bianfuxia

Made some further progress last night. The flight deck was made of wood, so far as I can tell, and then stained with a blue colour. So I painted it first with this deck tan from Vallejo, and then I will cover that with blue. Maybe I will then sand back a bit here and there to try to reflect a few images I've seen where the stain is a bit worn out. We'll see. The planes won't be that colour. I'll do the North Atlantic scheme of white with a bit of grey on top. But I already painted these before I realised that. I also added the mast and radar, plus the lower level of single AA guns. Each is two tiny pieces...only another 20 to go! Questions for anyone who might know: 1. what colour should that big radar array be? Modern ships mostly have them black, I think; the instructions suggest silver, which must be wrong. I am thinking maybe gun metal dark metal kind of colour. 2. roughly from how far back would the planes commence their take-off run? I am assuming this didn't have a catapult on it? Thanks! Of course the photos show up all the blemishes, gaps, parts where the paint missed: I will tidy all that up before the end. So I think I am pretty confident I can get this one done by the end of the GB, maybe not with its full complement of planes. Unfortunately I now have a week of business travel so I won't get anything done for a while.

Haha, yes, back on the "straight and narrow" now.

I hated the colour I put on the flight deck so I cut my losses while it was still wet and wiped it off. Good excuse to hit the shops soon and find a spray can with a better colour. Meanwhile, I put the first paint on the Izumo's airgroup (bar one still unpainted which I located after I'd washed up). It will have two Seahawks, two 101s and two Ospreys (of course, Japan doesn't fly them, but I think they've flown off this thing and certainly might in the future). One of the helos is in folded up state so I guess it can park off to the side later.

Not sure if this is out of the ordinary but while building this carrier, which is presently waiting for a coat of paint on the flight deck, I have also been progressing an escort for it. While I wait to move the main build along, here's where that escort is at now. It's getting close to the final stages. This is the Marusame. I don't think it's as blue in real life as it seems in these quickie phone shots. Next post I hope to have the carrier almost completed with just all the tricky details to add.

In. Sane. What a great model, well done!

Made some more planes tonight. Other than the Wildcats which obviously go on my other carrier build, there is now at least one of everything I'll have on my Nimitz deck except an E-2. I'm using this cool site as a guide for what to put on the deck and where, although I am not planning to fold all the wings - too fiddly. But I seem to have enough for about 12 F-4s and A-7s so there will be plenty of jets on deck.

Perhaps it's a theory backdated to the show rather than something the show set out to do. But if you consider the Enterprise in planform it does look a bit like the Venus symbol ♀ which represents femininity and feminism. Maybe that's what the Prof had in mind? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planet_symbols#Venus

That's insane! Great build. I would put it proudly on the shelf and not worry about that issue. It looks amazing.

Made some good progress today. Sprayed it with Haze Grey at lunchtime and then did all this in about an hour tonight: In order as I went along:

Yeah each one has five parts - the plane, two main wheels, tail wheel and prop. It comes with quite a few in the box and I would be amazed if anyone can build them all. Last night the wheels were flying left and right out of the tweezers!

I've made some progress on this in the last 24 hours. Sprayed the hull and built up the main superstructure. I hope to paint the flight deck today or tonight and finish the main assembly. First pic shows the lovely lifeboat, but once installed you only see the side of it. Such a shame. The other pics show the other work so far.

Thanks again, super helpful!

OK cool, thanks. I did ask but wanted to avoid looking dopey if there is some obvious place where they are. I couldn't quite understand the eligibility criteria for this one. Anyway it seems that the Hammann destroyer, which escorted and helped the sinking Yorktown in the battle listed in the criteria and then was sunk too, is eligible. If so I look forward to joining in. thanks

Yes I guess so. I did the ship (will do the ship) with the paint scheme described on the website you suggested. That is, blue below, grey above, and a blue flight deck.

Hi Mike Sorry I know I could google this but it might be more accurate to ask you - any tips on roughly what shade of grey those planes (Wildcats and Avengers) would be? I imagine like a kind of dark sea grey shade? thanks in advance!