Japanese 1/16 scale A Class midget submarine build.

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Moebius SEAVIEW pump-jet

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

1/72 FOXTROT propellers

1/72 GATO propellers

1/72 SKIPJACK propeller

[Davidh]

Hello Dave,

this is thread has been great but it seems to have run out of steam. Yes I know I'm the one asking for HWSNBN to do all the work posting, however I would still love to see heaps more pics of the build process. Even if they're not annotated, just dump heaps of pics and we can make our own conclusions.

On a slightly different topic I would love to see some pics of propeller making with silicon moulds. I would love to learn the whole process.

thanks for putting up what you have so far put up, dave

dave h

[Von Hilde]

Those are all of the Ha 19 at Mare Island the day they put it on the flatbed truck. Everybody that worked on it, at the yard came out to sign their names on the hull with chalk. Ended up getting a few thousand signatures, most washed of on the trip from San Francisco to Los Angles to the UCLA football stadium in 42. Thas where the bond tour had the Hollywood celebraty send off. There lots of pictures of it from all the cities that it visited thruout the war. Including Fredricksberg Texas. Ironiclly that is where it ended up in 91. I have searched, but havent found out how much they sold in bonds for that tour. I'll bet there were quite a few. There are rusting hulls in the Allutian Islands still left from where they were destroyed near their bunkers. I wonder why nobody ever tried to remove them for postarity sake.

[MFR1964]

Digged in on my digital archive, and found some nice pics, the search for more is on.

Manfred.

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Gene's big Gato is super scale. 1/32 or 1/24?

It's an old 32nd Parallel kit (1/32nd scale). He's had it for at least 25 years I know of. I works very, very well in the water and is a stunner to look at.

M

[Von Hilde]

Gene's big Gato is super scale. 1/32 or 1/24?

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Thanks to HNSBN I shoud have a copy of Gene Berger,s drawings in my possession in a few days. As soon as I get my EZ driver in my type IX project and dialed in, I will be getting my ducks together for an EZ powered 1/24th Ha 19. One of the first things is the counter rotation gear box, that seems to be the key component in the boat. M (like the guy in the Bond movies) should be on board with his input with that situation. I can't wait to get started on this one!

Yes, I received Gene's permission to pass out copies of his Type-A drawings last night. Gene is one of the best model-builders I know ... let's see if I can get this hard-drive to spit out some of his stuff:



And I found this video too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QOFAGYIHiA Go to 7::23 to see Gene's big GATO firing torpedoes.

There you go! By the way: it was Gene who introduced me to the r/c model submarining.

M

[Von Hilde]

Thanks to HNSBN I shoud have a copy of Gene Berger,s drawings in my possession in a few days. As soon as I get my EZ driver in my type IX project and dialed in, I will be getting my ducks together for an EZ powered 1/24th Ha 19. One of the first things is the counter rotation gear box, that seems to be the key component in the boat. M (like the guy in the Bond movies) should be on board with his input with that situation. I can't wait to get started on this one!

[Von Hilde]

Great stuff dave,

I think that I would probably be doing not just me a service by asking if you could post as much info as you can on the contra- rotating set up.

I have barely finished resolution and I'm already looking around at japanese boats. I am tossing up the type D Koryu class but would really like to find more on the Ha -201 class of which there seems precious little info.

keep dumping stuff dave, I'm reading it, others are also appreciating it....

