Subject: SMML VOL 1742 Date: Thu, 06 Jun 2002 12:27:52 +1000 SMML is proudly sponsored by SANDLE http://sandlehobbies.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MODELLERS INDEX 1: Ship model 2: Re: VACUUM FORMING 3: Re: Vacuforming 4: Re: What to see in Mass & Maine? 5: VACUFORM kit source 6: Re: What to see in Mass and Maine 7: My Vac-u-form dissapeared 8: Re: Pearl Harbor Paints 9: Zhengdefu Kits 10: Re: Pearl Harbor Paints 11: What to see in Mass & Maine? 12: Re: Roma photos 13: Re: Profile Warship Volume 4 14: Ship Degaussing -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TRADERS, ANNOUNCEMENTS & NOTICEBOARD INDEX 1: News 2: WTB: Classic Warships 1/350 USS Alaska -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MODELLERS -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) From: LCI655@webtv.net (Matty) Subject: Ship model Do you have a model of an L.C.I. ( L ), Landing Craft Infantry, (Large )?? Sincerely.....Matty -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2) From: "Mike Kear" Subject: Re: VACUUM FORMING >> My Vac-u-form dissapeared many years ago. Does anyone know where I could find one? << There's a little article in the May 2002 issue of Fine Scale Modeler magazine about making your own vac-form machine. Doesn't look all that difficult or expensive. I have an issue right now with vac forming and I'm going to have a go at making one just like the magazine. If it works, I can put details of how it works on my web site if you like. It's a bit naughty to copy the article and hand it to everyone but I don't think FSM would complain if I made one or two copies for people. Let me know if you want it or can't get hold of the May 2002 FSM and I'll give you the gist on making your own vac-form machine. Cheers, Mike Kear Windsor, NSW, Australia www.modelwarship.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3) From: "Ron Wild" Subject: Re: Vacuforming The Mattel unit has not been available for years, but it is so simple to make a former from a piece of plywood, that it's a snap to make your own. Styrene is available almost everywhere from plastic shops or sign painting shops. If you would like a diagram of the homemade unit, contact me off list and I will send you a copy. Ron Wild Kelowna. British Columbia Canada -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4) From: schiefet@cs.com Subject: Re: What to see in Mass & Maine? >> I'll be in northern Mass and southern Maine this week and was looking for suggestions on marine related sights in the area. Any suggestion? << Charlie, Here are a couple of suggestions: USS Salem - Quincy Shipyard (south of Boston) USS Constitution and Cassin Young - Charlestown (Boston) Navy yard There is a submarine in Portsmouth, NH, right off route 95 (just before you go over the bridge) Steve Pelham, NH -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5) From: David Miller Subject: VACUFORM kit source A friend of mine recently purchased a vacuform kit off ebay (of course!). I think she paid 75$. It appeared to be in working condition and contained many molds and plastic sheets. She was satisfied with it. Dave Miller Macomb, IL -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6) From: Phil Stewart Subject: Re: What to see in Mass and Maine Charlie asks what marine-related sites are good to visit in Massachusetts and Maine, USA. Here are some ideas: Boston: 1. The view of the city from Interstate 95 traveling south across the Mystic River Bridge is simply awesome. If you have passengers with you they will of course have the luxury to look around more. The Big Dig, so-called (the large transportation improvement project involving tunneled highways) is evident everywhere, and as impressive in its scale as in its budget. ;) 2. The U.S.S. Constitution (if memory serves me) is anchored in Boston Harbor and a good tour of a Colonial-Early National-era warship. For sail enthusiasts this is a must-see. 3. Boston Aquarium. A big attraction that I haven't seen. Highly recommended by many. 4. Boston Museum of Science. Great museum. 