Japanese Sub Color (I-19)

This might be close, the US used it once I believe.

Taken from SECRET Files called "Operation Petticoat"  Shhhhhh, someone may be listening OR listing, (dependin gon how much they drank) 

;)

The I-19  fired the greatest torpedo spread in history on Sep. 15, 1942, sinking the carrier Wasp, destroyer O'Brien, and damaging the battleship North Carolina, sending her back to Pearl Harbor for nearly two months for repairs.  The I-19's skipper never reported the O'Brien sinking and the hit on North Carolina because they were nearly six miles away in another formation of ships, just at the maximum range of the Japanese "Long Lance" torpedos. Incredible luck!!

emo07

I thought I read that the torp that hit the BB went around 13 miles!

Manstein's revenge

I thought I read that the torp that hit the BB went around 13 miles!

Data at Combined Fleet indicates that the Long Lances had a range of 40,000 meters (21.7 nmi) at 36 knots run speed

http://www.combinedfleet.com/torps.htm

The paint scheme depends upon the time period- Prewar Japanese submarines had a light gray upper hull and conning tower with natural wood decks. By 1943 this was cahnged to overall dark gray on the upper hull with a recognition rising sun painted on a white background on the conning tower. Later in the war a black upper surfaces and hull red lowers was adopted. Often the recognition marks were kept on the conning tower on the black subs. So depending upon when you plan to depict I-19 in her service life, dark gray would be a plausible choice.

I'll take your word for it - the model maker thinks so and I like wooden decks. Two good reasons.

For rivet counters, I-19s attack is an odd one. The Wasp and it's group were very close - not much over 1,000 yards - but Wasp saw the fish as did Helena which was barely missed. DD O'Brien was also taking evasives. One of the advantages of the Type 95 - the somewhat scaled down submarine version of the Type 93 Long Lance - was that its oxygen fuel should have left almost no wake. But USN look-outs saw them. North Carolina was escorting the Hornet's group and was struck about six minutes after Wasp - an utterly amazing hit. No wonder US intelligence assumed it was two boats. Logic tells one today that they were right, but no other IJN boat reported an attack. So we have to accept the almost impossible proposition that I-19 struck a target probably not in view and must have fired type 95s. War is wierd.

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Pic above of is the DD O'Brien getting hit with Wasp already burning in the background. O'Brien actually sunk several days later trying to get back to a major base for repairs - all hands were saved. Adventures like that were known to much more violent.

Not suprisingly, for once the I-boats were operating with real time intelligence, reacting to aerial recon which had identified the US fleet and allowed seven I-Boats to get into position. Lacking the code breaking wizardry of the US, the UK and, rarely mentioned, the Germans, Japanese subs did far too much stumbling around. This fact alone almost doomed that I-boats would never live up to great pre-war hopes regardless of methods of deployment. 

The Type 95 torpedos launched by I-19 had a range of 13,000 yards at 45 knots.  North Carolina was 12,000 yards from Wasp at time of launching according to Capt. Ben E. Blee,USN (ret) in his book Battleship North Carolina. He was the ships Intelligence Officer during WWII. Torpedos were almost out of fuel when they entered the Hornet task group. In 1986, surviving crew members of I-19 were invited to attend the BB North Carolinas crew reunion onboard the battleship in Wilmington, NC. The Japanese veterans returned home having made new friends and were presented a mahogany shadow box with a fist sized fragment of the torpedo recovered while the BB was in drydock for repairs. Abrass label attached to box says:

Fragment of a stray torpedo fired by I-19, retrieved by BB-55 Sept. 15,1942

Returned to I-19 June 24, 1986, with apologies for damage done to it when we hit it.

USS North Carolina Battleship Association.

Shadow box is now on display at the Japanese Naval Academy, Etajima, Japan.

emo07