Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Can America still build ships?

Yes, we have not yet contracted with foreign yards for Carrier or Submarine construction, but can we/do we still build commercial vessels?
We were able to build enough ships in WWII, to stay ahead of the U Boats, but today?
Fincanteri, in Italy, Hyundai in Korea, yards in Japan and China. Looks like they build most of the ship now.

yes,

travel to south Louisiana.

Bollinger and Chouest turn out quite a few

Most of the shipyards and dry-docks have been sold off for development of marinas and expansion of cargo ports. Any serious effort to build ships would have to take back what has been sold off, and with most under foreign investment its not likely!

Phil

looks like America produces about 3% of the tonnage, compared to the rest of the world. Even Poland builds more. Italy makes almost twice the tonnage.
Big boys are S Korea, Japan, China.

We build the important ships - Carriers, cruisers, destroyers, subs..

but not the bottoms that would allow us to resupply NATO in case of a dust up with Russia.
We will lose any war where we can't project material into the conflict.

For my last year and a half of employ I was resident at Samsung Heavy Industries yard in Goeje South Korea. The yard employed 30,000 crafts and spit out six to eight ships a month. Throw in nearby Daewoo in Okpo, which is where I lived, that is larger and Hyundai north along the coast (larger yet) and, yes the Korean's rule the shipping industry. Building ships is a piece of what they do as a pile of O&G work is done as well. It must be seen to really gather the scale of what they do.

In order to lose those ships the enemy would have to better our navy; do you think Russia can do that?

I can think of 2 shipyards within an hour of me that can build commercial vessels at a good rate - if pushed.

WI used to build A LOT of ships and could again. Not all of the old timers are dead...

They could not compete with the Korean's hence they don't, plain and simple.

i would love to do that type of work, welding preferably.

due to wages?

unions?

how strict are Koreans on safety? do they turn a 30 min job into 3hrs of paperwork?


just wondering......

Question wasn't if we could compete but if we could build given necessity.

Currently they're building LCS, icebreakers, buoy tenders, ferries, OSVs, etc. If necessary as Sam asked, they could build the commercial vessels needed during a time of war.

If we can buy the steel from a foreign country, and if we can find the skilled labor, and if we can get the permits, then yes, we can build ships

yes,

San Diego:

http://www.nassco.com/products-and-services/comm-design-construction.html

Portland OR:

http://vigor.net/projects/shipbuilding


There's a number more out there too.

Might take a while to ramp up production, and maybe not to WWII levels, but we can stillbuild boats, commercial and military here.

Geno

I'd imagine a combination of labor cost, productivity, and government red tape.

They build some in Marinette Wi.

Resupply what?
After the buttons are pushed there won't be anything left to supply. You still brain washed into thinking a conventional war between 2 major players will happen? that's so 1960's.

Any dust up would start conventional, through proxies, and would not go nuclear unless one side faced a significant threat to their heart land.

Now add productivity into it and they absolutely win. I have worked all over the world and the least productive have been, in order of good to bad, the US, Canada and Australia. The latter absolutely winning, or losing, hands down.

Here's a bit on Samsung's yard.

http://www.samsungshi.com/Eng/Pr/shipyard01.aspx