In the Construction Updates we frequently refer to the modules and sections that make up the hull of a Virginia Class submarine. Use this diagram to orient you as you read the updates. Note: CCSM stands for Command and Control System Module.

May 2008 Update:

'Pressure Hull Complete'
The Virginia-class sub's four hull sections were recently joined together to form a single, air-tight unit.
(NEWPORT NEWS DAILY PRESS 20 MAY 08)...Peter Frost
 
NEWPORT NEWS - The next nuclear-powered submarine Northrop Grumman Corp. will deliver to the U.S. Navy passed a key construction milestone Sunday as workers completed the final hull welds on the New Mexico.

The process, called "pressure hull complete," means the submarine's four hull sections have been joined together to form a single, air-tight unit.

New Mexico , the sixth boat of the Virginia class, is scheduled to be christened later this year in Newport News and handed over to the Navy in 2009. The sub is expected to be finished eight months ahead of schedule, Northrop officials say.

"That's a testament to our shipbuilders who have taken ownership of our goals and are involved in process improvements, which allow us to meet our quality, cost and schedule commitments," Northrop's vice president of the submarine program, Becky Stewart, said in a release.

The fast-attack sub will cost an estimated $2.36 billion, according to the Navy's 2009 budget, about 4.6 percent higher than its original contract.

Northrop and its shipbuilding partner, General Dynamics Electric Boat in Connecticut, assemble different modules of submarines and take turns on final assembly and delivery.

This year, the partners wrapped up construction on the first group of four subs: the Virginia, Texas, Hawaii and North Carolina. Construction of six more boats is well under way, with the next-in-class New Hampshire set to be handed over to the Navy this year by Electric Boat.

As part of the Pressure Hull Complete event there was a special banner signing by yardworkers and the crew. Many photos were taken. If you go to this link, http://www.nn.northropgrumman.com/vcs/ssn779phc/ , you can see some of them in a slide show. One of the banner signers is a Mrs. Delgado of Taos, NM, a foreman on SSN'779's construction. CDR Dain said there have been three passes on the final weld. While more are needed, the shipyard decided to claim PHC. There are also two holes for personnel access and utilities, so the NEW MEXICO is not seaworthy yet.

March 2008 Update:

USS NEW MEXICO is now approximately two-thirds complete. The aft section is complete except for the shaft and propeller. The shaft tube has been hydrostatically tested. The reactor core is loaded. The forward section is coming along nicely with insertion of the torpedo room module in 2A. The control room module (CCSM) will be inserted in 2A in this month. The 2B/5 module, the last big hull section, arrives by Sea Shuttle this month.  The Christening is still scheduled for January 2009 and delivery to the Navy in August 2009. Commissioning will be 3 or 4 months after that.  The crew for PCU New Mexico now numbers 80 and is fast-approaching the full complement of 130. The navigator will be reporting aboard soon. Some forward crew members are training at sea aboard USS OKLAHOMA CITY (SSN-723). The crew is standing watches aft but forward crews will not stand watch until the sub is in the water (January 2009).  

December 2007 Update:

NEW MEXICO 's bow and stern are looking very good and the submarine has been declared 55% complete.  The sail has landed on Section 1/2A which completes the forward one-third of the hull.  Pictured below is Section 2A as it appeared in November 2006 sitting on end at GDEB’s Quonset Point, RI.

Sections 8 and 9 were welded together in February 2007 and the main propulsion unit was end-loaded in Section 8/9 in August 2007.  Then in October, Section 8/9 was moved astern of Section 6/7 and welded, completing the aft one-third of the hull, and beating the schedule by nearly two months. 

The remaining one-third, the so-called super-module or Section 2B/5, is all that is needed to complete NEW MEXICO’s pressure hull.  This long straight mid-section of the hull is scheduled to arrive by sea shuttle from GDEB in early March 2008.  This leaves only two big welding jobs, the 5/6 weld and the 2A/2B weld to reach the “Pressure Hull Complete” milestone.   Pictured below is Section 5 as it appeared in November 2006 at Quonset Point.

NEW MEXICO is on track to reach her Pressure Hull Complete milestone on May 4, 2008.

August 2007 Update:

The NEW MEXICO is now 50% complete. She is taking shape in Bay #4 in the Module Outfitting Facility at Northrop Grumman’s Newport News shipyard. Her bow faces the James River.

On July 16th, hull section 2A and the Main Propulsion Unit (or engine raft) arrived from General Dynamic’s Electric Boat Quonset Point facility in Rhode Island. Section 2A has since been welded to the 1A/B bow section.

The Main Propulsion Unit (MPU) raft was loaded in the 8/9 stern section on August 7 th. See photo of the section 8/9. This 25-ton engine raft includes turbines, main engines and gears. On the nuclear path, the initial primary coolant fill has taken place and testing is ongoing. The crew is very busy standing watches and testing systems. Special acoustic mold-in-place hull coating operations are underway for sections 6 and 7. The sail (see photo) is nearing completion.

