Well, we don't have a tag yet, but I thought I would get going with my build log. If you recall, I was going to do the Iron Shipwright 1/350 resin kit but after spending a bunch of time studying & sanding, I decided I didn't want to put that much effort into it.

So, I have switched to the Trumpeter 1/350 North Carolina. I also have the WEM P/E for the North Carolina and the WEM USN Light AAA P/E. In addition, I have some L'Arsenal 20mm & 40mm on order (so the WEM lt AAA P/E won't be needed).

Study of the kit indicates on one accuracy issue so far -- the NC had 4 4-blade props -- the kit comes with 2 x 5-blade & 2 x 4-blade. Other than that, I laid it out over the Floating Drydock plans & it is hard to see any major problems.

I did test fit the upper & lower hull and think the upper hull is a bit too wide. I think I can fix by simply cutting each support beam & reglueing - that should take enough out to make the problem manageable. The deck might not fit real great, so there will be some fill & careful sanding, but it isn't a killer by any means.

I have to sit down with the FD Plans, the kit, & the WEM stuff and develop a plan for what am I going to do; hopefully I start that tomorrow.

Anyway, see the Dreadnought Campaign album in My Gallery -- this link should get you there directly: http://photos.kitmaker.net/showgallery.php/cat/14516

Current pictures are just kit pieces & references .... I haven't built anything yet.

Oh yes, I have a nice new set of WEM paints for this, so I'm all set ....

John
(Would be nice if we got a Dreadnought tag for our posts, hint, hint, hint ...)

I'm looking forward to reading your build on this one. This kit is on my short list of ship kits I'd like to get, assuming I ever have any money again. As Bravo said, thank goodness for the stash. The North Carolina was a great asset to the USN in the early days of the war.

Hi John!

I can see you're all packed up and ready to go!
It shall be a wonderfull end result - a masterpiece model




I was watching your gallery items and on this image the sets indicate 2x4 blade + 2x3 blade! If you're going to use it as reference, it should be easy to transform the 5 blade into a 3 blade propeller



Keep us posted

Skipper

Greetings, John!
Your game plans for this entry will definitely make for an interesting read...looks like all you need to do is develop one and get busy, Bro! I am looking forward to seeing your progress with this, John, so please keep us all posted...as far as the Dreadnought heading, Jim S. will generate one as soon as he gets a chance...
Gunny

Skipper:

That drawing is wrong -- probably a graphics issue or something. All the text refs & a diff drawing have four 4-blade props.

But I'd kill to have your eyes !! Great catch !!

Anyway, I can just cut off the 5th blade & it'll all be OK, right ??? :-)

Gunny:
Hope when we get our tag, this thread can be retroactively hooked to it ???

John

Hi John!

:) Sorry for the misleading, but it was your drawing
Yes, it will be far easyer to remove one of the blades - better than to scratchbuilt one!!!

Of course, you will have to remove all the blades and repossition them, using the 4 bladed one as reference

Although it is going to be a little boring task, it will improve your BB!
The other option is to get some white metal 4 blade propeler of the right size - so hit the workbench, cutter and some putty :-)

Skipper

John, glad you found a reference on the NC class battle ships having two 4 bladed props. I have a bunch of stuff on the Iowa's but I was not able to find that information on either the NC class or the South Dakota/Indiana class. As far as the Iowas go, they absolutely had two 5 bladed props (inboard 17' diameter) and two 4 bladed props (outboard and 18' 3" diameter).

One thing to note about these line drawings. I have several Iowa Class drawings in my material done both by Walkowiak (same as the NC that Skipper showed) and some by Chesley.

These should NOT be used for prop blade count, as some of the Iowa drawing's show two 4 and two 3 blade just like the NC drawing, and some show four 3 blade props, and some show four 4 blade props. NONE of the drawings show the correct configuration, even though all the literature and photos confirm a two 5/two 4 configuration.

I guess that part of the drawing wasn't considered important.

Tom

Tom:

My two primary refs for the NC are:
-- Ship's Data 1, USS North Carolina (BB55); publ by USS North Carolina Battleship Commission, ISBN 0-915268-07-8
-- USS North Carolina, WWII Battleship Memorial, Technical Reference 1; Randall S. Shoker, publ by Oxford Museum Press, ISBN 1-930127-02-2

I found both of 'em on ABE ...

So, I guess it's up to us Army folks to show these swabbies ???

John

AIn't that the truth!!

Just goes to show that you have to be careful what you use as your source material! As a guy who makes his living now, supervision a section of CAD designers, I place a lot of importance on details like that which are shown on prints.

While you can surely make the case that the correct number of blades on the props verges on "rivet counting", look at all the discussion that has come up about the "correct color" of paint on warships at a point in time and the accuracy of the real color of OD. :-)

One could easily look at the line drawings and believe they are factual, and yet NONE of the line drawings in any of my otherwise outstanding reference materials has that done correctly, or even consistently! Glad there were pictures or I might have been tempted to start cutting off blades and repositioning them.

NAAAHHH.

Tom