Subject: SMML VOL 1018 Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2000 23:37:42 +1000 shipmodels@tac.com.au -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MODELLERS INDEX 1: WW2 ship movies Correction! 2: Grosser Kurfurst for $45 3: Andrea Doria 4: Is there a Revell kit... 5: USS England's good luck 6: Re: French Navy 7: USS Eldridge 8: Re: Warspite Decks 9: Re: Russian Vosper MTB's 10: Re: 1/72 Scale 11: French Navy 12: Re: Russian Vosper MTB's 13: Re: WARSPITE DECK COLOURS.. unpainted or painted?? 14: Re: DE RUYTER Camouflage 15: Re: Future wax woes 16: Re: USS England's good luck 17: Scattershot replies 18: Bill Holden: Tugman 19: Re: WW2 ship movies - Victor Baca 20: Re: USS England's good luck 21: Re: What are "Queens"? 22: England's good luck 23: nuclear sub nautilus 24: Comments on Alan Raven's RN Camouflage Vol.1 Book 25: Korean War Exhibit 26: Re: Minsk planes 27: New Tamiya Ship Kits 28: Re: Tamiya Essex?? 29: Re: Warspite Decks 30: Minsk's Fate 31: Re: Ship Models from Russia 32: Heller Charles de Gaulle update? 33: 1/350 Essex Class 34: Re: Site for French Navy 35: Saburo Sakai -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TRADERS, ANNOUNCEMENTS & NOTICEBOARD INDEX 1: Website update -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MODELLERS -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) From: "Tony Ireland" Subject: WW2 ship movies Correction! Silly me! After 56 years my memory confused two Hollywood actors. It was William Bendix (not W.Holden) who was the Neanderthal coal-shovelling stoker in the ship in the movie 'The Hairy Ape'. Anyway, it raised more laughs among our battleship's crew than a Marx Brothers film. Raised the morale of our stokers, although they never had to wield a shovel, luckily. Reminds me of a nightmare few days in July 1944 when HMS 'Howe' was steaming southwards at 15 knots down the Red Sea en route from Liverpool to Sydney, and we had a following northerly 15 m.p.h. breeze, hot from the desert and almost 100% relative humidity. At 47,000 tons we had been the biggest ship ever to get through the Suez Canal, though it took us two days and many groundings which damaged our boilers or condensors, so we spent some days at Port Taufiq to fix them, in baking heat that made our thick armoured hull into an oven. So we had to reverse course every four hours and spend 30 minutes ventilating the ship, clearing out the sulphurous funnel smoke that rose a few feet and then flowed down around our superstructure. It was too hot to sleep inside the ship, so the 1,000-plus crew slept on every scrap of deck space. In desperation, I slung a hammock between the centre 14-inch gun barrels of 'Y' quadruple turret - possibly a unique occurrence in the history of the Royal Navy - and had the first good night's sleep for a week. Cheers, Tony. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2) From: Ned Barnett Subject: Grosser Kurfurst for $45 I just got an e-mail from Pelta, an online hobby store in Poland (after a list-member suggested they have low prices) quoting $45 for an ICM Konig/Grosser Kurfurst. This is remarkable, if true (don't know about payment, postage, etc.) - here's their website: http://www.pelta.com.pl Ned -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3) From: "Bonini S.r.l." Subject: Andrea Doria John, Don't worry! I was born the same year of the A.Doria's sinking and feel old, too...the advantage is that I know practically all the kits released by Revell since 1959 (I "built" my first kit, an Airfix Spitfire, at the age of 6) and am perfectly sure that a kit of this beautiful liner was never released by Revell, nor by any other manufacturer of kits in bigger scale, AFAIK. I had a metal model of this ship, in 1/1250 scale, produced by an italian company, Mercury, which closed many years ago. Newer models of the ship in this scale should be available from some german manufacturer. Cheers, Giusto Gallas / Italy -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4) From: "Bonini S.r.l." Subject: Is there a Revell kit... ed, I built the normal, wartime XXI from Revell, but could have a short look inside the box of their "Wilhelm Bauer" : as far as I can remember, the differences in the sail are respected, while the hull seemed to be the same as the other kit. At present, this kit is no more in the Revell Germany catalogue (at least, on their website), but is easily available in better modelshops. As regards documentation, there was a german book