5. Boston Harbor is home to some naval installations, judging by the presence of warships there, but I haven't looked into it. To see if there are tours and such available, a Boston tourism Web site might be useful for this. Southern Maine: 1. Portland Harbor. Home to the U.S. North Atlantic Destroyer Fleet in WWII, this place was full of ships-- not just destroyers-- in WWII. Not much is in evidence these days commemorating this (though the Portland Public Library's Portland Room probably keeps photographic archives relevant to this). The islands in Portland Harbor have the remnants of fortifications and refueling installations, some of which make interesting tours: Peaks Island has some kind of a restaurant or community center built into a big gun emplacement left over from the coastal defence fortifications. Long Island (Portland Harbor's) has some remnants of naval activity, but none on public land that I can think of and most of it is refueling-oriented infrastructure that is either eerie or boring, depending on your point of view. Island makes a nice bucolic place to stroll and see the ocean, though. Fort Gorges is a Civil War-era island fortification similar in concept to Fort Sumter (sp?). It's in disrepair and I'm not sure if official tours are available. Caution is advised so one doesn't fall down a hole here; a chartered small boat may be necessary, with knowledgeable skipper, for a visit. House Island has another dug-in fortification. It's a private island and I don't know if tours are available. Cushing's Island is another private island, and has several interesting WWII-era observation towers that may still be structurally sound, and dug-in fortifications and tunnels reminiscent of the Maginot Line in France, requiring caution to explore so one doesn't end up with a broken leg in the bottom of a big gun's magazine or something. I don't know if tours are available. In South Portland and Cape Elizabeth, just South of Portland Harbor, there are several coastal installations, including one at Spring Point, facing the channel into Portland Harbor. There is another fort just to the South which I forget the name of. At Two Lights State Park in Cape Elizabeth there are remnants of fortifications and one observation tower which can still be climbed. Bath Iron Works in Portland Harbor (Commercial Street, Portland, roughly at the end of Franklin Street) services destroyers and cruisers, making use of a floating drydock. This installation is being scaled back or closed soon, as I understand it. Great views of Aegis destroyers, etc. can be had here, from a distance. BIW builds ships at another installation in Bath, Maine. Tours of Portland Harbor on Casco Bay Lines can be fun. Chartered cruises of the area are available all over the place. Inquire at places like Handy Boat in Falmouth or DiMillo's Marina in Portland, where a number of charter services are available. A School of Ocean Sailing based at DiMillo's Marina offers hands-on training in various aspects of sailing, including navigation with LORAN and GPS, and other fundamentals of modern sailing. If you just want a meal in a nice maritime setting, I recommend DiMillo's Floating Restaurant. Lunch is a great time to go there, when there is a fine view of the harbor. The mast of the cruiser U.S.S. Portland stands in a park on the Eastern Promenade overlooking Portland Harbor, memorializing the sailors who served in the Pacific on that ship. 2. Maine Coast There's a lot on the Maine coast worth seeing, though a lot of it is geared to the art collector and such. I'd recommend Fort Knox (perhaps I forget the name-- it's not the place with the gold reserves!-- but I *think* Fort Knox, Maine is the fort I remember) or thereabouts, where there are two old dug-in forts to explore. It's a bit of a drive to get to any of these places, so if you're not interested in Colonial-era forts guarding rivers and estuaries, this is not for you. However, I loved the tours when I was a kid. Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park. Bar Harbor is a snooty sort of rich-person's resort, but may have some good shopping. Acadia National Park is beautiful, as one expects, and makes for a good camping experience if you are interested in that. The Cat, a large passenger catamaran, provides rapid transit between Bar Harbor, Maine, and Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, if memory serves correctly. Some mysterious collisions have happened with the Cat, the nature of one of which the U.S. Coast Guard has remained curious about, without satisfaction. A later collision, which caused the death of a Canadian fisherman in a fog bank, has provoked demands that the Cat's speed be limited in the coastal waters of Nova Scotia. However, it seems problems like this with the Cat have not recurred, and I would dissuade no one from visiting Nova Scotia. The Maine Maritime Academy may hold some interest, though I have not looked into what it offers for tours, for example. Beaches along the Maine coast, particularly Old Orchard Beach, Pine Point Beach,Ogunquit Beach, and others in Southern Maine, are very nice to visit, though the water is very cold and thus not great for long swims. There is a Peaks Island-to-Portland, Maine swimming race that occurs each year-- I forget when it is held-- which makes an amusing time for swimming enthusiasts, and tests the endurance of the best swimmers