The term "long hull" and "short hull" is somewhat deceptive, as the hulls weren't really any longer, at least not at the waterline. The short hulls had a fairly blunt bow and single quad 40mm mounts at the very bow and stern. The long hulls were an effort to add more AA to the class, and saw the structures at the bow and stern changed to allow for more mounts in these areas. The bow extended further forward in more of a sharper "clipper" shape to allow two quad 40mm tubs and their associated directors, and the stern had an extra extension build on that also allowed an increase from one to two mounts and directors. Along with this, an effort was made to increase these mounts firing arc and the flight deck at the bow and stern edges were cut back by eleven feet on the bow and 7 feet on the stern. Only three ships were launched with this configuration, and of those, only CV-19 Hancock went to war with it.

Five long hulls were launched early enough to see service during the war, and CV-14 Ticonderoga was the first of these. Because of this, it is not uncommon for these ships to be referred to as the Ticonderoga class, even though there is not much different between the two. Other long-hulls that saw service were CV-15 Randolph, CV-19 Hancock, CV-20 Bennington, and CV-38 Shangri La. CV-36 Antietam was launched in January of 1945 but was only three days out of Pearl Harbor when the war ended.

A new platform for the forward open 5"/38 gallery and quad 40mm that was next to them is included to represent the later configuration where this quad 40mm was lowered and the notch in the flight deck above it filled to allow for better movement and spotting of aircraft. The original piece is also included, which is handy for reason I'll cover later. Other additions with this tree are some 20mm galleries, a revised platform for the bridge, and an SK-2 radar. Sixteen aircraft are provided, four each of the SBD, F4U, TBF, and SB2C.

While a decent effort, Trumpeter fell down on several key details. The biggest potential pitfall I can see lies in the manner in which Trumpeter chose to add the new bow shape. The chopped short hull may cause potential fit problems for builders; my hull cut was not straight, appeared to be cut a little short, and had a curve to the cut near the waterline that was probably the result of the plastic flexing during the cut. Originally I thought that it might be a simple matter of truing up the cut, but test fitting the new foc'sl deck and all three hull pieces revealed that the cut in the main section of the hull was about 1-1.75mm (1/32-3/32") too short, leaving a variable width gap about that much on both sides. It's hard to line to port side up correctly without the bottom hull, so I would advise waterline builders to at least tape the two upper pieces to the lower hull when trying to line everything up correctly, otherwise you'll have a bow section that's pointing off centerline.

There were three of these cutouts. Two of them were for the quad 40mm mounts that were next to the open 5"/38 galleries that were originally mounted higher than the 5" galleries in order to give them a better firing arc. These cut outs made spotting planes during landing and take-off more difficult and the mounts were dropped down so the cut outs could be planked over. My research hasn't nailed down an exact date but it was before she left the west coast for war in November of 1944. This is also true for the third cut out, a large one forward of the deck-edge elevator on the port side where the two quad 40mm mounts were on the old hangar catapult sponson. The original plans had been to mount an additional Mk 37 fire control director on this sponson, but the airgroup objected to this as it would have been a hazard to air operations. The mount was deleted but the structure was build for it any way to expedite Ticonderoga's completion. This cut-out is not molded either, another case of late-war outline on an early war fit.

Another change to the flight deck is that the Mk 51s that were originally mounted between the quad 40s on the bow were moved up to the forward corners when the deck was extended forward. This was done as the new overhang severly limited their arc of effectiveness. A goof that Trumpeter made with quad 40s was the inclusion of two extra mounts in step 13, port side, aft of the deck edge elevator. This was a later addition that was not present on shakedown or her first war patrol. Easy enough to fix.

Trumpeter provided a new platform for the bridge level of the island, but the shape of the bridge enclosure itself is still wrong. It's sort of a rounded off rectangle when it should be just a straight curve. It may not too noticable when the Mk 51 overhead is mounted correctly, but it noticably cramps the platform. The Mk 51 I mentioned earlier should be mounted so that about half of it hangs off the forward end of the bridge, which is different than where the kit's alining hole would have it.

The hull itself has a minor problem in that the mount fot the hangar deck catapult is still present on the starboard side. This should be flush with a platform that was folded up in this area (see picture NH 92243 on the Navy Historical Center's CV-14 page. In some pictures this platform is actually hanging down. I found that the hull bottom's torpedo armor didn't line up with the upper hull's representation of the armor.

Ticonderoga never had SBDs so these should be used on another ship or to stock the spares box. The decals for the air group are incorrect in that they provide inverted triangles; correct for her 1945 patrol but not for her shakedown (which were just plane numbers and stars & bars) or first patrol (inverted chevrons, numbers, and stars & bars).

The ship's markings are incorrect as well. I can find no evidence that Ticonderoga ever had a "14" on her bow, so leave those off. The Deck markings position the center line in the wrong area and elevator markings are incorrect. Trumpeter has you run the centerline stripes through the center of the rear elevator and a simple "X" intersect with it; in actuality this elevator wasn't mounted on the centerline of the deck and the deck itself wasn't centered on the hull. So the "center line" actually ran to port of the elevator centerline, and the centerline of the elevator had its own *solid* centerline.

Finally, there were two 20mms on the main (hangar) deck level starboard side, aft of the rear crane. This was common on some of the other ships of this class so reference shots should help you with the fabrication of the missing splinter shield should you decide to add this feature.

I recommend this kit to anyone who wants to do a long-hulled essex, but I must admit that I am a bit disappointed in this release as it uncharacteristically does not follow Trumpeter's pattern of noticeable improvement with each release. Even the box art is a step back; it's just not inspiring at all.