about the story of "Wilhelm Bauer", some time ago...maybe some German SMMLie can help ? Ciao from Italy, Giusto Gallas -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5) From: "John Rule" Subject: USS England's good luck >> I will leave it to others to explain how the England managed to dispose of the six Jappo subs. Was it luck or skill. did it stumble onto the line by accident or was there prior knowledge? << I have it on good authority that the destroyer received a personal message from Winston Churchill telling them exactly where the submarines were located. It is believed, but has never been confirmed, that Mr. Churchill did this because he believed that the destroyer was named after his home country. In belated gratitude for the information provided the US has decided to name a destroyer USS Winston Churchill. WTIC John -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6) From: "Kevin W. Woodruff" Subject: Re: French Navy John: The offical website for the French Navy (Marine nationale) is: http://www.defense.gouv.fr/marine/index.html An English version is at: http://www.defense.gouv.fr/marine/anglais/present/present.htm Hope this helps Kevin -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7) From: "Don Carner" Subject: USS Eldridge Looking for a kit or plans of the former US destroyer, USS Eldridge. This ship was sold to the French I believe, then bought back to be used in the famous, "Project Rainbow" experiments conducted at the Philadelphia Naval Yard. I do not have a hull # or class. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated! Don Carner -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 8) From: "John Sheridan" Subject: Re: Warspite Decks >> I have, sitting here by my computer and waiting for me to do a Munsell color match, a chunk of weathered teak from the deck of a USN heavy cruiser which shall remain unnamed lest I receive a visit from her keepers. << Sailors Vito and Big Al from our "unnamed" ship will be by soon to "collect" our piece of decking Mr. Snyder. I knew we were going to have problems with you when you showed-up at the convention armed with a paint scraper in the left hand and a paint chipper in the right hand........ Sheesh! John Sheridan The only human to defeat the Minbari is behind me, you are in front of me. If you value your lives, be somewhere else. : Delenn -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 9) From: ALROSS2@aol.com Subject: Re: Russian Vosper MTB's >> I recently bought the Revell Vosper MTB and discovered that the boat was built in the US and delivered to the soviet union. If there are any photos of these boats or information about there weapons (what kind of machine guns did they carry? US cal. 50 or russian guns??) and painting, I to would be glad to get them. << They were fitted with the standard aircraft M2 .50 caliber mgs on the standard USN MK17 mount. The torpedo tubes were the MK19 types fitted to early Higgins PTs. Al Ross -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 10) From: "J. London" Subject: Re: 1/72 Scale A recent posting suggested that HO scale was close to this scale. HO is actually 1/87, i.e. much smaller. The larger railway OO scale (Hornby et al) is much closer at 1/76. Michael London -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 11) From: "larsenal" Subject: French Navy Hello ! For those interested by the French Navy, there are two good sites that can be consulted: 1- www.defense.gouv.fr/marine is the official French Navy site, all ships, material etc... are presented. It is even possible to make a virtual visit of the new carrier Charles de Gaulle. 2- www.netmarine.net is run by a group of enthusiast people, the site is less academic but contains a lot of information such as decommissioned ships, etc...Many good photos can be found in this site. Best regards, Jacques Druel L'Arsenal -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 12) From: PT191@aol.com Subject: Re: Russian Vosper MTB's Martin: Go to www.ptboats.org and ask them if they have anything on the USSR Vospers. T. Garth Connelly -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 13) From: "Caroline Carter" Subject: Re: WARSPITE DECK COLOURS.. unpainted or painted?? Well, I really need to wade in here and say that, after some serious early morning discussion on said subject with John Snyder, that I also support WR Press's position on this particular subject (Yah-Boo, Mike E. et al... though point taken about the baseplates ... good observation). When Dave and I did the P+P and overhead for the camouflage scheme on our 1/700 HMS Warspite 1942 kit, we researched every possible source, and no evidence was strong enough to indicate that the decks were painted. I'd like to point you back in the direction of Tarrant's Warspite. The fact is that we feel that if the deck had been painted, the caulking would also have been painted and not been visible as it is in the Tarrant pics. Interestingly, to show how photographs CAN be misleading (through the use of orthochromatic film for example), a good example of an unpainted teak deck can be found in the Classic Warships Pictorial USS Texas, p.11. This is apparently very dark, due to the film that was used, and could lead to speculation that the decks were painted, . However, we know that they weren't! On P.25, of the same publisher's "New Orleans Class Cruisers", Chicago and Northampton appear to have very dark decks.. but the decks of these ships were in fact unpainted teak. The film has recorded a high level of contrast between the deck and the light hull/upperworks, but the decks would have been a pale buffy-grey of course, and the contrast, in reality, would have not been particularly high. A good example of an unpainted teak deck ca. 1935 can be found on page 10 of thre Classic Warships USS Minneapolis book. The caulking is CLEARLY visible, and the deck has a very disctinctive "feel" and appearance. Keeping that image in mind, go back to teh Tarrant book and look at p. 123. This shows Warspite in 1943, and the darker caulking is clearly visible. It is also visible on p.126. The pic on p.127 that Mike referred to IS probably the moot point here, and yes, the baseplates are clearly the same shade. This does not PROVE, to my mind, that they were painted though... it could be as likely that the teak happens to show the same degree of lightness as the paint on the baseplate. Also, caulking is far more in evidence here than on any "equivalent-scale" pic I have come across on the photos I have seen of the painted decks on US cruisers. So... I really think that someone, somewhere, will have to prove the actual documentary evidence here... and no, it aint gonna be me!! Cheers! Caroline Carter White Ensign Models -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 14) From: "John Snyder" Subject: Re: DE RUYTER Camouflage Hi Falk, My Dutch contacts informed me that there was a book due out "late this year" on the Dutch Navy, that was to include camouflage and color information. I guess I better follow up on this, since it's now getting on towards "late this year." John Snyder Snyder & Short Enterprises The Paint Guys http://www.shipcamouflage.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 15) From: "Kelvin Mok" Subject: Re: Future wax woes >> I tried to apply Future with airbrush and could not overcome problems of clogging and spattering. I tried applying Future with brush, and ruined a nice little model << It clogged my airbrush and cup to a point where I spent hours cleaning them out and then some. The FW was less than impressive when applied with an airbrush or an artist's brush. The problem I think is with not knowing what solvent to use to thin FW and to clean up after use. But as David says I already have finishes I can live with. FW isn't it. Kelvin Mok -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 16) From: "John Snyder" Subject: Re: USS England's good luck >> I will leave it to others to explain how the England managed to dispose of the six Jappo subs. Was it luck or skill. did it stumble onto the line by accident or was there prior knowledge? << I seem to recall that the latest information indicates there was some decrypt guidance, but she still had to find 'em and sink 'em! And are you saying that the 2nd Support Group had no assistance from Bletchley Park...?? JWS -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 17) From: "Poutre, Joseph A" Subject: Scattershot replies Re: 1/350 Essex: ICM has been reported to be working on a 1/350 "Esseks", due in 2002. I'll believe it when I see it, though. I'd want three, myself: CV-37 Princeton as built, as CVS, and as LPH-5. Re: Oriskany et al I have come to the realization that there are probably too many ships being preserved in the USofA. As a supporter of the effort to preserve USS New Jersey, I've seen what is needed to save a ship of that size, and can imagine that carriers are even more expensive. Many of the current ships need money, and