in the area, quite rigorously. Swimmers typically cover themselves in Vaseline and the like to protect themselves from hypothermia and aid endurance during the swim. Portland, Maine has lots of strange indigenous micro-urban human fauna worth studying if one has a camera, but that's more of an ethnographer's pursuit than a maritime enthusiast's. Restaurants in Portland of note: Try Sapporo for sushi on Commercial Street. There is another sushi restaurant on Exchange Street. I mentioned DiMillow's Floating Restaurant above. Panda Garden, off Forest Avenue near Exit 8 of the Maine Turnpike, has great bean curd szechuan style (which I am still trying to reverse-engineer), and a lot of other good dishes, including a fine pork lo mein. Tseng Thai (if I remember correctly) is a very nice little Thai restaurant located in a sort of shrunchy neighborhood on Congress Street, Portland. Highly recommended. Saigon Sandwich's owner has retired, a sad thing for all lovers of good food. We must move on and find other experiences for our palate, but we will never forget the Saigon Sandwich! :) There is a restaurant co-located with Handy Boat in Falmouth (or Yarmouth?), Maine, which is very good. I forget their name, which has changed, I think, to something like "Sea Grill." Their softball team once defeated the I.R.S. softball team before my very eyes! Very good New England Clam Chowder here, at least in the past. There are plenty of good restaurants in Portland and vicinity, however, which I am neglecting, some no doubt unfairly. It's hard to find a bad restaurant in Portland, I suspect. I'm sure I'm forgetting a lot, but that's a sampling from memory. I hope it serves. Phil Stewart Washington, DC USA -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7) From: JVT7532@aol.com Subject: My Vac-u-form dissapeared >> My Vac-u-form dissapeared many years ago. Does anyone know where I could find one? << Hi Chuck, try Ebay, I pick a like new one up for $20.00 Best regards, Jon -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 8) From: SteveWiper@aol.com Subject: Re: Pearl Harbor Paints >> When the December 1941 memorandum quoted in Mr. Wright's letter spoke of "an indicated preference by the Pacific Fleet for a color midwary between Navy Blue and Dark Gray, Formula 5-D," it added, "possibly a 20-pint addition of 20-TM to 5 gallons of 5-U...." What does that sound like? I know 5-U was white.... << The mixing ratio for Sea Blue(5-S) was 10 pints 5-TM to 40 pints 5-U(white). The mixing ratio for Navy Blue(5-N) was 15 pints 5-TM to 40 pints 5-U. 5-TM is a 50/50 mixture of Ultramarine Blue and Black. This new info on the mixture of 20 pints 5-TM (I am of course assuming this is the correct measurement) to 5 gallons (40 pints) would produce a very dark blue/gray. This may well have been the color as of 12/07/41. I have seen the film out-takes from the John Ford footage. I have a good eye for color and they do look very blue. The only color shift I remember in this footage was actually a slight yellowing. My personal belief is that the above 12/1941 memo may be correct as to the battleships painting. Steve Wiper -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 9) From: NeilTaylor54@aol.com Subject: Zhengdefu Kits These kits have become available in the UK priced at £4.99. When I first saw them my attention was caught by the length eg 30cm. I checked with the model shop owner and we converted the length of a Spruance class destroyer to 1:600 scale and realised that it was near enough. I purchased 4 Spruance and 3 Ticonderoga kits as I knew the latter shared the same hull. When I got them home and examined them even more closely the hull length worked out to be 18 scale feet too long. Which for me is close enough. The hull beam is slighty too wide but the quality is good. There are enough pieces in the kit to build all the variations possible and some spare tomahawk missile canisters. My only disappointment was when I purchased 1 Sovermenny and found it scaled out nearer to 550 scale but the fittings varied in scale so they might be useful for conversions and scratch building. I will be looking forward to building the Spruance and Ticonderoga to place with my Lee Enterprise and other 1:600 USN ships. I was surprised at the lack of comment on my review of the Profile Morskie books. I did foget to add is there any one out there who has translated the Polish introduction and phto. capitions? Neil Taylor -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 10) From: John_Sheridan@putnam.com Subject: Re: Pearl Harbor Paints >> When the December 1941 memorandum quoted in Mr. Wright's letter spoke of "an indicated preference by the Pacific Fleet for a color midwary between Navy Blue and Dark Gray, Formula 5-D," it added, "possibly a 20-pint addition of 20-TM to 5 gallons of 5-U...." What does that sound like? I know 5-U was white.... << The Ship camouflage.com website lists all of the paint specs from WWII http://www.shipcamouflage.com/painting_and_cementing_chapter8.htm#FORMULAS%20AND%20SPECIFICATIONS. 