andyelbac

I'm currently working on the dazzle scheme for the lower section of the bridge superstructure. I hope to have it finished and fitted in place by the end of the weekend. Photos to follow. Meanwhile, a few hours work early this morning on the four 44" searchlights. Trumpeter have you make them from seven parts (a mix of plastic and PE). Pontos have you keep the main plastic body and lens and add nine of their own PE. Here's the Pontos instructions: The kit parts removed and cleaned up: The cradle, formed but not yet glued along its seams: Here I have added Pontos parts 705 & 706 to either side of the cradle and some PE representing an electrical cable: Next up; a handwheel that operates the turntable the searchlight sits on. Thankfully Pontos make the handle 1.5mm long to assist in the fitment!🤨: and the turned brass base it mounts to: Finally, a small handwheel attached to one of the cradle arms: and here we have the (almost) finished product: I say almost finished. You will notice I have yet to fit Pontos part 711 (some sort of shutter or protective shield over the lamp?). I need to think about what colour to paint the lens. I'm steering towards a Tamiya clear blue followed by a light application of Micro Kristal Klear before I fit the last piece of PE (which I will paint on the sprue). I've only made one searchlight and that took a little over 2 hours. I know the 3 remaining will be quicker but it's still a sobering thought that I'm likely to spend the best part of 8 hours of my life making four tiny searchlights! 271 hours in.

Thanks Jeff. Yes, I was very pleased with the way the catapult turned out, even If I did take it apart and rebuild it. Not sure how I'm going to get paint into it all but for the moment happy with how it looks.

A quick post. I finished the cradle last night. Here it is sitting on top of the catapult on no. three turret. Nothing has been glued in place yet and there are a few things missing such as the Oerlikon's, some sort of locker, two ship's boat's, a support frame for the catapult that sits on the rear of the turret and of course the Walrus itself:

Many months ago during the assembly of the Pontos catapult I managed to completely screw up the etch and brass launch cradle the Walrus sits on. It was a fiendishly difficult piece to build, not helped by my misunderstanding of how some of the pieces were assembled. Luckily I managed to obtain a replacement fret and brass pieces from Pontos (not without some difficulty it must be said). Last night then I attempted this little sub-assembly for a second time. First up, here are the Pontos instructions: and here are the pieces ready for assembly; I felt it safer to separate the brass pins as I didn't want to get them mixed up: You can see from the Pontos instructions how the turned brass pieces are shown: For the cradle you need to identify brass parts 70 A+B & 70 C+D. Pontos often machine two different pieces from the same length of brass rod and they differentiate this by showing each part as either black or red. All you need to do is apply some gentle pressure to the division point and the parts come apart cleanly. First I formed the largest part with four simple folds. Then I inserted both brass pins (71D), ensuring that the two movable etched arms (721) were fitted onto the rearmost pin as it was positioned through the body of the cradle. In reality this proved impossible as the holes in part 721 were much too tight to accept the pin. After 15 minutes of fruitless fettling with a diamond file I binned the Pontos pin and dug out a length of 0.5mm brass wire from my parts bin and used that instead: Next up were pins 70b (x2). These went in nice and easy: Now for the pieces I had trouble with previously. These are the two supporting arms that are attached to the front of the cradle and run back at an angle to attaching points at the rear. What I realise now is that Pontos machine a tiny hole in one end of pins 70 A + C to enable easy attachment to etched part 723 (I was ignorant of this previously). In the photo below you can just make out the hole: Eventually you end up with two braces like this: Now all the pieces ready for final assembly: .....and too tired to do more so back to bed I toddled! Hopefully will finish off the cradle tomorrow. 269 on the clock.

