Calling all USS Lexington CV-2 fans

[Dick J]

At first, only 5 stacks hung (Lundstrom's First Team, pg. 38), various Life mag photos, but by late Jan '42 the entire port funnel side was lined (9 stacks?).

Ten "stacks" (or singles?) on the inboard side, eight singles outboard. (The "spaces" that would have made it 10 outboard were filled by the 2 "dumbwaiters" that elevated the ammo to the MG gallery at the top of the stack.)

[smithec]

Just getting back into ship modeling after a hiatus of around 20 years or so. Busy collecting all these dream ships that I would have died for back as a kid. One of these of course is the Lexington as she appeared when she was lost at Coral Sea. It seems that the mystery of the deck marking is solved. Correct me if I am wrong but there were no deck markings in 5/42 and the three stripes are in fact drain channels that end about even with the last island side 1.1 mount. I can get a pretty good idea of their placement from the pictures of Chris Smithers outstanding build, but aircraft in this photo cover how they terminate. Does someone have an overhead plan or shot that clearly show the start and terminus of these channels? THANKS!!!

Here is the link to Chris's work. http://www.modelshipgallery.com/gallery ... index.html

Jon - thanks for your kind comments and the link.

You can also find my complete, step-by-step build feature at: http://modelshipwrights.kitmaker.net/mo ... artid=2191

I've got a copy of the 1/16th flight deck plan (builders plan, 1927) which clearly and unambiguously shows the layout and start and termination of the linear drains. The plan's up in my loft rolled up - all 20ft of it. I'll look it out when I've got a spare moment and scan the relevant bits and will post here.

Regards, Chris

[smithec]

Steve Wiper's Warship Pictorial #33 certainly contains some thrilling new information. It has fuelled more speculation about the flag plot, FC radar and 1.1" tubs fore and aft of the stack. But we seem to be getting to a concensus - if not the reality!

One additional thing has come to light in Steve's book that hasn't been covered in this forum yet. And that's the arrangement of the arrestor wires and crash barriers. They were certainly changed during refit 4/30/37 and 5/7/41 (see page 20 in book) from the orginal, as built arrangement.

The latest arrangements are shown on the plan on page 18/19. So, BEWARE. The Trumpy kit and the Nautilus wooden deck represent the original, as built arrangement. For Coral Sea you need to alter this.

But I'm not going to try and correct it on mine with the Nautilus deck - besides, the wires are not wires at all - but etched lines in the deck.

[smithec]

Just getting back into ship modeling after a hiatus of around 20 years or so. Busy collecting all these dream ships that I would have died for back as a kid. One of these of course is the Lexington as she appeared when she was lost at Coral Sea. It seems that the mystery of the deck marking is solved. Correct me if I am wrong but there were no deck markings in 5/42 and the three stripes are in fact drain channels that end about even with the last island side 1.1 mount. I can get a pretty good idea of their placement from the pictures of Chris Smithers outstanding build, but aircraft in this photo cover how they terminate. Does someone have an overhead plan or shot that clearly show the start and terminus of these channels? THANKS!!!

Here is the link to Chris's work. http://www.modelshipgallery.com/gallery ... index.html

Jon - thanks for your kind comments and the link.

You can also find my complete, step-by-step build feature at: http://modelshipwrights.kitmaker.net/mo ... artid=2191

I've got a copy of the 1/16th flight deck plan (builders plan, 1927) which clearly and unambiguously shows the layout and start and termination of the linear drains. The plan's up in my loft rolled up - all 20ft of it. I'll look it out when I've got a spare moment and scan the relevant bits and will post here.

Regards, Chris

Hi guys. Sorry, couldn't fit the plan on my scanner - hardly a surprise. So I took some photos instead. I hope they help. The sequence is stern to stem, and I've only photographed sections where the drains terminate or change route. I hope you can work out where they do actually change route rather than it being the plan all bent!

