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Of Planked Decks and Pointy Bits: The EARLY-FIT ESSEXES

Posted by Matty on September 27, 2009, 0:23:28
Message modified by board administrator September 27, 2009, 9:09:31

This is the thread dealing with the straight-decked Essex carriers:

Click on Image to Enlarge These are the Essexes having what I will call the "earlier" type fits - all of them essentially WWII-type configurations (and note 2 of the 3 aircraft on deck, above - the F6F Hellcat and F4U Corsair - actually flew in WWII) - even though roughly a third of the class would retain these fits clear through the end of their service lives; as late as the '70s, in some cases.

One day (if I live long enough ), I may break out the SCB-27-fit Essexes, such as Lake Champlain, pictured above, into their own separate thread. But for now they will be included here, along with the original WWII- and later straight-decked CVA-, CVS- and LPH-fit Essexes. Few if any other classes of vessels have undergone the type of radical transformation, both in sheer degree and total variety, as did the Essexes.

And here we will take a look at them - along with, of course, all your contributions and comments on the subject, appended below.

Cheers,

-Matty

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FLIGHT DECK-Edge PIERCINGS

Posted by Matty on September 27, 2009, 14:12:45, in reply to "Of Planked Decks and Pointy Bits: The EARLY-FIT ESSEXES"
Message modified by board administrator September 28, 2009, 10:37:14

This may sound like an esoteric or geek-enized topic, but it is actually one required at the present stage in my USS Boxer build. What I need to determine is an accurate - or, at lest plausible (see below) - layout of all the holes, hatches, doors and scuttles along the sides of her flight deck; leading from the catwalks inside, to the gallery:

Click on Image to Enlarge Here, as a Hellcat does its best to lose control (though in the end it didn't) while landing aboard Yorktown-II during the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot (6/19/44), note a crewman (lower-left) is ready to shove himself through one of these openings - not a hatch, note, but simply a rounded, approximately two-thirds-height archway - to (relative) safety, under the flight deck. And note in the foreground a second, even lower archway (whether leading to the same space or to its own small niche or cubby, I don't know) has a squared-off top. Note also that, especially in black-and-white pics from this angle, the general shapes of the fire extinguishers also can resemble the round-topped archways.

This is only the beginning of the complexity in identifying these piercings; there were several more types clearly apparent alongside Essex flight decks:

Click on Image to Enlarge Here, on the bow of Lake Champlain in February of 1952 - with several crewmen also in the picture, for a good indication of scale - there are visible six large piercings, of three distinct types: 3 large oval openings; 2 smaller oval hatchways (or perhaps more accurately "scuttles") and - furthest aft, below the crewman on the flight deck - a rounded archway, as already seen above. This "as-built" type of archway was doubtless the origin of the 3 large ovals (without hatches); given rounded lower rims during subsequent lowering of the forward catwalk.

Yet another type of archway - and yet more to the point, documented for Boxer - is seen in this example, from exactly the same forward-starboard area:

Click on Image to Enlarge In 1964, her starboard-side forward catwalk has either still not been lowered, or has reverted back to the higher level, after her conversion to an LPH. But now note (at least) two archways are clearly wider - nearly square in shape; like those seen above on Yorktown-II, except now of the full, "two-thirds" height (and proportional width). Of course, such closeup pics - of Boxer in her immediately preceding CVS fit - are all I would need, however such references, covering all edges of her flight deck, are simply not available; not for any Essex-class carrier, AFAIK.

Moreover, note even in this closeup much of the bulkhead is obscured by float-net baskets, radio aerials, etc. - a common occurrence in historical pics and - maddeningly - a (copout) feature of virtually all drawings I have seen, as well. Nevertheless, on a model - particularly in 1/525 scale - the typical view from well above the flight deck will reveal these openings clearly, where they were distinctive on the Essexes.

