Peruvian Cruiser Almirante Guise 1/700

[proditor]

Yeah, I'm insane for doing this, but I'm feeling my oats after finishing the Vyborg in 5 days. The base for this build is going to be the very old Matchbox USS Atlanta (reboxed by AMT) and a very nice Los Angeles class bridge off of Shapeways from the Vietnam era. This is going to be a crazy late 80's final modernization with Sea Sparrow, twin Phalanx, possibly ASROC, and 4, count 'em, 4, 76mm Super-rapids.

The plan is to replace all 8 twin 5" mounts with the 76mm Super-rapids, the sea Sparrow, ASROC, and for the wings, the Phalanx. Believe it or not, that still leaves me some space for various smaller weapons, but seriously, what I'm planning on sticking on here is overkill. Maybe a set oh harpoons at the aft? Dunno, still thinking on that score. To make this work, I'm probably going to have take serious advantage of the prep rules for this one.

[proditor]

And this is what I'll be using.

[Thorvic]

Nice idea I guess it also means Lattice masts and Radar plus plenty of sensors  . A FRAM II Atlanta class.

I would drop the ASROC and add Exocet if you have any of the Airfix 1/600 Falklands ships as they are better sized for 700 scale than the Pitroad ones that are nearer 1//600 

[proditor]

Yeah that's a good point, it's not like I'm equipping this for multi-purpose or dedicated ASW.  The original plan was to go with 6 OTOs and 2 Phalanx and make it a GUN cruiser.. Heh.

[Thorvic]

Yeah that's a good point, it's not like I'm equipping this for multi-purpose or dedicated ASW.  The original plan was to go with 6 OTOs and 2 Phalanx and make it a GUN cruiser.. Heh.

Didn't Peru get Italian Frigates ? you could mix the Oto  127mm with the 76mm guns and possibly switch the Phalanx to the twin Breda with can be found on the NATO weapons sprue Pitroad did that's now with Dragon RN kits (bar HMS Dragon !, which had the modern ship sprue for the Phalanx and Harpoon - but you do get a tasty Merlin HM1 in place of the Lynx  ).

I must admit I did look at the Flyhawk Naiad to see how that could be modernised but decided to wait on the Trumpeter 1959 HMS Belfast to come out as additional copies of that kit may be handy for other post war conversions

Certainly one I'm looking forward to seeing how it comes together, and a nice way to use an old kit   

[Captain Canada]

Cool idea I love watching you guys do these ships ! And again, excellent box art that painting is excellent !

[proditor]

I embarrassingly missed the kick-off due to work shenanigans. 

So now, time to make up lost time.

Start of last night:



End of last night:



And I also finished Sherlock, Season 4.

[Weaver]

Peru actually refitted their old Darings with twin Breda-Bofors Fast-Forties as well, so it was obviously a system they thought highly of.

[Thorvic]

Peru actually refitted their old Darings with twin Breda-Bofors Fast-Forties as well, so it was obviously a system they thought highly of.

The Peruvian modernised Daring's will probably be handy for ideas as they got plated masts and the Dutch radar as well as the Breda's and the Exocets.

Prod appears to have the current Pitroad US/JMSDF equipment sprue there going off the Chinook, that should have the Radar on but the Breda's are on the NATO sprue.

Onto the build you can see why Pitroad and most others do one piece hulls with a base plate, those matchbox hulls with separate hull sides deck and base are real buggers to get together and keep true as they have no internal bracing and the sprue layout and nature of the boxing can lead to the hulls sides getting warped or distorted.
Looking forward to see that 3D printed Los Angeles bridge fitted as it should really change the look and feel on the ship, interesting to see the Type 42 funnel as a streamlined single funnel rather than the twin funnels as that's going to really change the silhouette of the design  . The alternative would be Mack's but that would give it that very 60s USN/JMSDF look, so the single modern funnel will give it that 80s look your after 

[proditor]

You have all read my mind. 

I didn't go for the Bredas, though i looked at them for a very, very long time. I decided to go with Phalanx, since I went with the Mk 92 Fire Control with added STIR for missile and gun direction, the logic is that the ship was refit a couple times, lastly by Peru with aid from the US in the form of electronics and weaponry.

And I got a massive amount done.  Like woah.  So, the pics from end of last night, and about an hour ago today.



