Calling all Essex-class (WWII configuration) fans

[Hanchang Kuo]

Hi,

I can use some helps on my Trumpeter 1/700 Franklin project. I am thinking about building my Franklin in her March 19, 1945 fit,

- Island detail. Almost all March 19 photos I came across are showing starboard side of the ship. Is there any photo available on the port side of the island? Franklin's also had a main mast. What does it look like before the attack?

- Aft radio masts. Did she land her heavy radio mast and receive whip antennae during her late 1944 refit? One of her March 19 photos shows something like a whip antenna standing at the burning aft section but I am not sure if it's a whip antenna or remains of a lattice structure.

- Colors. From the photos I think it looks like she was carrying MS-21 at the time but the Warship Perspective book says MS-22 1945 revision was used. I am inclined to believe MS-21 but...what scheme was actually used on Franklin?

Thanks in advance for any input.

[Tracy White]

- Island detail. Almost all March 19 photos I came across are showing starboard side of the ship. Is there any photo available on the port side of the island? Franklin's also had a main mast. What does it look like before the attack?

Pretty much the same as the earlier pictures. They added some Mk 51 directors to the starboard side, but the port side didn't change really other than the extension of the bridge itself. Not the flag plot extension where the quad 40mmm was removed... the level ABOVE it was also extended forward and squared off.

The below picture is a sketch of proposed changes I found with the old bridge and a sketch of the new outline (never implemented on her though, by the way)... the picture below that is the drawing of the inside layout, which should help you also see the profile it had:

- Aft radio masts. Did she land her heavy radio mast and receive whip antennae during her late 1944 refit? One of her March 19 photos shows something like a whip antenna standing at the burning aft section but I am not sure if it's a whip antenna or remains of a lattice structure.

Yes, she had the whip aerials aft in 1945. She also only had two towers forward.

- Colors. From the photos I think it looks like she was carrying MS-21 at the time but the Warship Perspective book says MS-22 1945 revision was used. I am inclined to believe MS-21 but...what scheme was actually used on Franklin?

I can't answer this one for sure yet but it's one I've been trying to for about 2-3 months now at the archives. It is for sure MS21; I've got the memo stating she was painted MS21 on or about January 4th. The question is what color. We know they switched over to revised paints in 1945, just not WHEN. I've been looking through the records for Puget Sound Naval Shipyard but haven't found any mention of new stocks of paint, old ones being retired, etc. My best guess right now is 5N as a memo I have concerning Lexington in April 1945 states she was painted in Measure 12. So the change happened *probably* in February or March.

[Keith Hufnagel]

All of my recent research for Yorktown in Oct. 1944 points to 5-P, 5-H, and, 5-N for her paint scheme. Having looked at every picture of Yorktown I could find I am convinced that this is correct. A well known artist I know, after his research came to the same conclusion. Hope this is helpful not contentious.

[Tracy White]

Now back to Franklin....Anyone knows if there's clear pictures of Franklin's main mast in its undamaged state?

Circa January 1945 after refit but before she left Puget Sound.

[Tracy White]

OK, this isn't a really serious attempt at doing a hangar deck... that'll come with my Tico build. Reason is that I left most of the Trumpeter details on when assembling this area and when comparing it to the plans and pictures I have now.... well it's a decent representation but far from correct.

Starting off with the #3 elevator area:



When I originally started this I whacked out the elevator pit. Found out later that there was an auxiliary elevator that was usually flush with the main (aka hangar) deck; it covered a little less than half of the pit on the port side. Would have saved me much cutting and drilling

In general the bulkheads on the interior are over simplified. The white strip is my experiment with adding some of the structural stiffeners that were present and visible in pictures I've posted before. I'm also not really that happy with how my hoses and pipes turned out, but I was just playing around... this area won't be too visible because the elevator will be raised and lighting poor. Note too the added structures around the elevator shaft. There was a regular watertight door on the aft bulkhead and what looks like a large open archway in the forward bulkhead that I noticed AFTER I cut and glued the piece into place.

The area forward of this, in between the elevator area and the uptakes that also have strip is way over simplified but I don't have a real complete idea of what it looks like yet. There were air shaft columns and stairways as well as a hatchway that was usually left open. I just need to sit down and sketch out what I see in the pictures and compare it to plans, etc.

OK now, Port side just haft of the area that the hangar cat track was:



On Tico I'm going to cut and sand away ALL the detail and start over. The vertical supports are in the wrong area... doesn't look bad until I start trying to build this area as it existed on an actual ship. So this is just an approximation, as well as an amalgamation of several ships.

