ARL 12 USS Poseidon

[Fliger747]

Aft deckhouse with 40 Quad tub and mount. I printed this open without the deck for printing reasons. The deck, is cut seperatly on my stencil cutting machine (very accurate) from Strathmore Bristol Board (A historical favorite with Model RR types).

Slowly adding bits and pieces about the superstructure. Possibly an endless process.

[BB62vet]

Tom,

That's really starting to take shape!!! I like the super detail you're getting with the 3D parts. I was wondering what the after gun mount foundation/deckhouse was going to look like - very nice job!!!

Hank

[dhenning]

Looking very good Tom!

[Fliger747]

Thank you Dave and Hank! I suspect that Achilles with it's lower aft superstructure probably looked like an aircraft carrier to both the bomber (New Guinea) and the Kamikaze (Off Luzon?) to pilots, notoriously bad at ship ID. The ARL's 10 and above had operable bow doors and I need to somehow machine a good aft hinge line gap in the existing hull. I'll get slowed down quite a bit when I start working on the large winches, there are three winches on main deck forward, three on the O1 level near the A frame, two boat winches abaft the pilot house and the large stern anchor winch.

Regards: Tom

[DrPR]

Tom,

Nice work. It is a ship that isn't often modeled.

Did the quad 40s really have the shields? On small combatants (destroyers and light cruisers) the shields were omitted, possibly to reduce topside weight.

****

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Phil

[Fliger747]

Phil:

Yes the 40's had the shields. For a small 12 knot ship, 8 40's and 8 20 mm Orlikons (with the latest MK 14 sights) was a fairly decent close in AA armament. This were suggestive that these were considered valuable in support of the beach head. Despite the minor superstructure above the O1 level, one would guess that stability would not be an issue.

Cheers: Tom

[Fliger747]

One of the better, more detailed photos from Navsource. I like photos like this, showing a lot of small detail which I can attempt to replicate. These material lockers forward held a treasure trove of repair materials to build whatever you wanted!

[Fliger747]

David H:

Looking through Navsource LST's they have photos of the one's converted to ARL's. The 1-9 photos probably give a pretty good idea of how Achilles appeared after her conversion. The first nine are not much modified from the original LST's but by the time they saw some service a number of modifications were made to improve their operation for the rest of the class. One notable item was aft they has a 3" 50 on the main deck with a super firing 40 above and just forward.

Tom

[Fliger747]

Despite the hundreds of LST II's built, I haven't found any good photos of the external expression of the ramp leading from the main decking it's raised position. Plans show where it is and the size, but not a lot of help to accurately build this. It is possible that this was removed or decommissioned in the ARL conversion as the carpentry shop was in the area near the bow doors. However it was possible to open the bow doors and allow LTV's to climb aboard for work. LST training film did show the earlier type elevator in operation.

Model kits are at best a tertiary source (often Quaternary) .

Tom

[Fliger747]

The Sphinx plans show no foredeck ramp, certainly possible this was decked over. The available NAVSOURCE photos make it hard to tell if there was a general practice here. Many ships featured an awarthships rack to park boats on for work. Maybe some had the ramp. some didn't, so far no good info!

Would be nice to get the BOGP from NARA, before it is disbanded to make right of way for a MAGLEV train between Bangor Maine and Danbury Connecticut.

[Fliger747]

Hank Strub commented on the MAGLEV routing, I pointed out that a good government boondoggle is not required to follow a direct route. BTW I have ridden on the Shanghai Maglev a number of times, smooth and fast, but still a boondoggle "we have one" project. It starts at the airport (good idea) and ends on the outskirts of the city (bad idea).

On topic: Yesterday I added the hull side ribbing. First to turn the hull upside down and scribe the location lines. As the hull bottom is not parallel to the base line the inversion is necessary. I use a heavy magnetic block with two adjustable arms and a holder for an instrument. What I used to scribe was a #11 Xacto blade.

For the ribbing i used a material called "Wildfire" by Beadalon, a synthetic woven .15mm beaders stringing cord, non fuzzy and non stretchy. Beginning at the stern I anchored with CA and strung along the scribed line, adding tape and spots of CA for anchoring to the point at the bow where the ribs kink. Then misted with Krylon flat and let dry, then a coat of auto primer.

Printed some more Carley floats of a new design, some with frames, some without. Also the Stern Anchor with frame, modified from the design I used for the LSM. Rudders, skegs, props, prop guards etc, not to say fwd anchors etc to go on the hull. For some reason the "Spelchequr" doesn't recognize "Skeg".

