The Ship Model Forum

Hey everyone I know you have been wondering what happened to my project, I have been working on research and ordering kits, 3D printed parts, PE sets and everything else that's needed for a project like this. It's not been a total waste of time and of a year, hard to believe it was a year ago I last posted anything.

I also was dealing with family issues and more health issues, not to mention a cancer scare, but it's been a challenging year at best. Now, let's see how the project is going........

I have built 3 tables for the project or I should say I rebuilt 3 tables from my old diorama and they are 3' x 3' x 42", yeah I know I am still going to be doing the majority of this build on 4' x 8' x 42" but I have to start with something or somewhere. I have also begun working on the first of the WICKS CLASS conversions from DD to DM & DMS.
I have also started working on the USS SAN FRANCISCO, but it's in the early stages of construction. At the moment I have on my work bench is the USS SCHELY DD-103, USS CHEW DD-106 (which is a USS WARD DD-139 plastic kit), and the USS GAMBLE DM-15 all are in various stages of construction and/or modifications, I'm using various aftermarket kits to complete each.

Well I think you can get the idea of what I have to still do but at least you have something to see for a change. Enjoy and I look forward to reading your comments and I will be posting again soon.

_________________
Jim Varnell
ABH2USN

"BATTLE STATIONS"

1/700 Scale PEARL HARBOR Complete Base Diorama
Every Ship and Vessel present on 7 December 1941
1/350 USS ALASKA CB-1 (75% COMPLETE)
1/350 USS TEXAS BB-35 (10% COMPLETE)

Welcome back Jim! Looking forward to the updates.

Dave

Thank you Dave, it's good to be back and I hope to have another update in the very near future, as I have a lot of work ahead of me and several ships to get to work on. It's going to take a while but as we all know a diorama this size and subject is never truly finished, as Jeff Sharp said it is never truly finished as we all try to make each ship, building's and aircraft as perfect as we can and forever upgrading as better kits and parts are made available.

_________________
Jim Varnell
ABH2USN

"BATTLE STATIONS"

1/700 Scale PEARL HARBOR Complete Base Diorama
Every Ship and Vessel present on 7 December 1941
1/350 USS ALASKA CB-1 (75% COMPLETE)
1/350 USS TEXAS BB-35 (10% COMPLETE)

Jim,

Some notes about the Flush-Decker Minelayers, Minesweepers, and destroyers at Pearl Harbor in December 1941. First off, Pearl Harbor had been the home base for the Pacific Minesweepers and Minelayers for many years prior to 1941.

I notice that you are modifying your Minelayer (and maybe Minesweepers?) models with what looks like the configuration after the Pacific Fleet units of these types were upgraded with 3-in guns in place of the 4-in guns (circle gun tubs forward) AFTER the attack in 1942-43. The Flush-Decker APD's received 3-in guns prior to the DM-DMS as far as I can tell. From the limited photos I have, most are overhead views of Pearl Harbor showing all flush-deckers with 4-in gun, these units still had 4-in guns in December 1941. Even the Flush-Decker Mine Warfare units based in the Atlantic still had 4-in guns in December 1941. In the last half of 1941, both the minelayers and minesweepers were getting overhauls/modifications. In the weekly overhaul reports priority was getting sonar, ASW upgrades, prep work for radar, and improving mine sweeping gear. There was no mention of 4-in gun to 3-in gun replacements. Also, you show mid-war 20-mm gun tubs when there weren't any 20-mm guns at Pearl Harbor during the attack. See attached Weekly overall reports for 10 November and 24 November 1941.

Also, USS SCHLEY (DD-103) would look similar to USS WARD, but USS CHEW (DD-106) was unique among the Flush-Deckers in WWII in still having her aft 4-in gun on the main deck and not on the aft deckhouse. She retained her aft 4-in gun on the main deck all the way through the war. See attached image.

