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 Author  Topic: Boot Topping
  TED WALTHER

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of TED WALTHER   Send Email To TED WALTHER Posted on: Jun 22, 2015 - 2:50pm
Rick;
here is a good shot of PT 731, this shows it good. however, in the waters around New York and Bayonne, I would think green algae and black oil would be the way to go.



Take care,
TED


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David Waples

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of David Waples  Posted on: Jun 27, 2015 - 8:44pm
I'm trying to remember where I saw it. I'm sure somebody here will remember. It was a video of the Elco factory painting one of the boats. After painting the hull bottom red a worker walked down the side of the boat holding a big sheet of cardboard or something similar. He held the sheet up to the side of the boat and a guy with a paint gun shot the finish color. The sheet acting as a mask. The worker took a few steps and the painter shot the next couple of feet and so on until they had walked the length of the boat. They didn't mask off perfectly level lines, although I think the worker was pretty consistent in the height he held the masking sheet.

As modelers we're so careful painting and masking perfect water lines and boot straps. If I'm true to the model I should have a little scale figure holding a piece of card stock and scoot him along the side of the model until I have my maybe not so perfect water line.

I would love to know how this was done in the field. Do any of our vets remember how they painted perfect water lines on their boats?

Dave

David Waples

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CJ Willis

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of CJ Willis  Posted on: Jun 28, 2015 - 2:04pm
Dave: I helped paint the bottom of PT242 twice while I was aboard. Once in Rendova and second time in Green Island. The first time in Rendova was the first time the bottom had been painted since the Higgins plant in New Orleans. We just free handed the line with a paint brush. We didn't even use masking tape. I don't know how the original line was put on at Higgins.

C. J. Willis

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David Waples

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of David Waples  Posted on: Jun 28, 2015 - 9:58pm
Thanks CJ.
That's great information to know.
Dave

David Waples

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Rick Abramson

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Rick Abramson  Posted on: Jun 29, 2015 - 4:11am
Ted, Dave:

Great info. . .thanks!!
Looking at the photo that Ted posted, that "black" line looks almost too even to be anything other than a boot topping; but then. . .
I built the Revell PT-109 and temporarily omitted any boot topping due to the uncertainty if she actually had it.
I also built another as PT-117 in the two-tone gray; once again, no boot topping.
Once again guys, thanks for taking the time for your help. . .much appreciated!!

Rick

Rick Abramson

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David Waples

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of David Waples  Posted on: Jun 29, 2015 - 5:23am
We've come to learn with these little boats that nothing comes as a surprise. Who knows, maybe on that particular boat they did play with the paint a little. It's a very late war boat with unusual markings for the time and torpedo tubes. Also a 20mm mount on the stern? Note that the sailors in the foreground are probably not US. Who knows what the story is behind this scene and boat. But I've never seen an example (yet) of one of these boats with a proper boot toping. This may be the exception.
Dave

David Waples

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ducati650

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of ducati650   Send Email To ducati650 Posted on: Jun 29, 2015 - 5:48am
Do the torpedo tubes look like the pneumatic type used on the boats going to Russia to anybody else but me? Some of the uniforms looked Russian to me, also.


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Will Day

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Will Day   Send Email To Will Day Posted on: Jun 29, 2015 - 8:41am
Yeah, I think that is one of the lend-lease boats, which would explain the tubes.

Will

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Drew Cook

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Drew Cook  Posted on: Jun 29, 2015 - 11:07am
I'm pretty sure the video Dave remembers of the Elco plant workers masking the waterline on an 80-footer is from "Giant Killers."


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Dick

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Dick   Send Email To Dick Posted on: Jun 29, 2015 - 1:47pm

As discussed in earlier posts: Here is Frankie's copy of the “Paint Instruction” for Elco boats as instructed in the MTBSTC RTU MANUAL1944 (painting section only).

Click on the link below to view .PDF document:
PT Boat Painting SM.pdf

Click below to view the older PT Painting discussion posts:
Earlier Post - Frank's MTBSTC RTU Manual Excerts

Here is a Higgins Document by Dave Buck which outlines painting procedures for PT 625-660:
PT 625-660_Specifiction of Construction.pdf

None of these painting instruction include any reference to Boot Top on PT’s.


Dick . . .


Richard J. Washichek
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