PT-109 by rudybob - FINISHED - Revell - 1:72 - PLASTIC

[rudybob]

Back in the 60's I was turned on to PT boats because of Lieutenant Commander Quentin McHale. Great show for a 9 year old. I built models then and always wanted to do a PT boat. Never did.

Recently I read: The Expendable: The true story of Patrol Wing 10, PT Squadron 3, and a Navy Corpsman. and here is my build log. 

 

I don't spend much on plastic models. That's me.  I stretched it to buy this one.

I'm not interested in doing it as 109. I want to label it 34, 35, 36 or 37 which were if I recall accurately the PT's that got MacArthur out of the Philippines

 

It's packed in one side open box which I do not appreciate so I taped all the sides closed and cut a flip lid. Much easier. 

 

Fair weather means I can get in the paint booth (firewood storage room) so I can use rattle cans. I will never air brush cause I don't want to learn the art or clean the device.

I will get back to the pinnace in late fall. 

 

 So far I have taped the hull together. It's a pretty good fit. I am happy to have Tamiya Extra Thin. I wish there was a similar product for wood

 

More as life permits

[Canute]

Rudybob, just be careful that you have tight seams all along the hull. The Tamiya is a very thin liquid and can find the tiniest holes. The painters tape can hide the seepage.

[rudybob]

On 6/10/2022 at 11:33 AM, Canute said:

Rudybob, just be careful that you have tight seams all along the hull. The Tamiya is a very thin liquid and can find the tiniest holes. The painters tape can hide the seepage.

Thanks. My plan at this time is to glue the hull where it fits best which is in the middle. Then I can progress fore and aft holding the seam tight and applying from the inside. The extra thin allows for this. Third hand anyone? My goal on every model is to make the seam disappear. I have yet to do that though my skill level has improved greatly. If glue gets through...bugger. I will pay heed

[rudybob]

There were a lot of considerations for me going into this model. I have not done a plastic ship since the Oriskany in 1967 or so. I am well attuned to the order of build when doing a 1:72 WW II US or British plane. That's not the case with ships. The directions are actually pretty good. My concern is with order of paint as well as which paint. I normally hand brush everything on planes. If I am going to perfect a skill concerning paint it will be brushing. I find hand painting extremely fun and very relaxing. On a model this size I must rattle the bulk. The colors listed for the PT can't be found down to Walter's Tru Value so I must get as close as possible. I am going with the green scheme, actually I am tired of green or grey builds but I am not doing a hot rod so I am limited. The stores so far had nothing that I found acceptable. My preference is always to use what I have on hand so I am going with Rustoleum Hunt Club Green.  All will not be rattle canned. I find white paint the most difficult color to brush and the bulkhead asks for Flat White. I have some 18 month since last use Testors that I opened today. Truly, I close the tops best I can with cleaning but after a year or so there is evaporation. A thick slur greeted me but I felt the jar salvageable. I added thinner drop by drop until I brought back an acceptable consistency. I tested it out on the the back of the nameplate and it looked about like I figured it would. Not swell at all. Since there was nothing for it (I'm not buying a new bottle) I did a coat on the bulkhead and it looked like one coat of white over grey plastic. Sometimes I prime first, this was not one of those times. I washed with Ajax first. I think washing best. Enamel paint needs a day or so to dry. I am going to sand with some 1600 or 2000 paper and see what goes.

Sanding did little if anything but I will apply thin coats until I get something I like. White takes time. I post this picture to force me to make it good. Goals are good. 

Edited June 14, 2022 by rudybob

[Canute]

Rudtbob, you may want to wash your plastic parts with Dawn and warm water. The Dawn cuts through the oils on the parts. Works on both plastic and resin. Wash after cleaning up the parts, but before assembly. The CA and styrene glues work better.

[rudybob]

50 minutes ago, Canute said:

Rudtbob, you may want to wash your plastic parts with Dawn and warm water. The Dawn cuts through the oils on the parts. Works on both plastic and resin. Wash after cleaning up the parts, but before assembly. The CA and styrene glues work better.

I use Ajax. Dawn doesn't make the color I want. Lemon Yellow

[Canute]

Must be a Yooper.  😁

[rudybob]

1 hour ago, Canute said:

Must be a Yooper.  😁

Ya, eh?

[Canute]

Had a good friend from up that way. Heck of a mechanical engineer. Unfortunately, he passed about a year back from a heart attack. He had stories about the Michiganders. We miss him.

