1/720 USS Ranger CV-61 1993

[gjholmes77]

Here is my attempt at producing a reasonable reproduction of the final configuration of the Ranger CV-61.

Ship Background: The Ranger was the third Forrestal class aircraft carrier and was commissioned in 1957. After 36 years of action in the cold war including the wars in Vietnam and Persian Gulf, she was decommissioned in 1993. Efforts to preserve the Ranger as a museum near Portland, Oregon failed and she was sent to Brownsville, Texas for scrapping in 2015.

Kit Background: The Forrestal class has been somewhat poorly represented in model kit form. The latest, most modern kit of the class is the Italeri 1/720 kit. The kit was designed as Forrestal sometime after her service life extension program. By the end of their lives, all ships of the class were quite different from each other, but Italeri boxes each ship with the same plastic with only the decals changing for each ship. Ranger was the only ship of the class not to receive the SLEP upgrades and as a result there are many differences between this kit and how the actual Ranger was configured. Currently this kit is only available from Italeri as the Saratoga but ironically the box art depicts Ranger painted as Saratoga.

Box Art

References:
Booklet of General Plans USS Ranger, March 1978 - Available from http://www.floatingdrydock.com/
Booklet of General Plans USS Saratoga, 1993 - Available to download from http://archive.hnsa.org/doc/plans/index.htm
Ray Bean's Forrestal Class Carriers Photo DVD - Now also available from The Floating Drydock
USS Forrestal in Detail & Scale by Bert Kinzey - Out of print but can be (occasionally) found on Amazon used at a reasonable price.
The usual internet image sources including the excellent pictures from this Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/USSRANGERCV61

Materials:
1/720 Italeri USS Saratoga - https://www.italeri.com/en/product/1966/6/30
1/720 Gold Medal Models USN Supercarriers (720-11) http://www.goldmm.com/ships/gms7carr.htm
1/700 Various Trumpeter Aircraft Sets
3D Printed Parts designed by me and printed by Shapeways
Lots of Exacto Blades and Putty!

The first step was start removing all of the unnecessary sponsons and inaccurate chunks of plastic from the hull.

[Mark McKinnis]

Way Cool!!!!


Looking forward to following along.......

Mark


edit: Also, based on the research I did, your parts should be able to do a Ranger 1985-1993 with possible exceptions to a few antennae or SATDOMES. If you do a set without adding the CIWIS, it appears that it could do a Ranger 1978-ish to 1985. It appears that Ranger got the modifications to the stern and gun sponsons with the overhaul 1977-78.

[ModelMonkey]

Have popcorn in hand.

[gjholmes77]

Great research, Mark. It will be useful in doing future (older) versions of the 3D parts.

Before I get too far ahead on the ship, I've got to consider the airwing. I figure I'd try to make my own decals. Right now I just have the F14s but am expecting a shipment of the rest of the aircraft this week. Using GIMP and a set of scale drawings I've started to freehand the markings for VF-1 and VF-2. When I get the rest of the aircraft, I can start on the other squadrons.

Here's the decal progress so far:

[Craig Robbo Robinson]

Great research, Mark. It will be useful in doing future (older) versions of the 3D parts.

Before I get too far ahead on the ship, I've got to consider the airwing. I figure I'd try to make my own decals. Right now I just have the F14s but am expecting a shipment of the rest of the aircraft this week. Using GIMP and a set of scale drawings I've started to freehand the markings for VF-1 and VF-2. When I get the rest of the aircraft, I can start on the other squadrons.

Here's the decal progress so far:

RangerDecals1.jpg

Oh goody goody goody. I'll certainly be keeping track of this. I can maybe help with a few items. I have scanned the decals for the 1/144 E-2C Hawkeye from that cruise. I aslo have sourced one of the EA-6Bs which may help, that's if they can be scaled down and still look reasonable.
I'm trying to build the lead aircraft from each squadron that served on the Ranger between December 92 & January 93 when I was fortunate to do a ship visit.

[Psar77]

Aircraft carrier ? 1/720 ? Always !!! Following

[mmaresm]

'gjholmes77', I also will be Extremly Interested on how you will tackle this!!

I have (had) this Project of building the FORRESTAL-class vessels, after I completed the MIDWAY-class of CV-41/-43 only.

But...When I got started on the FORRESTAL, it was SO MUCH Work it was driving me Crazy!!! . I have the Arii kits though NOT 1/720, but the RANGER is Most trying! Got FORRESTAL 95% complete ... just needed to finish the CVW esp. the A-7 ( just having those planes "look right" ). Kinda started SARATOGA, but stopped when the CVW didn't have decals replacements to make an Adequate CVW!

So your RANGER will be looked at with Great Interest!!! I look forward to your build, and I might PM you later.

Mario

[gtbred]

Going to order the Kitty Hawk 1/350 model to do the Ranger. Too many F-14's and FA-18's that haven't been made. Going to light up the hangar bay on this build

[Mark McKinnis]

Hi Red,

That will be quite a project! Ranger never cruised F-18 Hornets though. Two F-14 Squadrons, two A-6E Squadrons, 1 each Hawkeye's, Vikings, Prowlers, and Helo's. CVW-2 was referred to as the "Grumman" Air Wing back then even though they had "Lockheed" S-3A Vikings and of course the Helo bubba's..

Good Luck!

Mark

[gtbred]

Ohhh! Thanks Mark. Should have gone to gonavy.jp to see what her air wing was.