USS Tautog from a Revell 1/72 Gato

[aurora-7]

I'm just starting the process of making the USS Tautog (Tambor class) boat from the Revell Gato kit.  I want to depict the Tautog as she appeard on the morning of December 7, 1941 when she was at the submarine docks in the harbor. The Tautog shared  a downing (in some references, the lone perpertrator) of a Japanese torpedo plane.

After this build, I'd like to do another version of the Tautog as she was at the end of her carreer in early 1945. She finished the war with the highest numeric count for ship sinkings for any us submarines -26 boats sunk in all.

The Tambor class boats are four feet shorter than the Gato class boats (307 ft versus 311 ft). So far I've cut the hull portions in have but I have not yet removed the .6 inches for the scaled 4 feet.

I've ordered  a set of the outer torpedo doors from AMP; A 5"/51 MK18 deck gun and ventral flood ports template from Nautilus Models; a Tambor class fairwater and 30. machine gun mount from Iron Bottom Sound Models.

Mike K from the forums here has been an immense help for information about the wood decking lay out to replace the kit's 'post-war' metal decking.

I'll post images to this thread through my progress of the build -This may take a while.

[Rokket]

Looking forward to the pix. And Mike K is The Man! He is extremely knowledgeable (he lived it), but hes also VERY generous.

Tambor class is such a cool build, what a great idea.

[Division 6]

Looking through the different pix of the Tautog and the Trout on NavSource it looks like the hatch to the Galley is centered behind the fairwater, can't tell for sure on the Tautog, it may just be that way on the Trout.
The aft marker buoy looks to be forward of the metal exhaust deck plate on the port side closer to the fairwater, I don't see one on the bow, doesn't mean it's not there thought.

On the picture of her launch the banner covering the torpedo tubes has moved enough so that you can see all the holes in the plates between the tube doors.

Eric...

[Rokket]

Nice o the "banner peek" - somany times I look at old pix and wish the photographer had just smooshed a litel left or up or down or whatever. GRRRR! (or better yet, taken hi-def colour video from many angles, with scales.)

[aurora-7]

I'll probably not get serious into my Tautog until after the summer. After I get my other smaller builds out of the way for a couple of shows this fall.

I think I good target date to have my Tautog would be for 2011 - for the 70th Anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack. There's bound to be shows with that theme for that year. Not that she'll be a contest winner but it's a chance to show her off.

Rokket, where did you here about wartime EB boats not having stern torpedo shutters (from a post I read of yours in FSM)? It would make sense since they face aft and their absence would not have any hydrodynamic drag.

[Rokket]

ahhh, now you want my brain to work! This is the guy who ha to continually ask his wife stuff like: "it's a movie, you know, the one with the girl with the hair thing, and that guy" She usually pulls up ust what I'm thinking about, amazingly.

Non exhaustive...but all the Portsmouth boats seem to have shutters. The shutterless boats are all EB. Pretty small sampling, but limited resources.