So - despite the above proof that piercings were not identical on all ships (certainly at least not between different fits) - we are left with the endeavor to cobble together a decent generalized layout for them, employing all available Essex-class pics. Some of which clearly show the above high, wide-type archway on (probably most, if not all) early-fit Essexes:

Click on Image to Enlarge Here on Bon Homme Richard, still in her WWII configuration on 2/2/52, a pair of wider archways right aft appear to have stature - compared to the crewmen on deck - closer to half-height than to two-thirds', but either way they are clearly wide, with flattened top edges; similar or identical those on Boxer, above. Further forward, it is unclear whether additional, small dark swaths high on the side walls, in this black-and-white pic, are perhaps yet another type of squarish piercing, or the shadows on fire extinguishers, etc., as previously observed. And note that the floater-net baskets again complicate the view.

Nevertheless, already at a minimum we have observed at least four distinct types of piercings, whose statures I will label "tall" for between about half- and two-thirds-height, or "short" when roughly half that high:

- Tall oval arch
- Tall square arch
- Short oval hatch (scuttle?)
- Short square arch
And again, the short piercings can occur high-, low- or midway up the bulkhead, relative to the level of the catwalk.

A helluva lot bigger research project than I originally bargained for! But - especially given my interest in additional Essex-class builds in the future, not to mention all your various Essex-class builds, already in progress - I think this will be effort well spent, all around.

I have already divided the total Essex flight deck perimeter into 8 segments, each of whose piercings I will document, and attempt to lay out accurately - or, failing that, at least plausibly - in generalized drawings for the entire class. Look for installments on each of these appearing as "responses", below.

And of course, if you have any good graphic references - for any Essex carrier, in any fit - give me a shout, and I will incorporate it here, and/or post a copy.

Cheers,

-Matty

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Section V: PORT BOW

Posted by Matty on November 8, 2009, 15:35:19, in reply to "FLIGHT DECK-Edge PIERCINGS"
4.254.135.194

OK so I lied when I (wishfully) said these analyses would all go much faster now - in fact I'm discovering just now that really decent results demand a much more painstaking, mind- and butt-numbingly (assuming there is any difference ) intensive procedure - far more work than I would originally have "signed up" for - but, halfway into it, with decent results coming in of course I'm going to follow through on it now!

To wit, consider this port-bow Section, one of the most clearly-photographed areas of any ship, as it is right up front. Again, we can use (to even better effect now) all four of our best relevant LPH/CVS pics - three out of four depicting Valley Forge:

Click on Image to Enlarge At top left and -center, Valley Forge in March of 1956 and undated from the late '50s, respectively; at top-right, Princeton as an LPH, in January, 1967. And at bottom, Valley Forge after conversion to LPH fit, on 5/30/64.

Also as usual, the greatest amount of the best coverage was for WWII-fit Essexes:

Click on Image to Enlarge At top-left, Franklin in the spring of 1944; center-left, Yorktown on 7/17/44; at center- and far right, Bunker Hill in January, 1945 and undated circa 1970, respectively. At bottom-left, Bon Homme Richard on 1/9/45, and at right a "boneyard" of decommissioned Essexes, in 1948, from which the first and second carriers back from the foreground, respectively Essex and Ticonderoga, provided two examples.

Note, however, that the number of WWII-fit examples is now down to 7 - while the selected SCB-27 examples (below) is now increased to 5 - because of the postwar removal of extensive port-bow 20mm galleries wich often greatly obstructed the view.

Thus, some very clear views are provided by the selection of SCB-27 examples included:

Click on Image to Enlarge At top-left, Oriskany on 12/6/50; at center, Wasp in November, 1951; and at top-right, Lake Champlain in September, 1952. At bottom-left is again Wasp in November, 1951; and at bottom-right, Hancock in March, 1954.

All the above, subjected to the improved analytic technique now adopted, produced the most definitive results so far:

The "smearing" of non-matching features, while remaining substantial, no longer looks so random (evenly-spaced), meantime the instances of strongly-repeated "hits", from perfectly-matching features from different ships/pics, are more pronounced for all three groups (top).

