The Ship Model Forum

Couple more images,


A larger and clearer crop of the Louisville image. You can make out the steps down into the tub and linking rails to inclined ladder going from Gun deck to boat deck.


The Chester shows he Inclined ladder down to the boat deck, which probably means there was a Vertical Ladder up to the gun tub.


Take what can be seen with a grain of salt, it appears the back of the Northampton's tub was open however it can't be certain that it just isn't there anymore.

Artistic license may be the best option.

Matt

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In the yards right now:
USS Utah AG-16
On Hold
1/350 USS Portland CA-33 1942
1/350 Trumpeter Texas with a twist

Hello Matt,

thanks a lot, these are wonderful close-up photos of the Augusta! Dou you have any dates for them?

You are indeed right about the differences in modifications between sisters. I cross-checked my Chicago collection once again and the two photos below clearly witness that - compare them to your Louisville photo. It seems that in case of Chicago the upper 5in deck ended even with the aftmost splinter shield without any opening for an inclined ladder leading downwards. The second photo perhaps indicates a vertical ladder close to the centerline? So perhaps there was only a narrow gangway (obscured by the superstructure here) leading to the spotting glass platform. In that case presumably another vertical ladder provided access to the 1.1in gun tub from the lower 5in deck.

It also seems that the 1.1in gun tub centerline part was already closed at this time, it can be seen behind the railings.

What do you think?

_________________
My Gallery | At works: USS Astoria
Prep stage: USS Vincennes | HMAS Australia | USS Bagley | USS Wilson | Kako | Yubari | USS S-44
Recently completed: 1/700 USS Chicago 8/1942 | 1/700 Kinugasa 8/1942

They were taken during Operation Torch in late 1942

I agree with your observations but I would possibly think there was an inclined ladder angled out from the centerline. In the first image, you see a sailor who's head is almost even with the 1.1 tub. Don't know what else would be there to have him so elevated other than he is descending a inclined ladder? It could open just out of sight being obscured by aforementioned superstructure.

Matt

_________________
In the yards right now:
USS Utah AG-16
On Hold
1/350 USS Portland CA-33 1942
1/350 Trumpeter Texas with a twist

Good catch! I thought the sailor was further apart but thinking about it again now that you pointed it out, you may be right! Thanks once again!

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My Gallery | At works: USS Astoria
Prep stage: USS Vincennes | HMAS Australia | USS Bagley | USS Wilson | Kako | Yubari | USS S-44
Recently completed: 1/700 USS Chicago 8/1942 | 1/700 Kinugasa 8/1942

Hi all, I've been gathering references/pictures for a future build of the 4 Northampton class cruisers of the Pacific fleet in 1941. I was curious if anyone knew when Chicago was painted into Ms11 from Ms1. Shipcamouflage.com states she was in Ms1 all the way until repainted into Ms21 in 1942, but photos of her in December of 1941 show she definitely was not in Ms1 (and also shows Lexington in Ms12). The time frame I'm going to building her as is Nov-Dec 1941, so I'll go overall sea blue, but was just curious if she actually wore Ms1 (I haven't seen any pictures I can remember of her in Ms1)



I was also curious if anyone could help me determine the turret top colors. This is what I've discerned from info on Tracy White's website

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-Abram

Abram,
I haven't taken the time yet to go through USS Portland's deck logs to figure out when this 1941 footage for the movie "To the Shores of Tripoli" was shot. She was sailing with USS Astoria (camera ship), USS Minneapolis, and USS Chicago.


All ships except USS Chicago were wearing MS-1. Chicago was in MS-11. I suspect it was either Aug or Sept of '41 but that is only a guess at this point.

Jeff, looks like Ms11 for sure for how I'm trying to depict the ship then, but with natural wood decks, based on the info you provided in the Portland and Indy thread.

_________________
-Abram

Abram,
Looks like my leading candidate for the date of this film footage is Dec.5, 1941 in the morning before Minneapolis left the formation at 0920.



So I have a feeling that Chicago was probably painted in MS-11 in November at Pearl like Raleigh, Detroit, St Louis, Honolulu, Phoenix were.

