Calling all Essex-class (WWII configuration) fans

[Navy2000]

Yes I do. All I am looking for are some photos to clear up what I am seeing on the drawings for the bulkheads. Like I said before this a 1/96 scale model.

Also I am wondering about the cat walks. Were they a solid deck plate or what is known as punch plate that's with the round holes or were they some like what a modern carrier has with grating. I haven't seen any clear photos to make a judgement call. I know that inside the gun tub areas are mostly a solid deck.

Any help will be grate.
Duane

[Tracy White]

Best I can do for Tico are photos from her 1945 Kamikaze damage report. I made a separate page that has the list of attached photos and photo captions / descriptions that should help. Mostly the photos are focused and not "wide" so it can be a bit hard to mentally place them and figure out the details but shots like 931-45 might help with ladder placement and 932-45 should give you an idea about the light locker to the forecastle deck at the forward end of the hangar bay. Most of the photos list the frame number and which direction they're looking, so you at least have a foundation to start with, but I've found that a lot of the hangar structure was c0omplex enough that it can be a little bewildering.

Hangar space was "boring" so you don't see as many photos as you do top side and when you do the photographers often used flash or lighting on subjects so the background details are often dark/in shadow or out of focus. Of all of the many photos I scanned at NARA very, very few are of the hangar bay and Those tend to be fairly "common" in what they focus on. I have a few photos, for example, of the area forward of the port hangar deck-edge elevator because ships tended to hold religious services there, but I have no good photos showing the aft elevator area forward and aft of the elevator itself on any ship. It's one of the things that's been holding me back from wanting to finish "the book" to be honest.

As far as catwalks go, yes, the walkway portions used what you refer to as punch plate. Overhead walkways in the hangar bay used a slat arrangement of some type you may see in the Ticonderoga photos for what it is worth. Photos of the entire walkway can be hard to find and I tend to pay attention to the shadows beneath (example: this photo from CV-13 Franklin's
appendecies to the 1944 Kamikaze strike shipyard report shows a pattern in the shadow under the #3 twin 5"/38 mount. If you look carefully, you can also see it in this Navsource photo of CV-13 Franklin following her March 1945 bombing.

[Navy2000]

What was the standard color for the bulkheads in the hanger bay area.

Duane

[Tracy White]

White for most of them as well as the overheads.

Darker color on the bulkheads around the elevators - likely 5-N Navy Blue or 5-O Ocean gray to match the flight deck color but I have yet to find authoritative documentation that defines the color and how far from the openings the darker color was supposed to extend. There was a band of black 6 feet thick from the flight deck down so that they could lower forward and aft elevators three feet at night to allow wind to evacuate engine exhaust without causing light leaks.

[Navy2000]

Would the fire hose during WW II been gray in color? I know modern style are orange with a red bracket and the nozzles are brass. I would like to know what the setup have been during WW II on the carriers. Also what about the fire extinguishers have been.

Duane

[Tracy White]

I haven't seen any official directives and suspect "dirty canvas" with a variety of grunge levels:

CV-16 Lexington1945 February 25 F6F Ens Ardon R. Ives

[Guba]

When I was in the navy in the '80's, the fire hoses were "manila gray" or "international orange", inside or outside the ship. I really believe that they didn't have orange fire hoses during WWII. But I do believe that the fire extinguishers were red. I don't have conclusive evidence on this, but it is what I believe to be "realistic".

[Michael Potter]

1/700 Tilly : https://www.shapeways.com/product/FBDXH ... -tilly-ww2

Original inquiry: Has any source a 1/700 Tilly mobile crane and other flight deck tractors and carts, suitable for our subject ships?

[Tracy White]

Has anyone reached out to Black Cat Models to see if they could scale down their 1/350 offering?

[benjamin.marn]

I am planning on building a 1/350 model of USS Boxer in her 1945 configuration. I know she didn't see any combat, but since she was commissioned in April of 1945, can we consider her a WWII Essex? I ask since I am specifically interested in depicting her in her as commissioned 1945 appearance. My grandfather was a machinists mate on her from 1945 to 1949 after spending 1942 to 1944 piloting Higgins boats in the pacific.

[Dick J]

I am planning on building a 1/350 model of USS Boxer in her 1945 configuration. I know she didn't see any combat, but since she was commissioned in April of 1945, can we consider her a WWII Essex? I ask since I am specifically interested in depicting her in her as commissioned 1945 appearance. My grandfather was a machinists mate on her from 1945 to 1949 after spending 1942 to 1944 piloting Higgins boats in the pacific.