The area with the two vertical strips and a block was wildly different on each ship. I have pictures of two of them with the locker like I made; Yorktown (at least in 1943) lacked this locker. A common use of this area forward of the locker was for storage of 40mm barrels, but Hornet actually had an organ and a faux stained glass window painted in this area for church services.

There was an open chock welded into the bulkhead in this area with a watertight door next to it and a bit inside. The one picture I have of this area that shows where the chock is has a tarp or something hanging in this area, but I don't know if this was for any purpose such as blocking light... I would imagine that on the open ocean they'd seal it off with something a little more robust!

Aft (left) of this is the light locker or labyrinth structure I've mentioned in the past as well. The two boxes you see are part of the problem I have with doing this area... there is some structure that I can't put in because of them. C'est La Vie.

I'm mulling over the idea of scratch building a replacement for this segment as something that can be resin cast and dropped in place (once the interior structure is removed.

[Poppop]

Has anyone used the Nautilus wood decks on their 1/350 Essex Class ships?

Is it a complete replacement, or does it overlay the deck that comes with the Trumpter kit?

Regards,

Charlie

[Devin]

Charlie,

I have the Nautilus wood deck for the Essex. I've assembled the kit's plastic flight deck and will sand it smooth as a surface to glue the wood to. The wood just on its own isn't going to work too well, as it isn't nearly as rigid as the plastic, and there are details that get glued onto the undersides of the plastic deck.

Tracy,

That looks great so far. Nothing major, but it improves the look a lot. I'll be using your photos on my build! I'll also get photos of that section of CV-10 flight deck I bought on eBay photographed and posted this week sometime (classes are starting up again, bye bye copious modeling time!)

-Devin

[Guest]

Charlie,

I have the Nautilus wood deck for the Essex. I've assembled the kit's plastic flight deck and will sand it smooth as a surface to glue the wood to. The wood just on its own isn't going to work too well, as it isn't nearly as rigid as the plastic, and there are details that get glued onto the undersides of the plastic deck.

Tracy,

That looks great so far. Nothing major, but it improves the look a lot. I'll be using your photos on my build! I'll also get photos of that section of CV-10 flight deck I bought on eBay photographed and posted this week sometime (classes are starting up again, bye bye copious modeling time!)

-Devin

Hey Devin,
I too have a wooden deck from Nautilus and am very impressed. Did a ink wash, followed by a stain of blue tint, then a very light sanding and WOW!

I am also gluing the wood deck to the kits flightdeck by first sanding the plastic deck down a .031". This makes is a lot easier than building a base out of styrene and having to scratch the catwalks.

And Tracy, as I said before, thanks for your time and effort in gathering those pictures, especially of the SCB details.
Scott

[Devin]

Hey Devin,
I too have a wooden deck from Nautilus and am very impressed. Did a ink wash, followed by a stain of blue tint, then a very light sanding and WOW!

Scott,

I've been looking at the grain on my deck and wondering if I need to seal it with shellac or not. Did you do any sealing, or just the wash and stain? I'm assuming the wash was just to bring out the scribed details?

THanks,
Devin

[Phil73805]

Quick question for you all. I'm in the middle of painting Trumpeter's 1/700 USS Franklin in the measure 21 scheme she wore during the battle that nearly saw her sunk. What colour do I paint the various masts, aerials and radar dishes?

Phil

[Tracy White]

Well, based on the following picture I'd say it's a color close to the hull color:




Another little Hangar post. The below picture is of the forward port hangar deck area, just forward of the hangar cat area that was later turned into a gun gallery for quad 40mms.



This is another area that needs a little work if you want a decent representation of what it looked like It's hard to make out, but there's a little white platform above the PE door. I presume this was some sort of hangar cat control station but I haven't been able to find anything hard yet. Just outboard of this was an inclined ladder up over the door to the platform level; behind (or rather, forward) of the platform was another ladder going up to the overheads from outboard to inboard. I have a couple of OK photos of this area but unfortunately my arrangement is such that I can't post or republish them. The inclined ladder from the main (aka hangar) deck on the model meets the deck just where the roller door's edge is, and there isn't enough room as it is to do the ladder from the platform level up without extending this platform out farther and thus pushing the lower inclined ladder out in the way of the roller door. So dimensionally something's off; either the placement of the bulkheads or the roller doors. I think what I'm going to do on my next kit is remove the plastic piece that is the bulkhead the platform and PE doorway are attached to (it's got big knocking pin sink holes anyway that are annoying to xig) and scratch build one behind (or further forward) the original, so I have a little more room in this area. This should give me enough room to add the second inclined ladder.