You can order this and other plans of CV2 from The Floating Drydock Company @ http://www.floatingdrydock.com/

[Jonck]

Hello guys, first post in this topic, modeler from Brazil

I am building a 1/700 Lex and have the same questions a lot of people already had here. Paint scheme at Coral Sea. I think it is correct to say that at that time Lex had MS 11 painted - 5N on vertical and deck blue 20B on horizontal, according to shipcamouflage.com.

However, Stern says that MS 11 is overall Sea Blue (5-s)...Steve, in his new book, indicates the same paint scheme (5N and 20B) in his book.

has anyone the docs indicating that Stern OR Steve are correct abou the colors indicated in their books?

Another question: assuming that Steve and 'Camouflage...' are correct, ALL of the vertical surfaces are deck blue 20B - flight deck, steel, "ceilings" of the bridge etc?

I have another question abou the hinged plataforms added in the PH period but I will leave it to another time, got a little confused about the drawings in Steve book.

Thanks folks!

[MartinJQuinn]

Hello guys, first post in this topic, modeler from Brazil

I am building a 1/700 Lex and have the same questions a lot of people already had here. Paint scheme at Coral Sea. I think it is correct to say that at that time Lex had MS 11 painted - 5N on vertical and deck blue 20B on horizontal, according to shipcamouflage.com.

However, Stern says that MS 11 is overall Sea Blue (5-s)...Steve, in his new book, indicates the same paint scheme (5N and 20B) in his book.

has anyone the docs indicating that Stern OR Steve are correct abou the colors indicated in their books?

Another question: assuming that Steve and 'Camouflage...' are correct, ALL of the vertical surfaces are deck blue 20B - flight deck, steel, "ceilings" of the bridge etc?

I have another question abou the hinged plataforms added in the PH period but I will leave it to another time, got a little confused about the drawings in Steve book.

Thanks folks!

The official scheme may have been Ms11, but the Lexington was most likely overall Navy Blue (5N) by the time of Coral Sea, having been repainted while at the Pearl Harbor Navy Yard during a brief refit. Sea Blue had been phased out and replaced by Navy Blue by this time.

The steel decks were 20B, while the flight deck was the 250N Norfolk Flight Deck Stain.

[Dick J]

I am building a 1/700 Lex and have the same questions a lot of people already had here. Paint scheme at Coral Sea. I think it is correct to say that at that time Lex had MS 11 painted - 5N on vertical and deck blue 20B on horizontal, according to shipcamouflage.com.

However, Stern says that MS 11 is overall Sea Blue (5-s)...Steve, in his new book, indicates the same paint scheme (5N and 20B) in his book.

The Pacific Fleet very quickly determined that Sea Blue (5-S) was not dark enough. They substituted Navy Blue (5-N) in all applications. So while it was called MS-11, after the start of 1942, the color was Navy Blue. The "revised" MS-11 with Navy Blue was later officially codified as MS-21.

[engine5t3]

My Trumpeter 1/350 Lexington project is finally underway. I am starting with the re-construction of the bridge to more accurately depict the ship days before departure to the Coral Sea: http://i1097.photobucket.com/albums/g34 ... geport.jpg

[DennisJP]

Was LEX painted in 5N or 5S at the Battle of Coral Sea? Thanks, Rich

She was in overall seablue. (A very Dark Blue) (Tamiya has it) The color of the camo did not change until june of 42 when it went to an overall navy blue measure 21.(For overall)
Hornet in Santa Cruz still had measure 12 modified but the colors changed. Measure 12 is seablue and ocean grey but the ocean grey looks more like a sky blue.
In Santa Cruz the colors changed to navy blue and ocean grey but the ocean gray was a litter color more like an intermediate blue with a strong tinge of grey.

[Dick J]

The Pacific Fleet had already discarded Sea Blue as a workable color by the time the Lex repainted. They substituted Navy Blue (5-N) for the Sea Blue (5-S) in all the measures that called for it. Therefore, at Coral Sea, Lexington should have been overall Navy Blue. However, that is hard to absolutely prove from B&W photos. The Atlantic Fleet had also started doing the same substitution. This "modified MS-11" was later formalized as MS-21, but many Pac Flt units were already effectively in MS-21 prior to its official release.

