Tamiya E-Class Destroyer +++FINISHED+++

[Ray S]

9 minutes ago, Ray S said:

Hello all, well as promised I managed to stay indoors for a while today and got some of Escapade done. I bent to shape the forward carley float racks and fitted them to the fo'c'sle deck, and I found a pair of Trumpeter carley floats left over from a build of HMS Eskimo. They look different to the Tamiya versions, which are fitted to the rear of the midships gun platform. Some ships had another rack at the aft gun platform, but my images do not show them fitted (that I can see) and I have no spare floats anyway. When I fitted the racks, I remembered to leave some space for the railings which still need fitting.

 

 

Then came the 16' dinghy - there were 4 oars and a rudder to fit. Well, I managed to get two oars in, lost one and heaven knows what happened to the rudder (if anyone asks I will say it is stowed inboard). You can see the stack of three Carley floats here, they are much thinner than the Trumpeter ones.

 

 

In that image I can see I still need to retouch some of the oar paintwork as a hint of brass is glowing like a beacon...

 

One thing I like about super-hyper-mega-close-up imaging is that you can see all sorts of issues with your paintwork. For another example:

 

 

This photo shows an enormous black blob intruding onto the upper part of they grey of the aft funnel, but when I was looking at the ship just now I could hardly see it, although now it is obvious of course. The aft funnel platform was interesting to fit, it is pretty small and there was hardly any space to get even very fine pointed tweezers in, position the part and open the tweezers to release it. And then paint behind it.

 

The main mast has been fitted. I needed to open up the slot at the fore end of the aft gun platform to get the rake to the right angle, as well as open up the location hole. This was caused by me using .8mm brass rod for the mast, and it is slightly thicker than the kit part was, so is not a problem with the kit. I fitted the etch mainmast yardarm over the brass part soldered previously, and any rigging I add later will go over that. I remembered very early (2am) this morning that I needed to fit that part before I did the rigging between the masts later on.

 

 

I had a bit more luck with the 30' gig and its oars. Five were supplied, but I managed to fit 4 this time. I used a smear of Glue'N'Glaze again on one 'seat' in the thwarts to gently hold each oar in place then used some thin CA to secure them properly, then dry brushed the oars with Revell Wood Brown to lift them out from the Humbrol 110 thwarts. I will need to get a magnifier to see if there are any stray brass bits showing. I was also successful with getting the rudder on this time.

 

 

And finally, here is how she looks at the moment:

 

 

That is it for now,

 

All the best, Ray

 

 

 

 

 

Ah-Ha, it looks like I hit Quote instead of Edit!

 

I think the twenty minutes I had in the sun earlier addled my brains!

 

Ray thehumblysorry

Edited June 17, 2017 by Ray S
Added extra info!

[Ray S]

Hello all, lets see if I do this post without messing up today!

 

I have had a bit of R&B today. No, not music but Rigging and Base. First up was the rigging. I wanted to get four cables across the masts, so I Blue-Tacked the ship to a sheet of paper and put a sausage of Blue-Tack fore and aft of the ship. Out came the Caenis thread, which I cut way over-sized and pressed on end into one of the Blue-Tack rolls, then threaded the thread through the upper yardarm stays on the fore- and main-masts, then pressed it into the other piece of Blue-Tack. I did this for both threads on one side of Escapade, then secured them straight away with thin CA, rather than using Gum Arabic this time. I turned the ship around then completed the other side. When the CA had dried, I carefully cut away the surplus thread with the razor blade.

 

 

There will be more rigging fitted later, but that needs to be done after the railings are finished. In the meantime I started on the sea base. I cut out a piece of MDF, rather badly (my sawing has never been the straight-line variety) and then used a rasp and sandpaper to even it out. I cut out a piece of textured card, drew around the base of the ship (on the back of the card) then used a fresh Stanley blade to cut out the waterline shape, just slightly oversized. I then stuck that down onto the MDF with a liberal smearing of PVA glue, and weighted it down with a spare socket set that just happened to be in my room.

 

 

When that had dried sufficiently, I just had to try the ship for size:-

 

 

It fitted quite well. This is the best I have managed when cutting out the shape of the waterline. Previously I had used a scalpel (hand held) but did not seem to have the control. This time the knife of choice was a Stanley knife in a good solid metal holder, and it seemed like the extra weight gave me much more control, I was even able to cut around the curve at the stern okay. I have given the water its first coat of paint, Winsor and Newton Prussian Blue Hue. It will need a few extra coats but it does dry quite quickly. I have decided that the sea state is calm with no swell or breaking wavelets, and Escapade will be moving through the water at a sedate pace, so will not have a spectacular wake or bow wave.

