Subject: SMML VOL 2554 Date: Tue, 06 Jul 2004 23:12:54 +1000 SMML is proudly sponsored by SANDLE http//sandlehobbies.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- MODELLERS INDEX 1 Re Looking for photos of the NMM builder's model of Minas Geraes 2 Re Uniforms 3 Flat Hats & Model ship parts 4 More on Flat hats 5 USCG Uniforms 6 RN WWI Colours 7 Re Amarapoora 8 Italeri Kits 9 Wolverine and Sable (USN Great Lakes Training Carriers) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- MODELLERS ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) From Daniel Kurtz Subject Re Looking for photos of the NMM builder's model of Minas Geraes >>The trouble with Internet (and computers) is that you have to spell correctly. Try "Minas Gerais" in Google, and you will find amongst others http//www.fleetairarmarchive.net/vengeance/History_BN.html Enjoy! lots of pix of the ship in all its periods (HMS Vengeance) << ) Guess I should have specified that I'm interested in Minas Gerais, the dreadnought of 1910 (and I've seen it spelled both ways.) The model in question is the 1/48 builder's model, which of course is contemporary with the actual ship, and which has been called the 'finest modern ship model ever made.' And it is impressive, based on the single color photo of it I've seen. I'd like to see more. I have an ambition to scratch-build a Minas (or her sister, Sao Paolo) and details are very hard to come by. The model would be a good resource. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2) From "Tom Detweiler" Subject Re Uniforms Hi all -- I was in the US Navy from 1968-71 and at that time we were only issued the white "dixie cup" and for cold weather (Korea!) or storm wear, we were issued a navy blue wool stocking cap we called a "watch cap" because we were usually on watch when we were wearing it and freezing our butts off or getting soaked during rotten weather. I liked standing after watch best, up on the catwalk where the ECM shack was and you could sometimes get some coffee. You see and hear a lot of beautiful, strange, unexplainable and just plain wierd stuff out there in the middle of the ocean, 'specially on a clear night with smooth sailing and doing about 15 knots or less. Had a flying fish smack into the shack up there once, scared me back awake; also saw lights flashing under the ocean, other guys did too. It wasn't phosporescence like from the wake in tropical waters, it was deep down and VERY bright. Go figure! Anybody else wanna chip in a sea story about standing watch? Tom Detweiler, USS Higbee DD-806, 1968-71 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3) From Kdg345@aol.com Subject Flat Hats & Model ship parts The flat hat was worn when the uniform of the day was Dress Blue B (Baker) and the white hat worn when uniform of the day was Dress Blue A (Able). At least that was what I put on the Plan of the day in during the Korean War. Where is the best place to find fittings such as winches and ladders for my scratch built 1/96 scale AKA? I am interested in buying the whole package of complete fittings. Ken From Kent ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4) From Kdg345@aol.com Subject More on Flat hats Tom Dean You will see my answer in a recent SMML. You might like to know that I am making slow progress on my AKA that I corresponded with you a couple of years ago. Thanks for your detailed input I am working on the superstructure now and have finished the main deck, cargo holds and am up to the 02 deck. Ken Groom Kent, WA ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5) From Duane Fowler Subject USCG Uniforms Adding to what Mike said The Undress Blue uniform shirts (both long and short sleeve) that I was issued in the late '70s say "AF Blue" on the label. My brother was in the Air Force at the time and the only way that we could tell the difference between our shirts was that his had sleeve patches. On my jumper uniform (Cracker Jack, traditional, 13 button, etc.) There was a difference between the USCG and USN. We had a shield on the right sleeve. It was black on the whites and white on the blues. It was included on the dungarees too but removed before I entered the service. We also put it on the P coat. When I was going to school on Governor's Island, NYC, P coats were popular with civilians as well. When leaving the base we would be checked to see if the coats we were wearing had the shield on the sleeve. If it did it was part of the uniform and could not be worn with civilian cloths. If it didn't it was a civilian coat and couldn't be worn with CG uniforms. To keep from having to buy two coats we put the shields on with velcro. Best regards, Duane ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6) From "Brown, Michael \(SKM\)" Subject RN WWI Colours George Hargreaves was after some WW! Colours for the RN. I’ve got a note which states that in an Alan Raven article he says a pale and light grey were used. Light grey was one part black to twenty parts white and pale grey was one part black to thirty parts white. Some time ago, I got into the Australian War Memorial’s Annex where the restoration work is carried out a little while ago and had a long chat with the guy who recently restored the Emden & Sydney exhibits of WW1. He took me all the way through the restoration process of the articles now in the ANZAC Hall i.e. the gun & stern section of Sydney & the gun & bow shield of Emden. Sydney’s artefacts had 28 layers of paint on them! She had two "real" shades of grey. They identified these in four ways Got chips from obvious