[Tracy White]

Case in point, The Atlantic Fleet was ordered into Measure 12, but with 5-N Sea Blue in November of 1941:
http://www.researcheratlarge.com/Ships/ ... CL-41.html

While the SHIPS-2 revision defining Navy Blue in official instructions was not released until June of 1942, its use started much earlier, in the fall of 1941 (limited use and mainly on new construction).

Dennis's color call outs aren't quite accurate; the Tamiya Sea Blue is not matched to the USN WWII naval ship Sea Blue 5-S

[lvsquarerigger]

Hi everyone. It's been quite awhile since I've posted, as life took me hither and yon, but I'm finally back at work on my Lex. I have the new WP33 and see quite a bit but still have some questions mainly directed at Chris Smithers if he is still following along here but anyone with answers please feel free to jump in.

I don't have the capability to post photos yet but I'm working on the bridge and funnel structure. I completed the xram radar from pe and what an introduction to small fragile stuff !!!!!!!!!!!! My focus at present is the bridge structure and looking back at Chris's build with current documentation and pics raises some questions.

On the lower bridge structure Chris has moved the starboard splinter shield out to make one continuous line but not the port side. It would seem to me that if they widened one they would do the other. Anyone know why or is this one of those things that will hang in limbo?

I've extended the deck along flag plot to match Chris but have questions about the changes on the flag plot roof. I can see the changed arm needed for the range finder but what are the rounded platforms at the rear and what were they put in for? It looks like possibly a searchlight on the port side but I don't see anything on the starboard.

I have a lot of questions about the 8 inch firecontrol platform but will leave them until I get that far. BTW I have to disassemble mine as part of my frenzy to get going when I first started, before becominig aware of all the discrepancies in the kit (foolish me I thought a kit advertised as being May of '42 would be built to those specs), I had glued it up as a small subassembly.

I also covered the round section as Chris did for the same reasons but intend to drill the openings. Looking at the pics of Lex I only see two on each side, not the three in the kit, and can't really find a good pic of the front but what I can see it looks like there may have also been only two across the front. Anyone have an answer?

OK, enough for one day.

James

[MartinJQuinn]

Welcome back James - hope life has calmed down a bit for you.

[lvsquarerigger]

Welcome back James - hope life has calmed down a bit for you.

It has some. Thank you

[smithec]

Hi everyone. It's been quite awhile since I've posted, as life took me hither and yon, but I'm finally back at work on my Lex. I have the new WP33 and see quite a bit but still have some questions mainly directed at Chris Smithers if he is still following along here but anyone with answers please feel free to jump in.

I don't have the capability to post photos yet but I'm working on the bridge and funnel structure. I completed the xram radar from pe and what an introduction to small fragile stuff !!!!!!!!!!!! My focus at present is the bridge structure and looking back at Chris's build with current documentation and pics raises some questions.

On the lower bridge structure Chris has moved the starboard splinter shield out to make one continuous line but not the port side. It would seem to me that if they widened one they would do the other. Anyone know why or is this one of those things that will hang in limbo?

I've extended the deck along flag plot to match Chris but have questions about the changes on the flag plot roof. I can see the changed arm needed for the range finder but what are the rounded platforms at the rear and what were they put in for? It looks like possibly a searchlight on the port side but I don't see anything on the starboard.

I have a lot of questions about the 8 inch firecontrol platform but will leave them until I get that far. BTW I have to disassemble mine as part of my frenzy to get going when I first started, before becominig aware of all the discrepancies in the kit (foolish me I thought a kit advertised as being May of '42 would be built to those specs), I had glued it up as a small subassembly.

I also covered the round section as Chris did for the same reasons but intend to drill the openings. Looking at the pics of Lex I only see two on each side, not the three in the kit, and can't really find a good pic of the front but what I can see it looks like there may have also been only two across the front. Anyone have an answer?

