1/72 Casablanca class escort carrier

[ADM]

I'm working on a 1/72 Casablanca class aircraft carrier, I've started few month ago with around 50 planes (including some japanese for the background) and 250 figures, now I'm on the eve of starting to do the ship. A long work has started

[ADM]

some photos of the crew

[ADM]

Right now I'm finishing the 20 Oerlikon (John R Haynes product) + gunners and twin Bofors gunners (milicast), after this will come the parts of the ship.

[Capit�o Norbert]

Hello ADM interesting subject
i will watching some news of Casablanca carrier
the crew is very well made painted

[DrPR]

Boy! I ran across some tough CPOs in my day but never one who chopped off sailor's arms! Must be a really strict ship!

Phil

[Dave Wooley]

Hi ADM great to see a new carrier build , pictures please when available .Question is your model to be R/C or static
Dave Wooley

[ADM]

My model will be static, cut to waterline in order to be used for wargames (Taffy 3) and when finished it will be followed by two 1/72 fletcher class destroyer, but now I'm concentrating on the build of this escort carrier, I've got the plan, some photos, tools and material, it took me some month to gather everything, find what is necessary in the right scale and already spent 6 month to build all the planes and figures, so I'm ready to start the ship, photos will follow soon, time to finish painting on the 20 Oerlikon guns and gunners. I will update with picture as often as possible.

[ADM]

I'm working on my Oerlikon and Bofors gunners, using Acrilyc colors (Vallejo), they're nearly finished, I need to paint shoes, base and helmet, after that I will finish to paint the 20 Oerlikon and start working on the 8 twin Bofors and others parts.

[Bill Waldorf]

Looks great so far......Where did you get the figures and the 40mm from??? Please advise .....Thanks!

[ADM]

Hi Bill,
I had the opportunity to appreciate your 1/72 Gambier Bay, great work, it inspired me for sure because now I'm building my own escort carrier and a whole fleet, 1/72 is the perfect scale to introduce figures aboard ship models and despite no plastic manufacturer offer 1/72 WWII US sailors, we can find these figures in metal or resin and make some conversion for plastic figures, here what I used :




The metal figures can be found here, it's the best quality available :

http://www.historexagents.com/shop/hxse ... rpKey=1-72

A few resin set of pilots :

http://www.cmkkits.com/en/figures/index ... 6&fMaker=0

Oerlikon gun crew :

http://www.milicast.com/shop/product.ph ... t=0&page=1

Bofors gun crew :

http://www.milicast.com/shop/product.ph ... t=0&page=2

Revell figures set, especially german set offer a lot of different figures and only few modification to adapt them to the US Navy.

The only 1/72 twin bofors available are from HR products, the ones you used, but (for others ship) we can now find some 1/72 quadruple bofors :
http://www.battlecrafts.co.uk/index.php ... 1-72-scale
You will also find them on ebay.

[Bill Waldorf]

Thanks much for the info. I shall be watching as you progress. Good luck on the continuing build.

[ADM]

I have just finished the 20 Oerlikon and their gun crew.

These 1/72 Oerlikon can be found here :

https://www.johnrhaynes.com/shop/index. ... ductId=695

[ADM]

I'm starting to work on the 8 twin bofors (ref : S72-2) and their 4 MK51 director (ref : S72-3), and 31 life raft (Ref : S72-19), they come from "H-R products", the only manufacturer to offer these items :
http://floatingdrydock.com/fittings.htm#72

A small instruction sheet with the MK51 director (3 metal parts for each model), but no explaination about how to build the twin bofors, anyway there's plenty of good photo on google and only few part to build so it's easy, I will show this.

[ADM]

The MK51 director come in 3 parts to assemble, I've added the cables to improve the level of details, these are now finished and ready for painting.

[ADM]

Cleaning all the 31 life raft took around 1 hour for each of them to make them look as good as possible, they're ready for painting, and now I'm starting with the twin bofors, I've drilled the barrels, the base and I'm cleaning each part. The work worth it, the result will be great.

[Richard J OMalley]

ADM
I will be watching this with great interest .Good luck .

[ADM]

After having removed unwanted metal, a lot of work to clean every parts, I'm starting to assemble these twin Bofors, here is the way to do it in 6 steps. Of course they're not finished yet, more details to scratchbuild.

[ADM]

More details added with evergreen rod and 2 seat for the gunners, next step : I will assemble the 2 parts and add the gunsight.

[ADM]

The 8 twin Bofors are now ready for painting, the photoetch gunsight come from milicast and I've added evergreen rod (0,5mm) to complete all the details. To finish with the armament of this ship I'm going to scratchbuild the 5"/38 open mount aft gun because it doesn't exist anymore in 1/72 scale, but We can find the barrel and the base here :
http://www.scalewarship.com/store/index ... uct_id=261
all the others details will be made by myself.

[Richard J OMalley]

Nice job on those guns .My IPMS club is going to do a 1/72 Casablanca class CVE so you are leading the way .