by Carl Musselman
1/700 USS Iowa BB-61, 1986 (Skywave/PitRoad)
With the help of the Iowa Class BB photo CD from Ray D. Bean, the wonderful online gallery of walk-around photos of the USS Iowa by Peter Bakels and Stef Willems, and several photos given me by a few model building friends, I have attempted, here, to add as much detail as I am able to notice from these references and as much as I think is possible in this small scale to the rather bare-of-detail and anatomically inaccurate Skywave/Pit-Road model kit. Mind you that some creative license may have been taken with some areas of the build.
This is my second attempt at a 1/700 modern USS Iowa model. The first one was the Trumpeter kit (which is about 99% the same kit as the Skywave/Pit-Road kit). I was dissatisfied with how this first model turned out, especially the inaccurate wooden deck pattern on the aft end and the incorrect fighting top area of the kit; so I just had to do it again.
The first step in this "do-over" was to scratch build the fighting top area of the forward superstructure. The second was to putty, sand, and scribe the correct wooden deck pattern around the aft 16" gun turret.
I replaced the aviation shack near the helo deck with a scratch built one. I also cut off the larger deck vent stacks and drilled holes and inserted styrene rod stock in their places.
Throughout the model, I added photo-etched doors, hatches, vertical ladders, fire hose racks and reels, and life rings (Gold Medal Models and Tom's Modelworks); along with brass wire stowed davits, vents, scuppers, and fire hose applicators. I added portholes throughout the model by drilling little holes.
I cut off all of the molded-in inclined ladders and replaced them with photo-etched ones and modified various areas of the superstructure with styrene stock. I extended the mast's top platform aft a little and added more support structure with brass rod.
Using Gold Medal Models' 1/700 Modernized USS New Jersey / Iowa photo-etch set I added detail throughout the model (bridge windows, radars, mast and stack railings, deck railings, and the bow's birdcage antenna, etc.) and in particular the UNREP crane area on the starboard side and the port side crane area. Here, I also used Battlefleet Models' resin winch sets for the small winches on the base of the UNREP crane, the port side crane's large winch, and the large UNREP winch was a BFM "winch-bash". I even added the basketball hoop and scratch built the portable small boat stowage rack that appears so, often in photos of the real ship in 1986.
The bridge area required some physical modifications, as well, around the deck edges and the inclined ladder arrangement, there. I added the award ribbons and efficiency award letters from the kit and Gold Medal Models' 1/700 Super Carrier Decal set. I used JAG's Iowa Class upgrade resin set for the 5" gun turrets, Tomahawk launchers and CIWS's. The 16" gun turrets are from the original kit. I scratch built the inflatable life rafts by cutting them from square styrene rod stock.
