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Welcome to Pat Gilmore in Utah


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Hi there Pat, its great to see that you have joined the Norwegian IPMS Forum  ;)

 

I am sure you will find some very friendly members here who are willing to help you in almost any topic, and of course to discuss what ever you like.

 

As a former US Air Foce pilot and a member of the Hill Aerospace Museum, and of course being a skilfull modeler as well, I know you will become an important member in this English speaking part of the Forum.

 

And for inforamtion to other members, for a start, Pat might be interested in information about the Skua and FAA operations here in Norway, including Aircraft colors etc.

 

So Kjetil, can you please...............when time permits?

 

Hope to see you soon Pat  :)

 

All the best

Øystein

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I have got an e-mail from Pat today - telling me:

 

" I'm at the IPMS/USA National Convention in Anaheim this week.  Very busy and very happy to be among so many other modelers who share my particular brand of mental illness!  I'll have to wait until I get home to check into your Norwegian IPMS forum.  Please let everyone know I'm not shunning them!"

 

So now you know why he's not back at the Forum. Lucky him  ;)

 

Cheers

Øystein

 

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  • 3 uker senere...

Thank you to all my new Norwegian IPMS friends!  I am finally able to sit down and get onto your forum.  The IPMS/USA Nationals in Anaheim, California were not one of the better national conventions I have attended.  No organization and very little security, but I did do a lot of damage in the Vendors Area.  I bought WAY too many new model aircraft kits (Eduard/Special Hobby/MPM were there in force!) and I even bought the new 1/350 Tamiya IJN I-400 submarine with Seiran aircraft.  It is almost complete.  I'm building it for a local contest here in Utah, USA in two weeks.  I usually build 1/48 WWII aircraft, but this subject was just too interesting to pass up!

 

As Øystein has said, I am a retired USAF pilot (I flew C-141 Starlifters between 1971 and 1991) and am also a retired Delta Airlines captain (retired on the Boeing 767).  All during my 35 year flying career I built model airplanes to help me recover from jet lag after returning from my world-wide travels.  I have over 400 built model airplanes in my display cases, and over 1,000 more in my collection to build!  My visit to Anaheim two weeks ago didn't help to reduce my growing unbuilt kit collection at all!

 

I am past president and current vice president of IPMS/Salt Lake City, and also am affiliated with the Hill Aerospace Museum at Hill AFB here in Utah.  I have done many model projects for both the Hill museum (USAF) and the Fort Douglas Military Museum (US Army) in Salt Lake City.  In fact, I have built models of both musuems for these museums, the Hill model in 1/144th scale and the Ft. Douglas model in 1/87th scale!  I built all the buildings, grounds, and aircraft/armor for each of these projects (100+ aircraft and 4 buildings for the Hill project, and 12 tanks and two buildings for the Ft. Douglas project).  Now that I'm done with these, I can concentrate on my own model building.

 

I recently purchased the new Special Hobby Blackburn Skua and intend to build it as one of the aircraft that sunk the German cruiser Königsberg in Bergen Harbour on 10 April 1940.  I have been corresponding with Øystein about this aircraft, and the Fairy Fulmar, a lot recently.  It was he who urged me to join this forum, so here I am!

 

I have built ONE Norwegian aircraft from WWII...the Gloster Gladiator "421".  I built the model over 30 years ago using the 1/48 Life-Like kit, and it isn't one of my better models, but it still looks pretty good if I do say so myself!

 

Although I do not speak or write Norge, I do have a very close Norwegian friend here in Utah.  He is the former Norwegian Consul to the State of Utah, Leif Andersen, who was also on the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics Committee in 2002.  It was he who helped organize the Cross Country Ski venue, and he hosted the Norwegian team while they were here.  He also invited my wife and me to the Norwegian team parties and arranged tickets to many events for us, and we got to sit with all the hard partying Norwegians at these events!  I have an empty can of Aass Dark beer sitting on my desk to remind me of those party days in 2002.

 

Please feel free to contact me any time!

 

Pat Gilmore

Bountiful, Utah

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and am also a retired Delta Airlines captain (retired on the Boeing 767). 

 

I remember seeing a cartoon in Flight International - a pilot sitting in the cockpit, leaning back and saying "After being on the 76 for so long, I couldn't hand fly an approach if my life depended on it...but I can type at sixty words a minute."  These skills will be useful in this forum.  BTW, Aass beer is mine and Arild's "local" beer, and a good one it is too.  Ringnes..the less said the better.  You may have found the Skua thread in the Galley?

 

Jens

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  • 2 uker senere...

Hi Pat, welcome to a very chatty forum.

