Calling all Japanese pre-war/wartime Merchant Marine fans

[Quincy]

I broke down and ordered Fairy Kikaku 1/700 IJN Aiyo Maru, in her 1943 fit, the Battle of the Bismarck Sea. She is probably their best offering! The only down side is, she is planked from how to stern and everything inbetween. Her Trom says she was a cargo ship so, I�m going to have to do a lot of sanding to correct this.




BobPink

[reigels]

Yep. Been there. Not sure I want to do it again, but workable.

[Quincy]

That looks really good , Scott!

What kit is that? Empire Castle??




Bob Pink.

[reigels]

Thanks Bob. She�s San Francisco Maru.

[Quincy]

You�re doing a great job on a 3 piece kit! What you�ve done is night and day better than what they provide you! I have to give them a lot of credit though. They produce stuff that you�d never see in plastic!


Bob Pink

[reigels]

Thanks. I glued it together with brass pins to keep it secure, and added a styrene sheet to the bottom to be double sure it won�t crack at the joints.

This was a lot of work to get to the open-the-box starting point for most resin hulls.

[Jim Smith]

OK guys, here's a conundrum for you.

I built the Fairy Kikaku kit of America Maru as a hospital ship. You can see in the picture she has 2 well decks giving her a 3 island appearance.

I now want to build her in her OSK pre-war configuration and the pictures are conflicting - the bulwarks on some photos show her with a rear well deck, another shows her with no well deck (or at least with continuous bulwarks).

Any ideas? Was she modified for war service? Was she built as a flush deck ship?

Any answers will be helpful.

[Jim Smith]

With the bottom picture (see above post) as inspiration, I set about completing the Fairy Kikaku America Maru kit in OSK livery.

I've included the Hospital ship comparison photo. Same kit, but the liner looks sleeker due to the hull lines being 'cleaner'

Hope you like it

[Dan K]

I like it a lot, Jim! Well done.

[juergen.klueser]

Very cool! I also build all these FK kits, so I know: You do a really good job

[reigels]

I don't recall having seen this posted previously so thought I'd share the below link with 3D models of several wrecks from Truk Lagoon.

https://sketchfab.com/3d-models/san-fra ... af2c1fd47a

Fantastic presentation!

[Peter Rathgeb]

Hi all

I am presently building a pre-war version (Chosen Yusen K.K.) of the Shinkyo Maru (Niko Models kit), but I have found very little clear photos of her in pre-war configuration.

Can anybody help?

Thanks a lot in advance and cheers,
Peter

[Guest]

Hello Peter
That�s a hard one, I have two poor quality pictures that I down loaded from a Japanese web site years ago, and I think one of them might be the Shinkyo Maru (Sinkyo Maru). There the correct ship class and have the T on the stack of the Chosen Yusen K.K. If you would like I can e-mail them to you, please contact me off-line.

Ron Wolford

[Peter Rathgeb]

Hi all again,

Another ship I am looking for pictures is the refrigerated cargo ship Suruga Maru from 1938 (Nippon Suisan K.K.). I love reefer ships (which I also collect in 1/1250 scale), and the modern design and distinct spoon bow of this ship (which Niko missed to represent in their kit no. 7062) is lovely in my eyes:

This is the only photograph I have found (in different qualities) in the net, so I would be grateful if anybody would have more. I also wondered which color the funnel could be. If you look at the "bull's eye" funnel marking of Nippon Suisan (which is white inside), the funnel seems to be a different color, yellow?

Suruga Maru funnel crop.jpg (21.71 KiB) Viewed 4098 times

By the way, what I found and would like to share is a set of drawings of the ship (on the website of NDL National Diet Library Digital Collections: https://dl.ndl.go.jp/info:ndljp/pid/111 ... &__lang=en

Thanks for your help and attention, cheers,
Peter

[Ron Wolford]

Hello Peter
Here are a couple of photos I have of the Suruga Maru in Long Beach CA.

https://imgbox.com/g/5xntpQ5zyG

https://imgbox.com/g/esAUh4hWp4

[Peter Rathgeb]

Hello Peter
Here are a couple of photos I have of the Suruga Maru in Long Beach CA.

https://imgbox.com/g/5xntpQ5zyG

https://imgbox.com/g/esAUh4hWp4

Hello Ron

Wow, these are great, thank you so much! Here it seams there is no funnel markings, just a white funnel with black (?) top.

Any idea about the year/date?

Cheers,
Peter

[Ron Wolford]

Hello Peter
I do not have an exact date for the pictures of the Suruga Maru, but they come from a collection of photos and most of them date from the late 30�s to the summer of 41.
I put the 3 photos (one of them should be the Shinkyo Maru) into the gallery of the first picture of the Suruga Maru, click on the first link and that should take you the gallery.

Ron Wolford

[Peter Rathgeb]

Hello Peter
I do not have an exact date for the pictures of the Suruga Maru, but they come from a collection of photos and most of them date from the late 30�s to the summer of 41.
I put the 3 photos (one of them should be the Shinkyo Maru) into the gallery of the first picture of the Suruga Maru, click on the first link and that should take you the gallery.

Ron Wolford

Hello Ron
Thank you so much again for the photos of Shinkyo Maru, one of them was new to me.
All the best and cheers,
Peter

[berend]

Hello Peter and Ron,

I put the 3 photos (one of them should be the Shinkyo Maru) into the gallery of the first picture of the Suruga Maru

The first one is Anshu Maru a sister of the Shinkyo Maru.
The third is the Shinkyo Maru.
I haven't found an id for the second one yet.

Regards,

Berend.

[Peter Rathgeb]

Hello Peter and Ron,

I put the 3 photos (one of them should be the Shinkyo Maru) into the gallery of the first picture of the Suruga Maru

The first one is Anshu Maru a sister of the Shinkyo Maru.
The third is the Shinkyo Maru.
I haven't found an id for the second one yet.

Regards,

Berend.

Thank you, Berend!