dave h

Well David, there is not much info to be had on the 201s. There were only 9 completed at wars end they never saw srevice. The boat was a last ditch attempt at a fast coastal sub. They only had 2 forward tubes for 21" torpedos. The total compliment of fish was 4. 2 in the pipes and 2 stowed. The tatics were to be pac attacs of groups of boats during the X Day invasion, that never came. There were 90 planned but 80 were destroyed by bombing at Sasibo, where they were being built. #201 thru 211 were completed, #207 was destroyed by a RAAF Typhoon at the dock. #211 was actually completed after the official wars end.(Not sure of the story behind it) But the remaining boats were all scuttled. There is only one picture of a 201 underway, and no accurate drawings available. I suppose if one went to Sasibo and hunted aroundm possiblly some factory drawings could be found, but for sure not, without some dificulty. However, if you build a Ko Hyoteki type A, I can give you any info I have on them. I probbably am one of the few people left alive, that has been inside of one. The Ha19 basiclly sat in my front yard for a few monthe while at the Navys Advanced Underwater Swimmer School in the early 60s, It was given to the Key West lighthouse museum when the Navy closed the base in the 70s. In the 80s it was given to the WWII museum in Texas, where it sits today. Over those 30 years I managed to keep tabs on it. Had a chance to aquire it from the Lighthouse museum. The only reason it sat there is the city of Key West didnt have anywhere appropriate to store it. The lighthouse property was the closest and easiest spot. The Museum wanted to basiclly give it away. I looked into the cost of moving it, which came to about $25,000.00 just to put it on a trailer. Then there was the cost of the Tractor trailer lease $$$ and where would I take it and park it. Too big for any of the small boat yards around here except one. The fantisy bubble popped on that idea quick. Eventually the Texas museum picked it up in 91. They seperated the hull and removed the tower and stuck it on a barge. The cost of the move must have been fenominal. As the boat sits now, indoors and without its tower, its just not he same as it was when here. In the spring of 42 the Mare island shipyard repaired the damage that it got at Pearl and stuck it on a flatbed for a war bond drive, so it was mostly intact when repaired except for the aft section by the pops where it had grounded on the reef in Hawaii. When the Nimitz museum people chopped itup, I thought it was the end. The two boats brought up from he Sidney habor were cobbed together to make one for the Ausie bond drive, but is not a perfect representation either. The best boat to use as a guide, would be the Ha8 whick is completly intact with all the prop guards. A feature that had escaped all the other boat restorations. Ha19at the Navy base in 62 KWLH museum 70s on the pier in 91at the Nimitz museum late 90s Ha19 0n the bond drive, note the prop guards have some missing parts compaired with Ha 8s full bracing and hoopsthe big plus in using the Ha8 is the drawings that are about as correct as you could get

[Davidh]

Great stuff dave,

I think that I would probably be doing not just me a service by asking if you could post as much info as you can on the contra- rotating set up.

I have barely finished resolution and I'm already looking around at japanese boats. I am tossing up the type D Koryu class but would really like to find more on the Ha -201 class of which there seems precious little info.

keep dumping stuff dave, I'm reading it, others are also appreciating it....

dave h

[Albion]

Are the Kairyus still available?

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Yeah ... I once heard an onlooker shout out, "What degree, Brother?"

Morons.

M

[Von Hilde]

You do look rather Masonic with the regalia, But if I saw you standing next to a pond with thoes goggles on, I would ask ya if they was biteing.You need a Guy Harvy fishing shirt and hat when you do that. Ill bet you have a set of waders stashed away if you loose one. Put all your video gear in a wickerbasket kreel. The kids wont bother you if they think your some grumpy old fisherman

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Thats a mighty clever camera viehicle. I didnt know the Williams models had a 1/16 scale Kairyu, Ive seen the 1/72 kits. They must be Discontinued kits, like Dinasaurs and 57 chevys and people like us. You have any old Dumas wood PT boat hulls stuffed away in one of those sheds, gathering dust would you? I dont care about the deck and details, I want to build a PTF Nasty some day soon.

Yeah, I think he departed the scene a while back. It was a fine effort, based I assume on only photographs and the scant write-ups of the time. He did good. I found his kit a good starting point -- I only used the sail and hull.

A very stable and reliable camera platform, but only in pool water. None of the water around here is clear enough to present an image with a visual range grater than two-feet. In a pool, you can see everything, but then you have tunnel-vision as the horizontal field-of-view is only 30-degrees left, and 30-degrees right. I found it better to not use the virtual goggles while driving and to shunt the received signal to a portable DVD recorder. Today, it just goes to an card on the camera itself (those neat little 808 HD video camcorders).

And no ... I'm not a Mason!

M