NOVA73

Hello everyone. The progress of the IJN ISE. It's almost finished. There are still some details to be added. Installing the cables and antennas. The sailors are arriving; they cleared customs yesterday. I'm going to be doing about a hundred sailors. Best regard Alain.

Hello everyone. Below are the latest progress on assembling the 1/350 scale IJN ISE. I've finished painting, applying filters, and adding volume to the details. To get an overall view, I did a quick setup without gluing anything. After working on each detail, the result is only moderately satisfactory. But once everything is in place, the whole thing seems coherent. Now I have to install the railings and finish the weathering on the ship and aircraft. Another 3 to 4 months of work. Sincerely, Alain.

Hello, Thank you for your comments on this assembly. That's very kind of you. To answer the question. Currently the ship consists of hulls and 3 subassemblies. The painting of this ship is relatively simple because the vertical and horizontal surfaces (with the exception of the wooden deck) are all the same shade (Kure Arsenal Gray). I always apply the same method. I assemble as many things as possible and by subassembly. Then I paint the horizontal surfaces. After drying, I mask all these horizontal surfaces to finish by painting the vertical surfaces. I finish the painting with the various and varied shades, such as the rope unwinders, cables, etc. Then I apply a coat of glossy acrylic varnish. Then, I make a filter based on oil paint (Natural Umber or Burnt Umber or Burnt Sienna). The choice of paint starts from the base color of the ship and/or the level of wear that we want to represent. I pass the filter with a wide brush and it is removed almost immediately after another wide brush soaked in odorless gasoline. I work sub-assembly by sub-assembly and/or by small portion of the hull. Then I put the juices in the raw with a very fine brush, taking care to remove the excess with a clean brush moistened with gasoline. For this I use either Wask detail from AK, or Mr Color Weathering Color or even oil paint. After that I lighten the highlights with enamel paint diluted in odorless gasoline. I use a fine brush moistened with the shade using either matte white, or light gray Matte or light blue matte depending on the base paint. It is necessary to make several passes because after drying the first pass, the lightening fades a lot. Then I finish all the traces of wear using oil paints and products from the AK naval range. Now, I no longer use matt varnish at the end of the process. I find that the varnish reduces the effects of previously produced paints. After all these steps, the model is already matt. I also gave up using primers. They do not stick to the PE and resin. If you have to make masks. most of the time the paint and the primer come off with the mask. To do the whole process on a ship like ISE, it takes 3 to 4 months of work. Best regards. Alain

Hello everyone. The rest of ISE. The assembly is coming to an end. The last details remain but these are the ones that require the most time. On the aft deck, I will put 9 seaplanes with folded wings. 2 with deployed wings and a fighter with folded wings. On this ship the aircraft endowment was 20 units. This is the first ship where I integrate the most parts in 3D printing. All of these come from Black Cat Model. Now I am able to give you my opinion on these products. Super good for planes, intermediate AA artillery, reels, deck equipment, such as binoculars, etc. For secondary boats, I remain doubtful. I find the sales prices too expensive compared to the result. I will assemble the boats of the kit by putting the elements of the PE kit in order to make an objective comparison. For the ammunition boxes. I don't see the contribution compared to PE products. The only difference is the assembly time and the cost. Knowing that those in PE are included in the Flyhawk kit and in all kits of this kind. For the single and triple anti-aircraft elements. There I am disappointed. The tubes are too thin and deform on all sides. I prefer the Infini models products where the tubes are made of metal. The problem with the Infini products is that to assemble all the AA artillery for such a ship requires a good month of work. For the davits, the 3D products are too thin and therefore deform. I prefer to make them in PE. They will be as thin, but without the deformations. I will stop the assembly for a while, to draw new railings. Those proposed in the Flyhawk Kit do not suit me too much. I will take the opportunity to draw new davits (unfolded and folded) because I do not yet know which version I will put on the ship. On to the photos: Have a nice end of the day to you all. Best regards. Alain

Hello everyone. The latest progress on the assembly of the Japanese battleship ISE. I have finished the assembly of the lower part of the ship and the part of the aircraft maneuvering rails on the aft deck. The turrets and the front tower are finished. On the aft tower, I still have to put some ladders here and there. I will have to draw another PE board for the railings and some other elements. The problem with assembling ships is that it takes a long time. So the posts are very spaced out. Sincerely. Alain.

Hello, I use the Flyhawk kit for the ship details. I really like the sets of this brand. In order of my brand preferences for detail kits, first I would say Pontos, then infinity models, then Flyhawk. For the searchlights, secondary artillery, etc. I prefer to use 3D parts now. My choice fell on the Black Cat Model brand. Best regards. Alain.

Hello everyone, I glue the PE with ultra-fluid pink ZAP CA. Small progress on the Japanese battleship ISE. I'm making slow progress, 1 to 2 hours here and there. I spend a lot of time looking for parts or tools that are in front of my eyes. On the tower, there is a part remade in scratch that I thought was lost. I looked for it for two days, emptied the worktop, etc. Five days later, I realized that I had not undone it from the sprue. I will continue with the ship's bridge. Best regards. Alain.

Hello everyone, After 4 weeks of waiting for the PE board, I have made some progress on ISE. Below are the photos of the PE board. The quality of the engraving is still there. But the price has increased significantly. Before COVID, this board would have cost me between 20 and 22 €uros. The bill for this last PE board is 34 €. I think that represents a nice increase. I have finished the main assembly of the rear axle. With the PE, I find that it gives a much better appearance than the original FUJIMI version axle. I will now put all this together and finish assembling the rest of the details of this rear bridge; Best regards. Alain.

