Betelguese90 wrote:
Cutting in that notch shouldn't be to difficult. It retains most of the curvature and outline of the seperate structure and funnel. Quick cut and reshaping of the plastic should work. It also has a platform where those search lights are (wrong dimensions but same location). I'd have to scratch build the 20mm platforms as well, but the kit came with an extra super structure peice that I could probably salvage, reshape and use as the platform(as it's suspended on the side rather then fully down to the deck). I can't find a clear picture, but are the 20mm and 40mm placements by turret 3 the same in her 44 layout or were they changed alot in the 45 refit? As for the 40mm placements along the midship, were those any different from the different layouts as well? Can't tell, but main one I'm wondering about is the 40mm placements above and behind the forward 5inch turrets. If anything, I have spare parts from the numerous usn ships I've done, and also have a complete 43 Missouri kit (spare parts) that I can mess with too.
The 40mm tubs at the forward 5" guns were there after her rebuild, same with Tennessee and West Virginia. Number of 20mm mounts were reduced in the '45 refit when she got twin 20mm's.
If you are able to find it, get the book "USS California" by David Doyle. Lots of very good pictures of her '44 configuration and '45 refit that are not on
http://www.navsource.org starting at page 104 of the book.
For the 20's by turret 3, there's 5 by the portside 40mm mount and 4 by the starboard side. There's a row of 4 20mm's on each side of the forward 40mm mount that's behind turret 2. On the deck below just forward of the rows of 4, those rows have 6 20mm's.