Because of these clearer findings, I allowed the WWII and SCB-27 results - particularly the former - to influence my generalized "average" layout (middle) perhaps more than in earlier work. Again, the precise shape of each opening remains very difficult to estimate, and all the patterns are erroneously sparse, no doubt, where the view was routinely blocked by gun batteries - again, the 20mms in WWII pics but particularly also the 5" and 40mm mounts, in almost all cases. However, for exactly the same reason these areas are the least critical for the modeler to worry about detailing, as well.

Cheers,

-Matty

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Section VI: PORT-FORWARD

Posted by Matty on October 11, 2009, 18:28:24, in reply to "FLIGHT DECK-Edge PIERCINGS"
Message modified by board administrator November 8, 2009, 15:39:56

(Editor's Note: This analysis was REDONE 11/8/09 - due to discovery of a potentially major error-inducing misinterpretation of the base drawing, now of course rectified in the end graphic, below. Surprisingly, these new results are described about equally well by everything originally written about the earlier, highly suspect result! )

--Originally Posted 10/11/09--

This is the relatively short (but prominent) segment between the portside elevator and the forward 5"/AA-gun sponson. Again, there were 4 high-quality pics of examples (mostly Valley Forge) in the straight-decked CVS/LPH fit:

Click on Image to Enlarge At top-left and -center, Valley Forge, with ASW air complement (indicating CVS fit), in March of 1956, and undated, from the late '50s, respectively; at top-right, Princeton as an LPH, in January, 1967; and at bottom, Valley Forge after conversion to LPH fit, on 5/30/64.

Also as per usual, the bulk of the required 16 reference pics came from the set showing WWII-fit examples:

Click on Image to Enlarge At top-left, Franklin on 2/21/44; top-center, Yorktown on 7/17/44; and at top-right, Bennington on 12/13/44; at middle-left and -right, Bunker Hill in January, 1945 and undated, circa 1970, respectively; while at bottom-left, Bon Homme Richard on 1/9/45, and at right a "boneyard" of decommissioned Essexes, in 1948. From the latter pic, two examples were utilized; Essex and Yorktown, the 1st and 3rd carriers back from the foreground, respectively.

The remaining 4 of 16 references depicted SCB-27-fit ships:

Click on Image to Enlarge At top-left, Oriskany on 12/6/50, and at both top-right and bottom-left, Wasp in November, 1951; finally, at bottom-right, Hancock in March, 1954.

Surprisingly, clear interpretation of such a prominent segment - particularly towards its midsection - was relatively difficult. And the clearly-indicated result (below) was fairly unexpected as well:

Note the typical "smearing" - as well as clearly repeated "hits" - are both evident, as are the differences in pattern between the different sets (fits). And yet, the reconciled "average" betweent them - again, emphasizing the CVS/LPH pattern, as always - resulted in a generalized pattern (middle) in which the piercings look about evenly spread over the entire section! I had real trouble believing this, but a random re-check of the references proved this indeed was often the appearance in this Section.

Moreover, my interpretation of the above followed exactly the same methodology as for all the others - so there really is no valid basis to "tweaking" it - or even to decide how. Interesing...(IMHO )!

Cheers,

-Matty

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Section VII: PORT-MIDSHIPS

Posted by Matty on October 11, 2009, 17:49:27, in reply to "FLIGHT DECK-Edge PIERCINGS"
Message modified by board administrator November 16, 2009, 10:42:16

(Editor's Note: This analysis was REDONE 11/16/09, the graphics below updated with the new results, which should be much less prone to errors than presented earlier.)

This segment is actually offset aft; extending back along the port side from the deck-edge elevator over the next 8 hangar doors, proceding aft (see below). The analysis was able to utilize 3 reference pics showing examples of the nearly unmodified CVS/LPH-fit:

Click on Image to Enlarge At left and center, Valley Forge in her CVS fit (again, very much like I am depicting for Boxer) in March of 1956 and undated from the late '50s, respectively, and at right, Princeton in LPH fit, January, 1967.