that comes from the same pot as the needs of the new vessels. Personally, I don't think Oriskany is worth saving - there are already 4 Essexes out there (Intrepid, Yorktown, Lexington and Hornet), and they all need money. Cabot _may_ be saved, and _may_ be worth saving. She is a unique and historic vessel, but there just may not be a market for another carrier museum. I believe, though, that she would have made a better choice for Camden, NJ, with BB-62 going to Bayonne. Cabot was built _in_ Camden, would not have been competition for Olympia, and we planned to work _with_ Intrepid, not compete with them, despite the fears of those running Intrepid. Now Midway is being preserved in San Diego, and apparently Saratoga will be opened in Rhode Island. Will enough people visit the Sara? Will Midway draw enough visitors when there are modern ships to see? Finally, some group wants to save the Forrestal, too. I just don't see this happening - too big, too much money needed, no (reasonable) place to put her that's not near another carrier. Plus, she's a haunted ship, whether or not you believe in ghosts. Better to scrap her and let the spirits rest in peace. Re: Fire Queens: I don't know, but a whole lot of jokes came to mind, mostly dealing with an island off Long Island, NY. Re: Does anyone know of a website for the French Navy? http://www.defense.gouv.fr/marine/anglais/indexeng.html Re: HMS Warspite Wooden Decks: Painted or Not? Flip a coin. There are clearly no conclusive photos. If you want a wood deck, make it wood. If you want to paint it, paint it. If some yahoo tells you you're wrong, tell them to prove it. Joe Poutre -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 18) From: "Victor M. Baca" Subject: Bill Holden: Tugman Hi Tony: Naw, Willliam Holden was definitely the captain of his salvage tug in the movie and it's name escapes me. His character was a burdened man at war, similar to the reluctant lawyer drafted to fly naval fighter planes in "The Bridges Of Toko-Ri," one of his best flicks. One day I will find his war-tug movie and then I will unplug the phones, shut off the computer and it better be as good as I remembered... -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 19) From: Burl Burlingame / Pacific Monograph Subject: Re: WW2 ship movies - Victor Baca >> That Hollywood film starring William Holden c.1942 sounds a bit like The Hairy Ape, in which he was a bare-chested, sweaty stoker shovelling coal into the boilers of a small steamer, frequently pausing to thump his chest, like Tarzan, and shout "I makes her go!" This naturally aroused the interest of the raven-haired passenger Susan Haywood, with predictable results. << Nope, 'twas William Bendix, not Holden. Which didn't make the movie any better. Burl Burlingame Pacific Monograph, 1124 Kahili Street, Kailua HI 96734 808-263-6087 buzz@aloha.net A historical interpretation company. Visit our web sites at http://www.PacificHistory.com/ and http://www.PacificHistory.net "He's supposed to be dead. This is vexing. I am terribly vexed." -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 20) From: SteveWiper@aol.com Subject: Re: USS England's good luck >> I will leave it to others to explain how the England managed to dispose of the six Jappo subs. Was it luck or skill. did it stumble onto the line by accident or was there prior knowledge? << As with most instances during WWII, or any other conflict, "ALL OF THE ABOVE", would probably be the "Most" correct answer. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 21) From: SteveWiper@aol.com Subject: Re: What are "Queens"? Well, here goes....... Tall, thin, hairy men who wear dresses, put on lipstick, and carry a purse, and are real good at singing show tunes! -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 22) From: Ned Barnett Subject: England's good luck >> I will leave it to others to explain how the England managed to dispose of the six Jappo subs. Was it luck or skill. did it stumble onto the line by accident or was there prior knowledge? << That's a real "enigma." It's almost like "magic" - I'm sure it made the Japanese "purple" with rage. In short, code-breaking signals intelligence helped position the England. The then-new Hedgehogs helped the plucky ship maintain sonar contact while blasting the subs - much more effective than depth-charge runs. All that being said, nothing can be said to diminish the heroic, effective impact the USS England had - for a "trash-fish" make-do ship designed for North Atlantic convoys, those little DEs really pulled their weight in the Pacific. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 23) From: "JODY KELM" Subject: nuclear sub nautilus I was hoping someone could help me find a good quality model of the U.S. Navy submarine Nautilus, if one does exists. Chris Kelm -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 24) From: Dimi Apostolopoulos Subject: Comments on Alan Raven's RN Camouflage Vol.1 Book Kudos to Alan Raven for the fantastic Camouflage book! I have studied the book numerous times and have learned a great deal from it. I truly hope that WEM, IS and others will produce new Royal Navy warship kits that will give modelers the opportunity to capture some of the amazing camouflage schemes shown in Alan's book. I will post the following comments to the ship-camouflage site: http://members.boardhost.com/shipcamouflage/ but I just wanted to post them to this list too seeking comments from others. A couple errata have already been pointed out by others. Errata: - page 26: need starboard view of SHEFFIELD as in September 1941 (book shows portside twice) - page 27: need the correct portside view of LONDON's (b) camouflage (it appears that the portside of the (a) camouflage is shown twice) - page 27: are the colors of LONDON's (b) camouflage MS1-B6-507C or MS1-B5-507C? - page 37: ESKIMO's camouflage consists of white and WA blue; there is no WA green - page 53: need FORMIDABLE's portside scheme; the one shown seems to be a match to Formidable's starboard scheme but needs some improvements. I am using as a reference a photo I have seen in P. Smith's book "Stukas Over the Mediterranean." Comments: - page 10: In reference to NORFOLK' s camouflage in early 1941: I have found a photograph of her from the time that does not show the light stripe upfront. Maybe there was another slight modification of the scheme... - page 14: Regarding ARK ROYAL's scheme: the idea I get from the illustration is that the island was also painted in dark grey, but the caption says "dark hull light upperworks." - page 18: Is there any evidence on whether SUFFOLK's May 1940 camouflage was identical on both sides or not? - page 38: The starboard pattern of ILLUSTRIOUS was NOT identical to the portside. Again, I have found a starboard view of Illustrious (late 1940) in P. Smith's book "Stukas Over the Mediterranean" which clearly shows a different pattern. I will post a JPG of it at the ship-camouflage site. - page 46: Is NAIAD'S darkest color black or 507A? I have seen 2-3 pictures of her in the specific scheme and my impression is that the color was a dark grey, but may be it is the quality of photographs. - page 50: There is photographic evidence that JUPITER's camouflage pattern was identical to the starboard's pattern. A picture of Jupiter, Jackal and Verboten which has appeared in at least 3 books seems to support this comment. Finally I think that the some illustrations could be refined for greater accuracy and in particular: - page 12: YORK's starboard - page 31: SOUTHAMPTON's camouflage (I actually think that the Ensign 5 illustrations are better) - page 32: VICTORIOUS's deck camouflage Dimi -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 25) From: "Mike Leonard" Subject: Korean War Exhibit Today I swung by the Washington (DC) Navy Yard to try to pry a set of orders out of the computer. After succeeding (miracle!) I stopped by the museum annex down the street -- main building is still under renovation -- to see what was new. They have a modest exhibition called "Korea 1950-1953: The Navy in the Forgotten War". Displays include several uniforms and weapons from both sides. For ship models, there's a spectacular USS Washburn (AKA-108) from the David Taylor Collection, about six or seven feet long. Also HMCS Haida (about 3-1/2 feet long), the light cruiser USS Worcester, and a cutaway Sumner-class destroyer in 1/2" to 1 foot scale. Thing was around 12 to 14 feet in length! Lastly, there is an actual LCVP and period motor whaleboat on display. Outside the building is the prototype Vietnam-era "Swift" boat (PCF-1) on a pair of cement supports, its bow pointed skyward at about a 30 degree angle. Makes it kind of hard to see much of it, though. The museum's temporary gift shop stocks a pretty good selection of merchandise, ranging from prints to books to plastic models to neckties and other souvenirs. Mike -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 26) From: "FCR" Subject: Re: Minsk planes Hello list If you are talking of the Aoshima "Minsk" CVGH I have that model. The model is quite poor (extremely poor unfortunately) and the planes YAK-38 Forger are in the line of those that Hasegawa and Tamiya builds for their aircraft-carriers. They aren't quite bad but ... Still contact WEM because they probably have also those planes at 1/700 in their vast list of resin aircraft. By the way the Minsk brings also a few helicopters KA-25 Hormone but unfortunately they are extremely poor. Compliments. Filipe C. Ramires Lisboa, PORTUGAL -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 27) From: louellet@uism.bu.edu Subject: New Tamiya Ship Kits With the recent talk here about the possibility of new 1/350 kits from Tamiya, I'd like to share some scattered memories of when this was discussed at great length on rec.models.scale (I think.) As someone else mentioned, Tamiya's primary market is Japan. The *vast majority* of their sales and profit comes from the homeland. The rest of the world is bonus money. Any kit they develop must sell well in Japan, as the rest of the world alone isn't enough to get a return on investment. As others have said in the past, injection molds are incredibly expensive to create. A 1/350 Essex would run at least $500,000 (US), probably more since it is so big. The company needs to sell kits in the tens to hundreds of thousands in order to make enough money to pay back the development costs. An old mold, or one that has been paid off, can be run again in smaller quantities, but many more than we can afford. Shaya from Naval Base Hobbies had the Lindberg LST run off and put in his own packaging. I don't know how many he had to buy, but I bet it was at least 1000. I think someone else said that a model company was will to run any kit they still had the mold for as long as you bought 5000. This is for a re-pop of an old kit, not anything new. Tamiya did release the 1/350 Fletcher a few years ago, but I don't know if they call it a success yet. Notice that they haven't come out with the square bridge version, even though their 1/350 battleships all have at least 2 versions out. Has the Tamiya Fletcher been "paid off" yet? Who knows? To the person who balked at the $120 potential price tag, look at what the 1/350 Enterprise goes for after all these years ($120 to 150) in most online stores, higher in storefronts. A brand new 1/350 Essex class model from one of the resin manufacturers would probably be $500 to $1000. I'll take $120 any day. ICM's Konig is going for $70-80 and it is not nearly as big as an Essex would be. If Tamiya's cost to wholesalers of an Essex was $50 it would take 10,000 sold to make up the $500,000 development cost. My numbers are probably too small. Would I like to see them do it? YES. Did I buy one of the ICM kits even though I didn't know much about the Konig? YES. And did I buy one of the Tamiya Fletchers? YES. These are corporations after all and they are looking at the bottom line. If it sells, they will make it. Larry Ouellette Volunteer, USS Salem (CA 139) United States Naval Shipbuilding Museum Quincy, Massachusetts, USA http://www.uss-salem.org/ PS: I just realized that Tom's Modelworks makes/made a resin Essex for $400. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 28) From: Bradford Chaucer Subject: Re: Tamiya Essex?? >> Lord!!!! Is it just me? $125-150 "REASONABLE" for a box of plastic??????? Am I the only one in this hobby who didn't become a millionaire in the'90's?? << Yes :-) Regards, Bradford Chaucer -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 29) From: louellet@uism.bu.edu Subject: Re: Warspite Decks John Snyder wrote: >> I have, sitting here by my computer and waiting for me to do a Munsell color match, a chunk of weathered teak from the deck of a USN heavy cruiser which shall remain unnamed lest I receive a visit from her keepers. << Give it back! Give it Back! So that was why you were sneaking around! Now I know why I tripped on the deck after SMMLiecon 2000! (In case anyone thinks I serious, I'm NOT). >> It is fully as dark as AP507B, and would appear so in a black-and-white photo (wet, it's nearly as dark as AP507A!). << Every former SALEM crewman who comes aboard says "The deck never looked like this when I was here!" We also don't have 1500 men around to keep it holystoned! Your weathered sample from the un-named USN heavy cruiser would not be so dark in service. Unless the decks were not holystoned in wartime?? To get a proper match, grab a boiler brick, some sand, some sea water, and get to work! Larry Ouellette Volunteer, USS Salem (CA 139) United States Naval Shipbuilding Museum Quincy, Massachusetts, USA http://www.uss-salem.org/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 30) From: "Jim Johnson" Subject: Minsk's Fate http://www.abcnews.go.com/sections/travel/DailyNews/Minskworld000928.html Ran across this on the Internet and thought the SMML's would be interested. