1/700 HMS Unicorn 1943 (HP Models)
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by Jerry Lloyd |
1/700 HMS Unicorn 1943 (HP Models)
H.M.S. Unicorn was a maintenance aircraft carrier completed by Harland and Wolff Belfast in 1943, she was conceived to support the armoured fleet carriers operating overseas by repairing and maintaining their aircraft and was a complex ship holding stores for all Fleet air Arm aircraft yet she could still operate as a front line carrier with her own air group of 818 and 824 Squadrons with Swordfish and 887 Squadron with Seafires stored in her lower hangar, her upper hangar was a workshop served by a network of overhead hoists and a motor lighter could be hoisted from her stern bay to collect aircraft from other ships for repair, she was the first ship to take the new type 281B air search radar to sea which had a single array for transmitting and receiving, her directors were Mk V** HACs with radars developed for the Hunt class destroyer escorts, armament was four twin 4 inch, four quad pompoms, four twin and five single 20mm, camo colours in 1943 were MS4A, B30 and B15 and she had 2inch armoured decks with 2 inch armoured boxes around her destroyer engines, top speed was 22 knots, after further service in the Korean she was scrapped in 1959