Although the above pics are excellent - in truth, well able to provide the desired layout for Boxer - to maintain consistent results, I again included additional pics, sufficient to obtain 16 references, mainly from WWII-fit ships:

Click on Image to Enlarge At top left and -center, Franklin on 2/21/44, and at top right Yorktown on 7/17/44. At middle left, Bennington on 12/13/44, and at middle center and -right Bunker Hill in January, 1945 and undated circa 1970, respectively. And at bottom an entire nest of decommissioned Essexes in 1948, all 5 of which in the foreground were selected: Essex, Toconderoga, Yorktown, Lexington and Bunker Hill, from the foreground moving back, respectively.

Finally, supplementing all the above (amounting to only 14 references) I employed the following 2 best references of ships in SCB-27 fit:

Click on Image to Enlarge At left, Wasp in November, 1951, and at right Hancock in March, 1954.

The following graphic of the result is clickable to reveal the full coverage, as this Section proved too large to fit in the desired screen (since I kept its resolution/scale identical to all the other drawings):

Click on Image to Enlarge Again the "bad news", using 16 references is the "smearing out" of errant hits (pinkish) - particularly for the WWII-fit set, which included by far the most (11 out of 16) references. The bona-fide wartime pics, in particular, were frequently difficult to interpret where obstructed by 20mm batteries, as well as very dark features of the disruptive camo schemes.

However all sets exhibit definite clustering, including direct, repeated hits (darker reds) - even in the small (3-pic) set for the LPH/CVS fit. Again, the patterns of clustering do not appear to be the same between different fits, however there is enough commonality - and clarity - to pretty easily "guestimate" a generalized layout (middle), which I think looks quite reasonable.

This Section was again a lot of work - but it is the largest/most dense of all, so later work should be (and already is) going faster from here.

Cheers,

-Matty

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Section VIII: PORT-AFT

Posted by Matty on October 4, 2009, 20:58:45, in reply to "FLIGHT DECK-Edge PIERCINGS"
Message modified by board administrator November 16, 2009, 10:58:36

(Editor's Note: This analysis was REDONE 11/16/09, the graphics below updated with the new results, which should be much less prone to errors than presented earlier.)

For this segment of the flight deck perimeter, extending from the portside fantial forward over the last 2 hangar doors (see below), I resolved to use significantly more references - even if it meant accepting a lot of less-than-ideal shots. The idea was to improve upon results of initial work, wich seemed to suffer from insufficient pics; I now basically doubled the (minimum) required number to 16.

In addition, analysis of this Section was already to be graced by some notably improved source pics to begin with, including the following two examples of the all-important CVS/LPH fit, similar to Boxer:

Click on Image to Enlarge At left, Valley Forge in CVS fit, circa late '50s; and at right, Princeton in LPH fit almost a decade later, in January of 1967. Princeton exhibits exactly the same (ASW) aircraft, in exactly the same paint schemes, as carried by Boxer during the period of interest ('56-'57) for depiction by my current build.

Again, the great bulk of the available, (next-to) most-relevant pics are of Essexes in WWII-fit:

Click on Image to Enlarge Eleven ships were examined from these 8 refs: at top, both pics show Franklin on 2/21/44. At middle left, Yorktown-II on 7/17/44, at center Bennington on 12/13/44, and at middle-right Bunker Hill towards the end of her days (as an electronics testbed); sometime circa the '70s. Note the latter type of "boneyard" pics can be very good for our purpose, as the float-net baskets - along with innumerable other obstructing gadgets - have been removed. At bottom left is Yorktown-II on 9/3/44, at center Ticonderoga in April, 1945, and at right a real gold-mine of decommissioned Essexes - a whole "boneyard" of them, in 1948 - from which the nearest 4 were selected: Essex, Toconderoga, Yorktown and Lexington, from the foreground moving back, respectively.

Finally, I also included the following 3 (best) pics of carriers in SCB-27 fit:

Click on Image to Enlarge At top, Intrepid on 5/14/54, at bottom left, Wasp again from November, '51, and at bottom right Hancock in March of 1954.

