Essex class carriers/Korean War

Overall Haze gray #27 with #4 Deck Gray flight decks and horizontal surfaces. These are not the WW2 era colors, these are neutral grays.

White Ensign carries these paints in enamel form.

Jeff Herne
Modelwarships.com

What ship? A good reference is the movie "Bridges at Toko Ri" which was made shortly after the war. Some carriers had the flight deck painted, some did not so you have a light teak color that went to a bronze color with weather and age. Flight deck markings in yellow.

Scott

Hey Scott,

I'd like to see some post-war bare deck pics if you got 'em...

Jeff

Hi Jeff,

I wish I could scan the pics from the cruise book I have of the Oriskany cir 1954 and the Lexington cir 1956 but they fold out to 11" long. Both books have great color panoramic shots of the ships in the inside cover with bare decks and safety yellow deck markings. The Lex was on her a shakdown cruise after it's modernization had her deck painted with grey non-skid later in the cruise and deck markings were changed to white.

I also have a great issue of the "Hook" which is the Tailhook Associations magaine that has a tribute to airdales in the Korean War. It has a ton of flight deck pics in color. I'll see if I can scan those. If not, they have a website where we might be able to obtain the pics. Most of the pics were taken on the Boxer and Essex which had the grey deck and an escort carrier with a natural deck. I think the issue is March 1991 but I'll need to look.

Scott

Another movie to reference would be the Cain Mutiny. There is a great flight deck scene on an Essex class carrier. This movie is in color and the scene was done in 1953.

Scott

Very cool, look forward to seeing them...

J

Thanks for the feedback re Essex class deck colors. My father's ship was USS Tarawa, CVA 40. He was a member of the crew from 1951 through 1954.

The Tarawa would be a nice example to model. Kinda a forgotten Essex class carrier. I don't think she was ever modernized.

Scottrc

I am building a 1/700 scale Hasegawa waterline model with photo etched parts. Any idea where I could get ships numbers/decals?

Looking at the black and white photos at the Haze Grey website, it looks like the island number is shadowed with the black offset. These are hard to find as decals and the ones I've seen look too out of scale. Also, the bow 40 is elongated and looks to be safety yellow. Again, I wouldn't know of any decals on the aftermarket other than ones in the old Lindberg and Aurora kits of the Essex, Lexington, and Oriskany. Right shape and color but wrong scale.

I built the Lexington in 1/700 as it looked after its modernization in 1956. I had the same problem, no decals, so I ended up making them on my computer with an aftermarket decal kit I bought from an ad in FSM. I'll see if I can find my notes to see what the dimensions were for both the deck and island pendants.

Scott

Scott
Great topic- Keep us posted with the details on your computer generated decals. I built the USS Shangri-La (WWII configuration) by converting a 1/700 scale Hasegawa model of the USS Hornet and gave it to my father-in-law for Christmas. He served on her 1954-58. I plan to build another version of the "Shang" modernized but have no decent decals. Your decal information will be very useful on this effort.

Great to here it. The model is at my fathers house 2000 miles away. I built it for him back in 1991 for his plank since he was a plank owner. Anyway, I took a bunch a slides of the construction while building it in my dorm room while in college, but seem to have misplaced them. I called my dad to see if he can take some new pics for me. However, it may take awhile.

I do have my notes of the build and the dimensions of the pendants. I had a line drawing of the Yorktown (an old book I got at the gift shop in 1978) in 1/720 with all the markings, so I was able to scale them down.

There is another gentleman by the handle purplexs650d, doing a 1/700 conversion to the SCB27A, 25A modernization here in this forum. Here is also a link discussing the modification of both 1/700 and 1/350 essex class kits.
http://www.clubhyper.com/forums/shipchatframe.htm

Scott

Scott,

Thanks for the help. I do have access to some ship "yearbooks" at my father's home. You are correct about the offset black shading. The pictures are early 1950's yearbook quality black and white. One doesn't get much in the way of color.

I presume no aircraft exist form the Korean War era in that scale. Most aircraft carrier models are either WWII or Vietnam/1980s era with appropriate aircraft. My father's ship had F-4U corsairs, including the night fighters. These planes had four propeller blades and elongated noses. The ship also had Panther jets, Douglas Skyraiders, and Banchee Jets.

Thanks again for the help Scott.

Mark M aka Anthon

Scott, saw your messages about the wwII essex class carriers, please e-mail me at wild57mustang@yahoo.com on how i may obtain a copy of the plans and/or photos you have on the matter.

Sure cutter, I'll send you the publishing data on these books. I picked one up at the Lexington last summer and that one also lines a bunch of line drawings from WW2 to her last refit.

Hey guys, looking through my library and here are some references with great line drawings and pictures.
REF #1
"The Hook" Journal of Carrier Aviation;Summer 1989 Korea-Naval Air's Unforgotten War:: Barrett Tillman.
Submit request's for back issues to:
Tailhook Association
Box 40
Bonita, CA 92002
(619)279-2010 About $10.00 per issue.

This issue has great color photo's of weathered flight decks and air operations. Jeff is right, the decks were painted a deck blue (Measure 20-B through 1954), but in the photo's, very little of it is left exposing bare wood.
REF#2
Ships Data #7 USS Yorktown CV10; Leeward Publications ,1977ISBN 0-915268-08-6

I bought this book in 1978 while visiting the Yorktown. Many great line drawings and hundreds of pics of the carrier throughout the entire life of the ship. Also includes color chips and colors/markings for all the airgroups. This book may be out of print.
Leeward publications, Inc.
P.O. Box 149
Annapolis, MD 21404
REF#3
Carrier Lexington #61, Hugh Power; Texas A&M University Press College Station; 1996.

I bought this book at the Lexington last summer. It too has thousands of drawings and pictures of the ship as well as all the aircraft and airgroups than have been aboard it. Check with the Lexington's website store or the Texas A&M Bookstore for a copy.
REF#4
Details-n-Scale also makes a book on the Essex, Yorktown, and Lexington. But it is very short and only has a few details on the 1943-1945 and 1956-1987 configuations. Nothing pertains to Korea.
I'm still trying to set up a website to host pics. Sorry!
Scott

Scott
Thanks again for providing us with very helpful information and access to reference materials. Keep up the good work. Looking forward to visiting the website once you set it up.

If you need additional pics, chances are I have them, just need to look...

Jeff

To update, I found a Revell Lexington, vintage 1975 on Ebay. The Hancock is about 30' longer than the Lexington, but we can make this work. It saves me some scratchbuilding work, and should look pretty impressive. I'm hoping to have it done by Christmas, will be building a display for it that will include a small shelf underneath to store the cruise book from the two years that my dad spent on the Hancock.