Egilman

Yes, I had some left over from KGV Thanks Greg, They are gorgeous aren't they.... Personally I think they (Infini) offer the best looking 1/350th scale small caliber AA weapons even beating out the resin guys.... I have their water cooled .50 cal set and they look every bit as good as those 20mm's.... (and they give you enough of them) Believe it or not, those pedestal bases and barrels are turned brass, not PE.... amazing quality, and looks way better than PE ever could....

The maneuver was called the "Lockheed Stomp", it also involved dropping the flap on the side of the retarded engine, you could almost rotate the plane in the air.... (the p-38 had individually actuated flaps which could be used as airbrakes) They would also use the individual flaps to increase roll rate for sharper/faster turns..... The P-38 was an amazing aircraft, way ahead of it's time..... Dick Bong almost became a Bombardier, he had a problem in air to air gunnery and almost failed it in advanced flight school..... he could not get the idea of converging bullet streams and a ring reticle lead computing gunsight.... A great pilot, he barely passed gunnery training...... (by his own words he was a bad shot) The P-38 solved his problem.... The army wanted to ship both him and MaGuire back home after 38 victories feeling that the risk was too great at losing them for their propaganda value, Bong refused and threatened to resign, but agreed to stop flying combat.... (he became a gunnery instructor of all things) But he would take up aircraft on his own from time to time... and there was two sets of gun camera films that showed that he got two more making his total 40 and the brass (Gen. Kenny) had enough and ordered him home...... I would say not bad for a guy who claimed he couldn't hit the broad side of a barn in a fighter aircraft...... A great pilot, it's a shame we lost him the way we did....

That is one heck of a vision my friend.... And excellent execution of such.... An artist at work..... Well done, I'll bet the finished item it going to be even more spectacular....

Now that is very sharp!!!! Another beautiful lady getting ready for an evening on the boulevard!!!! Well done sir....

Ah, Suggestion.... Your SK2 & SG radars, (that square bedspring looking thing on the top of the mast and the small oval curved dish on the short mast behind it) should be pointed in the other direction.... The supporting frame of the SK is on the rear of the radar, the flat surface of the SK should face the bow of the ship as well as the curved inner surface of the SG antenna..... Just a minor quibble, the rest looks on the money.... Not that it would never be seen in that position, (it rotated at 5 rpm when in operation) usually facing forward or at a slight angle to forward is the photogenic position for radars.... EG

That kit is probably one of the better ones to start with if your an experienced modeler that hasn't done 1/350 ships before, like you said, a modern molding so the parts are well fitting and the included PE isn't that involved.... Certainly better than starting with a Yamato.... It's big enough to be interesting, yet not so complicated with details that it becomes a long drawn out build.... Nice PE skills as well..... I hope you don't mind if I sit in?.....

My pleasure brother, I've always believed that being able to see how it was really done helps with making display judgments given the level of details being added to model kits today.... so much detail that it's hard to show it all in real life situations... This is why the modeler takes a bit of artistic license when setting up a display.... My last Corsair had one wing folded and one down & locked, and I've done a TBF that way as well and as you can see that in real life, the TBF's wing fold was hydraulic and simultaneous.... My personal opinion on US navy folded wings? they look best when you have several aircraft packed together on the deck.... but that's just my opinion and I'll build them with one wing folded again..... EG I'm only sure of one thing, whatever way you decide to finish & display her, she will be gorgeous....

Mike, I found this video on youtube, it consists of landing and respotting of an escort carrier flight deck around early '43... Wildcats and Avengers..... Probably in the Atlantic somewhere... It's a training film explaining basic Flight Deck procedures.... Note how the wings are folded with the wildcats and where the Ammo is installed, the ammo is installed from underneath the wing while they are folded as soon as they can install it... The belts are loaded into the guns with the wings horizontal from the top of the wing.... Note the wing holdback cords and stick/control surface lock cord.... You can actually see the tell-tale that pops up when the wings are unlocked and how fast it all happens... A really neat film... One of the better videos showing standard practice... EG

In standard practice, the panels would be off only on the Hanger Deck, which means that predominantly the wings would be folded, even for the life raft compartment... All maintenance was done on the hanger deck...

So, in essence, you didn't stop modeling, you just chose a different scale.... Nice work by the way..... gonna be sharp when you polish that body......

Mike, it would make a wonderful display, but it would be more like a one side shows one situation and the other side shows another.... Here's two shots of Wildcats on the deck of the USS Wasp off Africa....... Arming.... Usually done on the flight deck while they were working up for a mission..... And another shot off the same ship earlier, (still has the yellow ringed national insignias) showing gun accurization and testing.... Essentially, they never worked on the guns on the hangar deck and when they were on the hanger deck the wings were folded.... It was this way on all carriers during this period of time, arming guns, bombs and torpedoes was handled on the flight decks.... Way to dangerous to do it on the hanger deck..... And as you can see in the first pics where they are arming the machine guns, when lined up to be armed, they are on the flight deck with wings folded waiting their turn, wings are unfolded for arming, and once armed, they are spotted for flight operations.... This was always the preflight prep procedure throughout WWII..... I believe through today as well....

