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Revell H.M.S. Campanula Flower Class Corvette, with GLS Detail Sets


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Thought I'd share my Revell Flower Class Corvette WIP, that I've been working on for the last month or so. I bought the Premium Edition version of the kit, and decided to build H.M.S. Campanula. I chose the Campanula both for the obvious reason (Nicholas Monsarrat, the author of The Cruel Sea served on her), and also for the lesser known fact that she was one of the escorts for the ships that laid the PLUTO pipeline for the Normandy landings.

Since the kit has so many well publicised problems with accuracy and detail, I decided to do a lot of corrections to her, scratchbuild some details, and also ordered some of David J. Parkins' excellent detail sets from his 'Great Little Ships' range.

For research I bought 2 books; 'Flower Class Corvettes' by John Lambert and Les Brown, and of course 'The Flower Class Corvette Agassis' by John McKay and John Harland. For inspiration I have been following this excellent build at The Ship Model Forum; Linky, as well as martyn's build on these forums. I also treated myself to the book and DVD of The Cruel Sea!

By the time I'd thought of taking pictures of the build, I'd already got stuck right in, so here's where I'm at now;

I ground down the horrible keel, assembled the hull, decks and engine room, then applied the self adhesive wooden decking. I decided to lay all the wooden decking straight onto the plastic decking, rather than smoothing down the raised detail first, and also decided not to cut out the 'steel' areas of the decking, instead, I decided I'd paint those areas a steel colour...

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Fo'c'sle fittings and wheelhouse in place...

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Funnel, bridge deck and (incorrect, which I later removed) bridge wing struts fitted...

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Mast and Radar lantern added, and steel areas of deck painted (you can also see that I've removed the incorrect bridge wing struts. I'll be scratchbuilding correct ones later on)...

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At this stage I decided to start work on one the the GLS detail sets I ordered; the Hedgehog ASW mortar...

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That's as far as I've got at the moment, more pictures to follow as the build progresses...

Edited by bruce3371
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Snap, I'll watch this 'un. Always liked the Flowers and keep meaning to build one...one day. Have you seen the old film, the Cruel Sea? There are some incredible shots a corvette in heavy seas. Tiny ship very big ocean.

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Snap, I'll watch this 'un. Always liked the Flowers and keep meaning to build one...one day. Have you seen the old film, the Cruel Sea? There are some incredible shots a corvette in heavy seas. Tiny ship very big ocean.

Yes, as part of my 'research' I treated myself to the book and the DVD! I also bought the book, film and mini series of 'Das Boot', because I'll be getting Revell's 1:72 Type VIIc to go alongside the corvette!

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Looks like your off to a very good start with this build will be watching along with the others :popcorn:

Beefy

Thanks! I've finished painting the first 2 colours of the hull (black lower, and pale grey upper), so next I'll be painting the WA (Western Approaches) camouflage colour on the upper hull...

Always enjoy a 'corvette' build :popcorn:

Cheers Kev

Me too, figured it was about time I did one myself!

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Here's a quick update; I've painted the lower hull black, and the upper hull in WA pale grey. Next job is to paint the WA pale blue camouflage pattern;

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I've still got a bit of touching up to do (the WA pale grey bled underneath the masking tape), and the gunwhales and bullwarks still need to be painted...

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Thanks! I've started work on the 2 pounder gun platform from the GLS detail set;

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I've made a bit more progress this weekend. I continued the painting of the engineroom deckhouse, painted the mast and started to build the Great Little Ships 4" BL main gun platform;

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I also made my first attempt at 'annealing' some PE (the cylindrical part between the 4 supports) and was pleased at how easy it was!

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I've still got lots of touching up to do on the paint work!!

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Quick update; I've added the funnel overlays, and the new mast from the Great Little Ships Funnel and Mast set. I've also made the first of the corrections that I need to make to build an accurate H.M.S. Campanula; I cut away the arch-shaped support for the Radar tower, ready for the plain support posts to be added later...

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Superb work of a great little ship

John

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Superb work of a great little ship

John

Thanks!

Here's a couple more pictures of the work I've been doing on the new mast;

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The first picture shows the crow's nest and lantern fitted, and the 2nd picture shows the spar fitted.

Next job will be to finish adding all the fittings to the mast, then painting and decalling the funnel, ready for the rest of the funnel fittings to be added.

I must say, while the white metal parts are really fragile and require lots of work, I've been really impressed with the Great Little Ships detail sets. They're not cheap, but they really are top quality!

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  • 2 weeks later...

I've made some more progress with the Great Little Ships Mast & Funnel set;

The first 3 pictures show the PE ladder attached to the mast. The ladder was REALLY fiddly! It consisted of 3, long, thin strips; the rungs and the risers(?), all of which had to be kept straight while I glued a small section at a time...

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The next picture shows the first of the fittings glued to the spar (yard arm?)...

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The next 2 pictures show the frame around the top of the crow's nest; another really fiddly job!

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The last 2 pictures show the pre-rolled overlay for the kit funnel, and the PE details glued to the shorter pair of boiler room vents...

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This last picture shows my favourite part of the Mast & Funnel set - the PE, pre-rolled overlay for the kit funnel;

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I've done a little bit more to the model since these pictures were taken, like grinding away the plastic kit mounts for the bridge wing Oerlikons (ready for the holes that remain to be filled, and the GLS Oerlikons to be fitted), painting the lower section of the funnel overlay, and touching up the overall paint job around the deck superstructure.


More pictures to follow soon!

Edited by bruce3371
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  • 2 weeks later...

I lost my Mojo with this build for a little while, but after seeing Martyn's updates on his Flower Class thread, I'm feeling inspired again. I'll hopefully have some progress to report soon!

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Keep it coming buddy, we need all the corvettes we can get . . .

I find if I get stuck/bored/frustrated I move onto a different sub assembly.

Keeps me going its supposed to be entertaining not a chore :yahoo:

Cheers Kev

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Keep it coming buddy, we need all the corvettes we can get . . .

I find if I get stuck/bored/frustrated I move onto a different sub assembly.

Keeps me going its supposed to be entertaining not a chore :yahoo:

Cheers Kev

Unfortunately, the new mast got damaged, and one of the parts was lost to the carpet monster. I think that's what made me lose my Mojo for a while! Fortunately, having recently bought a lot of materials for scratchbuilding the necessary corrections, I'll be able to make a replacement, so that's top of my list of jobs to be done! After that, I need to finish off the mast, then I've got a LOT of painting to catch up on!!

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