Lindberg USCG Cape Class questions + kit photos

I realize this is a Zombie thread, started 11 years ago, but I’ll chime in anyways...

If you want USCG vessel plans, there is a better way than bothering the USCG Historian’s office to get them. The Coast Guard Museum Northwest in Seattle has a large listing of Plans, and they are inexpensive, and shipped quickly. 

Master Chief Walter (Walt) Wardle has provided a nice picture of the Cape Coral, before she had a name and was simple CG-95301, from 1958, when he was just a seaman apprentice/seaman/bos’n mate striker. The photo, and lots of other photos of this 95 footer through the years, is available at the boat's facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/cgccapecoral  (on facebook @cgccapecoral )    The 1958 photo is specifically at https://www.facebook.com/cgccapecoral/photos/a.737151152975431.1073741827.509654182391797/2050300358327164/?type=3&theater

In 1958 there was a deck mounted .50 cal aft of the doghouse.  By the time I served on the boat in 1973/75, most of the weapons from the 50s were gone, but we had two .50 cal machine guns that we mounted on pintels forward of the pilothouse.  

Master Chief Wardel described the armament of the 1950's thusly:

"The 95, which was designed for anti-sub warfare, as you look at it you will notice on the bow the black rails on the deck. These were hedge hog rockets used for anti-sub warfare. Behind the stack was a deck mounted .50 cal machine gun. Just aft of the stairwell to the galley those barrels were depth charges (4) which when we pulled a pin they would roll off the rack into the water. We drilled with all three of these once a quarter. The depth charges pissed off the fish."

Hello GARTH! I just thought I would let you know that I am in the process of doing the "CAPE" class as a cutaway. I wanted to do something different. I have been looking and I think I remember where I put the photos of the "TULAGI TERROR" if indeed they are there, I will send them to you. tankerbuilder

Hi

The machine guns were mounted on pintals on either bridge wings ...

The gun in the kit is very basic ... at best ... it should be replaced ... when I had my cutter built as the 95308, I had the modeler use a twin 20mm gun and two single .50 guns from NAUTILUS MODELS in the US and they look GREAT on the model.

The depth charges from the kit look like 55 gallon oil drums.  These two should be replaced with something better.  I would recommend the depth charges and racks from GREAT LITTLE SHIPS in the UK.  If I had known how good these were at the time I had my 95308 built up - I would have them used on it.

I hope this helps.

Garth

Cutwould - Weldome to the Forum!  You'll find that it's a highly informative and, generally speaking, congenial place.  Some of its inhabitants are a little weird, but most of us are relatively harmless.

For future reference, there are a lot of more practical ways to start on a scratchbuilding project than by scaling up the measurements of a plastic kit.  What you need is a good set of plans.  How hard it is to find such things varies tremendously according to which ship you pick.  (Don't bother looking for accurate, reliable plans of the Santa Maria or the Mayflower.  There are no such things.)

Getting plans for Coast Guard vessels isn't hard.  For the most part, the drawings used to build the actual ships are available to the public.  (There are, of course, some exceptions when it comes to really modern vessels, and there are some surprisingly big gaps in the available documentation where drawings have disappeared over the decades.)  A good place to start looking for original plans is the Coast Guard Historian's Office in Washington:  http://www.uscg.mil/history/aboutoffice.asp .  The current Coast Guard Historian, Dr. Bob Browning, is a first-rate gentleman and sympathetic to the needs of ship modelers.  Unfortunately he's also extremely busy, and has to get by with a small (but highly competent) staff.  A letter to him (at the address given on the website) inquiring about plans of a Coast Guard vessel will undoubtedly get an answer, but that may take a while.  (The original drawings themselves are housed at the National Archives; the Historian's Office has copies of lots of them, and relatively easy access to the others.)

There also are some good commercial sources for plans.  Probably the most comprehensive in the U.S. (if not the cheapest) is Taubman's Plan Service.  (Abe Taubman was a grand old man who was a fixture in American ship modeling for many decades.  When he retired some years back - in his late eighties - he turned his plans business over to a company called Loyalhannah Dockyard, which still uses his name for its plans department.)  The website is:  http://www.taubmansonline.com/ .  Click on "Plans" on the left side of the screen, then on "U.S.C.G. Plans"  in the center.  You'll get a list of ships for which the company sells plans - including three of the 95' class, in different scales.

