The kit was built to represent the Laffey on November 13, 1942, while she's engaged in her famous point blank duel with the Japanese battleship Hiei, during the famous Naval Battle of Guadalcanal.   

As most who visit this website are probably aware, the two ships were so close together, that Hiei's guns couldn't depress to hit the American ship, while Laffey riddled Hiei's superstructure with 5in and 20mm gunfire, wounding the Japanese commander, Vice Admiral Hiroaki Abe, and killing his chief of staff, Commander Suzuki Masakane.  

Shortly thereafter, Laffey was hit by at least one 14" shell, as well as gunfire and at least one torpedo from the escorting Japanese destroyers.  While abandoning ship, Laffey's after magazines detonated, killing 59 of the crew.   She now sits upright on the bottom of Ironbottom sound, with both her forward 5in guns and director turned to port, still ready to engage the unseen enemy.  Hiei survived the night, but, heavily damaged, she sank late the next day, after repeated American air attacks, which were launched from the very airstrip the Japanese force has been sent to neutralize.   

The Dragon Benson/Gleaves kits contain lots and lots of parts and are very detailed, but are also very complicated to build.  Unfortunately, the Laffey kit has an error, where the area between the forward funnel and superstructure should be more open, with that forward funnel's uptakes trunked into the deck, not covered with a deck-house.    The deck-house was cut back and Evergreen plastic strip was used to replicate the funnel.   Based on plans of a similarly constructed sister (and lots and lots of photos), I fabricated walkways from the shortened deck-house to the read of the bridge.   It's probably not 100% accurate, but it all looks the part.   As a result of all this work, I had to fabricate a new main mast from brass tube and rod.  

Photo-etch if from Gold Medal Models' Benson/Gleaves class set.  While I used the kit main battery turrets and 20mm guns, I upgraded lots of other parts with 3D printed parts from both Model Monkey and Black Cat, including:

• Mk 37 director
• Ships boats and rafts (the number and placement of the rafts were changed to match photos)
  
• 1.1 inch gun
• Winch
  
• Smoke dischargers
• Lookout chairs
• Searchlight

Figures are from Dragon.  

I also added some brass rod to the aft funnel to create stays for the antennas.  Model was rigged with a combination of Uschi and Infini line.  Paints are from the Colourcoats range.  Model was weathered with oils, using the "dot filter" technique.   Seascape is a piece of insulation foam, sculpted and finished using the Chris Flodberg method.

The model placed 3rd in it's category at the 2021 IPMS USA National Convention in Las Vegas, NV.

Gallery updated 11/13/2021

© ModelWarships.com