Starboard side looks the same to me as far as I can see.

Later on they covered these inclined ladders with sheet metal (aka light labyrinths), but I'm not sure what was done with the hangar cat control station platform.

[Poppop]

Tracy:

My thoughts:

No need to do those items that don't show, or would be difficult to see with the roller doors in the open position.

Overheads would really be nice. Totally bare now and I just don't have the time to scratch build them.

Other details at your option. Some are pretty obvious, others add to the accuracy and detail, but are only really noticable to the builder (important) and the very knowlegeable observer. Some details vary from ship to ship, so it might have to be up to the individual builder to add those items. If you can provide a somewhat detailed sheet for those items, most builders could do the scratch build themselves.

I know you are also working on a book, so it's obvious that you have to be careful what you distribute... it will be copied and distributed regardless of how you try to protect it.

Charlie

[Tracy White]

Overheads would really be nice. Totally bare now and I just don't have the time to scratch build them.

The interesting thing I've determined is that the hangar bays on each ship changed as much as the outside. No way can I track individual ships; at this point the best I can do is a set based on a collection of pictures from different ships. Between all of the pictures and all of the ships I can do a pretty good representation, but it won't be accurate for any one ship at any one time.

Better than nothing though.

The overheads changed too, by the way. Certain open areas were "reclaimed" by adding a deck and bulkheads and turning it into an office space. Later on they started adding catwalks and structures to store and retrieve drop tanks (Can't remember the exact ships I've seen the records for, probably Lex and Wasp) and the numbers for this varied from around 280 to 330+. I have found NOTHING other than mention that work was done on this, no plans, photos, etc.

[Tracy White]

For those of you that have some patience in reading, my copy of CV-16 Lexington's 1945 report on the use of quad .50 caliber AA mounts is finally finished. Took me about a month working here and there to get all the formatting done. For those of you building a 1945 Lexington there are some subtle details mentioned!

[scottrc]

Hey Devin,
I too have a wooden deck from Nautilus and am very impressed. Did a ink wash, followed by a stain of blue tint, then a very light sanding and WOW!

Scott,

I've been looking at the grain on my deck and wondering if I need to seal it with shellac or not. Did you do any sealing, or just the wash and stain? I'm assuming the wash was just to bring out the scribed details?

THanks,
Devin

After I glued it onto the plastic, I sealed it with a light coat of sanding sealer. This would help prevent any curl or warping from using acrylic washes. I used black india ink as a wash to highlight the details. When I am all done with decals and weathering, then I will airbrush a final coat of Liquitex satin clear.

Scott

[Tracy White]

SHhhhhhhhh
Measure 31-32-33 Design 3A
Measure 31-32-33 Design 6A
Measure 33 Design 10A

[Devin]

I have to admit ignorance of the dazzle schemes: the sheets say that 3 or 4 ships were painted in these schemes. Were they exact, or did each wind up with noteable variations?

-Devin

[Tracy White]

The design sheet sets the pattern, the Measure defines the color. So Intrepid, for example, was painted in MS 32 3a whereas Hornet was in MS 33 3a. Pattern's the same, colors are different.

Look at the second picture on Navsource's CV-12 Hornet Page and this photo of Hancock and you can see that the patterns are pretty much the same. This despite the different measures.

There would be little variations I think.. you know, a foot here and there.

[Poppop]

Well, it's back to the Yorktown after a delay in painting the dazzle scheme. It looks pretty good if I must say so myself, but there is a lot of detail painting that is required, so time will tell.

I am working on the side elevator area. I read somewhere that the railings that the doors rolled in would fold up and out of the way when moving aircraft into and out of the hangar bay. First, is this correct?

If so, did they fold up to a 90 degree angle, or did they fold up and attach to the top of the hangar bay (sorry, I don't know the proper terminology)?

Thanks,

Charlie

[Tracy White]

I am working on the side elevator area. I read somewhere that the railings that the doors rolled in would fold up and out of the way when moving aircraft into and out of the hangar bay. First, is this correct?

If so, did they fold up to a 90 degree angle, or did they fold up and attach to the top of the hangar bay (sorry, I don't know the proper terminology)?

Yes, they would fold up into the overheads (terminology)
Whether or not they folded for and aft or inward I haven't been able to find proof of, but based on the pictures I have they looke like they fold fore and aft and are snug enough that they'll be hard to make out in 350th scale.