 

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Ray

Edited June 19, 2017 by Ray S
Tidy up the post

[beefy66]

Ray that is starting to look the part now and I like your base color tiny rigging though  

 

beefy

[Hewy]

Very nice Ray, good job on the delicate rigging. 

Glynn

[Ray S]

Beefy and Glynn, thanks for those kind comments! The rigging is rather delicate, and I have to keep remembering it is there when I pick the ship up!

 

I have tweeked the base a bit, I felt the original blue was a bit too bright, so I overcoated with a slightly thinner covering of Prussian Blue hue mixed with a bit of Paynes grey. This left some of the tonal variation that was in the original, but darkened it just a touch

 

 

I then started on the wake. First I mixed some of the Prussian Blue with a bit of a very light Olive and thinned that just a bit more than previously, and spread that out in the immediate aft area where the prop wash would be. I tried to make it look like the ruffled water you would see which to my eyes at least always seem to have hints of green in it. Then I used some Winsor and Newton Heavy Carvable Modelling Paste to create the rougher area of water, this was applied thinly with a cocktail stick and spread about, then the side of the pointy bit of the stick was continually dabbled into the paste - this spread the paste out and tamped it down so there was not too much height for the choppy water. This did not completely cover the previously added blue/green paint, so some of that is still visible and gives a visual edge to the 'foam'

 

 

As you can see from above, the foamy wake aft breaks up rapidly, so I hope it gives the impression that Escapade is not wellying along, just sailing sedately! This section has now had two coats of Humbrol Clear brushed over the dark blue areas. I also added a few wisps of white on the dark blue to give the impression of breaking wavelets, but not too many as it is fairly calm. Again these were added but 'dry brushing' with the cocktail stick and the modelling paste. Varying the angle of the cocktail stick produced slightly different shaped crests. Finally, I have just put the ship in place to see how it looks

 

 

I may just add one more coat of Clear to gloss up the sea, then try and pop a bit of matt or satin varnish on to vary the texture a bit before I fit the ship permanently.

 

Cheers,

 

Ray

Edited June 21, 2017 by Ray S
Tidy up the post

[Ray S]

Hello all. I did not manage to get much done today to Escapade. What I did complete was quite fiddly:

 

 

 

They consisted of five etch parts each! I cut out all five parts and trimmed the fret tabs, then folded the pedestal (two folds), held that in the self locking tweezers, then fitted the shield and ammo drums (two pieces) to the front with Glue'N'Glaze, then the barrels (one piece) to that again with GNG but then ran some thin CA along both sides, then fitted the base plate with GNG. All parts fitted except the barrels were placed using a damp end of a cocktail stick, barrels were held gingerly in a pair of tweezers. They have now been painted, once again being held by self locking tweezers.

 

Or I could have used these:

 

 

I have test fitted the etch versions into the midship gun platform, and they fit.

 

Hopefully more tomorrow!

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Ray

[Hewy]

Really like your water effects ray,  sets it off very well

Glynn

 

[Ray S]

Hello all! I am pleased to say that this is now finished! The last few bits went on really well. The 0.5" Vickers guns were just drop-in replacements for the plastic parts. Flagstaffs were kit items as they did not appear to be too thick (until I painted them and photographed them of course!). I popped another couple of bits of rigging on, but I have left this as 'an impression' rather than reality. Railings were ok, I needed to be careful about them ensuring they were symmetrical, and there was not a lot spare if I made a mistake, so no pressure there. The ship was fitted with copious quantities of CA to the base, and the slight gaps between the hull sides and the card 'sea' were filled with the Carvable Paste again applied with a cocktail stick and adjusted with a damp cotton bud.

 

So here is the completed H17 HMS Escapade:

 

 

 

 

 

And finally to show the effect of the textured paper:

 

 

I will put some more into the Gallery.

 

Thanks for looking, all the kind comments and the encouragement,

 

Ray

[nimrod54]

A lovely build Ray. I like the base, it really sets the model off.

 

[Bitzer]

That is some unbelievable work especially next to the pen!

[Hewy]

Super model ray she's turned out very nicely indeed

Glynn

[Grandboof]

Superb 

Martin H