KenR : HMS Icarus and the U-744 (60 Points)

 Hopefully I will be able to sneak this one in under the wire, a bit of photo etch rage on the Destroyer stopped me posting earlier, and people say this is a relaxing hobby !

This post is for two models who meet in the photograph above as they did in real life on the 6th March 1944.

HMS Icarus was an I Class Destroyer built in 1937 and is typical of the 4 x 4.7 inch single turret arrangement of most early British Destroyer. The ship is built from a HMS Ilex 1/700 kit from IBG Models, I've just changed the pennant number on the sides and rear of the ship to the I03 of Icarus.

As you can see from the pictures the model comes with a lot of photo etch and I have to admit some of it ended up in the bin, handrails I have got the hang of (I do love how they look) but the complex bending of some parts around complicated features led to a lot of breakages, never mind the swearing.

The pendants amongst you may realise I've glued the central AA platform on backwards, I know I have but I'd finished everything before I realised and as far as I was concerned I'd passed the point of no return !

I wanted a HMS Icarus as she was present at the 2nd Battle of Narvik (a potential future demo game) as well as being one of the Destroyers escorting Hood and POW on the chase for the Bismark. She also came in handy for this post and an action towards the end of the war.

Sticking with my previous scoring I have gone for 40 pts.

The second vessel in this post is a surfaced U Boat, this is a Hobby Boss kit in 1/700 scale of a Type VIIC Submarine. I've ditched the bottom part of the hull and put it on a sea base to fit in with the other ships I have. I've added a few deck crew from my 1/700 Eduard Set to give the model a bit of life. I gave the crew a wash with Army Painter dull tone, although I liked the look of the German Destroyer I did with the crew a lot, I felt some of the crew were a bit bright, so I experimented with dulling down the crew on this vessel and perfer these more, so I will give the Destroyer crew a wash later. 

Points wise I've gone for 20, its on a 15 x 4 base opposed to the 22 x 6 of the Destroyer, so I've just halved the number of points.

The two vessels met in March 1944, on only her second Patrol U-744 was chased by a number of ships including Icarus for 21 hours, eventually being forces to the surface following a depth charge run by the British Ship. The U Boat was boarded and a number of important documents recovered however a number of these were lost whilst being transferred to the Icarus, the submarine was taken under tow but that too failed and the U Boat was subsequently scuttled.

For the Naval Project I have Ark Royal nearly complete and Prinz Eugen ready to prime, so that will probably be it, although I may sneak in a Destroyer or two before the end, but that might be a stretch especially if we are loosing a couple of days. I have some 10mm Malburian to post but I will do a round up post for them at Challenge End. Oh, there's the matter of some Italian Wars Spanish too !

Another pair of stunning ships Ken.  It sounds like it's a good thing that the Icarus wasn't the ship selected for the live tweet build!  It's been a few weeks since we've had a photo etched parts rant from you, so I had figured you'd slain that beast.  I guess not.

Anyway, HMS Icarus looks great and suitably grimy.  Maybe the rough North Atlantic weather washed off some of the fragile photo etched bits.  Not the most auspicious of names however, the RN did love to troll Greek mythology for names regardless of how inappropriate they might be.  I remember my dad teasing a fellow officer for having served on HMS Hesperus (did the wreck occur on your watch?) and there was once an HMS Charon serving as a hospital ship.

Also love the chopped down U boat.