20-TM (TM = Tinting Material) is the base for Deck Blue 20-B. 5-U is White as you noted. SHIPS-2 September 1941 lists the early version of 20-B deck Blue to be mixed. The Deck Blue paint 20-B is made from untinted deck paint formula 20-U by adding a tinting material 20-TM in the proportions 20 pints of 20-TM to 5 gallons of 20-U. Sounds exactly like what you are describing. Deck Blue 20-B was used on Horizontal surfaces, like decks. John Sheridan www.shipcamouflage.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 11) From: John_Sheridan@putnam.com Subject: What to see in Mass & Maine? >> I'll be in northern Mass and southern Maine this week and was looking for suggestions on marine related sights in the area. Any suggestion? << Lots of stuff to see on the coast from Maine to Massachusetts; Maine: Bath Iron works - Arliegh Burkes under construction Bath - Main Martime Museum (Gibbs and Wilcox USS De Haven model on display!) Portland - Drydock for fitting Aleigh Burkes. Portsmouth NH / Kittery Maine: USS Albacore, Portmouth Naval Shipyard. Massachusetts: Essex - Maritime Museum Salem - Peabody Museum Boston / Charlestown USS Cassin Young USS Constitution & Museum USCG station Boston Tea Party Ship (cannot think of the name at the moment) Quincy - USS Salem Plymouth - Mayflower Fall River - Battleship Cove - USS Massachusetts, USS JP Kennedy, USS Lionfish, DK Hidensee John Sheridan www.shipcamouflage.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 12) From: SAMI ARIM Subject: Re: Roma photos Hello, Go to the link below. They have superb plans selection of Italian warships drawn by Giancarlo Barbieri, in their catalog. They also have some photos of a built-up model in 1/100 Roma again by Mr. Barbieri. They are slow to correspond to the emails, but efficient to deal with. http://www.anb-online.org/ Regards, Sami Arim -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 13) From: "Steve Sobieralski" Subject: Re: Profile Warship Volume 4 Some comments on this topic: 1. The Belfast book was never meant to be the fourth volume in the Warship Profile series. It was, in fact, Profile Book 4, not Warships in Profile Vol.4, (Profile Books 1, 2 and 3 covered armoured vehicle topics) and was an expansion of Wingate's regular Warship Profile on the Belfast. 2. Warships in Profile Vol.3 was only half the size of Vols.1 and 2, covering only six profiles instead of the normal twelve. 3. The color artwork for most, if not all, of the Warship Profiles is contained in a book called Encyclopedia of the World's Warships by Hugh Lyon. It even includes the artwork for several of the profiles that were not published, including Lexington, Nelson and Le Terrible. A quick search in Advanced Book Exchange revealed many available copies, some at very reasonable prices. Steve Sobieralski -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 14) From: "David Edgerly" Subject: Ship Degaussing I am looking for information concerning ship hull degaussing. Where can I find good solid technical info on how the system works? Any help will be appreciated as I will be starting a job soon that involves Degaussing. Thanks, Dave E -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TRADERS, ANNOUNCEMENTS & NOTICEBOARD -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) From: "Airton Ciulada" Subject: News Expensive gentleman, We are a specialized Brazilian Plasti models magazine and circulation is bimonthly. Would like to be able to divulge its products and launchings with authorization. If possivel to receive material written technician and photos (JPEG 300dpi) We can receive Kits too. Airton Ciulada 55 081 34257756 55 081 34257765 fax Precision Hooby Modeling ciulada@dpnet.com.br phm@dpnet.com.br http://www.viamarmotos.com.br/modeling/index2.html -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2) From: "Keith Bender" Subject: WTB: Classic Warships 1/350 USS Alaska Hi SMMLies, I'm looking for the Classic Warship's USS Alaska kit 1:350 full hull unbuilt. Anyone have one they haven't built yet? Please contact me off line, Keith -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Check out the SMML site for the List Rules, Backissues, Member's models & reference pictures at: http://smmlonline.com Check out the APMA site for an index of ship articles in the Reference section at: http://apma.org.au/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- End of Volume