USS West Virginia, 0755, December 7, 1941.

[UberDaveToo]

Somewhere in the neighborhood of twenty years ago, I went to a model show in Atlanta and someone had the Blue Water Navy 1/350 USS West Virginia. 

 

 

The guy selling it was like a drug dealer, he kept lowering the price until I was hooked. I came home with this in the trunk boot of my car. 

 

 

I take it out from time to time to look at it, then put it back on the shelf, it's a daunting kit! At the upper right in this pic you can see the turned brass 16 inch gun barrels I bought to replace the misshapen white metal parts.

 

 

There like a pound of resin in the overpour of the major parts that need ground off, if I started it now as an entry in the Salty Sea Dog GB, I'd need a 12 month extension to git'r done.

 

 

 

(I flipped some of the small parts in the bag, didn't want to risk losing any.)

 

 

 

I'm not looking forward to cutting out, shaping and gluing the cage mast PE parts. Any ideas on removing the over pour or other advice will be greatly appreciated.

 

The main thing is controversy over how she appeared minutes before the carnage that occurred 81 years (and a month) ago. If I screw up the courage to do this. I want to be right. I know it was in the measure 1 scheme, but there were some variations. Some time back there were issues brought up, mostly with builds of newer USS Arizona kits, I'm wondering if historians came to any conclusions. As usual, when researching a model project, Google is not my friend.

 

Dave 

[bissyboat]

Brass heaven or your worst nightmare? Would be mine.

[UberDaveToo]

Any advise on colors and painting this kit as she appeared that fateful morning will be appreciated...

[Toms Modelworks]

My understanding is that West Virginia was painted in standard Measure 1 camouflage, 5-D dark gray vertical surfaces, natural wood decks, 5-D dark gray for metal decks, and masts generally above the funnel tops were 5-L light gray. Black boot topping and red underwater bottom were used as usual on USN ships of the era.

 

I believe you can find 3D printed "cage" masts now which will have the proper shape.

[Rich75]

I think I have read, two black turret tops one red as well for identification....

[UberDaveToo]

On 1/23/2023 at 1:35 PM, Toms Modelworks said:

My understanding is that West Virginia was painted in standard Measure 1 camouflage, 5-D dark gray vertical surfaces, natural wood decks, 5-D dark gray for metal decks, and masts generally above the funnel tops were 5-L light gray. Black boot topping and red underwater bottom were used as usual on USN ships of the era.

 

I believe you can find 3D printed "cage" masts now which will have the proper shape.

 

On 1/25/2023 at 5:22 AM, Rich75 said:

I think I have read, two black turret tops one red as well for identification....

Thanks, this is the kind of thing I was fishing for...

[Mr. Church]

8 hours ago, UberDaveToo said:

 

Thanks, this is the kind of thing I was fishing for...

 

 

Here is the full list courtesy of Researcher at Large:

http://www.researcheratlarge.com/Ships/S19-7/PearlHarborBatDivMarkings.html

 

Battleship Row must have been quite a kaleidoscope of colours when viewed from the air.

[Tracy White]

Aloha! I'm Researcher@Large, I *personally* have nothing new with regards to the fleet at Pearl at the time of the attack, but the Covid Pandemic and a few other curve balls have kept me away from archives for about four years. I have a trip on the books for early summer, so maybe I'll have some news by the time you're ready to lay paint?

 

There has been some discussion about paint stocks and variations of schemes in a warship camouflage group on Facebook I'm not a member of (don't h ave an account). The general gist is this: because the production of 5-D Dark Gray was ordered stopped at the end of July, stocks were low by December and orders went out to decrease use of 5-D until sufficient stocks of the new 5-S Sea Blue and 5-O Ocean Gray were received. One of the other researchers involved in the  2005-ish research with me read an order from Admiral Kimmel over the phone to me that called for battleships to retain enoughpaint for one painting of the hull in 5-D from the waterline to the main deck, and then to perform touch ups as needed in 5-O or 5-S. I have not seen this memo with my own eyes and will not speak to it's veracity, but it would certainly creat an interesting situation for builders if we can verify it.

 

Resin kits of that era I tend to think of like trees and the saying "the best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago. The second best time to plant a tree is today." I have five (yes) Essex carriers in 1/350th and the planes to do the full air groups for all of them. 500 1/350 airplanes is a lot, even if some of them are overall glossy sea blue, so it's something where I randomly will take a box out and start two or three of them and just take another nibble so that when I get to it, it's not a massive burn out.

[Alan P]

On 1/30/2023 at 7:02 AM, Tracy White said:

Resin kits of that era I tend to think of like trees and the saying "the best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago. The second best time to plant a tree is today."

So true

[Alan P]

On 1/10/2023 at 5:17 AM, UberDaveToo said:

Any ideas on removing the over pour or other advice will be greatly appreciated.

Speaking from experience, as someone who used to like using resin parts, I wish I'd invested in a bandsaw

[Zoran Srb]

I don't know if you looked here, but here it is, hope it will help...

https://www.shipcamouflage.com/usn_bb.htm

https://www.shipcamouflage.com/measure_1.htm

And other info..

https://www.shipcamouflage.com/warship_camouflage.htm

Cheers

Edited March 6 by Zoran Srb