Following a successful test with 161-106 Illicit, the rest of the Depender 161A fleet of multi-role support ships (the official role, actual role is thought to be intelligence gathering) will receive e-Core engines during an upgrade later this year.
The engine upgrade will be carried out during scheduled heavy maintenance. The ships will also lose their Canister TPMs as these missiles are now obsolete, plus they have TPM-VLS cells in any event.
DF have announced a new ship programme called Future Heavy Combat Ship or FHCS. This is a feasibility study which will look into potential specifications and future trends for a new heavy combat ship for the second half of the 2130s which will replace the Solaris 37C and Type 35 fleets between 2135 and 2150.
A modular design is expected which can replace the two heavy combat ships which form the backbone of the DF combat fleet. DF expect FHCS to feed into the Solaris replacement plan in the early 2130s with the first ship planned to enter service in 2135.
UNDF has agreed an 750 million zark deal to sell it's surplus fleet of Sting 58A light patrol ships to Triple Megan. DF were already in the process of withdrawing the Stings but had no plans for the ships and so put the fleet of ten ships up for sale. Triple Megan will accept the ships and will carry out their own localisation and system integration.
The transfer of the ships will begin in the next few weeks. The final patrol duties of two ships will be completed this week. A Triple Megan team will arrive and assess how to take the ships to their planet. DF crews may ferry the ships to Triple Megan.
Three of the five Okra 86L light patrol ships which had been earmarked for storage will be retained in DF service as general purpose ships. It is thought these will help replace the six Romes which will be loaned to Molab as part of the forthcoming Advanced Rome sale.
The Okra 86Ls will be redesignated as Okra 86K. They will retain their armament but will lose some of the tactical and sensor systems fitted for the patrol role. The space freed up will be used for extra accommodation and storage space. The ships will be added to the general purpose duties pool which means they are available for a whole host of missions such as ad hoc transport and crew transport, reconnaissance, surveying and testing.
A technical team from the Molab military has arrived on Solaris to receive information on the Advanced Rome. They have received in depth information on the new ship including simulation data from the Advanced Rome bench testbed at UNDF Engineering as well as telemetry data from the n-Core test bed. They were also presented with details of the localisation options available for the Rome 46A ships which will be loaned to Molab to tide them over until Advanced Rome arrives.
Molab are after sixteen Advanced Rome with a delivery from 2128, with six Romes arriving from late this year to help ease the pressure on the crumbling Kalahati Tuul fleet. The value of the contract is said to be 9 billion zarks which would make it the biggest export order for DF for quite some time.
The main sticking point is said to be Molab's insistence on getting n-Core engines as soon as they are available in the early 2130s. DF originally wanted to keep n-Core to themselves for at least five years though may make an exception for Molab due to the importance of the order.
In a major shock, Molab has declined the chance to buy the Dino Swordfish and instead say they think the Advanced Rome is the ship they need to replace their eighteen Kalahati Tuuls which are in desperate need of replacement. The problem is, no Advanced Rome yet exists, building the prototype has only just begun. Even if things go smoothly Molab might not receive any ships until late 2128 or even 2129.
The Kalahati Tuuls will simply not last long enough, some are said to be already virtually end of life, with the remainder being rotated to prolong the ships so some can reach 2130, though none will live much beyond that. Molab said the Swordfish is an excellent ship but is too small and under-equipped to replace the Kalahati Tuuls being more a Dino equivalent to the Pentekonter Protector.
DF has said they can transfer up to six Rome 46As to Molab on loan, and after localisation could be ready to begin service by the end of the year. These ships can help tide Molab over until Advanced Rome can take over in the late 2120s and early 2130s. Molab could buy up to fifteen Advanced Romes.