[Larry2022]

Totally agree with your pick on movies.  I don't want to nitpick but I do have a concern with the hull number.  PT hulls #28 through #60 was assigned to the 77 foot Elcos not the 80 footer.  Sorry.  The 77 foot had a different chart/navigation room profile with more windows.  As per paint, I have had the privilege of talking to two WWII crewmen.  One said "It looked like the whole boat was dipped in a bucket of green paint".  They could could not remember seeing either of the two camouflage design schemes that came later in the war.  They were around New Guinea late 42, 43.  My brother and I both have the Dumas 48" Kit.  (He bought me one so we could run them together.)  Both boats, #117 and #141, are painted with MTB Green.  Much lighter than the jungle green with a slight brownish tint. 

Just a note, the one guy I got to know rather well was in the engine room.  He sat on a steel seat bolted to one of the motors.  Said you can't imagine how much you hurt inside after a two hour trip across ocean waves.  He also said you was always looking for a good place to hide the boat during daylight.                

[lmagna]

First hand accounts are always so interesting. Years ago I had the fortune of meeting a WWII U-boat Captain. We had several interesting conversations.

[rudybob]

On 6/15/2022 at 7:42 AM, Larry2022 said:

Totally agree with your pick on movies.  I don't want to nitpick but I do have a concern with the hull number.  PT hulls #28 through #60 was assigned to the 77 foot Elcos not the 80 footer.  Sorry.  The 77 foot had a different chart/navigation room profile with more windows.  As per paint, I have had the privilege of talking to two WWII crewmen.  One said "It looked like the whole boat was dipped in a bucket of green paint".  They could could not remember seeing either of the two camouflage design schemes that came later in the war.  They were around New Guinea late 42, 43.  My brother and I both have the Dumas 48" Kit.  (He bought me one so we could run them together.)  Both boats, #117 and #141, are painted with MTB Green.  Much lighter than the jungle green with a slight brownish tint. 

Just a note, the one guy I got to know rather well was in the engine room.  He sat on a steel seat bolted to one of the motors.  Said you can't imagine how much you hurt inside after a two hour trip across ocean waves.  He also said you was always looking for a good place to hide the boat during daylight.                

Following the historical scheme is very important to many and I appreciate their accuracy and diligence. I am not one of those types and have no reason(s) why not.  

[rudybob]

Paint and wait....sand some then paint and wait. I did a fair amount the last couple weeks. White was the hard color and the one I sanded. I tried 2000 grit which was ineffectual. 400, 1000 and 1500 did they job. I made some sanding sticks but the results did not justify the time and effort. 

Just as in an airplane model the innards are built first. I looked at many completed Revell PT-109 pictures.  One Revell color scheme calls for blue grey matt. I made a mix of Fl Sky Blue and Dark Grey. I liked it and used it on the small decks but there is no way I can use it to hand brush the hull and deck so I am using it as an accent. The vast majority of the model is either blue grey matt or dark green matt (which I am going with) no reason I can't use my mix where I think it fits.   I may yet buy a rattle can of model paint. It goes on less thick. 

I don't do much weathering on my builds because I could ruin it but I like trying. I dry brushed a light grey on the doors then dry brushed white over that. It's OK. I dry brushed gun metal over the black benches. One thing I find real helpful is looking at pictures of my paint. I find it real easy to discover areas that aren't up to my expectation so I can go back and attempt better coverage which I usually achieve. I do reach a point where I think...That's enough or I am going to make it look bad in a different way. That mostly occurs along color interfaces. Around the cabinets I just scrapped paint off detail. The window fit snap snug which is great cause I too easily smear glue on clear plastic. 

The single bulkhead paint looks OK to me

 

I  glued these pieces together using Tamiya cement and extra thin cement. In combo they work great. 

 

I must come up with a scheme to mask these parts when I spray.  

[rudybob]

Does anyone know or does anyone care to speculate on what the "bow chin plate" is for. My best guess is to allow access to internals or maybe keep damage to a minimum if run into by a destroyer. 

[lmagna]

It served several functions. First off it normally had an eyelet welded to it and most often had a line attached to be used to tie up to buoys/other boats etc. where you would not normally need an anchor In addition I think it was a reinforcement/attachment point that was used when the boats were placed into cradles for transport.

 

Much the same thing can be found on almost any modern yacht. They are normally made quite robust so they can handle considerable strain. 