Hello, I have just finished the drawings of the Photo-etching board for the rear deck of ISE. As many people ask me how to create your own PE, I will explain how I do it. First, I start from a reference such as a photo of what I want to reproduce or a scan of the part where I have to do the PE. In this case, the scans of the rear deck of ISE. To do the PE, you have to draw two sides, the FRONT and BACK of the Board. Then there are two colors that are used: Black. At this point the acid will not attack the metal. White. At this point the acid will make the metal disappear. If you have white on the Front and Back sides, you will have a void on your board. If you have white on the Front side and black on the Back side, you will get a hollow on the Front side. I mark the folds of the parts by making a line of 0.17 to 0.2 mm depending on the thickness of the metal. Normally the line will be white on the back side. However, if your fold exceeds 90°, the white will be on the front side. On an empty surface, you should not make a line less than the thickness of the PE board. In my case, I will use a 0.16 mm board, so I do not make a line less than 0.2 mm. However, it is possible to cheat. For example, on a ventilation hatch, I would make lines with a thickness of 0.1 by making white on the back side. That's it for the basic principles. As you can see, it's very simple. I start by making a drawing including both sides of the board. To do this, I use a color code to make my task easier. The elements in Blue, which are the supports, will be black on the Verso side and deleted on the Recto side. The elements in red will be white either on the recto side or on the verso side. Then I make both sides. It is from this moment that the most boring phase of creating a board begins. On the other hand, you have to be very careful, because the final result of the board will depend on your attention and concentration. Do not forget to vectorize all the texts at the end of the process. Once both sides are finished, I save them in pdf. These will be sent via email to Hauler. The delivery time for the engraved plates varies greatly. Before Covid, as a general rule, the delivery time was 2 weeks. During the covid period and after, it took 2 months. On the other hand, Hauler is a service provider. It does not check your drawings. If you have drawn anything, you will get anything. I speak from experience (LOL). Best regards. Alain.

Hello, very nice montage. The ship is great and the sea superb. Best regards Alain

Bonjour Pascal, Toujours aussi impressionnant comme exploit. De plus vous nous expliquez comment fonctionnent les différents systèmes et sous-systèmes sur un tel navire. Très intéressant. Bonne chance. Bien cordialement, Alain.

Hello everyone. Fujimi favored its parts injection problems rather than reality. So I'm going to completely redo the ship's rear deck in PE. Drawing the boards shouldn't take much time. But, I don't control the current deadlines at Hauler for engraving the boards. I will take advantage of this delay to make the 3D modeling of the crane of the Kure arsenal. Best regards. Alain.

Hello, Superb montage. It's a treat to follow. Best regards. Alain

Hello everyone. Thank you for your feedback on this montage. I used to participate in model exhibitions as an exhibitor. But I had to stop due to illness. Now I stay at home and share on the forums. For the PE, I will make a tutorial of the process of creating the drawings and give you all the instructions to have the engraving done at Hauler Ltd in the Czech Republic. There are other service providers in the United Kingdom. I don't remember their names. But you can contact one of your compatriots Mr. Jim Baumann who I know uses the skills of one of them. The essential prerequisite for doing PE yourself is to master vector drawing software. Personally, I use Illustrator. Best regards. Alain.

Hello. I made this assembly before the release of the floating dock kits at 1/350 and 1/700. When I started this project, there was nothing on the market on this type of equipment and on the barges and cranes of service associated with this type of dock. By doing research, mainly on Navsource and on the sites of the archives of the US Navy and Congress. In total the US NAVY has put into service 7 floating docks of this type. By studying the photos, I made an inventory of the battleships hosted on this type of floating dock: • USS WEST VIRGINIA BB-48 • USS CALIFORNIA BB-44 • USS MISSISSIPPI BB-41 • USS IOWA BB-61 • USS PENNSYLVANIA BB-38 • USS IDAHO BB-42 • USS NEW YORK BB-34 • USS SOUTH DAKOTA BB-57 (entered the dock on May 6, 1945, following an accidental explosion in the kitchens) – Ship of the same class as the BB-59 And in 1952 the USS WISCONSIN BB-64 For those who want more information on floating docks. Attached is the navsource link on AFDB-1: http://www.navsource.org/archives/09/28/2801.htm First, I drew the base in PE to make a molding imprint of the dock bases. I then made 10 identical PE boards to make the side pontoons. I then engraved, cast and sorted the thousand (or more) various pieces that make up the details of the dock. Then I assembled the pontoons (a time-consuming operation because I had to repeat this operation 20 times). Then I tackled the dock cranes. I had to draw and engrave the crane boom 3 times before I got a decent result. After many months, I have completed the assembly of the dock. Once the dock assembly was finalized, I took care of the service buildings that were around this type of floating dock. For this, I was inspired by the drawings that Mr. Jean Mahieux shared with me of this type of equipment made in PE at 1/700. The 1/350 requires much more detail than the 1/700. So I completely redesigned this equipment for my needs. First, two cranes on barges Then, various workshop, storage and other barges. and finally an APL and an energy barge. The dock finished and painted. The barges and cranes are finished. For the ship I used the Trumpeter kit, the Flyhawk detail set and a lot of home made PE. And after 18 months of work, the final result. Good luck to you all. Best regards. Alain