S-boat 55

'Little' progress indeed, it is surely a challenge working in that scale but your pulling it off for sure !

It does seem to be, to be honest I quite like it shiny

I shall follow unless you object,

Definitely does, by the end if a session it all starts getting less defined

Howdy one and all, I'd not forgotten this one, been working away on it since finishing Dunkerque but as I've been looking to Taiho progress has been somewhat slow/minimal. However I did decide that I couldn't let a good deal pass on ebay and figured in for a penny in for a pound and picked up the extra planes set. From looking at the kit for a long long time and using the planes from Zeppelin to play with ideas for layout I decided it was worth it. Word to the wise, Veryfire are cunning, I'm noting little bits here and there that try and push you in the direction of getting all of the extra detail sets. E.g. there is no funnel cap in the kit, its only an etch option in detail set A, the flight deck barrier is a solid plastic part in the kit and looks awful and from looking at the rest of their moulding I think this is potentially deliberate. The only way to get the etch option is set B for the deck which also includes the crane 'well' covers as etch, these look great but again there is no plastic alternative in the kit so without set B you are pushed to have the crane in the raised position. I think its perfectly acceptable to be giving incentive to by the extras but it shouldn't come at the expense of not having the parts to actually complete the build satisfactorily without them, especially as were you to pay list for all the sets you'd be looking at £400 with the kit. The other part of set B is the deck markings - only the stern and bow are included in the kit the rest is optional extra, so its either mask it off or gulp and spend £100 nearly for a deck, arrestor wires and some decals. I shouldn't moan and please forgive the rant, it just seems a little underhand, The kit only has 8 planes albeit beautifully moulded as they are, so with this set the total increases to 55, 1 down on the 56 she had at her loss, and comprises; 19 Zero's 20 Judy's 2 Val's 14 Jill's Each has photo etch canopies and resin cockpit details - well seat and dash boards - anyone any idea what colour the cockpit internals were? So planes aside I'm finally in a position to be able to say that the progress made is actually visible. There's been photo etch, then more photo etch followed by some more photo et.. you get the idea, some has been reasonable and some has been rather small, Ive taken to laying them out ready to glue to make it more of a production line effort. Example below of the etch gussets etc in place on her forward port lower level, any idea what the misting is. I've been using loctite to make the assemblies and then gorilla super glue to fit them in place as it sets slower, I've not touched those areas with glue all i can figure is its from the glue as it evaporates a little? The most time consuming bit has been scraping away the moulded detail; Now on to the visible progress I mentioned, a before and after (blurred for some reason) below; Close ups of the area I've been working on, the rear starboard platforms are now complete to 'midships' in terms of construction, still require 'fitting out' and railing etc but that will come later when all the platforms are on elsewhere and I don't need to flip her over so often. This shows just how much brass there is and (moulded detail to remove) So that's 1 'corner' of her done, I've other platforms on her that need the etch adding and others still to remove the moulded stuff from. I said a while back there were 20 platforms, I was wrong, there are 42 in total, so far I have done 25, with 6 more on ready for etch and the others left to prep so there is a long way to go, but I'm pleased that you can actually see some progress now. Next I'll finish those 6 off and start completing the starboard forward platforms and start doing a few planes here and there, Apologies to witter on so much, thanks for stopping by, s-boat

Perhaps try just fitting a couple before removing any others that you have already done and if those come up how you would like then take the plunge, or just go all in and hope for the best,

I shall follow with interest, the railing looks hair like in thickness........ I'm sure she'll Come up great just like your other builds,

Just caught up with your build, she really is stunning,

She's coming on a treat, glad it's mercifully only mild for you, hope you're on the mend

I shall be looking forward to seeing all of those progress at some point, I've Littorio in the stash waiting for her turn so when Roma pops up I shall be especially interested, Keep up the good work, Sam

I think that's a stunning build, really handsome ship done justice with the care you have taken in assembling her. Those updated photos really show her off well,

Hi Jeff, that's great build of a very interesting subject, also that later picture really does show she's not a littl'n by any means, interesting the design route the Germams took at times, Sam

Fascinating build, I've toyed with the idea of this myself but always as a far off in the future kinda of thing, I'd thought maybe build the five sisters in the class and even bought Trumpys Queen Elizabeth but was so disappointed with it I sold it on and abandoned the idea as the idea of having to use Warspite as a base and 'rebuilding' 4 of the class seemed just too much like hard work, I shall follow with interest

That's looking very very nice indeed,

Thanks Rob,

I'm pretty happy with how ot turned out, I thibk planning it out earlier would have made it easier but it wasn't originally my intention to rig her. Glad I did though as the 'crown' really calls out for it

Thanks Bertie

That's a great shout re crew, hmmmm, you've got me thinking now, Thank you for the comments, I think your being very forgiving of imperfections but I'll take it

Thanks David, I'm curious about this stretched sprue, isn't it very delicate?

Thanks, yeah it could really do with that and railing, I looked at adding railing as I finished off Dunkerque but parts would be near impossible to get to, the masts are pretty soft as well which is a shame as you're right rigging would set it off well. I toy with the idea of doing her again but 'properly', we'll see, got a lot more to finish yet,

Thanks, yeah all done by brush, I've invested in an airbrush now though, should speed things up a bit in places

Thanks, yes certainly, it's mig ammos fine (.02mm) rigging thread. As much as it's sold as mig's it's actually mafe by uschi I believe and is better value bought from them if you can find it

Alas he doesn't travel well

Thanks beefy, it took a while but I got him to go where I wanted eventually

Higher res images here; https://1drv.ms/a/s!Arco4SQ9xxLFmTiNoDJAhF2V-0OS