The Ship Model Forum

I'm building the 1/200 Hornet at the moment and have the same result so I'm making it up ! I've been looking at other aircraft carriers of the period as inspiration. I've also struggled to find out what colour things like fire extinguishers were at that time on USN aircraft carriers - I know aircraft ones were bronze but someone mentioned they were red on ships. I have little experience of ships (aircraft modeller using this build as mojo restorer), I'm finding so little reference material a great chunk of my build is coming from my imagination however it's enjoyable - I like these floaty things.
neil

The new Flyhawk 1/700 Enterprise CV-6 kit is out! I went with the deluxe kit and got it shipped from China before the stupid economic situation went south. Flyhawk packaging is good, hull and flight deck wrapped in a cushion for protection. The deluxe kit adds a few extra aircraft (still not enough), a lot more phototech, brass stuff for things like gun barrels, and a small set of 3D printed parts.

Here's everything from the box


Parts look quite detailed. The instructions are a bit too clustered for my taste, but I do love the colored parts that get labeled.


The very detailed 3D parts, nicely protected


The Hangar deck is nicely detailed. To my surprise, we have a raised catapult! Looks like it will be tricky to align, and will probably require filling. This might have been better as a photoetch part (might be, haven't fully checked yet).


And an initial look at the lower hull. The forward keel looks very flat



When I have time, I place it alongside by other Yorktown class hulls for a comparison shot

If anyone has any requests for close up/detailed shots, let me know

_________________
"Also we will never see a 1/350 late war Enterprise from Dragon due to a paralyzing fear of success...." - Heavy Melder

Lots of unfinished model ships + attention issues = A busy slipway where nothing gets done!

I received the same kit a couple of weeks ago. Overall looks promising in the box, even though the hull plating and some of the flight deck details are overstated. I'm still confused as to why the deluxe kit doesn't have the painting masks, as they're available as a separate item, but otherwise it looks good.

_________________
We like our history sanitized and theme-parked and self-congratulatory, not bloody and angry and unflattering. - Jonathan Yardley

February 7, 1942

TLDR - Flyhawk appears to be under scaled

For this test, I've compared a number of Yorktown class waterline hulls. I've taken the numbers we have for the actual ship, and using the metric system, used my Tamiya hull to check my measurements against those of other members. As others have reported, they have found the Tamiya kits to be at a 1/719 scale. Measuring several difference areas using the cutting mat shown in the images below, I too found results in the 1/714-1/721 range. I measured the length at the waterline, max length of the hull, max length of the flight deck, length of flight deck w/o the ramps, and the overall length of the ship. Now that I have a method in measuring the approximation sizing of the Tamiya hull, I then measured the other hulls and the Flyhawk hull.

For comparison, here's are the 1/700 hulls we're measuring:
Tamiya Enterprise (width modified, but length as it came)
Flyhawk Enterprise
Trumpeter Yorktown (new tool)
Academy Enterprise
Tom's Modelworks Hornet (Resin, "replacement" hull for Trumpeter kit)
MENG Enterprise (Snap kit)
Trumpeter Hornet (older tooling, infamously known for its tanker hull)

Notes on measuring:
- Tom's Modelworks hull was advertised as a replacement for the Trumpeter Hornet kit, but it wasn't actually designed for the kit, but adapted for it. It wasn't a perfect fit, but its works with some modification, and makes for a great improvement. Instructions were provided on modifying the plastic kit to fit the resin hull.
- For overall length, only MENG, Tamiya, and Trumpeter Hornet could be measured accurately, as the hulls were built up enough for the flight deck to fit correctly. For the rest, rubber bands were use to hold the flight deck and hull together, placing the forward and aft elevators in roughly the correct position.

Here are the measurements, based in Centimeters, with comparison of the size of the actual Yorktown hull scaled to 1/700.


Based on my measurements, I estimate the Flyhawk kit to be around 1/715 scale. You can visually see how it compares in size to the Tamiya kit, which as stated above, its known to be under scale. Trumpeter and MENG seems to average very close to 1/700, with Academy just slightly smaller.


Some pictures to show the difference in sizing and shaping :

Here for the overall hull length, the bows are lined up at the 0cm line. Note that each hull has the same assigned number from the above table


Shaping of the upper hull to the waterline. You can see the improvement of more recent toolings since Tamiya and Trumpeters first offering


Comparison of the kits with full hulls with reasonable shaping. No idea why keel of the Flyhawk kit is so flat, that seems like an error. MENG's lower hull seems closest to the old Revell 1/480-487 hull, but I still think it thickens up too far forward. While not perfect, I think all 3 do a reasonable job of depicting a Yorktown class hull.


Comparison of flight decks


So regarding the new Flyhawk kit
Pros:
- Detail. While some might be inaccurate, the level of detail is incredible. Something you might expect from a 1/200 kit, not 1/700. The individual parts are quite detailed, and the number of things made as individual parts instead of part of a larger piece is very nice.
- Aircraft are probably the best you'll see outside of 3D printing.

Cons:
- Underscale
- Hull plating
- Hull shape is close, but it's still not perfect.
- Few aircraft. Standard comes with 3 each of F4F, SBD, TBD. Deluxe gives you a total of 6 each.


Despite its apparent issues, I look forward to building it.

_________________
"Also we will never see a 1/350 late war Enterprise from Dragon due to a paralyzing fear of success...." - Heavy Melder

Lots of unfinished model ships + attention issues = A busy slipway where nothing gets done!

Thanks for the detailed comparison! I'm looking for a candidate to build as CV-5 in 1942, and have been collecting most of the Yorktown class kits to see which is closest, and if there's a mix-and-match approach I can take. I built the Academy CV-6 kit and while it went together great, there's a couple of things I'd have liked to see done better (forward hangar deck under the elevator, something a bit off about the gun galleries in regards to height).

The fact that Flyhawk made the after pri-fly location (not sure what that's called. Secondary-fly?) as a separate piece, makes me hope they may do Yorky at some point. It's a good looking kit in the box, but the more I think on it, the more I believe I'll sand off the hull plating and do that detail with paint and pencil.

_________________
We like our history sanitized and theme-parked and self-congratulatory, not bloody and angry and unflattering. - Jonathan Yardley