Calling all Yamato (大和) and Musashi (武蔵) fans

[baseballbrat]

Can anyone suggest where I might be able to obtain the Yamato IJN after-action reports in Japanese?

[SaML]

see here

http://www.ml-modelships.com.ua/mlmodel ... hip_ru.dta

[Mike W]

I'll try:

1. The metal front deck and rear concrete flight platform and rear metal deck at the stern were not painted black (or stained black - I do not know whether paint or some combination of soot/coal was used for the coloration of the wood.) There was no need to darken them as they were already in "battle color".

2. I personally do not know anything about a different shade of gray for the rear concrete flight deck. This is the first I've ever heard of that possibility (keeping in mind again, the "language barrier" that prevents those of us not conversant in Japanese from reading the original reports and first-person accounts and documents - of which I have a box full that I will never be able to read.) [Rob Lundgren, for example, had to hire a professional Japanese translator to get translations of all of the IJN after-action reports for his recent book on Leyte Gulf.]

3. Yes Yamato was only in Kure between Oct 1944 and April 1945.

4. Whether the top of the forward fire control director was painted white or not is one of those mysteries that, try as I might, I have been utterly unable to find an answer to from the aerial photos of Yamato in 1945. [Those photos do answer the question in the affirmative about the crane tower having been removed prior to Okinawa, however.]

The really, really stupid thing about all this is that the answer about the color of the director is probably a very simple one, to whcih we, once again, don't have access for inability to read the Japanese books on the matter.

I will opine that Tamiya really seems to have done a thorough job in researching the ship for this updated Ten-ichi-go model; so if they say it was white, I would go with that, regardless of whether I personally think gray would look better aesthetically.....there are a couple of photos that you can see on my website that appear to indicate that the top was white as of 1943 anyways....but with grainy B/W shots its always a matter of opinion it seems ...

Thanks for the answers. Regarding Tamiya, the kit hasn't been especially done for Op Ten Go, it's just the standard Yamato kit with a sticker on the box, as it came in the Ltd Ed Ten Go Boxed set I purchased years ago! Even the painting guide is standard!

I've had another look in the 'Anatomy' book at the painting guide. It says the concrete aircraft deck was either the hull colour or darker. It also says that Linoleum was Ocre in colour not the Reddish Brown that I know of! It says it had linoleum strips running parallel to the aircraft tracks and catapults (Tamiya has them as Grey decals) and the top deck of the forward tower (AA control platform I think) had a Linoleum covering. There is no mention of part of the main rangefinder being painted White.

I've had a look at some of the Yamato pics on your website and I'd agree that it does look like the crane is missing but the pics aren't clear enough for me to say it was missing with 100% certainty. The 'Anatomy' book makes no mention of the crane being deleted.

I'm not at my home so I've not got my books to hand so - was the Yamato carrying any aircraft during Op Ten Go and if so, were they on the catapults or below decks? Yamato as built had 2 twin 13mm AA on the sides of the main tower (Bridge), were these swapped for 25mm guns at all or retained until the end?

thanks
Mike

[Oterlia]

The book Battleship Yamato (Anatomy of the Ship) by Janusz Skulski came out in 1988. When the movie Otoko-tachi no Yamato, literally The Men's Yamato came out in 2005, alot of reasearch was done. Janusz Skulski did not have that information when he wrote the book, so some of the drawings and information are not correct.

Yamato's deck was made of japanese cypress wood laid on top of the steel deck. Cypress turn darker after some time. To see this you can seacher on photos of the battleship Mikasa, a museum ship today. That battleship got the same type of wooden deck. You can see it gets dark. Furter the Yamato's deck got painted/stained with sot taken from the funnel.

Yamato's crane tower was dismantled before her last mission, to have better arc of fire for her aft main turret. The planes were flown of just after she left port on her final mission.

[Mike W]

[quote="Oterlia"]The book Battleship Yamato (Anatomy of the Ship) by Janusz Skulski came out in 1988. When the movie Otoko-tachi no Yamato, literally The Men's Yamato came out in 2005, alot of reasearch was done. Janusz Skulski did not have that information when he wrote the book, so some of the drawings and information are not correct.

Exactly why I'm asking the questions! New info is being learned all the time, so we go on the best information to hand at the current time. The Tamiya kit in question was made in 1998, again this might explain why the painting guide in the kit is not 100% correct.

