Some thoughts from reading No Right to Win

[R Leonard]

Yorktown generally eschewed tricing aircraft to the overhead of the hangar deck, a lesson learned over north Atlantic duty, and as a Ewen notes above, a practice BuShips ordered discontinued in future carriers. Essex class carriers were certainly capable of tricing planes to the overhead in the original design, but it was emphatically discouraged. By the time of Midway, you already would not see a hangar overhead stored aircraft on Yorktown, they were well aware of the danger and simply did not do so.

Explanation of Tom Cheek's F4F upside down on a trolley is much simpler. Landing aboard after completing the morning TBD escort mission, his tail hook skipped over the arrestor cables and he bounced into the top of the crash barrier, flipping the plane over so that it came to a halt upside down on the flight deck. After Tom ("Get this damn thing off me!"), whom I knew, was extracted with naught but cuts and bruises, the plane was lifted on to the trolley and struck below to the hangar deck. It was still there when the ship went down.

 

[Gilder]

Not really.

It was the USN practice from at least the introduction of the Lexingtons to service in 1928 until late 1942 to carry spare aircraft "triced" (i.e. hung / suspended) from the hangar roof either fully assembled or partially dismantled according to type. For monoplane types the fuselage could be fitted between the overhead deck beams leaving only the wings / lower fuselage to impact the 17ft 3in clear hangar height under the beams on a Yorktown.

The last USN carrier class designed to trice aircraft into the hangar overhead was the Essex. The Midway class, with the weight of the armoured flight deck to account for, was designed with an aircraft storage area aft of the main hangar. By the time they began to complete in 1945, this was simply treated as additional hangar space.

From looking at the photo, the forward end of the fuselage / cowling is probably more heavily damaged than the tail, which would suggest it fell first. Photo probably taken during the recovery process rather than immediately after the fall. Maybe lowering it onto its back first was the best way of clearing the problem.

This is a photo of the Enterprise hangar deck from Oct 1941. Note the TBD and SBD tricked into the hangar roof in the background.

https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/OnlineLibrary/photos/images/g10000/g17425.jpg

This is from the Damage Report of CV-7 Wasp and explains why the practice was ended.


"Stowage of Aircraft in the Overhead
Bays of the Hangar
47. It has been noted in paragraphs 4, 14 and 39 that
the tricing arrangements for four planes triced to the over-
head in the forward portion of the hangar carried away be-
cause of shock and permitted the planes to crash onto other
aircraft parked on the deck. The plane gasoline tanks could
not have escaped damage and gasoline must haye spread into
the hangar. This gasoline was unquestionably the origin
of the fir6 in the hangar.
48. War experience on other carriers subjected to bombing
attack has demonstrated that fires among triced aircraft
are not only apt to occur but that such fires are very diffi-
cult to control and extinguish because of the overhead loca-
tion. Fires among triced aircraft occurred on both ENTERPRISE
and HORNET, and in both cases were difficult to extinguish.
49. The dangers of overhead stowage for planes have been
recognized since the early days of the present war, and on
21 March, 1942 the Secretary of the Navy approved the design
characteristics for the CVB41 class which s-tated, "reserve
airplane stowage to be provided, if practicable, on the same
level as and adjacent to the ends of the hangar to elimina~e
plane s towage overhead".
50. Overhead plane stowage has been omitted on some of
the vessels of the CV9 class because of the strengthening
of the flight deck required to permit operation of the latest
types of heavy planes. strengthening involved the addition
of girders under the flight deck which prohibited the installa-
tion of tricing arrangements. The removal of tricing arrange-
ments from all other carriers in service or under construction
is now under serious consideration."

Many thanks.

 

[Skywalker Jin]

Yorktown generally eschewed tricing aircraft to the overhead of the hangar deck, a lesson learned over north Atlantic duty, and as a Ewen notes above, a practice BuShips ordered discontinued in future carriers. Essex class carriers were certainly capable of tricing planes to the overhead in the original design, but it was emphatically discouraged. By the time of Midway, you already would not see a hangar overhead stored aircraft on Yorktown, they were well aware of the danger and simply did not do so.

Explanation of Tom Cheek's F4F upside down on a trolley is much simpler. Landing aboard after completing the morning TBD escort mission, his tail hook skipped over the arrestor cables and he bounced into the top of the crash barrier, flipping the plane over so that it came to a halt upside down on the flight deck. After Tom ("Get this damn thing off me!"), whom I knew, was extracted with naught but cuts and bruises, the plane was lifted on to the trolley and struck below to the hangar deck. It was still there when the ship went down.

Cheek described the air combat against Zeros in detail in this book and I'm sure that I can restore the battle damage on his cat.

 

[Skywalker Jin]

Guys, I'm now planning to make a 700 scale YorktownCV-5 and her status would be 1942.6.4,her first wave of attack.
Tom Cheek mentioned that Yorktown had five types of AA weapon, I have found all but .30 machine gun's 3D-printed set.

But until now I haven't got ANY photo for the "30-caliber machine gun"
Wikipedia shows that she ONLY had 50-caliber machine guns

I wish someone could help me……

 

[Skywalker Jin]

Seems that Yorktown's TBD-1 still has national insignia like Battle of Coral Sea? Why didn't they delete the red dot in the center

 

[Shortround6]

But until now I haven't got ANY photo for the "30-caliber machine gun"
Wikipedia shows that she ONLY had 50-caliber machine guns

Wiki says that the Wasp (CV-7) didn't have any .30 cal guns either.
But

USA 0.30" (7.62 mm) Machine Guns - NavWeaps

www.navweaps.com

Has a picture of the CO, Capt. Forrest P. Sherman standing next to one on the bridge.
How many they had and for how long I don't know. The .30s didn't last long as they were replaced by .50s and 20mm guns as soon as possible.