Are those Infini 20mms?

Another classic, finished to work of art standard....... Impressive execution of an impressive model.... Very well done......

You haven't missed it my friend, I try to share what I've investigated and leaned when preparing a build, and in this case, there is a lot of history to be shared.... They don't want to teach this history, my opinion is they don't want the young'uns knowing what our history actually is, what it means to be an american, it's easier to manipulate them that way.... The way I build my stuff is in essence (I hope) of giving the establishment social brainwashers the middle finger.... True stories that need to be told.... I'm very thankful for my brothers that share their experiences and stories.... The more we build, the more we teach.... The more the memories/wisdom lives on.....

I originally thought she had some 20mm aboard as well until Rick Davis clued me into all four ships AA fit during the Doolittle raid...... They were in the process of installing 20mm's in the fleet in early '42 and they were in very short supply, BB's and CA's had priority over destroyers so they got the preponderance of them when they became available.... The destroyers got the .50's taken off the BB's & Cruisers, as many as they could fit given the weight handicap these ships functioned under..... Her "ultimate" fit as decided by the Bureau of Ships was 9 20mm's, but she didn't get them till after her post raid refit at Pearl.... the Meredith, Greyson and Monssen had a few but none had their full complement till after the raid at least... They all had a mixed bag of AA guns, 20mm's and .50's until late '42 when they started getting bofors twins at which point all the .50's were removed...... They were in constant flux on installed AA fit during their lifetimes so pinning them down to a specific timeline or point in their service life they could be very different.... The final armament fit of the Greyson during the war was 4 5"/38's, no torpedo tubes, a pair of quad bofors, a pair of twin bofors and 4 twin 20mm's, (known as the "kamikaze" update, during the raid she had 8 .50's and 4 20mm's)....... They were constantly being updated every time they hit a yard....

The color would be chromate green I believe on the cylinder side, white on the carburetor/supercharger side..... The ring is an airdam which directed the airflow around the cylinder bank out the cowl flaps.... Made the airflow controllable and kept the carb from being overpressured or inducting hot air and vapor locking while helping to control engine temps.... Yes they are, and the panels would be dzus fastened to the frame, so they are easily removable for maintenance.... most slightly thin the cowl so the inner surface of the PE sits flush with the inner surface of the plastic cowl.... This should give a scale appearance, (and avoid fit problems) If your going to have the removed panels in the scene then you would need to thin their edges as well..... the insides of the cowl could be bare metal, white or chromate green depending on when it was built...... It's not technically accurate...... Standard MG maintenance procedures established that all MG work from replacing them to loading ammo was done with the wings unfolded and locked...... (not to say it couldn't be done with wings folded as I'm sure the inventiveness of the aircraft maintenance people was at a very high level, but it was not standard procedure) Beautiful work Mike, she is going to be a real beauty.....

You do beautiful work sir....

I love those old kits, they just look right and are very well done.... This is a beautiful example of a well done kit..... Sitting here peeking out from behind OC's shoulder...... (you knew I would be here Craig).... Nice work so far...

It's quite fine usage for Europe, but not here in the US.... (it has a specific connotation this side of the pond) I think we decided given the setting to call it the Manor House, since he already has a Church, (the Lord's house in US english usage) and Cloister..... Whatever you call it, it's beautiful...... Good construction, Great modeling....

Tis a right fine abode mi'lord!!! Nice Job!

Wonderful work, the Diagonal cuts are for the bridge beams that support the corners of the platform/roof... Ingenious methods of construction from way back in the past... Upload them one at a time, then they are in the attachment section in order you put them in, only takes a few seconds longer and when they are uploaded as an attachment in the section, clicking on one individually will place it in the spot in the text section the cursor is sitting at.... In this way it is easy to comment each separate image if you want to....

Welcome, your work is an inspiration... I hope to have such skills someday..... Beautiful, simply beautiful.... EG

Ship's railings. Yep, but you don't fold them lengthwise..... {chuckle}

Nice Job! Reminds me that there is a lot more to modeling than hull planks and photoetch..... Excellent subject and execution of it... Well done...

Well, my GMM PE set arrived today.... Won't use them all cause most of it is for a late war Gleaves, but I'm sure they will come in handy at some point..... Paints, Paint/tool racks and PE tools are on the way, should be here by the end of next week.... Almost ready to go back to work....