More commonly known as the whaleback, these small fast craft were used around the south England throughout the later stages of the war, at the moment I am building another one these wonderful models, in 1-72 by Airfix and, well this is where once again research has drawn a blank, I built my first whaleback last year, I have seen a handfull of B/W photo's and thought there must be more, can't find any anywhere.
My model at the moment I have decided to paint dull red underneath, matt black upper, and deck and superstructure will be grey, while the anti flack padding will be a grubby off white, the grey has me stumpped as what sort of colour grey should this be ?
Grey as camouflage ? I remember the times I spent at Portsmouth, me and the old woman counted 4 ships, looked again, and there was three more, each grey in colour and all blending into the background, the rescue boat was basically the same, with little money, and never enough spares, these would often be painted to whatever came to hand, on the horizon, the black hull and grey upper structure would be very hard to see, but again, what colour grey ?
Look forward to your reply.

Don't worry about the deck or missing paint, there's a long way to go yet.

Great start on a fun kit to build Al.

As to what color gray, you could take a tip from your own observation and just use what you have the most on hand at the moment.

Barring that, I would suggest one of the RAF colors since it is a rescue launch.

Hi Alec

I remember building this kit back in the day...

For research purposes you can look for M.T.B.'s (Motor Torpedo Boats) & M.G.B.'s (Motor Gun Boats) as they were the same vessels, with slightly different fittings...

Hope this helps

Don

This is a color rendering of HSL 156, done by John Pritchard. The colors on the original are a bit darker, but it will give you a sense of this particular scheme.



Al Ross

Thank you for the response, the drawing oddly enough (body/structure) is now at the same stage that I painted my model last night, a bit of a surprise to wake up, log-on and find a drawing of an almost like for like model, a bit like a double take, first thing in the morning, you're half and half and you look, then 'WHAT' look again.
As with the first whaleback I built, this is a strange question, with the anchor, what is it actually attached to, chain or rope and then tied to ? LOL at the moment you could assume you simply throw it over the side, then go and get another one. Seriously though, I would like to show this as it would be in real life.

Hi Alec,

Looking good!

The anchor is attached to a ring which is attached to a length of chain then tied to the anchor line. That in turn is secured to the boat. This arrangement allows a bit of tinkering with the chain to allow removal of the anchor from what ever it catches a hold of below so you can pull it back up. Check out reference photos to see exactly where the line is secured to the deck. The line would be coiled on deck with the anchor and chain set over the top to hold it in place. To deploy the whole thing the chain would be grabbed and the anchor lobbed over the side.

Thank you Jay, while I dare say you're 100% right in what you're saying, I have to think that perhaps due to the very nature of this boat, and what it was designed for, they might not have had enough time to deploy an anchor, and during action these were pick up and drop off craft, the anchor (sorry about this) was probably secured to the deck but not attached to a rope or chain, I know what you are saying makes sense, I would love to see a real photo.
Back to the model - just spent several nervous moments drilling out the 4 forward machine guns, the main mast is in under protest as I already glued down the flak bags and no room for the mast, so out with the file and carefully does it with the superglue, at this stage I feel I've taken it far enough for the decals to go in, there will be some weathering, and I can't do that until the huge decals are dry.

Al,

Very fine job ...

Just a word of advice ... the red on the bow? It doesn't go up that far on the hull. Start at the stern and draw a straight, with a slight downward angle to the forepeak.

Garth

Looking very nice Alec.

This is cock-up number 2 and a major one at that, the above photo doesn't look to bad, until you look at the next one.

At this rate I'll be building whaleback No3 - I am so anoyed at myself especially knowing I've actually sealled the darn thing with varnish, sadly I might have to revert to plan 'B'

Alec I had the same problem with the Airfix decals all I did to hide this was rub the decal a little as to wear it away and then put a dark wash over it to make it look well worn


Hope this helps with your dilema

I'm going to have my Airfix RAF Launch built up as a RN MGB ..................

Garth

Thank you all - You know I just can't help myself saying this, the RAF air sea rescue launch is a nice (here comes that word) cheep model, okay old as the hills and unchanged, but there's nothing wrong in that.

Hi Alec, Looks nice to me.

In your eyes these might look rough close up but at normal viewing distance they will probably look fine. As keith said, damage and dirty the decals a bit and they will look great. No model should really be perfect unless it is a car model.

Around a year ago someone on this site had a whole bunch of different boats he was building from the same basic Airfix kit. Might be worth doing a search.

Without getting myself into to much bother, concerning the placement of the anchor, for this whaleback, I believe it would 'not' have been used in every day work, instead I feel it would have been secured to the deck, pull-up quick release, a rope tied to one end secured ??? and this is my reason for this photo.

This boat late 1944 was a work horse, keeping it tidy and ship-shaped could not have come easy, a nice round of rope, clean shiny metal work, no I honestly can't see any of that at this time period. Maybe after the war, things would have settled down, and a very clean and proud crew would have maintained this boat.