Navy aircraft carrier designed for trouble-free maintenance.

Despite growing interest in possibly expanding the number of vertical-takeoff warplanes in the U.S. Joint Strike Fighter program, the additional maintenance work associated with these aircraft makes it unlikely that they will fly from the deck of the Navy's future aircraft carrier, the CVN-21.

The CVN-21 will be far more sophisticated than the current Nimitz-class carriers. Air wings operating from CVN-21 are expected to include a blend of advanced combat jets, as well as unmanned aircraft. The Navy is slated to buy a carrier-unique version of the JSF, eventually to replace the Super Hornet attack fighter, but the Navy does not plan to add the vertical-lift JSF model into the mix aboard CVN-21. The vertical-lift JSF is intended to replace the Marine Corps' Harrier, and to operate from large-deck amphibious ships.

Maintenance "issues" associated with the vertical-takeoff JSF have led the Navy to make the decision that the aircraft should not operate from CNV-21, said Rear Adm. Dennis Dwyer, Navy program executive officer for aircraft carriers.

A spokesman for the manufacturer of the JSF, Lockheed Martin, said company officials were surprised by Dwyer's statement. "The whole emphasis of the JSF program is shifting to STOVL (short takeoff and landing), particularly given the lessons learned in Afghanistan and Iraq with their bombed out runways," he said. "STOVL is the most transformational fighter of the three versions."

Lockheed Martin has not identified any maintenance issues that would prevent STOVL from being deployed aboard the CVN-21, the spokesman said. "Other than the lift fan, all the maintenance is essentially the same for STOVL and standard version."

Maintenance is an overarching theme in CVN-21. The entire design of the ship was aimed at simplifying aircraft and weapon maintenance, and in the process shrinking the amount of manual labor needed aboard the ship. While a Nimitz-class carrier has a crew of more than 5,000, the CVN-21 will get by with about 2,000 sailors.

In a briefing to reporters last month, Dwyer explained that the CVN-21 features maintenance concepts taken right out of NASCAR's auto racing playbook--with on-deck pit stops on the starboard side of the carrier. Rather than move an aircraft from station to station to receive ordnance, fuel and diagnostic treatment, the pit stop provides a single, centralized point for all the aircraft's needs.

Advanced weapons elevators have been developed for the CVN-21 that employ linear electric motors, which means items from below get to the deck more quickly.

Dwyer said that productivity is a priority in CVN-21. The goal is to increase sortie rates by 15 percent over Nimitz-class carrier operations.

One key technology needed to increase sortie rates is an electromagnetic aircraft launch system, which will replace steam catapults.

Dwyer, meanwhile, expressed confidence about the future carrier's role in launching unmanned reconnaissance aircraft, now in development under a program called J-UCAS (joint unmanned combat system), managed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

The unglamorous business of re-supplying the ship at sea figured prominently in the design of the CVN-21.

"We've got to double the rate at which supply ships along side the carrier transport material," said Matthew Mulherin, vice president of Northrop Grumma, Newport News, the designer and manufacturer of CVN-21. "We've made the two elevators faster and bigger. We've also made sure that travel pathways within the carrier are built to allow rapid transfer of all materials to their locations."

The Navy has learned lessons from the construction of commercial cruise ships, said Mulherin, "particularly the modular approach they use to build their vessels." He noted that there are no paper blueprints for the CVN-21. "It's all in the computer, and even the steel fabrication will be automated."

Construction of the carrier will begin in 2007, said Mulherin. Currently, 2,700 design engineers and construction personnel are working on the design phase, which is 53 percent complete. As many as 3,500 technicians will be working on the program by the end of the design phase.

The Navy plans to deploy the CVN-21 in 2014. The yet-unnamed carrier will have a life expectancy of 50 years. Dwyer predicted the name is likely to be the Enterprise. That's not a surprise since the CVN-21 will replace the aging CVN-65 USS Enterprise that has been sailing the seas since January 1962.