I have a lot of blurry images of the Early-war IJN Depth Charge Racks that sit along the center-line of the ship.
But the way that the PE parts look.... It looks like the racks could only hold 4 or 5 depth charges in the upper section of the rack.... And I figure that they would store more in the bottom of the rack, but can't find anything that shows HOW they would store them there.
I am trying to build the depth charge racks for my 1/700 IJN Sub-chasers (those are insane kits with the number of PE parts that they have smaller than 1mm in size).
But I want to have depth charges in them (I have a PE kit for a few hundred IJN depth charges for the Sub-chasers and my IJN DDs). Putting the depth charges in the upper sections isn't hard to figure out.
But could someone please help me find out what they did to have more than 8 or 10 depth charges on a ship?
That doesn't seem like it would be enough depth charges to threaten a submarine very effectively (Maybe that is why Japanese Sub-chasers and DDs were so ineffective?).
Also....
I know that prior to the War, the IJN would have depth charges on little stands on the edge of the deck at the stern of the ship (something like 6 to 8 depth charges, 3 to 4 on each side).
And that early in the war they changed to having a single set of rails on some ships that the depth charges would be rolled off the stern.
Where did the depth charges for the roll-off rails stay prior to being rolled off?
Were they just strapped to those rails in the open?
I ask because the Sub-chaser No.13-class shows that single set of rails along the center-line for 1941 - 1942/43, when they put two depth charge racks on the stern (like USN roll-off racks), and I am building this thing for a 1942 outfit.
And because this (tiny) photo looks like there are depth charges lined up on those rails:
And, although this is a No.28-class IJN Sub-chaser, it too shows what looks to be depth charges simply laying on the rails at the back of the ship (everything that I can find says that the No.28-class Sub-chasers were just a modification of the No.13-class Sub-chasers)
And the center-line racks are still not clear as to how they are loaded with depth charges (is it "depth charge" or "depth-charge?"). So still no help there in what to do about putting depth charges in the lower section.
Also, the Sub-chaser No.4-class doesn't seem to have any stern-racks at all in the Early-war, just the two center-racks with Y-guns.
And the No.1-class seems to have had the stern roll-off racks (that look more like USN depth charge racks) added fairly early on. But I can find nothing about when, or what they had prior to the more "normal" looking depth charge racks.
Did they have the same center-line rails at the stern, along with the center-line rack (which seems to be "Singular" center-line rack on the No.1-class, along with a single Y-gun)?
Or did they have a second center-line rack as well, prior to the mounting of the twin stern roll-off racks?
Is information on IJN Sub-chasers really that sparse?
MB