Joining Sections 8 and 9 - this is the tapered stern section of the hull, with
rudder and stern planes. It houses the aft portion of the engine room. The
white tent is for temperature control and slag containment during welding.
(Photo courtesy of Northrop Grumman Newport News)

New Mexico’s sail under construction. (The scaffolding in the foreground hides some details.) The forward edge of the sail is on the left. The structure is free-flooding and houses electronic masts and a multitude of sensors.
(Photo courtesy of Northrop Grumman Newport News)

July 2007 Update:

The main propulsion unit (Engine Room Raft) for Section 8 has just arrived at the shipyard.  The crew started standing watches in Section 7 (forward part of engine room) on 7/6.  The sonar sphere is installed on front of Section 1A but there is no bow dome yet.  Vertical Launch Tubes (VLTs) are installed, torpedo tubes are installed, and work on the shutter doors is underway.  Section 2A just arrived from Quonset Point, RI where General Dynamics Electric Boat fabricates the straight sections of the hull.  It will be joined to Section 1 and then the sail will be attached.  The weapons module (torpedo room) is in the works.  The crew now numbers 62 and is on track to reach 100 by January 2008.

March 2007 Update:

Modules or sections of NEW MEXICO’s hull are presently aligned in Bay #4 of the 10-story Module Outfitting Facility (MOF) at the shipyard. Once a section of NEW HAMPSHIRE was moved out of the way, Section 8, the aft portion of NEW MEXICO’s Engine Room, which arrived by Sea Shuttle from Electric Boat in January, was maneuvered into position. It is being welded to Section 9, the stern. This will complete the aft end of NEW MEXICO.

Also in Bay #4, in perfect alignment with the aft section, is NEW MEXICO’s forward section. It contains 12 vertical launch tubes in the forward ballast tank, just outside the forward-most portion of the pressure hull. The sail is under construction as well as many mid-sections of the hull. Northrop Grumman Newport News manufactures the tapered hull sections of VIRGINIA-Class submarines and General Dynamics Electric Boat manufactures the straight sections. The largest straight section is called the 2B/5 supermodule. It will arrive from Electric Boat in late February 2008. Before any hull sections are welded together, they are first packed full of equipment, systems, and machinery -- every permanent component of the submarine. This process of installing equipment modules is called end-loading.

As of early March 2007, the shipyard reports that NEW MEXICO is 41% complete and looking very much like a submarine. As major hull sections come together, we expect additional construction photos that can be posted on this web site. It takes a while for photos to be cleared for public release but more pictures of NEW MEXICO are definitely coming our way.

She costs $2.7 billion and requires 14 million manhours to assemble her one million parts and 140 shipboard systems, all encased in the strongest submarine hull ever built. She is NEW MEXICO, the Navy’s sixth Virginia-class fast-attack submarine.

The partnership between two shipbuilders, General Dynamics Electric Boat (GDEB) and Northrop Grumman Newport News (NGNN) is unique. These former competitors have teamed to produce the world’s most technologically advanced submarines. NEW MEXICO’s hull sections are being built in two shipyards. GDEB is building the straight sections at its facilities in Groton, CT and Quonset Point, RI and transporting them by sea shuttle to Newport News, VA. NGNN is building the tapered hull sections and doing the final assembly at its Newport News shipyard. The company has been building ships since 1891 and NEW MEXICO is its 664th ship.

At present, NEW MEXICO is nearing 40% complete. Assembly is taking place inside NGNN’s 10-story Module Outfitting Facility (MOF) with NEW MEXICO’s bow pointed towards the James River near the mouth of Chesapeake Bay. In the MOF, hull sections are end-loaded with system modules which are powered up and tested before hull sections are welded together. Pictured here is the New Mexico state flag which is dwarfed by the 60-ft length of this cylindrical hull section. The forward direction is on the left side. This is section 7 which houses the forward portion of the engine room and the aft portion of the reactor compartment. NEW MEXICO’s reactor will power the submarine for its entire 33-year design service life without refueling. In this photo, section 7 is resting in Bay #3 but it will eventually be moved laterally and take its rightful position in NEW MEXICO.

Hull Section 7, Engine Room
Photo Courtesy of Northrop Grumman Newport News

Before tapered sections of the hull reach the MOF, they are fabricated in the Ring Assembly Building. Pictured here are two forward hull sections. Section 1A (on the right) is outside the pressure hull and houses the forward ballast tanks and 12 vertical tubes for launching cruise missiles. Section 1B (on the left) will be connected to 1A and contains the forward end of the pressure hull. The area with shiny buffed steel is where the sail will be attached. NEW MEXICO’s sail is also under construction in the Ring Assembly Building. The bow dome, housing a spherical sonar array, will complete the forward end of the submarine.

Section 1A on Right, Section 1B on Left
Photo Courtesy of Northrop Grumman Newport News

Another tapered hull section is the stern. Here section 9B is being raised vertically by the shipyard’s giant crane for transport to the MOF. Shown in this photo are the aft ballast tank flood ports, special ports from which countermeasures are launched, dihedral (fin) connection points, temporary steel pads for resting on chocks and the receptacle for the rudder pin. At this time, sections 9A and 9B are welded together as one unit and are in their normal horizontal position at the far end of Bay #4 where machining for the propulsor (ultra-quiet propeller in a special housing) is currently in progress. The upper and lower sections of NEW MEXICO’s rudder have already been installed.

Section 9b being Raised Vertically, Photo Courtesy of Northrop Grumman Newport News

 With a length of 377 feet and a beam of 34 feet, NEW MEXICO will be slightly larger than the Los Angeles-class fast-attack submarines. She will weigh 7,835 tons submerged. When on the surface, the bottom of her rudder will be 32 feet down. NEW MEXICO is scheduled for launch in April 2009 with delivery to the Navy one year later.