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I haven't heard of any further developments.

The two escorts in the photo both have four 5" mounts, single funnels, and round bridges, which are all characteristics of Sims-class destroyers. There were five Sims-class vessels in Destroyer Squadron 2 constituting Task Force 17's (Hornet) screen at the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands on 26 Oct 1942, Morris (DD-417), Anderson (DD-411), Hughes (DD-410), Mustin (DD-413), and Russell (DD-414). Perhaps the ships in the photo are two of these?

I was just commenting to a coworker last week about how Titanic's sisters are largely forgotten -- even though they both had longer and far more successful careers! Good luck on your project!

DESTINATION DUNKIRK: The Story of Gort's Army Gregory Blaxland Pen & Sword Books, 2018 436 pages, 16 cm x 24 cm format Verdict: Not all great historians are great storytellers. Destination Dunkirk is a reprint of a book first published in 1973. It is essentially a history of the BEF in France, starting with pre-war planning for a response to a German invasion in the west right up to the evacuation at Dunkirk that ended in June 1940. There's a certain kind of person who will enjoy reading this book, and I am not that type of person. Allow me to explain. The evacuation of Allied forces from Dunkirk was a remarkable accomplishment. Like any monumental struggle on the battlefield, it consisted of thousands of heroic actions carried out by thousands of individuals. These represent a trove of potentially gripping stories for any historian to mine (although you may not have gathered that from the, IMO, horrible Christopher Nolan movie that hit the theaters in 2017). Good historians who are also great writers, such as Barbara Tuchman, Stephen Ambrose, Nathaniel Philbrick, or Stephen Bungay, manage to paint an engaging and thorough big picture while also weaving in some of the fascinating individuals and actions that played their parts in the larger narrative. This, however, is not Gregory Blaxland's style. Mr. Blaxland, who passed away in 1986, was a meticulous researcher, and this is obvious in his descriptions of events. The problem with this volume is that it is entirely too meticulous about the wrong kinds of details. Blaxland spends page after page telling the reader that the nth Division moved here or there, with the X regiment on the left and the Y regiment on the right where it linked up with such-and-such division along the left bank of the (insert name here) River, where it took fire from the German XYZ Division, losing x number of (Bren gun) carriers and y number of casualties. In the meantime, the reader learns precious little about the men in those units. Who were they? Why did they fight? What was their experience in France like? The author himself provides clues about why the experience of the everyman in the Battle of France is largely ignored within the pages of his book. In his introduction, Blaxland describes The History of the Second World War, the official history of the British armed forces in that conflict, published by Her Majesty's Stationery Office, as "the framework round which I have built," and I'm guessing that there are precious few accounts of individual British enlisted men in the Official History. In the sources section, the reader also discovers that Blaxland availed himself of little additional material other than the official war diaries, notes, and minutes published by various units and officers (much of which first became public in the late 1960s) -- and not very much of it, either. So it should not be too surprising that Destination Dunkirk reads very much like an official history since it is, in effect, a repackaging of various official histories. The people who do tend to garner ink in this volume are the various officers within the combatant armies. This fact is evident not only within the narrative but is also seen in the selection of illustrations. There are 53 black-and-white photographs, which is actually a pretty good number, but of those 53 photos, 37 are of officers. Only one (!) shows any units actually engaged in combat operations Sadly, for me at least, Blaxland tosses out so many names and numbers and dates, and in such a matter-of-fact delivery, that it becomes impossible to keep track of all the dramatis personae. And since so little is divulged of their back stories, it is rather hard to form much of an attachment to them either. It's a style that is fine for anyone who might be primarily interested in who did what and when, but it's not exactly compelling storytelling. There's no hook, and very little in the way of page-turning suspense. Through dogged perseverance, I made it to page 104. Your mileage may vary.

You should post some pictures from the show!

Ah, Fort Ross -- I recently had trouble convincing a coworker that much of Northern California was once occupied by the Russians.

Hello, Paul. I have moved the post for you. Hope someone can help you out. Cheers!

Welcome aboard! I'm a transplanted Californian, most recently from Mariposa in the heart of the mother lode, but grew up in Humboldt County with frequent backpacking trips into the mining country of Trinity and Siskiyou Counties, so I'm quite familiar with seeing dredgers at work. Your Phantom looks very nice!

Look who's talking!!

Interesting timing -- I was just working on my family tree yesterday and came across a distant cousin who served a long stint aboard USS Grayson (DD-435), a member of the preceding Gleaves class. He transferred to Grayson after doing one patrol on USS Plunger (SS-179).

Semore, from here the only difference I can see between your model and some other highly-rated ones is that yours has perhaps slightly less weathering, but your crisp painting and neat metal work looks right up there to me.

This is not at all an uncommon reaction to first-ever unboxings.

👮‍♂️Tweeeeeet! I'm calling a foul on this one. You can't just say you're starting a card model and not tell us what it is! 😉

Congratulations! Superbly done!

Congrats on another amazing model, Greg!

Some excellent suggestions have been made so far, but I don't think that anyone has mentioned ventilation yet. Make sure your work area is well-ventilated.

I wouldn't be too hasty to make that judgment. I'm not as well-versed on the plastic kit world as I once was (many, many moons ago), but I know that it is not uncommon for injection molds to legitimately exchange hands between plastic kit companies and that Trumpeter has acquired molds in the past in that fashion. I'm not qualified to speculate any farther than that.

Congratulations! Looks fantastic -- even has the flag blowing in the right direction!

Looks like you succeeded. 😉

I have no insight on which of those two kits is more historically accurate, but if you purchase a kit through Model Expo, you get free replacement parts, should you need them.

The gun is in and the top straps are in place. After I completed this task, I noticed I hadn't done all the bolt heads on the knees along the hull. **sigh** I hit on a rather easy way to simulate these by using thin slices of styrene rod, but this will be a task for another day. In the meantime, I placed one of the seat covers in the photo; as you can see, the sheet from which that part was taken is very light-colored, so I'm considering the possibility of staining or painting these. Otherwise, to my eye at least, they just stand out too much. Also, a question for Jim or others who have built this: The instructions call for the gun pit ladders to be installed before rigging the gun tackles, but it seems to me that the ladders would be in way a bit. Should I rig the tackles first? Cheers!

Congratulations upon completing this long journey!

Heck, I know people that scratch build without power tools. I do find my Dremel rotary tool very handy, and technically it is a power tool, but it's not a mill, lathe, thickness sander, or band saw, if those are the kinds of power tools you're thinking of.

Hullo, yes, it's been a while. I was waiting until I had some discernible progress to show. The caprails, knees, and rubbing strakes have been added. Next up is supposed to be installation of the gun, oh boy!

The hull form of the Gloucester schooners is considered among the easier types to plank.