Question about PT boat bases in the Pacific

Glad to help oddmanrush.  Good luck on your basement!  For the Oscar, I would say, unless you uncover some real info that says the Japanese did not have Oscars in the Solomons, go with your original plan!  Page 6 of PT-109 Unknown History says that on April 7 (I presume 1943) Talugi was attacked by 177 planes, of which 25 were shot down.  I have no doubt some were Oscars.  The article only specifies that some were dive bombers.  No other type was identified in the article.  I am looking forward to seeing your pics when you can, but no hurry.  I know full well how life can interfere with the best laid modeling plans.  Or any other plans for that matter!

PS - That Page 1 has a couple of nice aerial photos of Talugi Base.  Big Base!

Bondoman and Tucchase, thank you both for the vote of confidence. I think I'll stick to my original plan of the PT being attacked at the dock by a marauding Ki-43. I finally got the time to read through that entire Unknown History site. Interesting story and great pictures. I did notice that aerial photo of the base which played a part in my deciding to stick to the original idea. The river in my basement is now but a puddle so I can really start cranking things out now - just hope it doesn't rain any more! Then I'll post some pics for you all!

Thanks again -- Jon

subfixer wrote:

I think that this is the movie that is being referred to: Robert Montgomery was, in actuality, a WWII PT commander and took over directing this movie when John Ford became ill. It is said that he did such a good job of directing, that he got other directing jobs later. The movie won two Oscars.

I recall watching this movie many years ago on the late show and the guy hosting stated that this movie was filmed around Key Biscayne in South Florida.

Ok, well here are a few pictures of the protagonist. It is still in my dad's capable hands, and quite frankly, I think he's doing a great job on it so far! Once he is done putting all the plastic together, he'll send it my way (don't be nervous, I only live 15 minutes away) and I'll do the finishing work which includes airbrushing, weathering, and so on. Now that my basement is not as, uh, moist as it once was, I hope to pick it up tomorrow. In the mean time, the Oscar is mostly done. I've painted and weathered the upper surfaces, I just have to work on the undercarriage. I'm not sure if you guys wanted to see a pic of it as this is after all a ship forum.

Any way, myself nor my father are experts on the PT boat, so please, if you see any glaring mistakes or no-no's, let me know! I've been doing my best with research and you all have been more than helpful, but details sometimes fall through the cracks, especially when I have a 2 year old and a pregnant wife and work, so any tips are great (for both the PT and raising two children!)

Here they are:

Here's where its at, any comments and criticism are welcome of course. 

Show us the Oscar, it's much more in my scope as well. Glad to hear you are having fun! One obvious tip is that any one single bottle in your pics would send little oddman to the ER, so watch out. They can get on, in, under and through most anything!

Bondo, yes wise words about those sneaky children! Which is why my basement door has a latch, that is out of reach, and remains locked unless I'm busy at work which isn't until the kiddo goes to sleep any how. She did however take a liking to one of my Fw 190's which she flew around the living room. It now has no landing gear, missing one prop, dropped its bombs, and lost its elevators. In a matter of a few minutes it went from Butcher Bird to Butchered Bird. I'll get a picture of the Oscar up soon.

Off topic, but if you want to keep things small - http://home.earthlink.net/~lcpwebmaster/Kit119.html - here is a complete PT boat base in 1/700!

That's a lot of detail for only $75!

I found some good info as well on these two sites:

http://www.pt103.com/index.html

and 

http://www.navsource.org/archives/12/05idx.htm

The second one is especially nice as it has two photos (one in color and one in B/w) of the PT 117 in perfectly good condition. 

You might want to look at www.ptboatworld.com too.