![]() ![]() Navy spending planned for FY24 will formalize Austal’s work on these modules, creating a dedicated submarine fabrication facility there, Jones said. Joe Courtney, a Democrat whose Connecticut district includes the Electric Boat yard in Groton, told Defense News. ![]() Jones said the Navy is looking to move at least 5 million production hours a year in large-scale steel fabrication, outfitting and other heavy manufacturing work to other locations, allowing the shipyards to focus on outfitting, final assembly and testing.Īlready, the Austal USA shipyard in Alabama has begun building steel modules for the Virginia submarine program, becoming a “strategic supply chain company … that will take millions of man hours out of the strain in the system” at Electric Boat, Rep. The third effort, strategic outsourcing, appears to be taking some of this growing work away from the two shipyards. The Navy is also pitching in with support for the facilities and equipment needed to keep up with growing demand. For example, Newport News Shipbuilding spokesman Todd Corillo told Defense News the yard is in the midst of making $1.9 billion in capital investments that started in 2016 and will run through 2025, which include facilities to accelerate submarine production. The shipyards are making their own investments. The Virginia-class submarine Iowa sits in a graving dock at the Electric Boat shipyard in Groton, Conn., in August 2023. (Though Electric Boat is the prime contractor for both submarine programs, it has a teaming relationship with Newport News Shipbuilding where both yards build certain portions of each submarine and share in the final assembly and testing responsibilities.) The second area is shipyard infrastructure, to ensure General Dynamics Electric Boat and HII’s Newport News Shipbuilding can ramp up their production to a rate that will, in FY26, hit its highest rate by tonnage since World War II: one Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine and two Virginia-class attack submarines with the Virginia Payload Module insert each year, dubbed a 1+2 production rate. In this fiscal year, the Navy will infuse about $70 million into the raw material market, an area where material must be delivered on time to keep submarine construction on schedule, and which has been “especially impacted by market fluctuations and post-pandemic realities,” Jones said. It has since seen a 100% increase in capacity to process large forgings, Jones said, and reduced its costs by 30%. The company, part of the castings and forgings market that has struggled to keep up with demand, used the money to buy more production equipment. ![]() For example, Scot Forge received more than $20 million as part of this effort. ![]()
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