This is just an example.  If you want to build a scale ship model from scratch, though, the first step really needs to be a search for plans. 

Hope that helps a little.  Good luck; it's a great hobby.

I realize your post is a little old but I thought you might be interested to know that I have the kit you are talking about but have taken this to another level.  I am a woodworker and have been interested in modeling for a long time.  I came across this area of hobbying as a result of a request from my grand daughter to build her a ship for a 4H project.  So I built the USS Cole from a plastic kit that I converted to a wooden model by multiplying all the parts by 4 to get a 6 foot long model.  I decided my next attempt would be a Coast Guard Cutter and the only available model I could obtain was the Cape Class Patrol Boat, Cape Gull.  I have rescaled every part of the plastic model by 250% to get an approximately 36" long model of the Cape Gull and it is nearly finished at this point...ready to start railings and final touch up painting.  I will send you pics when its done.

Carl

Hi

CG BOB's advice is spot on , there's plenty of good photos on line. I've built 4 of the Lindberg 95' patrol boats, even made one radio controlled! Just my 2 cents worth of tips: to improve the looks of the model wet sand the hull, Lindbergs penchant for out-of-scale hull plating is un-explainable. Also sand off the deck house hand railings and other "details" and subsitute your own detail, it will look a lot better. (New deck stantions either photo etch or scratch buiit improves the "look".)  If you need some genuine USCG "spar" paint(that neat looking straw color) let me know, I'll send you a testors size bottle, it's damn near impossible to duplicate(although snyder and short has some availible I believe.) The model as stated is accurate for, say,1955 as an "A" class, as the "B" and "C" class were a little more austare in appearence. Good luck!

Mike M.

The "A" Class 95' WPBs were:

Cape Small WPB 95300

Cape Coral WPB 95301

Cape Higgon WPB 95302

Cape Upright WPB 95303

Cape Gull WPB 95304

Cape Hatteras WPB 95305

Cape George WPB 95306

Cape Current WPB 95307

Cape Strait WPB 95308

Ca[e Carter WPB 95309

Cape Wash WPB 95310

Cape Hedge WPB 95311

The B class was WPB 95312 thru WPB 95320.  The C class was WPB 95321 thru WPB 95335.   The B class was built with a 40mm gun instead of the 20mm gun.  The C class had no gun when built.  The cutters were unnamed until January 1964.  The racing stripe was authorized in 1968.

Thanks for the information! I think I'll build the kit unmodified as an "A" class, with detail added or parts modified where necessary, using photos as reference. I'm not too bothered about which individual boat or class type to model, so given that the kit represents an A-class that's what I'll build.

One question, though; was the Cape Gull (built in 1953) an A-class vessel? This is the only name included on the kit decal sheet. (If not, I'll have to make a new name from Letraset or similar)

The book you mention appears to be out of print and is over £60 on Amazon.com, so I'll probably stick to using the Internet as a source of reference material! Though I'll keep a look out for a second-hand copy.

First, fins a copy of the book "U.S. Coast Guard Cutters & Craft, 1946-1990".  It has info and pictures of the USCG vessels in commission during that time frame.  Second, decide which of thhe three "classes" you want to model.  The Lindberg kit is correct for the "A" class, which had the mousetraps forward, depth charges aft and the twin 20mm.  The "B" class didn;t have all the ASW weapons.  The "C" class didn't have the ASW wepaons or 20 mm; the "C" Class had the cabin extended aft.  You can find pictures of some of the Cape class at Fred's Place.  The 50's were usually on tripod mounts  forward of the main deckhouse, roughly where the mousetraps originally installed. 

CAPE FOX

 CAPE CURRENT

CAPE CROSS

CAPE HORN

CAPE ROSIER

CAPE JELLISON

CAPE CROSS

CAPE HORN

POINT WELLS, 82' WPB