places and hidden places like inside scuttle rims where they figured previous restorers wouldn’t have painted. Looked at the layers under the microscope on the basis that the older layers would be more "cracked’ than newer layers. Looked at the number of layers of similar colours. Logic being that a colour appearing only once on the top layers would be restoration whereas those appearing in the middle several times would be real paint. Looked for black flecks in the paint on the assumption that these would be over painted coal dust and indicate that she was in service when this colour was applied. The good news is that the Sydney artefacts are "real" RN grey, the bad news is that it is not the colour she fought the Emden in. The decision on the grey to use was based on the Curators feel that as the Emden was light grey, Sydney must have been a light grey. This ignores the photos taken at the time of her on the way to & from the engagement which show her to be in a darker grey than circa 1915 photos. The colour they used is near as dammit the same as WEM’s AP507C paint. The fascinating thing is that 507C might have been introduced as an official named colour in 1920 but Sydney was wearing it or a very similar colour from 1915. As they weren’t going to use it, they didn’t match the other grey. (Insert here your preferred expletives!) It will be interesting to see if any of the Raven mixes comes close to AP507C. As for the dark grey used, any one visited the NMM lately and looked at a pre WWI model or compared it to ant S &S sheets? Would be interesting to see if the dark grey is anything like AP507A used after WW1. Re destroyers, I have the Cockatoo Island Painting Statement for His Majesty’s Australian Torpedo Boat Destroyer Huon dated 21st March 1916. It states Outside Work Painted Black Outside surface of ship, all fittings in sight from outside of ship including - outside of boats, inside & outside of scuttles, capstan, cable holders, outside of charthouse, guns, cable reels, searchlight projectors, masts, yards, voice pipes & fittings on weather deck except guard stanchions & depression rails. Painted white Inside of boats Michael Brown ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7) From "Tony Mattson" Subject Re Amarapoora >> The ship's name surely is for the Burmese city of Amarapura, near Mandalay. "Pura" is an Indian word (I don't know from which dialect) for city, as in "lion city" singh + pura = Singapore. << Interesting origin - and very off topic - so do plse forgive me Many languages feature common loan-words. Your suffix "pura" is one of these. From the Indo-Aryan root *"bher(e)gh" meaning "fort or town on a height, hence strong" you get many cities with names ending in berg, burgh, or bury, e.g. Pittsburgh (or Pittsburg in Texas and California), Canterbury and Hamburg. In India you get Jaipur, Udaipur, etc., in Thailand Thon Buri, Saraburi, and Singapore itself combines 'pura' from the same root plus the central Asian word for lion "Singha" or "Sengha". (This root 'Sengha/singha' straddles the whole central Asian region from Armenian and Iranian to Tibetan, Tocharian and Chinese). Amara comes from the Arabic "to thrive", "populous" or "flourishing" and is another loan-word. So Burma's (or Myanmar's) Amarapura is "the flourishing city", and the ancient capital, before the capital was moved to Mandalay in 1860. On another interesting but irrelevant sidebar, when the capital was shifted, all the wooden royal palaces and houses of the old settlement were dismantled, loaded on carts and the backs of elephants, and reconstructed at Mandalay - truly a portable society. There you go - truly interesting and, as promised, utterly irrelevant! Tony Auckland, NZ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 8) From "Serhan Oflas" Subject Italeri Kits Hi there, I'm looking for Italeri's old 1/720 HMS HOOD, GRAF SPEE and LUTZOW kits. I have checked web several times but did not found any. Would anyone gonna help me about it either offer from his stack or write web site address please? Very Best Regards. Serhan OFLAS Electrical Engineer ISTANBUL-TURKIYE ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 9) From "Reid, John (AFIT)" Subject Wolverine and Sable (USN Great Lakes Training Carriers) These fascinating little ships are not well documented – does anybody have reliable information about dimensions, or even a plan? To give an idea of the confusion, here are the data as per my bibles on the topic of US carriers. T = Stefan Terzibaschitsch, US Carriers (1st English ed – Conway, 1980) p 127 F = Norman Friedman, US Carriers – Design and Development (1st ed – A&AP, 1983), p 375 Wolverine (IX-64) T, flight deck 500 * 58-4 (feet/inches) Width 98-5 over paddle boxes F, flight deck 550 * 85 The flight deck width quoted by T is clearly incorrect because the photos show the deck almost to the edge of the paddle boxes. There is a photo with a plane on deck which supports a flight deck width figure close to F’s. Speculation are the figures in T which are labelled as FD actually the hull dimensions? This is possible because photos also show a long stern overhang, similar to HMS Ark Royal (1938) – fifty feet length difference between hull and flight deck looks a lot, though. Sable (IX-81) T, flight deck 535-5 * 58 Width 92-2 F, flight deck 587-5 * 85 Does any SMMLie have the German edition of Terzibaschitsch and if so could you please check for a translation error? JJR ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 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