This was really the end of gross construction. Trunked funnels, new Bridge, refit electronics, new aft mast for the radar. Then I did small details like hawsers and such, and threw on the first base coat of paint to get an idea of how it all came together.  Overall, I'm pretty pleased.

[Thorvic]

Wow really has come along

You might want to add a few more life raft canisters and maybe some small RIBs as these old cruisers will be crew heavy 

[proditor]

Ya know, I was thinking life canisters along the stack line, and then some RIBs inbetween the boats. And then i got lazy. 

Thanks for keeping me honest. 

[proditor]

The last two days have been a flurry of painting, adding little bits, more painting, shading, and then deciding I needed to do more painting.

I looked at the pictures of the Admirlante Grau, Peru's RL all gun cruiser, and I took some painting cues from that. This is where I thought I was finished at the beginning of last night:







I figured i was done, it was all good, and I started taking the wrap-up photos. Then i went back to my reference, and realized I could do better. More on that next post.

[proditor]

Peru - 1985

At the end of the Second World War, the United States was blessed and cursed with the most powerful navy on the planet. The blessing was obvious, but the curse came about in the next few years as the Soviets began massively expanding their own navy. Emboldened by their ability to split Japan's occupation as they had Germany's, the USSR began churning out a surface fleet to rival the Americans. The United States became rightly worried as this new fleet embraced all of the lessons of the last war, unlike their fleet which only did so for those ships constructed at the very end. So while the US had a huge quantitative lead, the quality gap was narrower than what the Pentagon was willing to accept.

It was almost impossible to get new build ships through for a populace already weary of last world war, so the Pentagon resorted to the time honored sneak of "upgrades". It always seemed to be easier to say you were just going to upgrade an existing ship, even if it was an almost complete rebuild, than to build one from the keel up, at least when it came to Congressional budgets.  It had worked repeatedly throughout the history of the Navy; the rebuild of the Constellation, the entire "New Navy" series of Monitors, and now it was employed again to update the fleet escorts at more capable ASW platforms, and to bring the first generation of missile cruisers into beings.

One of the odder refits was to the USS San Diego. Originally constructed as a standard Atlanta class Destroyer Leader/Light Cruiser/AA Cruiser, she was taken in hand at the war's end and initially decommissioned along with hundreds of other ships. She was preserved in the mothball fleet until the last 50's when it was thought to update her alongside some of the other cruiser classes. The first rebuild was fairly extensive and resulted in trunking the funnels into one large exhaust, the removal of all 40mm and 20mm guns, aa well as removing the torpedo tubes. She received a new bridge, her electronics were updated, and she was refit with ten of the new 3" dual mounts that had replaced the 40mm cannon as the standard anti-aircraft weapon. She and her similarly refit sister San Juan saw duty off the coast of Korea serving as guardians for the aircraft carriers. As that conflict ended, the ships again were sent to the mothball fleet. By now, there were four remaining Atlanta class ships, Oakland and Reno were both scavenged for replacement parts to keep their sisters functioning.

The ships stayed in mothballs until the late 70's when the administration looked to make a symbolic move by emptying out most of the reserve fleet. Though it angered a lot of people, most notably the Navy admirals that were still trying to manage a tenuous game of superiority with the Soviet Union, the liquidation went though, and it was like a fire sale of naval ships. Some of them were in great shape, some of them were barely serviceable, but all of them went for pennies on the dollar, and the fleets of many smaller countries suddenly expanded.

This was when the San Juan went through her last and final refit. Purchased by Peru, the cruiser was refit in the United States by Todd Pacific Shipyards - San Pedro, in large part due to that yards familiarity in building the Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates. The renamed Almirante Guise would utilize a similar Radar and identical fire control system as the frigates. The refit took the better part of two years, but when the Guise sailed for Peru, it was hard to deny her capabilities. Armed with four 76mm Oto-Melara cannons, a Sea Sparrow launcher, two Phalanx CIWS, and eight Harpoon SSMs, she represented an extremely potent surface warfare capability. Since the ship had already been refit so extensively in the 50's, and the purchase price was reduced even more because Peru had the new refit completed in the US, the Guise was sailed south as one of the most effective ships as well.

The Almirante Guise serves as an interesting comparison to her sister cruiser in the Peruvian Navy; the Almirante Grau. Not as extensively modernized intially, the Grau is a more recent ship. The comparison of the two very similar ships is still a subject of hypothetical debate in Naval circles.

[Thorvic]

Excellent work the extra effort to refine the paint scheme has certainly improved the look.