Graphic analysis of the above 16 references resulted in the following:

The increased number of sources produced, as expected, more unique "one-off hits" (light pink) scattered over the Section - so, for clarity I omitted the total-set overlay, and went straight to comparing the three groupings: SCB-27s, WW-II fits and CVS/LPHs, as shown. Note there is a direct increase in the total scatter, which looks like "smearing out" of the features - particularly for the WWII group - with the greatly increased number of references used. However, again for each type of fit, note there are some features consistently repeated (darker reds) - many of which correspond between the groups as well. So it was fairly straightforward to interpret a "generic" layout, at middle, for this Section - weighted substantially more heavily towards the CVS/LPH pattern, per my current interest in this fit.

The only things which remain very difficult to define are the precise types of piercings to go in each spot - not only in the interpretation of most source pics, but also in the final overlays, due to "smearing" of the numerous references. However I am very satisfied that the above represents a useful - and very believable-looking - layout for this segment. (If anyone wants to see the total-set overlay, just sing out and I'll lay one up, for you.)

This work took a long time - 14 hours(!) - only because I had to do all the (one-time) setup for the port side drawings, and data sets; the next port side analyses (Sections V through -VII) should not only go much faster, but should also be much more definitive, per the above (and more) reference pics, which reveal the remaining areas significantly clearer.

Cheers,

-Matty

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I would assume storage spaces...

Posted by Don Murphy on September 28, 2009, 4:02:27, in reply to "FLIGHT DECK-Edge PIERCINGS"
137.237.36.4

protected as well since gallery gun ammo was more than likely brought up from below or stored in there.

Having been on a nuke birdfarm, the galleries have fuel hoses and reels in them instead of massed 20mm guns. And there are tons of lockers along the gallery sides for different nozzles, hooking equipment, etc.

Cheers,

Don

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I bet you're right, Don!

Posted by Matty on September 28, 2009, 10:13:58, in reply to "I would assume storage spaces..."
4.254.128.231

The more I think about it, that's got to be the reason for the arches (and open ovals), vs the bona-fide hatchways: the openings without any watertight doors really didn't lead off of the "weather deck" (catwalks), but just into semi-protected storage areas - cubbies, or even corridors, under the flight deck. The bona-fide doorways to the gallery, which was not supposed to remain exposed to the (severe) weather, must be the ones with the doors.

The surprising thing - for all of them - remains that their locations appear to be so different on different ships - even within the same type of fit. You'd expect that all the Essexes would have a similar arrangement of internal spaces and equipment - so the access to them would have to be in about the same places - and the same would go for storage of their required tools/fittings, as well.

But it just ocurred to me that the deck-edge was where these arrangements of equipment probably varied the most - particularly the deck-edge guns you mentioned - and particularly with the addition of starboard-side 5" sponsons on the SCB-27s (but also the great variation in 20mms, as well) - this might explain much of the mismatches so far observed on the starboard sides.

I know it sounds geeky, but this topic is becoming more and more interesting to me - not least because these openings, peeking out in key places, really give an Essex carrier the look of an Essex-class carrier.

So, thanks for the input, Donny!

Oh - and one more thing: what the h*ll are you doing up at four in the morning?!!! Go back to SLEEP!

Cheers,

-Matty

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Night shift..........

Posted by Don Murphy on September 29, 2009, 3:09:20, in reply to "I bet you're right, Don!"
137.237.36.4

had a few guys in our Denver branch quit. Guess there's no recession out there? So while they get new night shift folk trained, I'm on Sat, Sun, Mon from 8pm to 8:30am. Just for this week. Today's my "Friday."

Ya know, the openings may be a simple case of what worked best for the skipper. If the skipper was a bomber pilot, then his emphasis would have been getting bombers in the air and loaded up as quickly as possible. Whereas a normal surface sailor skipper wouldn't really care that much.

So it's possible that as the ships entered the yards, the skipper may have said "hey, those gallery storage spaces are cool! Could I have ten more each side?" Or, alternatively, a skipper could have said "all they did was cause flood damage from the elements: seal up all but four on each side." Skippers were like that...