Edited July 1, 2022 by lmagna

[rudybob]

6 hours ago, lmagna said:

It served several functions. First off it normally had an eyelet welded to it and most often had a line attached to be used to tie up to buoys/other boats etc. where you would not normally need an anchor In addition I think it was a reinforcement/attachment point that was used when the boats were placed into cradles for transport.

 

Much the same thing can be found on almost any modern yacht. They are normally made quite robust so they can handle considerable strain. 

Thanks. I love knowledge

[alross2]

On 6/6/2022 at 9:56 PM, rudybob said:

 

I'm not interested in doing it as 109. I want to label it 34, 35, 36 or 37 which were if I recall accurately the PT's that got MacArthur out of the Philippines

 

 

 

The RON3 boat were 77' ELCOs; this is an 80' ELCO.  In the movie, they used two 80s and four Huckins boats, none of which looked like a 77'.  Here are two renderings of what they would have looked like.  The gray image is as they left the factory in Bayonne.  Once the war began, they removed the domed covers on the turrets and painted the boats green.  My Dad was the quartermaster on PT34 at the time.  She was lost on 9APR42 and he was captured a few days later, spending the rest of the war as a Japanese POW.  

[rudybob]

4 hours ago, alross2 said:

The RON3 boat were 77' ELCOs; this is an 80' ELCO.  In the movie, they used two 80s and four Huckins boats, none of which looked like a 77'.  Here are two renderings of what they would have looked like.  The gray image is as they left the factory in Bayonne.  Once the war began, they removed the domed covers on the turrets and painted the boats green.  My Dad was the quartermaster on PT34 at the time.  She was lost on 9APR42 and he was captured a few days later, spending the rest of the war as a Japanese POW.  

Wonderful. Thank You. Maybe I will do the grey because I like the different shades between hull and deck. I've decided on PT 52 because it's my birth year

 

 

Edited July 1, 2022 by rudybob

[alross2]

7 minutes ago, rudybob said:

Wonderful. Thank You. I've decided on PT 52 because it's my birth year

 

 

What would have been PT52 was also a 77' ELCO.  It was built for the RN as MTB310 and was lost at Tobruk in 1942.  The 80' ELCOs depicted by the kit ran from 103-196.

[lmagna]

If you really want to make a twist of things and want to do a 77' PT you could do PT59 John F. Kennedy's SECOND PT command. 

[alross2]

[rudybob]

1 hour ago, alross2 said:

What would have been PT52 was also a 77' ELCO.  It was built for the RN as MTB310 and was lost at Tobruk in 1942.  The 80' ELCOs depicted by the kit ran from 103-196.

That color scheme is the best yet. I'm going with it for certain. Your reference to MTB recalled to me an author, Douglas Reeman.  He wrote a series of action, reflection and romance war books and an MTB featured prominently in one maybe two. The books are similar in theme and I have not read them all but they are good war fiction. Thanks for your time, pictures and knowledge.   

[lmagna]

Reeman wrote about six books that center around MTBs. It is probably only natural as he served on them during the war. He saw action in destroyers and motor torpedo boats in the North Sea, the Arctic and the Mediterranean, and was twice sunk, twice blown up, and twice mentioned in dispatches. He ended the war being stationed in Kiel. Both his first and last novels as Douglas Reeman were MTB based. He also wrote the Richard Bolitho and Adam Bolitho series under the name of Alexander Kent writing 68 novels!

[alross2]

4 hours ago, lmagna said:

. He also wrote the Richard Bolitho and Adam Bolitho series under the name of Alexander Kent writing 68 novels!

Strangely, I absolutely loved his Richard Bolitho novels but couldn't even get through one of his MTB ones!  Since I focus on this type of vessel, you'd think it would be the opposite.  Maybe I should try to read one of the MTB novels again.

 

[lmagna]

I should probably do the same. In some cases it has been over 50 years since I read them. I didn't like his Blackwood Saga that much so only read the first one of that series.

[rudybob]

16 hours ago, alross2 said:

Strangely, I absolutely loved his Richard Bolitho novels but couldn't even get through one of his MTB ones!  Since I focus on this type of vessel, you'd think it would be the opposite.  Maybe I should try to read one of the MTB novels again.

