Dragon

1/700 USS Hornet CV-12, 1945

Kit Number: 7085

Reviewed by  Scott Hollingshead, IPMS# 34786

MSRP: $46.99 Website: www.dragonmodelsusa.com Originally to be named the USS Kearsarge, the twelfth aircraft carrier of the United States Navy was renamed the Hornet after the sinking of the USS Hornet (CV-8) near Santa Cruz on 27 October 1942. The new Hornet was the fifth ship of the Essex-class carriers, and was the eighth United States Ship to bear this name. Built at the Newport News Shipyard, her keel was laid on 3 August 1942; she was launched on 30 August 1943, and was commissioned on 29 November 1943. Displacing 27,200 tons, the eight boilers driving four turbines could take the ship up to speeds over 32 knots. The ship could carry thirty-six fighters, thirty-seven dive bombers, and eighteen torpedo planes by design, but frequently carried over one hundred planes in combat. In addition to the aircraft, for close-in defense the ship had four dual-mount and four single five-inch, 38 caliber guns, eight quadruple mounts with 40-millimeter guns, and forty-six single mounts with 20-millimeter guns. One of the unique characteristics of the Essex-class ships was their ability to fold up the deck-edge elevator, which was a design feature made to allow the ships to pass through the Panama Canal. During her service life, the Hornet helped to sink the Japanese battleship Yamato, and save for a damaged flight deck caused by a Typhoon in June of 1945, was unscathed during the war. After being decommissioned in January of 1947, the Hornet was reactivated in March of 1951, and was recommissioned as CVA-12 (Attack carrier) in September of 1953. The ship underwent two additional refits in 1956 and from 1964 to 1965. She was used for Anti-submarine warfare for a time, and was used in the space program, most famously for retrieving the crew of Apollo 11, and later the crew of Apollo 12. The USS Hornet was decommissioned in June of 1970, and was later opened as a museum in Alameda, California on 17 October 1998. This new release from Dragon consists of over 580 parts contained on twenty-three sprues (this is not including the flight deck, which is on its own sprue, and the upper and lower hulls, which are not on sprues) and a single fret of photoetched parts. The moldings are crisp, and there was absolutely no flash to remove on any of the parts. In addition to the USS Hornet, the kit includes two tug boats and eighteen aircraft (six of each type consisting of SB2C Helldivers, TBF Avengers, and F6F Hellcats), which are molded in clear plastic. Upon opening the box, you will find many parts. Dragon does a nice job of individually sealing the sprues in plastic bags, and I did not find any parts detached from the sprues. With the level of detail being put out in recent kits, the builder will find that nearly everything is a multi-piece assembly. As examples, all of the close-in weapons are two-piece assemblies, each aircraft requires five parts, and the tugboats each consist of nine components. With the photoetched fret, you have options of replacing the large radar array, and one small radar array along with building up the deck-edge elevator (this requires seven photo-etched pieces added to the underside of the plastic elevator part. There are also five two-piece photoetched assemblies that can be made to replace the plastic deck-edge towers (although the directions only call for the installation of four).

Assembly of the kit is for the most part straightforward and begins with the assembly of the close-in weapons. The larger main steps have smaller sub-steps within them when there is an option of using photo-etched parts, also to show additional detail in a specific area. The only issues that I encountered during construction were that in step 4, parts D42 and D45 did no fit without filing openings in A2; in step 9, parts C20 and C21 need to be swapped; and in step 10, you need to swap the sides for the wings if building the planes with the wings extended. The assembly also required two more "C" weapon assemblies (the quad 40 millimeter guns) than you were asked to build in step 1. The photo-etched replacement for the large radar looked good, but I managed to launch the collector piece during construction, so I had to settle for the plastic part. Considering the number of parts involved with making this ship, I consider the aforementioned items to be small, and all were easily corrected. The hangar bay has very nice detail, but the instructions have you install all of the exterior doors in the closed position, so I opted to leave a few open both forward and aft. The construction of the aircraft is a project in itself. Each plane consists of a body, landing gear/wheels, two wings, and a propeller. In addition, there are eight decals (really small decals by the way) for each plane. Dragon does a nice job with the decals for the planes by providing extra wingtip identification markings and national insignia. I did have problems with one of the wingtip decals, but this was easily remedied with a spare.

As far as my hits for this kit are concerned, the level of detail is just fantastic. I have used photo-etched 20-millimeter replacement guns on ships in the past, but the plastic ones in this kit look great, and provide better dimension in my opinion. The inclusion of two nine-piece tugboats is a nice addition to this kit, and Dragon even includes small display stands for them. Dragon really got it right with the instruction sheet with showing starboard, port, forward, aft, and top views of the ship to assist the modeler in painting the complex scheme. The builder also has plenty of options when it comes to positioning the deck-edge elevator, and the radar options between the plastic and the photo-etched parts. There is a plethora of additional parts in the kit, so although the markings are for the USS Hornet, any Essex-class ship could be assembled. Finally, the clear molded aircraft are a big hit with me by removing the old question of "do I paint the canopies black, silver, or blue?" For my misses, I have previously mentioned the easily correctable fit issues, and the need to swap sides on some parts. The only real problem that I encountered was getting the flight deck markings to line up as shown in the directions. The decals are in sections that are reasonable to handle (I have seen manufacturers that use a single stripe that runs the length of the flight deck), but after installing them, and spacing the sections with a divider, the overall appearance was off just a little bit in the end. I painted my ship using Model Master Acryl ship colors (anti-fouling red, ocean gray, navy blue, and deck blue) and White Ensign enamel (light gray). I did coat the flight deck with future before decaling it, and I covered the entire ship with Micro Flat once everything was completed. With a little time, and my obligatory good set of tweezers, this ship can really be made into a masterpiece.

In conclusion, I would highly recommend this kit to anyone wanting to add CV-12 to his or her collection, or to anyone interested in building an Essex-class ship. I would like to express my thanks to the folks at Dragon for providing this kit for the IPMS to review and to you for taking the time to read it.