When you watch "Fighting Lady" onboard Y'Town you see the skipper and airgroup commanders going through great pains to get all planes bombed up belowdecks in the hanger prior to raids. Other skippers may have opted for loading topside.

Cheers,

Don

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Yeah, DEPRESSION'S OVER - after a year of "new leadership"!

Posted by Matty on September 29, 2009, 9:17:02, in reply to "Night shift.........."
4.254.130.76

Haven't you heard the ObamaRama saying so - like at Pittsburgh last weekend? (That's why they turned it into a Police Assault up there - because they realize how happy everyone is, with the way things are going!)

Seriously though, your idea about the custom-ordered piercings sounds very believable. And speaking of The Fighting Lady, in the original book it is even more apparent that especially the first skipper - in Yorktown-II's case, Jocko Clark - could have a great deal of say-so on how the ship was fitted-out, prior to commissioning. Plus, the more I think about it, seems likely such openings could also easily be installed or plated over, as desired, during refit, as well.

In fact, up at Patriot's Point I was noticing exactly that; where the WWII-vintage hull-side openings - some of them very large - had simply been plated-in, with the weld lines clearly visible from up close.

All in all, pretty good news for the modeler, and the possibility for using "artistic license" to use your own best guesses of which and where these openings look most realistic...

When are you going to grace us with another carrier, Donny - been a long time, hasn't it?

Cheers,

-Matty

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Funny you should say that...

Posted by Don Murphy on September 29, 2009, 23:13:25, in reply to "Yeah, DEPRESSION'S OVER - after a year of "new leadership"!"
97.100.249.235

one of the old boys at my model club gave me a broken, built, USS Enterprise CVN-65. I'm repairing it and doing it as Enterprise circa 1970. Scrounging through my airgroup trying to do her before she went Tomcat.

And then there's still Aoshima 700th scale HMS Victorious...

Cheers,

Don

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Well, DEFINITELY show us That!

Posted by Matty on September 30, 2009, 5:50:16, in reply to "Funny you should say that..."
4.254.134.33

What scale is your Big-E - is it the ubiquitous AuroRevellOgram 1/400, or what?

Also, what year Victorious are you planning? I've been looking at RN planes and doing some calculations to conclude that Matty's Models could bring out some 1/600-ish planes which would also do well for 1/700. I already have a couple of subjects in mind, and might could bring out something(s) in time for you to use 'em.

Cheers,

-Matty

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Big E is either 1/720th or 1/700th

Posted by Don Murphy on September 30, 2009, 13:12:52, in reply to "Well, DEFINITELY show us That!"
97.100.249.235

I have A-6's and A-3's. I have a ton of unbuilt Fujimi 'Nam-era birds (Crusader, Phantom and Skyhawk). Vicky came with 24 birds and also the Fujimi RN set which has 32 birds (8 Gannet, 8 Seafury, 8 Wessex and 8 Seafire). I'm doing her during the "princess cruise" when she travelled the empire with HMS Vanguard. Vanguard of course had princesses Elizabeth and Margaret onboard.

We're talking late forties - '47 I believe. Right before HM Government publicly went broke and started scrapping the RN.

Cheers,

Don

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Section IV: STARBOARD-BOW

Posted by Matty on September 27, 2009, 16:31:18, in reply to "FLIGHT DECK-Edge PIERCINGS"
Message modified by board administrator November 8, 2009, 15:50:22

(Editor's Note: This analysis was performed using a method now greatly improved-upon, and is scheduled TO BE REDONE)

After the unexpectedly large mismatches found for Section I, I skipped to this analysis of Section IV; the starboard bow, and the area best-documented by my collection of references, overall. For direct comparison with the prior analysis, I limited these references to WWII- and SCB-27-fits only; for this Section reducing the set of relevant pics to the following:

Click on Image to Enlarge These 3 WWII-fit examples being, at top-left, Essex on 7/31/42; at top-right, Ticonderoga on 5/30/44; and at bottom, Bunker Hill in July, 1973.