Hi Abram and all, this is very interesting! I actually had a discussion about the possibility of Chicago retaining 5-S (Ms11) even after her voyage to Australia in the Facebook Warship Camouflage Research Group some weeks ago. Just my speculation on how to explain why the "Chicago Blue" happenned to be very different from even faded 5-N. Now you proved she actually wore 5-S before Pearl Harbor attack. I acknowledge there are arguments against her retaining 5-S later, it´s just a possibility. FWIW

Abram, re your table of turret colours above - I hope you are aware you actually need the USS Houston Corsair Armada kit to make a 1941 Chicago (unless you replace most of her superstructure like I did ). Their Chicago kit depicts her after the final refit in Dec 1942.

_________________
My Gallery | At works: USS Astoria
Prep stage: USS Vincennes | HMAS Australia | USS Bagley | USS Wilson | Kako | Yubari | USS S-44
Recently completed: 1/700 USS Chicago 8/1942 | 1/700 Kinugasa 8/1942

I also found this article that talks about USS Minneapolis and the filming of the movie. This confirms the date of 12/5/41 so Chicago was definitely in MS-11 before the attack.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.dailyr ... n/%3famp=1

Jeff and Vladi, Thanks for the information and looking into this with me.

Vladi, the Houston kit is the one I have, I just didn't distinguish which version of a kit I was using on the spread sheet. Thanks for checking on that.

_________________
-Abram

All good then, Abram

_________________
My Gallery | At works: USS Astoria
Prep stage: USS Vincennes | HMAS Australia | USS Bagley | USS Wilson | Kako | Yubari | USS S-44
Recently completed: 1/700 USS Chicago 8/1942 | 1/700 Kinugasa 8/1942

Check out her CXAM
https://www.shutterstock.com/video/clip ... -fired-uss

That's pretty cool, I guess I've never thought about the fact it rotates like that, for some reason I thought it was like the gun directors and only moved at what they're trying to see. Thanks for sharing

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-Abram

Thanks to Rick D for helping with some King Board info. Stumbled upon the CinCAF Annual Report 1941 with some references to Houston dated Sep 11, 1941.

Next 3 pages from the Annual Report, p.48 (last post), 59, 66, 67

Useful documents about HOUSTON. They confirm her propulsion system was sound at least--which was always the contention of her senior surviving Engineer officer (LT Bob Fulton)--as the war approached, even if her armament still needed considerable work. Her logs show she made at least 31 kts on full power runs as she steamed out from CA to Hawaii in late '40, and had reached 30 kts later in her second Asiatic Fleet deployment.
The issues with her 'new' MK19 5" directors were never properly addressed, as we know. THAT, in fact, eventually became her Achilles heel, and may be argued to have contributed to her loss.

The problems with her degaussing girdle explains anecdotal evidence that they were still fooling w/that at Cavite in Nov. 1941 when she left for her southern 'defensive' position at Iloilo.
And she never got her new searchlights (which were left on the dock at Cavite) or any directors for the quad 1.1" guns, etc.
Ironically, the former were noted by her IJN adversaries at Sunda Strait as weak during her final engagement.

Many thanks.

Kudos to you Jeff, you always find such interesting stuff.

_________________
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

Thanks Martin!
Here's some more for ya.
Tracy submitted this photo to Navsource dated Feb.12, 1945 aboard USS Chester.


There is actually color film footage of this day over on Critical Past.
The color those two sailors are painting the anchor chain is yellow.


There is a handful of Chester footage during that same week on the Critical Past site. She was wearing Measure 32 Design 9D in these films but her decks were no longer camouflaged.


A couple of close up shots of her hanger deck and the deck above the hangers have me scratching my head a little bit again about deck colors.
This one shows church service on Feb. 11th. Notice that the hanger deck no longer has wood decking. It appears to have some sort of brownish square pattern to it now.




The deck above the Hanger also has a very brown tone to it compared to the blue plane.



If you wish to see all the films from this week, just type in USS Chester in the search field on the Critical Past site.

I think the "squares" are non-skid material. There were several different non-skid surfaces tried/used during WWII, which one this is I have no idea. The USN painted the stuff deck blue (or whatever was the camo of the day) to match metal surfaces, but the paint wore off fairly quickly.

As for the Yellow Primer appearing almost white in B&W photography, this is pretty common. I came to the conclusion some time ago that the strange "whitest" areas were primer. I read somewhere that the yellow zinc chromate also changed color as it aged. I saw this in a couple of color images. Turning from bright yellow to light yellow, to a sort of Tan.

This image shows a well worn destroyer (USS ERBEN DD-631) with areas of rust and various ages of primer applied. Also note, how the faded 5-N becomes darker when wet.