Canada. And the navy doesn't want to - those are less capable than a post-felex cpf.

Whatever is bought will be made in Canada, with 5-eyes comms and combat systems, and will be capable of deep strike land attack, asw and area air defense. That's a $2B plus ship with a $2b+ missile acquisition program.

It's not liberal largesse, it's what the RCN needs to be a blue water expeditionary navy.

That's another problem. Irving is tied up for the next 10 years with the Arctic ships. And then Irving will want the government to cover the costs of building more new facilities and cover all the tooling costs. As it stands now even if we went for something comparable to an Arleigh full cost is around 2.5 billion and will fit all our needs.

And sea span outwest is tied up for about 10 years with the coast guard ships before they even get to the next AOR's the navy will have. As you can see the whole ship program is already mess. Put on the back burner due to the 2008 crash and the longer we wait the more Canada has to pay. Which we sadly can't exactly afford.

I wouldn't worry about recruiting and retention at this point if I were you. It's already a mess. The navy is one disorganized mess in disarray. And it's been bit by the SJW bug to boot. By the time the bullets start flying the new generation of bubble wrapped sailors will be incapable of dealing with bullets coming their way since they already can't handle a dirty joke these days.
 
I agree the ships will likely be around 2.5B each. The all up cost is a bloody expensive weapons package and strategic reserve of ordnance.

They won't reuse the cpf stuff, is basically obsolete and incapable compared to what everybody else runs now.
 
I just read an excellent book by a Canadian author. "Through a Canadian Periscope." An outstanding book by a skilled and devoted author. Other than being one of the few books on the Canadian Submarine Service a good part of it also addresses CF Naval procurement contracts in recent times and in previous eras. It is filled with excellent information I have not seen anywhere else. Highly recommended.

PS: IMO there are trainloads of cash in Canada for CF acquisition. BS politics often results in our soldiers sailors and airmen unable to do their jobs as effectively as we know they are capable of.

Sorry for the derail.
 
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Been over this before, but ya, the cost is way out of line.

When gunnies cant even understand the costs involved in military procurement, we should all not be surprised why our country is anti-military (and yes, IT IS).

These costs are not at all unreasonable. When I go to Australia, UK, NZD, US... WAY stronger support for hte military, costs that are higher than our yet the press is supportive so procurement is less political. Therefore timelines have become less - politicians aren't worried buying new jets will get them booted. (for example).

The reaction in this thread to a VERY REASONABLE initial production line setup contract has convinced me it's a lost cause to hope Canada will EVER be pro military as you guys nickel and dime ppl who are in the line of fire.
 
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