Thanks for answering the questions though, it makes life easier modelling the Yamato when the crane and aircraft need not be modelled! When the crane was dismantled, did they leave the crane base on, or was this dismantled too?

As a bonus, any left over PE will go on my Fujimi Super Yamato what if!

thanks
Mike

[Oterlia]

Tamiya came out with a new Yamato kit in 2012. That kit is corrected to the latest knowledge of Yamato. So if you serach for Yamato new tooling you will see all the corrections done from the older kit you got I have both the kits myself, and there are alot of corrections.

[Mike W]

I can't find any info on a new Tamiya 1/700 Yamato in 2012. I can see reboxes of the 1998 tooling kit I have but with etch parts but that's about it. .

thanks
Mike

[baseballbrat]

The book Battleship Yamato (Anatomy of the Ship) by Janusz Skulski came out in 1988. When the movie Otoko-tachi no Yamato, literally The Men's Yamato came out in 2005, alot of reasearch was done. Janusz Skulski did not have that information when he wrote the book, so some of the drawings and information are not correct.

Yamato's deck was made of japanese cypress wood laid on top of the steel deck. Cypress turn darker after some time. To see this you can seacher on photos of the battleship Mikasa, a museum ship today. That battleship got the same type of wooden deck. You can see it gets dark. Furter the Yamato's deck got painted/stained with sot taken from the funnel.

Yamato's crane tower was dismantled before her last mission, to have better arc of fire for her aft main turret. The planes were flown of just after she left port on her final mission.

To my knowledge, the most current drawings were re-drawn just after the first dives on the wreck by Model Art. They were updated in their Model Art Super Illustration #745 Yamato (blue cover) a few years back because their old issue from years back was not accurate enough after seeing what the real ship looked like, so they came out with a second edition to correct themselves.

If you don't have this issue, good luck finding it, because it has been sold out worldwide for sometime now. It took me over 2 years of looking before I found a new copy on ebay and purchased it for a whopping $70 in japan from a book dealer.

I would strongly suggest getting this publication if you can find it. It has a ton of high quality drawings with english/japanese captions. Format is quite large and bigger then Anatomy of a ship Yamato. Don't be frustrated if you can't just find one, but keep looking until one shows up.

If anyone is interested, PM me and I will send you information on where on ebay I got one from. He had multiple copies, but you have to bid for them due to its rarity.

[bucketfoot-al]

Mike - Oterlia is correct. As far as the crane tower goes - and this is the key to clearing up some normal misunderstanding that I had for years myself - it was NOT involved in the operation of the CRANE ARM.

So there is no contradiction in learning that the tower was removed, and then reading that Yamato took several float planes with her for submarine recon as she made her way out of the inland sea.

The planes were sent home the morning of the battle, 4/7/45 at 0600 AM according to the Futabasha film that I have up on my website. The pilots begged to be allowed to die in battle with their shipmates, but they were sent off. (Interestingly, one of Yahagi's float planes developed engine trouble and could not be sent back that morning - you can see it in the closeup overhead photo of Yahagi breaking up as she sinks).

So, yes indeed the crane TOWER was removed (the final antennae were then connected to the antennae connections on top of rear secondary 6" turret instead of the tower) but this did not have any impact on the CRANE ARM which was still used to haul the planes off the deck and onto the crane arms.

Hope this clears up the issue for you.

Hey Oterlia - Something just occurred to me - do you know whether the planes were launched on the afternoon of 4/6/45 for recon and then retrieved from the water (which would have required Yamato to slow to a crawl if not stop, wouldn't it?), or did they just launch them on the second morning to recon and then go home?

I am unfamiliar with the retrieval procedure - do you know if Yamato could keep moving while the retrieval was going on? I suppose the planes could keep revving to keep up til the crane arm was connected but common sense tells me she would probably have had to slow down for this operation, which would have made her vulnerable if a sub was nearby?

The book Battleship Yamato (Anatomy of the Ship) by Janusz Skulski came out in 1988. When the movie Otoko-tachi no Yamato, literally The Men's Yamato came out in 2005, alot of reasearch was done. Janusz Skulski did not have that information when he wrote the book, so some of the drawings and information are not correct.

Exactly why I'm asking the questions! New info is being learned all the time, so we go on the best information to hand at the current time. The Tamiya kit in question was made in 1998, again this might explain why the painting guide in the kit is not 100% correct.