Hey Rick I appreciate the help you know it's hard to get ever bit of information on the conversions.
As for the 20mm gun tubs they are just temporary (test fit) to try to get the right size and shape because I'm going to completely scratch build them, from my reference pictures they are a little bit bigger than the ones I have placed there for testing, mainly to get the right locations. As far as the main deck gun tub I have a couple of them depicting a tub on the bow during the attack, I will recheck my sources and notes for the conversions and see if I might have a date on the pictures, but you are very correct about the USS CHEW DD-106, I have the same picture in my files. Again, I appreciate the help and support of information.

_________________
Jim Varnell
ABH2USN

"BATTLE STATIONS"

1/700 Scale PEARL HARBOR Complete Base Diorama
Every Ship and Vessel present on 7 December 1941
1/350 USS ALASKA CB-1 (75% COMPLETE)
1/350 USS TEXAS BB-35 (10% COMPLETE)

Great to see this project back online.

Well Good morning fellow ship builders, I trust that everyone has had a great weekend and I hope y'all had a productive weekend with your various projects. Well I can say that I am excited to get back to work on my project and I have made a big leap forward with my diorama task, I have been working on plotting out the basic layout of the shipyard area and I have started it with (2) 4' x 2" tables and did so simply due to the size of my work area and it is going to be a little easier to move forward with with the process of the layout, as well as being more manageable than working on a full 8' x 4' sheet. I did however make a little mistake in the layout but I think it is a easy fix, I just have to do a minor correction on one of the finger piers/launch slipway, I drew it out correctly but I'm not sure if it is as correct as it should be, in other words, one reference depicted it while another does not, so more researching is going to be done today and I will correct it or leave it as is.

_________________
Jim Varnell
ABH2USN

"BATTLE STATIONS"

1/700 Scale PEARL HARBOR Complete Base Diorama
Every Ship and Vessel present on 7 December 1941
1/350 USS ALASKA CB-1 (75% COMPLETE)
1/350 USS TEXAS BB-35 (10% COMPLETE)

Small scale, but a giant's work!

_________________
Pascal

•Battleship Bretagne 3D: https://vu.fr/FvCY
•SS Delphine 3D: https://vu.fr/NeuO
•SS Nomadic 3D: https://vu.fr/tAyL
•USS Nokomis 3D: https://vu.fr/kntC
•USS Pamanset 3D: https://vu.fr/jXGQ

Wow Jim
That is an OUTSTANDING project in that scale it will absolutely monumental...
I can't wait to see how you will do it...
Will it be during the attack or moments before??
Have a nice day
Ps
Chair is pulled, snacks and drinks are ready to follow your build

Thank you Pascal and Greg for your support and for following this journey, Pascal I'd like to make it a 350 scale but I'm 99.99% positive my wife would kill me it's taken me a long time (nearly 32 years) to convince her to let me do Pearl Harbor.

Greg, my plan is to represent it just before the attack but it's not out of the possibility of adding IJN aircraft lined up and the attack. Just never know how or what might happen and I will admit I have been tossing the idea around to add them to my project. But for now I'm going to stick with it being just before the first wave.
Your comment about the chair, drinks and snacks made me laugh.

_________________
Jim Varnell
ABH2USN

"BATTLE STATIONS"

1/700 Scale PEARL HARBOR Complete Base Diorama
Every Ship and Vessel present on 7 December 1941
1/350 USS ALASKA CB-1 (75% COMPLETE)
1/350 USS TEXAS BB-35 (10% COMPLETE)

It's always a compromise with our wives on this subject. Failure to negotiate would be followed by an affair worse than Pearl Harbor.

_________________
Pascal

•Battleship Bretagne 3D: https://vu.fr/FvCY
•SS Delphine 3D: https://vu.fr/NeuO
•SS Nomadic 3D: https://vu.fr/tAyL
•USS Nokomis 3D: https://vu.fr/kntC
•USS Pamanset 3D: https://vu.fr/jXGQ

WISE WORDS

Well good evening everyone, I hope you're doing well and I thank everyone for following this journey. Not a lot of progress on the diorama this week but I have been doing a good bit of ordering kits for the project. I still have quite a few more ships to get but my stash is growing every month. My next phase for the diorama is to lay out the railroad around the shipyard area. I have ordered a few PE sets from AMW and they should be here Sometime next week or so.
But I have several of the auxiliary ship's and harbor craft Ordered and I think the first order will be here next week as well.
But like I said not much as far as the construction of the diorama but there's been a lot behind the scenes and everyone knows that a project of this scope and scale has a massive amount of work done that is never truly noticable until the final reveal.

