My Very First Ship--Tamiya's 1/350 DD445 Fletcher

[snaphappy321]

Hi Bill,
I hope the Deck Plans of the Sigsbee were a help to you. I plan on using them a great deal for my next build of the USS Bennett DD-473. She was a round bridge Fletcher built at the Boston Navy Yard. My grand father worked there as a ship fitter during WW II, and he may have worked on her. I will be building the Bennett in 1/96 scale and she will also be RC as well. I will start a build thread here when her keel is laid.

DD-555

[Bill Mall]

Thanks very much Gordon, Aleccap, and Snaphappy, I am having a blast working up this little kit.

Last night, after several self imposed and life imposed delays, I dove in to the PE. I did the whistle platform on the forward stack, and the ladders, etc of the stacks.

I also started the main radar, but the plastic rod I had on hand looks way out of scale, looks like I will get to try out the debonder I picked up yesterday.

Here are the photos:





And the ridiculously overscale radar



I think I am at the point where I should paint the vertical surfaces and then begin attaching the smaller pe and rails/weapons?

Thanks to all following, and comments welcome

Bill

[robertmelvin]

Good work, Bill. Very nice. I like the way you did your PE. It looks very good.

Bob

[jeroen zuiderduin]

Very nice, Bill. Are you sure this is your first ship?
I had also plan the order of battle concerning the paint-build-mask-paint-mask-build.

Keep it up!
Jeroen

[snaphappy321]

Looks Great Bill!!!!!!!!!!! In the scale your working with you will probably need to use strands of copper wire in the place of the styrene rod on the radar screen. You could cut up a cheap extension cord to get the wire you need. You probably know that 1/350th scale 1' = 0.034 thousandths of an inch, and 1 inch = 0.0028 thousandths. The wire I'm telling you about measures 0.005 to 0.006 and would look closer to size. Keep up the fine work your doing and I'll check back later.

DD-555

[snaphappy321]

Hey Bill,
After my last post I remembered that I used a picture of a PE set from L'Arsenal to make the side brackets for my Mk 12 Radar Antenna check out this photo I saved from the internet. You can also check out the first page of my build as well.

I�m sure you can find and purchase this set online someplace!!!!!!!

Roger DD-555

[Rick E Davis]

Bill,

Since you are building the FLETCHER as completed (or at least early in her career), you don't need the Mk 22 antenna with the Mk 12 antenna on the Mk 37 director. The FLETCHER had the Mk 4 radar for most of the war (until Spring 1945). The Mk 4 looks similar to the Mk 12, without the heavy bracing or the Mk 22 "orange-peel" antenna. Most PE sets use the same array for the Mk 4 and the Mk 12 since they look pretty close, there are differences (the two antenna arrays on the Mk 4 were more "open" than the Mk 12), but in these scales, they are not that noticeable. The most noticeable difference is in the "bulk" of the supporting brackets. The Mk 12/22 combo required heavier bracing and motors and had IFF antennas added.

Below are a couple of views of the Mk 4 installed on La VALLETTE (top), FLETCHER (middle), and DD-560 with Mk 12/22 (bottom) ...

[Bill Mall]

Thanks all, I appreciate the support for this project.

You can just see the steam pipes I added below the whistle platform, they are made from some speaker wire that I sacrificed, very fine copper wire. I will substitute that for the heavy styrene bracing that looks to me to be about 10 inches in scale diameter.

I will try to get some more completed this weekend, and will post my progress.

Again, thanks for the support, encouragement, and information, particularly the radar specifics.

Bill

[LE BOSCO]

HI Bill

Your Fletcher is really nice,and very pleasant has the eye ,Good luck for the continuation of your work
best regards
Nicolas (Nick )

[Bill Mall]

Thanks, all, I appreaciate it. Last night I was able to complete the new radar supports using thin wire, and glue up the assembly. I also primed the stacks, and put the nice Resin turrets on the bases, small progress, but here it is:





Then I mocked it up to see progress so far









It's starting to look like something.

Thanks for following,

Bill

[snaphappy321]

Hey Bill,
Looking very good!!!!!!!! What's the cannon in the background? I have one very similar to that one. The one I have uses black powder and shoots 45cal. balls. Back when I worked in the machine shop I made a carriage out of aluminum and a heavy base to mount it on when I brought it to the rifle range to fire it.

Roger DD-555

[Bill Mall]

Thanks, Snaphappy!

I just noticed the cannon is visible in that shot. I just got it yesterday and was playing with it while the CA was drying.

Correct, sir, it's a Traditions .50 black powder cannon, I am looking for a base for it, I may end up having to make one. I have a smaller mortar, I just pop it off ocassionally for 4th of July, etc. I have some .50 balls for it, but haven't taken it to the range yet.

[snaphappy321]

Hi Bill,
My cannon came with a carriage made of wood that is a replica of the USS Constitution. I made my carriage out of 3/8 aluminum plate the same shape as the one supplied with the cannon. Then I machined a couple blocks of aluminum so I could roll the cannon under the edges of the blocks. I attached the blocks to a piece of 1 inch steel plate. The steel plate was a little bit over kill, but I didn�t want the thing to move for safety proposes. I know you�ll have fun with it. I love to take mine with me to the rifle range; it always attracts a lot of attention!!!!!

Roger DD-555

[Bill Mall]

OK, in all honesty, I got kind of side tracked with the .50 cannon and carriage, but last night I did return to the fold, I laid down some nice pale gray for the vertical surfaces of the superstructure and turrets. Not a huge change from the Tamiya primer, so no photos, but I am making progress. We are in the middle of re roofing the house, to start Tuesday, so the garage is going to be bombed out, it will be a week or so before I can do anything more.

Thanks very much to all for the support and encouragement.

See you when we have a new roof.

Bill