 

I tried a Bolitho novel and don't think I got 10 pages so I appreciate your opposite :-)

[rudybob]

The hull fit together extremely well. Better than any plane model I ever made. There was no excess plastic I needed to shave or sand. I had thought to begin gluing the halves centrally but after 10 dry fits I settled on bow first. That way I could only mess up in a single direction. I used Tamiya cement. I placed what I thought was proper on both halves let them sit for about 10 seconds then held them firmly for a count of 500. Then blue taped the bow in a crisscross and across the open bow and let sit overnight. My work light revealed a pretty good seal. The remainder of the hull was sealed using Tamiya extra thin. I did a couple inches at a time. I was forced to act quick because I could not hold it tight and apply the extra thin simultaneously. Tamiya's literature states that a 40s hold is all that's needed. I did a 180 count. Each successive seal worked well this way. The single bulkhead added necessary integrity to the hull. I used regular Tamiya for that. I was able to get the halves together nicely and still be able to slide in the transom and the rear part of the hull. This made things easier.  One BAD fit was the bow chin plate. Something went wrong or it was a poor design because on the sprue the plastic was stressed to discoloration and the holdfasts were just bad. The one build review I found had similar problems so it probably wasn't my hull joining scheme. It does look like the plate is not flush with the rest of the hull in the one picture I found. Once I decided on best fit I could tell it needed some sanding and there is a small gap visible from inside.  The transom section is a bit of a misfit as well. I have a gap and a not quite flush area. I use Perfect Plastic Putty. Of the various fillers I have tried this is my favorite. I know how to use it. In the process of gluing I had very minor leakage to the outside. 1500 grit took care of it. I was warned and am glad I paid heed. I am painting the house deck railing. I scrupulously cleaned my hands but got a smidge of paint on the hull but that came off easy peasy.   I decided to prime the hull and deck before paint with a light grey. After filling and sanding that's next.

[rudybob]

Paint has been holding me up. Once I decided on a color scheme I set about looking for the color. I RGB'ed the picture and the translation I found was Cornflower Blue. There are not any flat blue's I found that were acceptable. None of the well known brands gave me a color I wanted. I did find a satin which was close enough. Easy Care Premium Decor brand sold at the Tru-Value. Unfortunately, it does not adhere nicely to plastic. I could have sprayed with a flat finish had it worked. What this means is that I will be hand painting the deck with my own 2:1 mixture of Testors enamel, dark gray and Fl sky blue. It's a big brush undertaking but time to see if my skills are up to it. I washed the deck then sprayed with Tamiya light gray primer. My brushing is better over a primer. 

I need to mix enough paint so I can do the entire deck using "one lot number". I made small amount and will wait to paint until I see how the mixture does overnight in my small bottle. I want to see if the bottle is air tight enough before I do the big batch. 

Thought I might show off-LOL-my paint booth which is in the firewood storage room. It's a dusty place but I have very large boxes that I get paper towel shipped in and they serve me well. Once sprayed I close the lid with clothes pins. After a short dry time I bring the piece in the house.

I have done a fair amount of sanding and filling on the hull.  What looks smooth to the eye is not necessarily smooth to the finger and that's the true test of how well I am filling and sanding. It's getting there. Another session or two should get me to where I want to be but if not then I must consider diminishing returns.    

[lmagna]

Walmart and Amazon boxes. The do all, catch all of the twenty first century.

[rudybob]

Just some minor progress but it is important to me nonetheless. The deck was brush painted with my mix and I am happy with the results. I was limited in my brush width choice by the bottle I mixed in. I would have prefered the next size up brush. I did one coat in as long and even strokes as I could. The light I had when I wanted to go was not the best. Next day in the direct sun I did some touch ups which worked well. The paint helped my skill level to blend itself during the touch up. The paint sat drying a week just because. On the deck are numerous vents that needed definition. I thought about using an ultrafine sharpie which I have used in the past but nixed that idea. Paint was another option but the vents are numerous and small which only increased my chances for a blob up. I decided on Dark Gray Tamiya Panel Line Accent Color that I had for a prior project but never really tried using. New stuff is easy for me to make a mistake with. The accent did a fine job distinguishing the vent from the rest of the deck. It is so easy to use too much accent but I knew that. I am happy with the results though they could be better. I did some other accenting on the deck as well. I will do more but not today.

I primed the hull. Dust will kill a models look fast and there were problems in spots so I did some light 1500 grit sanding. I have not yet decided on whether to putty fill around the bow plate. Still thinking. The stern part of the hull was putty filled and sanded. It is not as smooth a job as I would like but it is my best effort doing this sort of thing.  It primed OK and I don't think I will try for any "improvements".

There is no worse enemy then a rather high intensity light angled at a surface to show imperfections. Hoo Boy !  I love pictures cause they show me so much more then I can see with just my peepers

Edited July 19, 2022 by rudybob