Subject: SMML VOL 2076 Date: Sun, 29 Dec 2002 14:52:55 +1100 SMML is proudly sponsored by SANDLE http://sandlehobbies.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- MODELLERS INDEX 1: Ship BOOK 2: Three Questions 3: Re: Destroyer deck coverings/Three Questions 4: Re: Hornet's Aircraft... 5: Re: Publication 6: Re: Paging Duane Fowler 7: Re: RN deck coverings -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TRADERS, ANNOUNCEMENTS & NOTICEBOARD INDEX 1: Another WEM/Peter Hall Special 2: Warship Books Announcement ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- MODELLERS ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) From: "Don Macdonald" Subject: Ship BOOK Hey I just pick a copy of ON DECK USS LEXINGTION WHAT A NEW AND NEAT BOOK. It has some good color pictrues of her and good information on what she was like in the beginning and whear she went from there, I just had to tell you all about it ONE A GOOD BOOK WITH GOOD INFORMATION, It has shots of it in color that you dont usely see good drawings of both befor and after it was change to the angle deck in cluding pictures of it now as a floating musume for the mony you cant beat it, ok I have a soft spot for the lady lex ,sorry I cant help it ;-) Don That Portland Rustbucket ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2) From: "F. Pletscher" Subject: Three Questions Vanguard hull: This is me to blame for. I simply couldn't find the time which is required to reshape the old B-Resina kit. (It's not only the hull.) But I will do it. Seydlitz: This is more a problem on the WSW side. They are not only building ships, but aircraft and tanks as well. And the aircraft-and-tank section was asking its share. So you might still have to wait a bit for the Seydlitz kit. But it will be coming. They do have the complete master pattern. Falk Pletscher ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3) From: John Snyder Subject: Re: Destroyer deck coverings/Three Questions >> I believe that someone mentioned crude oil being used to coat cruiser decks and I have come across a petrol and black lead mixture which was quite well thought of but only seems to have been applied to one ship. << Hi Chris, that was me, and I've now come across two separate references from two separate ships in the Med from the same period, so suspect that it was a fairly common practice. Regarding the petrol/black lead mixture on destroyer decks, that may also have been more widespread than you think. We've been told that Dean's Marine here in the UK has a number of ex-RN DD sailors as customers who mentioned the practice, usually in connection with areas of steel deck over hot engineering spaces where paint would normally blister off. I suspect the appearance was probably along the lines of the graphite paint that most U.S. railroads used on the smokeboxes and firebox sides of their steam locomotives: a slightly metallic dark grey. >> Second: To John Snyder; RE: Fuel oil over wood decks. So what color was fuel oil slopped over wood decks? Can we expect a color chip? << I'm working on it. I've dug out my bit of teak deck that I purloined during my last visit to USS SALEM, and am now planning a return trip to plumb a bit of residual fuel oil from her tanks, while Caroline keeps the crew entranced and busy elsewhere.... Cheers, John Snyder White Ensign Models http://whiteensignmodels.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4) From: James Corley Subject: Re: Hornet's Aircraft... >> Actually, a TBN would have been (and was) a Torpedo Bomber, Naval Aircraft Factory. << Too many know-it-alls. Try to have some fun and stir the pot and the plan gets spoiled before it can hatch. Sadly, there was no TBN and too many here knew it too quickly. The tables in the back of the book are wrong in many details. Looks like the least they coulda done was to read Morisons books! They list in the photo caption for the TBF (pg 62) that the type didn't get aboard the class until Enterprise in 43, while the tables on pg 63 list them (correctly) being used at Santa Cruz and Eastern Solomons. The pages must have been edited by somebody not paying much attention. One or two lines dont even add up to the total aircraft (like VT-8 having 19 TBNs and 19 SBNs). All the times that the TBN is listed, a TBD was actually used. The SBN was indeed an NAF version of the SBA, and they were assigned to VT-8 in early 42, but I have found no evidence that they were used as anything other than shore-based trainers. I have never found a photo of an SBA/SBN operational aboard a carrier except for one taken during suitability testing in 1939 (on Yorktown?). ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5) From: Vincent.Mccullough Subject: Re: Publication Franklyn, I'm not sure, but I THINK the publication that you are referring to was the Nautical Research Journal. The Journal is always looking for good material, and is particularly interested in adding well written articles on "steel navy" subjects. You can contact the editor of the Journal, David Blanchard, at: editor@naut-res-guild.org, or by mail at David Blanchard Editor, Nautical Research Journal 87 Pearl Street Camden, ME 04843 Telephone: (207) 263-4793 I'm sure that he would love to hear from you. Vince McCullough Director and Webmaster Nautical Research Guild ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6) From: SHIPMDLR@aol.com Subject: Re: Paging Duane Fowler >> Has anyone heard from Duane recently? It's been about 3 months since we've heard from him, and we're getting a bit worried. << Same here. He agreed to do the decal artwork for the IPMS/USA 2003 Convention. I've been trying to contact him for some time (from two email addresses I have for him) and have heard nothing. We need the artwork BADLY and have heard no reply whatsoever. It's good to know he isn't just ignoring me. Hope everything is alright. I have more or less given up and have enlisted another artist working on the decal artwork. Let's all hope and pray he's okay. Rusty White # 20181 Chairman 2003 IPMS/USA National Convention http://www.ipmsmetrookc.org OKC In 2003! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7) From: WRPRESSINC Subject: Re: RN deck coverings On the matter of the colour of Corticine; I first began to look into this in the mid nineteen fifties when I wanted to get models painted correctly using plans by Norman Ough. The first person that I pestered was Norman Ough and I did this from around 1956 on and off to 1964, he died in late 1964 or early 1965. The man was active as a proffessional model maker of RN vessels from just after WW 1 to very near the end of his life. As well as using the official "as fitted" plans that were made available to him, he used to make on-board visits to ships on a regular basis, making notes and also taking close up photos of various fittings and general on-board views. Of the many models that he made, two were commissioned by Mountbatten, the destroyers Daring and Kelly. Other models were made for several prominate people including Beatty. Because I was a very young and keen modeller,not only did he go over the colours of ships with me, he showed me the notes that he had taken while making visits to ships. In EVERY case where corticine was laid on external decks on those ships completed right up to just before the Tribal class, the colour is described as being of a medium to medium dark brown. He said to me that the best way to describe it was that it had the colour of milk chocolate. I asked him if corticine had any other colour, and the answer was no. When a person makes and keeps these type of records and makes models for a living then I have no doubt as to accuracy. Another person that I had contact with was one Julian Glossop, like Norman Ough he was a proffessional model maker of RN ships from before the war until the nineteen seventies when he died. Like Norman Ough he also kept the same type of records, "as fitted" plans, photos taken on-board along with extensive note taking. He gave me the same answer as Norman did on the colour of externally fitted corticine, ie a medium to medium dark brown. No other colour was ever mentioned. From the mid nineteen fifties to ninteen eighty I also had contact with MANY other people who had served in the navy before the war and during the war. I was lucky in that because I had started to look into matters of colour not too long after the war, people's memories were still quite good; ie they still had their marbles, and there were still many of them around, unlike today when ther are so few left alive and even fewer with sharp memories. Of those that I interviewed in the fifties and sixties, all said that the colour of corticine as fitted externally to the pre-war built vessels that they had served on during the the pre-war period was BROWN. I have to conclude therefore that the colour of corticine as fitted externally to ships completing during the latter part of WW1 to just before the Tribal class destroyers was brown. Those ships that completed before the Tribal class had the corticine in place in service in WW11, but when these ships started to have repairs and refits it was common to have the corticine replaced by semtex. Semtex was a trowelled-on composite material that could be applied much faster than corticine which had to laid down in panels and held down with metal strips. When first introduced into service the colour of Semtex was a light tan. This comes from Ough, Glossop and many others. I spoke to one person who actually watched the stuff being trowelled on to one particular vessel. By mid war semtex was sometimes of a medium green colour, unfortunately what type of green I was unable to determine. During the war corticine was often painted over by various shades of grey as part of the camouflage. Sometimes even Black. It appears that blue was used but only very rarely and this may have been because of a lack of pigment. In the early nineteen seventies I interviewed Clude Muncaster who was the head of the camouflage department, who told me that camouflage instructions did not allow for semtex to be painted over because any paint would cause the semtex to flake away. He also said that it was determined that any attempt to disguise a ship from the air was of no value because of the ship's wake, however because of the psychological value to the crew, instructions did call for decks to be painted over if it was felt necessary. but excluding any arears of semtex. One note of interest was that Clude Muncaster was not the first person to be assigned to the camouflage department, that was Younge-Bateman and it was he who produced the very first design to go onto a ship which was the Battleship Queen Elizabeth in early 1941, followed immediately afterwards by the cruiser Suffolk. Younge-Bateman and Muncaster did not get on well together. Before these two patterns had been prepared, a number of experimental designs were drawn up, some of which used brown and green as the colours. These may have inspired by the use of these two colours in ships of the Home Fleet in the Summer of 1940. Unfortunately most of these patterns appear to have been lost. The most interesting thing that came from Muncaster was the use of substitute colours in the Western Approaches/Peter Scott designs. Where there was a shortage of colours or pigments then one could use MS2 or B5. This was an official statement from the camouflage department and was issued to dockyards in late 1941. I do not know if it was followed by a CAFO. And this is the most I have written on the internet, what an effort! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- TRADERS, ANNOUNCEMENTS & NOTICEBOARD ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) From: John Snyder Subject: Another WEM/Peter Hall Special One only: Tamiya 1/700 HMS Nelson kit that Peter Hall used for measurements in developing the WEM photoetch set for the kit. A few parts are off the sprues and bagged separately, but the kit is complete. We can't sell it as new, so it's yours for £6.50 on a first-come, first-served basis. Best, John Snyder The Token Yank White Ensign Models Home Page for WEM, http://WhiteEnsignModels.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2) From: Keith Butterley Subject: Warship Books Announcement Hi all, I have reduced the price of the AOTS Hood and AOTS Dreadnought by $10 and $11 respectively. Regards Keith Butterley http://www.warshipbooks.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 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