But until next time best of luck with your projects.

_________________
Jim Varnell
ABH2USN

"BATTLE STATIONS"

1/700 Scale PEARL HARBOR Complete Base Diorama
Every Ship and Vessel present on 7 December 1941
1/350 USS ALASKA CB-1 (75% COMPLETE)
1/350 USS TEXAS BB-35 (10% COMPLETE)

For some info on USS Zane, DMS14 go look at my USS Caine project in scratch builds. Zane was the ship Herman Wouk served aboard and about which he wrote the Caine Mutiny.

Cheers: Tom

Great to see this project again.

A lot of stuff you have to buy...and organize...
Can't wait to see the first pictures

LOL! You are a wise man!

_________________
Martin

"Tomorrow is the most important thing in life. Comes into us at midnight very clean. It's perfect when it arrives and it puts itself in our hands. It hopes we've learned something from yesterday." John Wayne

Ship Model Gallery

Yes sir I have played this one GOOOOOOOOOOD!!!!!
Well I'm happy to report that I have been making a little bit of progress on the diorama, I'm currently working out the layout of the train rail system and the basic layout of the roads, this is the most aggravating part of the diorama but it is a very necessary part, I have figured out I have that I have to go ahead and add another 2' x 4' table to get the right layout and then double check the measurement for the infrastructure. Something is throwing me off and I am positive it's the 1010 pier, it's scaled out correctly but it's not looking right, I think I have it too short, at least it looks like it to me. But I will get it right, after all with this project I have to, because the rivet counters will definitely lose their mind if I am 1/64th's of a nats butt off.

_________________
Jim Varnell
ABH2USN

"BATTLE STATIONS"

1/700 Scale PEARL HARBOR Complete Base Diorama
Every Ship and Vessel present on 7 December 1941
1/350 USS ALASKA CB-1 (75% COMPLETE)
1/350 USS TEXAS BB-35 (10% COMPLETE)

Good afternoon everyone, I just wanted to let y'all know that I am going to be making some BIG progress on the diorama, I have some more 5.2mm laminate to get the land and water differences and I have made some pier castings for the shipyard area, basically the 1010 dock and the bravo piers, can't remember the actual numbers for the piers. I'm sure someone will let me know, I do have them written down but not in my face at the moment.
Anyway, I got the first order from Shapeways and I must say I was a bit disappointed that the details are not good, but it's not a complete loss, I'm just going to have to modify them and get rid of the huge thick mast and cranes and scratch build them for the best details I can.
Today I received:
USS DOBBINS AD-3
USS UTAH AG-16
USS VESTEL AR-4
USS DOLPHIN SS-169
USS YO-43 Fuel Barge

The first three are the challenge for me but I can handle the modifications that are needed for a more detailed product. The latter two are going to be good for just upgrading them with some nice PE sets I have, there's not a dedicated PE set for them that I'm aware of but I do have plenty of general detail sets that I have massed over the past few years.
Well I'm going to get to work and I'll post an update very soon.
Take care everyone and have a great time at your work bench.

_________________
Jim Varnell
ABH2USN

"BATTLE STATIONS"

1/700 Scale PEARL HARBOR Complete Base Diorama
Every Ship and Vessel present on 7 December 1941
1/350 USS ALASKA CB-1 (75% COMPLETE)
1/350 USS TEXAS BB-35 (10% COMPLETE)

Hey David,
I know the photo you are referring to, I have it already downloaded and it's ready to be used once I get to the UTAH AG-16, But thank you for letting me know.

_________________
Jim Varnell
ABH2USN

"BATTLE STATIONS"

1/700 Scale PEARL HARBOR Complete Base Diorama
Every Ship and Vessel present on 7 December 1941
1/350 USS ALASKA CB-1 (75% COMPLETE)
1/350 USS TEXAS BB-35 (10% COMPLETE)