And the SCB-27 references being the following:

Click on Image to Enlarge At top, Wasp in November, 1951 and at bottom, Lake Champlain on 11/1/52.

Applying exactly the same interpretion as before, the following was indicated:

Not only do the persistent mismatches again occur, but now they are indeed starting to look randomly scattered over the Section - for both the WWII- and SCB-27-fits (top) - which strongly argues that the (reduced) number of reference pics is simply no longer adequate to the task (given my inherent errors). Although I again did my best to estimate a "generic" compromise layout (middle) note it simply appears to be randomly-spaced features; I don't find it very distinctive-looking, nor plausible.

I post this mainly FYI; I plan to revisit this analysis - incorporating (many) more reference pics, including the CVS- and LPH-fit pics most relevant to my Boxer build - after knocking out a couple other Sections which are presently even less well-defined...

Cheers,
-Matty

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Section I: STARBOARD-AFT

Posted by Matty on September 27, 2009, 15:44:38, in reply to "FLIGHT DECK-Edge PIERCINGS"
Message modified by board administrator November 8, 2009, 15:51:38

(Editor's Note: This analysis was performed using a method now greatly improved-upon, and is scheduled TO BE REDONE)

Beginning (arbitrarily) with the starboard side, proceeding left-to-right, Section I is defined as the stretch of flight deck-edge extending from the aft round-down forward to the point above the very beginning of the aft hangar doors (see below). To characterize the piercings here, I first analyzed the following 5 best of my pics showing WWII-fit Essexes:

Click on Image to Enlarge At top-left, Essex herself is shown after launching, 7/31/42; at top-right, Ticonderoga on 5/30/44; at middle left- and right, Bon Homme Richard on 1/9/45 and 2/2/52, respectively; and at bottom, Bunker Hill in July, 1973. Note 3 of these 5 do not view the ships from particularly astern; nevertheless these are the ones (for various reasons) showing this Section to best advantage.

To the above I added my 3 best pics of SCB-27-fit Essexes:

Click on Image to Enlarge Again, note only one of the above was actually shot from astern; an indication of how unsuitable are all other reference pics, most of which suffer from too-low resolution. This was the case for virtually all pics covering Section I on the "WWII/CVS" type carriers - Boxer, Tarawa, Princeton, Valley Forge and Leyte - or in their LPH fits, which they subsequently acquired. Too bad - particularly for their CVS fits - so if you have any good photo-refs from these (mid- to late '50s), in particular, definitely let me know.

Meantime, at present the following is the best I have been able to produce:

A line points to the box indicating Section I, on the full profile, at bottom. At the other end the line points to a closeup on which are overlaid, in partially transparent red, the types and locations of all piercings I was able to interpret from all the references, above. "Floating" above this total-overlay are the partial subsets from just the WWII and SCB-27 references, as indicated. Wherever two or more features agree, the red color is reinforced (darkened) accordingly.

Despite the high degree of disagreement, we can nevertheless clearly observe in the above a couple significant trends. First, while mismatches are very common, they are not spread randomly throughout the Section, but clearly do concentrate in certain areas, particularly for the WWII-fit group. Secondly, these areas of concentration clearly differ for the SCB-27 group (fainter because fewer pics to begin with) compared to the WWII-fit group. At middle, taking into account all the above, I made my best stab at a compromise, "generic" layout, which should at least look reasonable for Section I on "any" (straight-decked) Essex carrier.

Much of the observed disagreement undoubtedly came from (my) registration errors; the source pics all being either very oblique, fuzzy or both, over Section I. Still, the above argues pretty convincingly that layouts differed more between the different fits than for individual ships within each - again, a strong argument to analyze the WWII/CVS-fit ships, for my Boxer build in particular. Meantime, I guess Section I would be a particularly good area in which to lay on the float-net baskets pretty heavily!

Seriously though, an Essex class model with piercings detailed as above, or similar to it, in this area is going to look pretty believable, IMHO.

Cheers,

-Matty

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