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 31) From: Allan and Crystal Plumb Subject: Re: Ship Models from Russia >> Oktyabrskaya Revolutsia For that matter, how does one pronounce "October Revolution" given the above spelling? << All the other respondents seem to have answered the rest of your questions, but not that part, so I'll take a shot. "Ock-tee-yahb-er-skay-ya Rev-o-loot-see-ya". Accents on third syllables. This from Russian taken 25 years ago with much less chance to practice since then than my other languages, so take with some salt. (Besides, now maybe one of those more expert than I will say "no, he got it all wrong" and give you a better answer. :-) Allan "Yah govoryoo malee paw rooskee" Plumb (Hmm, at work my Windoze 98 box can type in Win1251 Cyrillic, which I've been fighting for some time, but not the home box.) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 32) From: Allan and Crystal Plumb Subject: Heller Charles de Gaulle update? A recent issue of Aviation Week has a colour picture of Charles de Gaulle on trials, which leads me to ask again: any news on photoetch or other updates for the 1/400 Heller kit, currently languishing on my unbuilt pile? The new house has a mantel over the fireplace, and it is my strongly held opinion that the purpose of a mantel is to hold up ship models. (The non-ships are on the shelves at the end, but only ships will do for the main section.) Thanks. Allan Plumb -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 33) From: Peter K. H. Mispelkamp Subject: 1/350 Essex Class If Tamiya really wanted to economize by only producing ships of classes that had two or more members why haven't produced a 1/350 scale Shinano? It not like they don't already have a mountain of research and drawings that stem from their 1/700 scale offering? For myself, I think I will wait until someone (Heller?) finally gets the bright idea that a 1/400 scale line of full-hulled, injection molded USN WWII warships would be a good idea. Sincerely Peter K. H. Mispelkamp -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 34) From: "Paul Jacobs" Subject: Re: Site for French Navy An unofficial site is www.net-marine.com. I believe that there is also an official site. A search should easily find it. Paul Jacobs -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 35) From: "Mike C" Subject: Saburo Sakai Hi gang, Nobody else has mentioned this, so I thought I'd pass it along. I read a small article in the newspaper that Saburo Sakai has died in Japan of a heart attack. He was the first man who provided a face to stories of the "enemy" when I was first learning about the war in the Pacific. I considered his skill and determination in the face of extreme odds to be inspiring, regardless of which side he was on, and I have great respect for the man. I deeply regret hearing of his passing. Mike Czibovic -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TRADERS, ANNOUNCEMENTS & NOTICEBOARD -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) From: "Ian MacCorquodale" Subject: Website update Hi SMML'ies, Just to let you all know some new pages have been added to my Naval photography site. http://www.geocities.com/macdale_2000/whatsnew.html (Fairey Swordfish, Sea King, and Liberty Ship pages, amongst others...) A brand new page on the German/French task group currently in Halifax is up as well, for you Heller 1/400 scale fans, Tourville, and Primaguet are here, as are German ships Lutjens, Bremen, Schleswig Holstein, and the Oiler Rhone. USS Ross is in as well, no pics as of yet. http://www.geocities.com/macdale_2000/fgtf.html Have a pleasant weekend, I know I will.... :-) Ian -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Check out the SMML site for backissues, Member's models & reference pictures at: http://www.smml.org.uk Check out the APMA site for an index of ship articles in the Reference section at: http://www.tac.com.au/~sljenkins/apma.htm -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- End of Volume