Boxer was a wartime Essex. After working up, she transferred to the Pacific, and before leaving the west coast, received the "outboard" quad 40MM guns. (The three below the island, the two at hangar deck level starboard-aft, and the two to port in the catwalk at the after end of the flightdeck portside extension.) She was enroute to the war zone when hostilities ended. Among her honors is a WW-II victory medal, so she definitely qualifies as a wartime ship.

[benjamin.marn]

I am planning on building a 1/350 model of USS Boxer in her 1945 configuration. I know she didn't see any combat, but since she was commissioned in April of 1945, can we consider her a WWII Essex? I ask since I am specifically interested in depicting her in her as commissioned 1945 appearance. My grandfather was a machinists mate on her from 1945 to 1949 after spending 1942 to 1944 piloting Higgins boats in the pacific.

Boxer was a wartime Essex. After working up, she transferred to the Pacific, and before leaving the west coast, received the "outboard" quad 40MM guns. (The three below the island, the two at hangar deck level starboard-aft, and the two to port in the catwalk at the after end of the flightdeck portside extension.) She was enroute to the war zone when hostilities ended. Among her honors is a WW-II victory medal, so she definitely qualifies as a wartime ship.

Good to know, based on my research and her day to day log books that are digitized in the national archives, she was in Hunters Point shipyard when the bombs were dropped and Japan surrendered. I presume that means that during her shakedown in the Caribbean, she did not have the the outboard, hangar deck, and port catwalk quad 40s? I've also been wondering if she was in 5-N Navy Gray or 5-N Navy Blue at the time.

[Dick J]

The ship would not have fit through the Panama Canal with the 7 outboard 40MM in place. That is why she put into Hunter's Point. She needed the extra firepower to face Kamikazes. She was probably in the neutral Navy Gray rather than Navy Blue, based on her being painted on the east coast after the switch was made, but one can not guarantee that she was not painted with some of the remaining older stocks of the Navy Blue. B&W photos are of no help here.

[benjamin.marn]

I never knew about the panama canal thing, I guess the question is do I model her with or without them. On the one hand, the war ended while she was still getting them put on. On the other hand, she looks more like a WWII Essex with them on. Would the deck color still have been blue if she was in 5-N Navy Gray? If so I will probably model her in gray for more contrast. For what its worth I have seen her depicted in model form as being both blue or gray. Perhaps I could ask the USS Boxer veterans organization. With a ship of more than 3,000 hopefully there is at least one WWII vet who remembers.

[Dick J]

https://www.navsource.org/archives/02/022132.jpg
She definitely operated with the outboard quads, so it is your choice.

[benjamin.marn]

Thanks for the image, I've seen it before but not in that high a resolution, makes me wonder what my grandfather was doing aboard her when that picture was taken. I might as well depict her with the gun tubs, that makes her look more "wartime". Her war diary also says that she got additional FCS equipment during her upgrades, would that have likely just been stuff for the new guns or would that be an upgrade to her FCS director itself (or something similar, perhaps internally)? If I am going to depict her with the gun tubs, I'll have to have the right FCS stuff on her as well.

[Tracy White]

Would the deck color still have been blue if she was in 5-N Navy Gray?

I don't have much for CV-21 herself but I can state that there wasn't a neutral flight deck stain during the war, so she would have had a blue flight deck at least.

[benjamin.marn]

Would the deck color still have been blue if she was in 5-N Navy Gray?

I don't have much for CV-21 herself but I can state that there wasn't a neutral flight deck stain during the war, so she would have had a blue flight deck at least.

Good to know. Shipcamouflage.com says that the horizontal surfaces were deck gray 20, is that the same as the pre-war deck gray #20 or something different? If I may pick your brain a bit, what do you know about CV-21?

[Tracy White]

The formulas changed, but they worked to match colors fairly consistently so it should be close enough, especially if you are weathering.

I don't have a lot on CV-21,

[benjamin.marn]

The formulas changed, but they worked to match colors fairly consistently so it should be close enough, especially if you are weathering.

I don't have a lot on CV-21,

That's fine, she had a pretty uneventful service in World War II so there's not much out there about her, at least when it comes to her service in that conflict. It seems that Korea was when she did her more notable actions. As for the colors as long as its the same as the prewar stuff I should be fine. I am using Colourcoats enamels and they're very well researched. The flight deck blue was the Norfolk 250N blue stain yes? I'm only doing light weathering as I am depicting her as commissioned, plus the outboard 40mm's she was getting at hunters point when hostilities ended.