It is a very hard weapon to model even in bigger scale as it is both considerably smaller than .50 cal and it has no real footprint. That is it was just stuck in the end of a post with no cleared space around it, no shield, no gun tub etc. I would imagine the guns were mounted in boxes/lockers or secure locations when action was not immanent to keep them out of the weather.
It was also 'possible' that some crews on carriers rigged mounts for spare .30 cal machineguns that were intended for Devastator and Dauntless aircraft.

 

[Wurger]

Looking at the pic I would say the MG is nothing more but the well known US Army Browning M1917A1 or M1919 cal.30 machine gun but with the water-cooled barrel. IMHO the lenght in 1:700 scale would be about 1.5mm.

 

[SaparotRob]

View attachment 890726
Seems that Yorktown's TBD-1 still has national insignia like Battle of Coral Sea? Why didn't they delete the red dot in the center

Busy with other stuff? Getting her back to Pearl and repairing battle damage along the way might have been more of a priority. Perhaps that TBD was out of the way, not bothering anybody at the time.

 

[Skywalker Jin]

Busy with other stuff? Getting her back to Pearl and repairing battle damage along the way might have been more of a priority. Perhaps that TBD was out of the way, not bothering anybody at the time.

I agree with you.

 

[Frog]

Looking at the pic I would say the MG is nothing more but the well known US Army Browning M1917A1 or M1919 cal.30 machine gun but with the water-cooled barrel. IMHO the lenght in 1:700 scale would be about 1.5mm.

Possibly served by the ship's Marine detachment.

 

[Skywalker Jin]

From Shattered Sword P1792:

Yorktown also carried three additional nonoperational aircraft; two F4F and one TBD triced up in the hangar overhead.

Those F4Fs couldn't be -4s for they were fresh out of the factory and had undergone Thach's test, if one -4 was nonoperational, they wouldn't carry it aboard.

This type of wing should be one of those cats:

 

[R Leonard]

Before departing Norfolk in December 1941. Yorktown received 20mm replacements for the originally installed .50 cal machine guns. They were supposed to turn in the .50 cal guns, but it was found that the .50 cal guns could be mounted to the open end of the typical railing stanchion. Gunnery officer, LCDR Ernest J Davis, decided to keep the .50 cal guns as insurance. I am un-aware of any .30 cal guns on Yorktown other than the free guns of the SBDs and TBDs.

The two non-operational F4Fs carried aboard Yorktown were both F4F-4s BuNos 5145 and 5146 which were wrecked in a flightdeck landing crash on 29 May 1942. 5145 was noted in a 13 Jun 1942 Monthly Report of Aircraft Operating Time as requiring major overhaul and 5146 noted as a strike. There were replacement wings for F4F-3s (not to mention SBDs and TBDs) stored along the bulkheads of the hangar deck.

The TBD was a VT-5 hangar queen (not sure of the BuNo) and the exception to the Yorktown tricing practice, err, or lack thereof. To get it off the ship they would have had to lower it down, drag it over to an elevator, move to the flightdeck, hoist it off the flightdeck with a crane and down to the drydock pierside. From there, the problem of getting across the water to Ford Island for a depot level repair rears its ugly head . . . All that amongst the three days they had to effect Coral Sea damage and charge on off, for certes there was plenty otherwise to keep folks busy. Not worth the trouble, no more than lowering it just to paint out the red on the insignia and stripes off the tail, after all, it wasn't going to fly anywhere any time soon.

 

[Skywalker Jin]

Before departing Norfolk in December 1941. Yorktown received 20mm replacements for the originally installed .50 cal machine guns. They were supposed to turn in the .50 cal guns, but it was found that the .50 cal guns could be mounted to the open end of the typical railing stanchion. Gunnery officer, LCDR Ernest J Davis, decided to keep the .50 cal guns as insurance. I am un-aware of any .30 cal guns on Yorktown other than the free guns of the SBDs and TBDs.

The two non-operational F4Fs carried aboard Yorktown were both F4F-4s BuNos 5145 and 5146 which were wrecked in a flightdeck landing crash on 29 May 1942. 5145 was noted in a 13 Jun 1942 Monthly Report of Aircraft Operating Time as requiring major overhaul and 5146 noted as a strike. There were replacement wings for F4F-3s (not to mention SBDs and TBDs) stored along the bulkheads of the hangar deck.

The TBD was a VT-5 hangar queen (not sure of the BuNo) and the exception to the Yorktown tricing practice, err, or lack thereof. To get it off the ship they would have had to lower it down, drag it over to an elevator, move to the flightdeck, hoist it off the flightdeck with a crane and down to the drydock pierside. From there, the problem of getting across the water to Ford Island for a depot level repair rears its ugly head . . . All that amongst the three days they had to effect Coral Sea damage and charge on off, for certes there was plenty otherwise to keep folks busy. Not worth the trouble, no more than lowering it just to paint out the red on the insignia and stripes off the tail, after all, it wasn't going to fly anywhere any time soon.

A friend of mine has made a 1/700 Yorktown like this

I wonder whether this stowage of propellers is right and a 'resonable' number of wings for replacement(I am preparing a model)
Also he is the guy who consults me for specific numbers of those aircrafts in another thread I posted yesterday