Tom

[Fliger747]

Printed more Carley Floats and the outboard A frame derrick winch. I have a decent side view of this winch in one of my dad's photos and the base size on the Sphinx drawings. Looking at this as a first effort with hopefully, as happens, more information will come to light. Suspicious of the size on the Sphinx drawings as it's just shown as a rectangle with a Gypsy Head. There is another large winch associated with the A frame which I have not yet divined the exact configuration. Similar but not the same as the starboard side winch?

Many of the ARL's had Carley floats along the main deck rail in the same manner as the LST's on a vertical frame. I printed a number of these and they are cute little devils, but not satisfied that Poseidon had any of these. Her rafts apparently to be on inclined frames between the superstructure and the main deck. Here I am peering at 76 year old small original photos with magnification to try to discern configurations.

Cheers: Tom

[Fliger747]

Bow view ARL 12 current progress. Note the rub strips on the sides of the hull.

Tom

[Fliger747]

Showing rafts with frame and bare as well as starboard midships A Frame winch.

Tom

[BB62vet]

Tom,

Mighty impressive!!! I esp. like the detail on the various parts as well as the parts storage lockers up forward - looks like it's right out of the photo!!!

Amazing how things come together once you have an inventory of parts to work with.

Hank

[Fliger747]

Wa Hail...

I now have the two large winches for the A frame Derrick. However somehow I managed to print them 16% too small. So one is drying and one is printing. An advantage with winches and 3D as opposed to wenches, size can be adjusted exactly by a pull and re print.

This ship seems to have the odd square inch of free deck space, unlike the APA. Bulkheads do seem rather used, space wise, there are huge numbers of gas bottles in racks along the main deck. Vents? A veritable forrest of vents of all sizes, I presume to extract work byproducts in the myriad of workshop areas.

Originally the ship was equipped with 2 LCVP's hoisted into the Whelan Davits abaft the bridge, but photos show many times ships carried 20 40' launches here. Poseidon also carried a 40 ' launch far forward on the work area cradle. Whether or not I have the 3D capability to pull this off is open to question. Song would carve one from wood, that possibility is always there.

Tom

[DrPR]

Tom,

I don't know if I mentioned this before, but the Joyner Library at East Carolina University has the plans/blueprints from the Barbour Boat Works. Barbour built everything from row boats to destroyers for the Navy, especially small boats. They also built a lot of other vessels like LSTs, yard vessels, etc. Who knows, they may have built ARLs!

They have plans for nearly every small boat used by the US Navy until the late 1980s. I have ordered plans from them and they aren't very expensive. I got a fast response from their library personnel.

https://library.ecu.edu/

Phil

[Fliger747]

Phil:

You have mentioned them before and certainly worth researching! My biggest issue with building a 40' motor launch is skill on my part! The ARL's were improbably commissioned as fully complete LST's, steamed (motored) to a Navy Yard, decommissioned and then sliced and diced into an ARL and re commissioned. I suppose that in the Wartime production assembly line production of LST's by mostly the cornfield shipyard it made sense to not disturb the one thing they knew how to do well and quickly. An example was the XP47-J which made 505 mph with a stock P&W R2800, the overriding consideration was cranking out P47 D's and a change over would cost a lot of production. I can see why the 40' motor launches were liked, compared to an LCVP, a lot of seating for a trip to Mog Mog

Tom.

[Fliger747]

Phil:

Some good resources there, especially about such items as landing craft and ships boats.

On Poseidon, printed a revised portside forward double winch, some winch control boxes (same as on ARL) and a test prop/skeg.rudder unit. From that currently printing mirrored port/starboard units, will see how those fit. I'll install the completed units with proper parallel spacing and see what minor further adjustments may be necessary. A disadvantage of making the hull by traditional methods and printing the appendages. The Sphinx and LST drawings I have seen show an exposed shaft, photos of Poseidon in dry dock show twin skegs ala Iowa et al. Much like a tug, a fairly flat prop pitch due to the relatively low speed of the vessel.

Cheers: Tom

[Fliger747]

I located the position of the rudder posts from the SPHINX BOGP drawing of the second deck, showing the steering room. I made appropriate parallel lines on a heavy Strathmore card and taped the skegs with printing bases on Then located the hull level and at the appropriate height and slid the skeg assemblies under the stern to check position and fit! Lucky beats good! removed and applied epoxy to the top of the skegs and replaced the unit under the stern. After the epoxy has firmly set I can turn the hull over and de platform the printing supports. The seam will undoubtedly need some putty, and minor blending into the hull.

Cheers: Tom