Thanks for answering the questions though, it makes life easier modelling the Yamato when the crane and aircraft need not be modelled! When the crane was dismantled, did they leave the crane base on, or was this dismantled too?

As a bonus, any left over PE will go on my Fujimi Super Yamato what if!

thanks
Mike

[baseballbrat]

I found this interesting!!!

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/sho ... 7377391b66

[bucketfoot-al]

Baseballbrat - For just a minute I thought I was reading someone's translation of something Yamamoto actually wrote. You naughty boy. Those of us unfamiliar with the "Gaming World" and its culture can be easily duped.

I sent you a PM about that book, BTW. I want to get a copy of it - if you can reply I'd be much obliged!

[bucketfoot-al]

Baseballbrat - I have three books which I believe contain both the Musashi and Yamato after-action reports.

I acquired them from Japan while I was searching for photos to include on my website.

If you can read Japanese I can take a photo of the book covers and send them to you for confirmation.

[Oterlia]

Hey Oterlia - Something just occurred to me - do you know whether the planes were launched on the afternoon of 4/6/45 for recon and then retrieved from the water (which would have required Yamato to slow to a crawl if not stop, wouldn't it?), or did they just launch them on the second morning to recon and then go home?

I am unfamiliar with the retrieval procedure - do you know if Yamato could keep moving while the retrieval was going on? I suppose the planes could keep revving to keep up til the crane arm was connected but common sense tells me she would probably have had to slow down for this operation, which would have made her vulnerable if a sub was nearby?

I think the planes stayed onboard untill they were flown off before the battle 4/7/45. I have nothing to prove it, but I think I read it somewere, when I was searching to find out if any of the planes and boats from Yamato survived the war. I think also they were flown straight to shore. I am going to see if I can find the place I was reading this.

The planes could be recovered when the ship was sailing. The crane was swung out to the side and the plane came in under it. Then the obeserver/gunner hooked it up, and it was lifted out of the water. This could only be done when the vessel were sailing slow. If they had to high speed it was a big risk that the plane would be dragged to one of the sides, and be dragged down in/under the water.

[Oterlia]

I can't find any info on a new Tamiya 1/700 Yamato in 2012. I can see reboxes of the 1998 tooling kit I have but with etch parts but that's about it. .

thanks
Mike

Sorry Mike. I was thinking of the Tamiya's 1/350 scale Yamato, and not the 1/700 scale.

[bucketfoot-al]

Thanks Oterlia. That is what I always understood to be the case.

[Mike W]

I can't find any info on a new Tamiya 1/700 Yamato in 2012. I can see reboxes of the 1998 tooling kit I have but with etch parts but that's about it. .

thanks
Mike

Sorry Mike. I was thinking of the Tamiya's 1/350 scale Yamato, and not the 1/700 scale.

No worries.

I've found a copy of the 1/350 kit online, which shows how the crane was, so I can see how to model that. What I can't see, is if they have updated the painting guide. Does anyone know anywhere online where you can see the painting guide to the latest 1/350 kit? Or can anyone scan it so I can see it? Like I said in a previous post, my kit is the 1998 tool in 1/700, so they might have updated the painting guide.

thanks
Mike

[baseballbrat]

Mike, I have a New Tool Yamato Instruction Manual that has the Tamaya Colors index. If you want one, PM me and I will shoot one to you! Jim

[Timmy C]

Hobby Search has the painting diagram scanned: http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/image/10164208t2/60/2

Click "item page" to see other scans of the kit.

Incidentally, bookmark that site for future use - they usually scan instructions and parts of new kits.

[Mike W]

Thanks Timmy, that's exactly the painting guide I meant! Only problem is the writing is so small, I can't read it!

Looks like Tamiya now think the top part of the main director is grey not white, as in the painting guide I have. I can't tell if they now think the aircraft handling deck is the hull colour or a different grey, as my painting guide suggests, as the writing is tiny.

It also seems that they think the wooden decks were left unpainted, contrary to what we now believe them to be.

thanks
Mike

[bucketfoot-al]

Just a word of warning about those decks - they look nice and light and shiny unpainted, but we KNOW that they were painted/stained "jet black" for "Ten-ichi-go". This is (again) one of those cases where they are probably simply showing the "favorite look", rather than going for historical accuracy. The inability to read the directions and commentary in cases like this is G-D frustrating, ain't it?