OK, enough for one day.

James

Hi Jim, long time no contact. Your most recent post came up as a link in my Google Alerts for USS Lexington this morning. God bless Google. By huge coincidence I was thinking last night I ought to get back in this forum to see how you geezers are progressing your builds which I hope and trust will take our understanding to the next level of truth. I have been quite flattered (bad trait) by your regular references to my build - intended at the time to be a benchmark reference. You guys are going beyond it now. Confess I kind of couldn't get hot and bothered about the 5" splinter shields - so great work here.

You've taken a lot of trouble using styrene strip for the shields. Can I suggest an alternative which is much easier to use? Paper, soaked in thin CA. It goes transparent and stiff, and you can bend it, fold it, cut it, drill it, file it - just like it was aluminium alloy. Holds it shape. Works for me every time. The great David Griffiths in his book Ship Models from Kits also suggests very thin brass sheet or strip. I haven't been able to get hold of any thin enough to try this, but have used aluminium food tray material with mixed results. By the way, I think David's book is the best I've read on building small scale ship models. I've updated and improved some of my better, older specimens using the methods he describes. It's published by Seaforth Publishing in the UK (www.seaforthpublishing.com), ISBN 978-1-84832-024-6. Ya gotta have it!

Anyway, to answer the questions above.

Lower bridge structure splinter shields: all the photographic evidence and plans I've come across (see WP33) shows the starboard side in a straight line, and inboard side joggled in - throughout the ship's life. I don't think there is any question hanging over this.

Rounded platforms at the aft end of the flag plot level: the searchlights were moved up to this level from the one below, and on that level were replaced with 20mm. That was a judgement I made, but it maybe they were additional pairs of searchlights, and no 20mm were substituted. But this seems unlikely because at this stage of the war searchlights were beng unshipped (thanks to radar) and replaced with light AA. But this is guesswork.

Peep in conning tower: now these are going to be really tiny - 0.85 x 0.1mm. I'd planned to use decal material or a sharp pencil to indicate these - but somehow forgot! The Floating Drydock plans should show how many there are. My plans are up in the loft, so difficult to get and refer to. But I think there were five equally spaced.

Hope all this helps. Well done guys.

Best regards, Chris

[lvsquarerigger]

Thanks for the info. I had put the two ones on each side in and wasn't happy with them so took off the styrene I had wrapped around the form and replaced it with fresh. I used a much smaller drillbit but don't think a true scale hole would show up so that's my compromise. I was wondering about the front as it seemed that in any photo I could see the peep was more centered but I coldn't find any photo from the port side to let me know. Thanks for that so now I will put one in front. Again, thanks.

James

[MartinJQuinn]

Rounded platforms at the aft end of the flag plot level: the searchlights were moved up to this level from the one below, and on that level were replaced with 20mm. That was a judgement I made, but it maybe they were additional pairs of searchlights, and no 20mm were substituted. But this seems unlikely because at this stage of the war searchlights were beng unshipped (thanks to radar) and replaced with light AA. But this is guesswork.

I believe that the searchlights were replaced by signaling lamps, not 20mm guns. But, that's just my opinion. As you say, it's just speculation.

[lvsquarerigger]

My questions today are about the infamous bridge structure and all page references are to WP 33. I start with the structure of the 8 inch range finder above the flag plot. On page 6 the front of the base is clearly clipped on each side and not straight across.Then on 11 it is clearly squared off. Also at this point you can clearly see a space between the top pf flag plot and the base structure. Clearly all of this hangs on the mast. I'm assuming the front was clippedbut have no idea why. This also shows in the diagrams on 16/17.

36/37 shows a temporary fc radar room on top of the 8 inch rangefinder similar to the one on the front of the funnel. The photo on 50/51 shows something here but the detail isn't good. It appears to be similar in shape to the range finder on top of flag plot. Also the windowed section of the rangefinder appears to be gone, although they may be folded down, but the remainder of the structure appears to still be intact on the bottom of the 5 inch rangefinder platform.