 

Sorry I missed this thread before. I see you are intersted in Skuas from the Königsberg raid, I do have some information on these. Is there any aircraft in particular you are modelling? Feel free to send me a PM or post any questions you may have here.

 

You may know that Mushroom Publishing will be releasing a new book on the Skua soon, I contributed colour profiles for this one.

 

Regards,

 

Kjetil Åkra

 

 

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Welcome Pat!

 

Your living in a place where I wished I lived. Close to Bonneville, and the Model car musum which Mark Gustavson are building up. Hardly any ruff weather from the ocean, and with no fear of loosing Your property when the all the ice have melted.

I'm always redy to help out if there is something I could help with, living close to Sola airmuseum in  the Southwest(of Norway), and having a usefull camera!!

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  • 1 måned senere...

 

I see you are intersted in Skuas from the Königsberg raid, I do have some information on these. Is there any aircraft in particular you are modelling?

 

You may know that Mushroom Publishing will be releasing a new book on the Skua soon, I contributed colour profiles for this one.

 

Hello, Kjetil:

 

Sorry it has taken so long for me to reply.  As I wrote to Øystein, I've been very busy since August and hardly ever get to spend time playing on the computer anymore.

 

I am VERY interested in building the Skua flown by Lt. Fraser Fraser-Harris of No. 803 Squadron FAA on the Königsberg Raid.  From the research I've done it would seem that the aircraft had a black right wing and white left wing on the undersides with Sea Grey under the rest of the aircraft and up the sides of the fuselage.  The tail code would have read "8H".  Is this correct?  I also intend to fit the A/C with a 500 lb. bomb, since this was the first time a major warship was sunk by bombing in time of war.  Was this an armour piercing bomb?

 

The painting of the attack on the Königsberg on the Skua web site is what I'm basing my model scheme upon.  Do you have any further information.  Do you know what the serial number was for "8H"?

 

The Special Hobby kit has no decals for this scheme, and from what I have determined the descriptions of the three colour schemes in the instructions do not match the schemes themselves:

 

>The first scheme (L2963) would actually be for the Scharnhörst Raid in July 1940, and it may have been the "L-2988?" aircraft that was flown by Lt. W.P. Lucy, code "8F", on the Königsberg Raid. Would this be correct?

 

>The second is merely the aircraft on display at the FAA Museum in Yeovilton (in early pre-Königsberg Raid codes).

 

>The third scheme is the one flown by "Kik" Filmer when he was hit by gunfire from an He111 over Andalsnes in the Romsdalsfjord on 26 Apr 1940 and ditched in the nearby harbour at Alesund.

 

As I said, none of the scheme descriptions in the instructions match the actual schemes available in the kit, as far as I can tell.

 

I intend to buy your book and am anxious to see your drawings!  Of course, I'll have to buy it before I start the kit, but the way I'm going lately, it will be a few more months before I can get started building again.

 

I would also like to build the MPM Fairey Fulmar in a Norwegian campaign scheme, but pictures of those are far and few between?  Do you have any information on FAA Fulmars in Norway?

 

Thank you for your offer to provide information on the Skua!  I will certainly welcome any information you can give me.

 

Regards,

Pat Gilmore

Bountiful, Utah USA

 

Just fixed your quotes, Arild :)

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  • 2 uker senere...

Hi Pat.

 

Regarding Fraser-Harris' Skua used on the Königbergs raid I do not know of any serial for it, although his later Skua marked "A8G" (probably only the G visible on the tailfin) was L2918. I've made preliminary profile of his Königsberg-Skua with this serial as I believe it would have looked at the time.

 

Skua_Fraser-Harris.jpg

 

Note that only the "H" was likely to be seen on the tail fin.

 

Regarding camouflage this would have had the white and black lower wings as you noted, although the left wing would have been black and the right would have been white. Upper colours would have been Extra Dark Sea Grey and Dark Slate Grey. The exact hue of these cololurs on early war Skuas is a matter of some debate but from what I understand they were locally mlixed, at least the latter did not look much like the late DSG seen on later FAA aircraft.

 

Here's some information that may help you to deduce what colours to use, note that my profiiel best macthes the faded samples:

 

Imagee.jpg

 

The 500 lb bomb used was a so-called Semi-Armor-Piercing bomb, whatever they mean by that!  :)

 

I have nothing on Fulmars operating over Norwegian waters, I'm afraid, but I do think Kyrre and Bengt do!

 

Hope this is a small step towards the completion of your Skua-model, Pat.

 

Kjetil Å

 

 

 

 

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  • 3 uker senere...