Finally i'm still not satisfied with the results of my experiment to replicate the peeps in the rounded section of the lower bridge structure. It has to do with getting such small holes to line up all the way around. I think I'm going to again remove the thin styrene I put on but this time make the holes while it is flat and easier to align them all then clean them out when installed.

Any help or ideas would be appreciated. I am also caught short of computer access so if I'm not here for a day or two don't worry.

James

[smithec]

My questions today are about the infamous bridge structure and all page references are to WP 33. I start with the structure of the 8 inch range finder above the flag plot. On page 6 the front of the base is clearly clipped on each side and not straight across.Then on 11 it is clearly squared off. Also at this point you can clearly see a space between the top pf flag plot and the base structure. Clearly all of this hangs on the mast. I'm assuming the front was clippedbut have no idea why. This also shows in the diagrams on 16/17.

36/37 shows a temporary fc radar room on top of the 8 inch rangefinder similar to the one on the front of the funnel. The photo on 50/51 shows something here but the detail isn't good. It appears to be similar in shape to the range finder on top of flag plot. Also the windowed section of the rangefinder appears to be gone, although they may be folded down, but the remainder of the structure appears to still be intact on the bottom of the 5 inch rangefinder platform.

Finally i'm still not satisfied with the results of my experiment to replicate the peeps in the rounded section of the lower bridge structure. It has to do with getting such small holes to line up all the way around. I think I'm going to again remove the thin styrene I put on but this time make the holes while it is flat and easier to align them all then clean them out when installed.

Any help or ideas would be appreciated. I am also caught short of computer access so if I'm not here for a day or two don't worry.

James

Hi James

You have misinterpreted the 8-inch control position. By the way, it did not contain a rangefinder per se, but the director. The position was always angled on the front corners - its shown on the plan on page 19, top right. The box below the position housed a radio direction finder. This was later moved during the 1935 refit to a position right at the stern on the port quarter. See page 11 of WP11 if you have it.

26/37 radar room: This wasn't a radar room. It is the radar iself. There's a drawing at the top of page 37 of the plan of the control position with a caption and arrow pointing out a pedestal chain drive for the radar antenae above.

The folding shutters surrounding the director (which by the time had been linked into the 5-inch fire control system - again the drawings on page 37 clearly state that this was a temporary expedient) have been folded fown. Hence the gap. Look at my model for detail here. I thoroughly researched the CV2's fire control system and others in use in the USN at that time and am convinced I have come to the right conclusion, apart from not knowing about the radar mounted on it that Steve Wiper has now uncovered on official plans. There has been a lot of debate about this on the forums for the last couple of years, and thanks to Steve we now have the answer.

As far as the peep holes in the armoured conning tower go - forget trying to drill them out. Life is too short to keep faffing around in this way. It'll never work at this scale. Just try using some decal material to represent them, or some such.

If you have a hotmail or googlemail email account, let me know it and I'll email you a pdf document of my complete build article.

It has everything you need to know about the fire control positions and equipment - including tiny little directors for the 5-inch, and the 8-inch director that was subsequently linked to the 5-inch system. By the way, the range finder on top of the flag plot was not a range finder for the 8-inch guns - these were contained in the No.2 and No.3 8-inch mounts. The one atop the flag plot was what was known as a tactical rangefinder. It was used for general navigation and range taking, not gunnery range finding. Characteristic of fire control systems in the era of the building of CV2 and CV3, and common to battleships and cruisers as well, was the separation of the range-taking function from the bearing and laying function. Only later were both combined in one unit.

Finally, keep studying the Floating Drydock Plans, plus those in WP33. And forget drilling those d***** peep holes! That way lies the route to insanity.

Regards, Chris

[lvsquarerigger]

I didn't bring my book with me but I did make notes to use when I get home. Thanks for your input.

James

PS My e-mail is lvsquarerigger@yahoo.com