Kjetil Åkra wrote:

 

Regarding Fraser-Harris' Skua used on the Königbergs raid I do not know of any serial for it, although his later Skua marked "A8G" (probably only the G visible on the tailfin) was L2918. I've made preliminary profile of his Königsberg-Skua with this serial as I believe it would have looked at the time.

 

Note that only the "H" was likely to be seen on the tail fin.

 

Regarding camouflage this would have had the white and black lower wings as you noted, although the left wing would have been black and the right would have been white.

 

Hello, Kjetil:

 

I was basing my research on the information I found in John Dell's painting of No. 803 Squadron FAA Skuas peeling off to dive bomb the Königsberg (refer to: http://freespace.virgin.net/john.dell/AArt3.html#skuas), which show the tail codes 8L and 8B on the two nearest Skuas, which other research has confirmed as being the tail codes used during the time of the Königsberg raid in April 1940.  The single letter identification did not appear on the tail until May/June 1940, from what I understand.  Also, the underside colour is depicted as a light sea gray in John Dell's painting, not the greenish Sky that your painting shows.  Sky apparently did not appear on FAA aircraft until late 1940.

 

You are correct, though, in saying the underside of the LEFT wing was black and the right wing was white.  I had them turned around.

 

John Dell mentions in the caption under this painting:

"The first wave of Blackburn Skuas flip over to attack the German cruiser KÖnigsberg at Bergen harbour, 10th April 1940. A lot of research went into this picture, and I have received help from experts in Norway, the USA and the UK to get it as accurate as possible."

 

Anyway, I thank you for your information.  I shall certainly use it when I build my Skua model!

 

Regards,

Pat Gilmore

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  • 1 måned senere...

I am a retired USAF pilot (I flew C-141 Starlifters between 1971 and 1991)

 

Hi Pat

 

I have a experience with Starlifter.  In 1989, I was manning a dropzone at night.

The black coloured Starlifter nearly dropped ............ right on my head. ;D

 

Maybe something idea for a diorama.... ::)

 

regards

Håvard Faller

 

Hello, Håvard!

 

You have to watch out for things falling out of black objects in the sky when you work dropzones!  I was never airdrop qualified in the C-141, but I understand your dilemma.  I flew all over the world during the 20 years I flew the Starlifter, but never made it to Norway.  I flew into Denmark a number of times for NATO excercises, carrying troops and supplies, but never into Norway.

 

My brother was a fire watcher in the mountains of Idaho during the summer when he was in college and he would often climb down from his tower to sleep on the ground in a sleeping bag when the nights were clear and warm.  One morning he was dreaming of an airplane, sound and all, when he realized he was actually hearing a real airplane.  He opened his eyes just in time to see a bundle dropping toward him in a parachute, and he rolled out of the way just in time.  It was the weekly air supply drop to his fire watch tower and he was almost killed by the dropped bundle!  I'm sure you understand what he experienced.

 

Take care,

Pat Gilmore

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  • 4 måneder senere...

Hello Pat.

 

Nice to hear that you are interested in FAA aircraft operating over and around Norway during WWII.

I see that my friend Kjetil refer to me regarding Fulmars. I do have several serial numbers, but these are not tied up with

squadron codes or any other markings. I'm working on it though. We'll se what the future might bring :shifty:

These days I am rather busey with the real thing.

 

oppfrahavet1.jpg

 

This is Lieutenant Commander John Casson and Lieutenant Peter Fanshaws Skua, L2896 'A' breaking the surface for the first

time since 1940. Recovered from approx 800 feet on 9 April this year. They crash landed in the mouth of Orkdalsfiord on 13

June 1940, after taking many hits from a German Bf 11o during the ill fated attack on the German battle cruisers Scharnhorst

and Gneisenau in Trondheim harbour.

 

Serial.jpg

 

Above is parts of the serial number. As is below.

Serienummerpskrog.jpg

 

Below is the marking on the fin. Green Flight, 'A' is the sdquadron commanders aircraft.

Finne.jpg

 

In the picture below, the serial number is written with a pencil on the back of the pilots seat.

Setemedsrnummer.jpg

 

And the two camouflage colours, Dark Slate Grey and Extra Dark Sea Grey. Both seems to have faded after

severals month of use and abuse, and then 68 years in sea water.

EDSGogDSGfargeprver.jpg

 

Right no, I'm meassuring up as much as possible of the airframe and making sketches and drawings. At least we

will have a deasent drawing of the Skua. It's much work but I enjoy every second of it.

Any way. If there is any specific question you might have, feel free to fire away.

 

Regards,

Bengt

 

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