03:43 in the morning. My partners reading her book next to me and I've just climbed back into bed after an hour fiddling with Rodney. We were both awake at 2.30..... insomnia or just the reality of growing old together? Either way it's the perfect excuse to do a little more modelling. The more I work on this kit the more I vacillate between long bursts of activity followed by long periods of inactivity or lots of little bursts of work seperated by short periods. Sometimes it's all I can do to summon up the energy to work on her. Let's be honest here...it's the PE. If I was building Rodney OOB, despite her being my first ship build and 1/200 at that, I've no doubt she would have been finished by now but I've just spent an hour putting together two etched vents and every time I open up the Pontos instructions I'm reminded of how much there is still to add. Anyway, onwards and upwards (or downwards, depending on my state of mind!)🤔 Here we are with the two vents mentioned above. They sit on the foward port side lower shelter deck. My first thought when seeing them was that they were the ships whistles, but I've always assumed these would be placed on the funnels. Pontos describe them as vents on the parts list, so I will go with Pontos unless corrected. Here are the parts for one: And both assembled: Here's where they are located on the shelter deck: If you look closely at the picture above, you will also notice etched hand rails running around the front of the shelter deck and down behind one of the ship's boat's. I hadn't noticed these previously and as you can imagine they are fiendishly small and delicate. On the opposite side (below) you can see that they appear to sit over one of the anchor points for a life raft (thanks Pontos), which will be interesting: If I had spotted these earlier I would definitely have tried to apply them before painting the shelter deck and attaching it to the main deck. Trying to retrofit them now is going to be much harder I think. However, a concern for another day. Finally, before I try to get a few more hours in prior to the day starting, a quick look at one of my Pontos parts box. All small assemblies awaiting paint; one of several and a visual reminder of why PE not only enhances the detail but extends the build: 266 hours on the clock.

I'm not even going to begin imaganing how you built that little beauty! Not sure my eyes would be up to it! In awe of your kit building skills sir!

Thanks for all those replies. I think I will be adding rust and grime to the hull then, especially as it will give the old girl a more interesting look. Back to the build then; here I have the bridge superstructure, at least up to the captain's bridge and compass plarform (I think). I've added the two Pontos ammo boxes that sit on the forward face of the bridge just behind and below the forward Oerlikon. Also fitted are the port and starboard navigation lights, again courtesy of Pontos. Here they are before forming: A simple enough operation; four folds and a small support to be glued in place. I annealed the parts before bending so I could more easily fit the actual lamps at a later date (Pontos turned brass). I've left off a couple of ladders and the ships coat of arms until I have painted this piece and applied some slight weathering: I've also added a couple of vents to the port side and luckily had just enough scuttles to finish the superstructure. Next up priming and painting. Five more hours bringing us to 265.

A bit more progress. As with the hull, I had to plug the scuttles in the bridge superstructure with 2mm styrene rod as the Pontos scuttles are just a tad too small. Thankfully there are only about 14 to re-drill before applying the etched scuttles. I'm away this weekend so unable to do any more work on the old girl for the moment but hope to start painting the bridge superstructure next weekend:

Interesting. You're learning me towards applying some subtle rust streaks at the end of the build. One thing I would say; if you are planning on building Nelson, do yourself a favour and don't do her in dazzle scheme. Without doubt the most frustrating aspect of this build.

Thanks Rob. I'm not entirely sure of it myself. I've had 20 years of weathering exclusively 1/35 kits and finding it slightly problematic adjusting to the more subtle weathering required at this scale although as always with weathering, less is more. Easier to add than to remove. One area where I definitely need advice from you marine modellers is the application of rust patches. Never having served in the Royal Navy I'm uncertain as to whether the ships, particularly from the deck up would have been constantly painted even during wartime. I don't want to start splashing rust patches around and make the whole thing look unrealistic.

I haven't been able to put in many hours since my last post but I finally have the shelter deck fitted to the main deck. It's been a long time coming but I eventually got there. It's had a light wash with MIG Starship Grey and I've applied Micro Kristal Klear to mimic the glass in the scuttles (they may not show up in the photos). Prior to fitting the deck I also added the Pontos wood deck to the rear section of the shelter deck. I can't say as I am overly impressed with the Pontos wood decking. The piece on the shelter deck had to be trimmed to size and appears a little too narrow at the waist. Irrespective, she's on now and not looking too bad. I've had to take a little artistic licence with the dazzle scheme but given the paucity of good pictures, particularly those without shadow, I'm not too unhappy. I managed to lose a couple of the etched wall braces over the course of the last couple of months; one minute they were there and then they were gone (PE eh?) but easy to replace with evergreen card towards the end of the build (2033?!). I'm keeping a snagging list on all the little areas of touch up prior to finally laying her to rest in my display cabinet. Another 4 hours bringing us to 260:

Here we are with further work on the Shelter Deck. I decided to modify the Narn 28 on the front face. As Narn 28 is used both port and starboard and inline with the front of the Shelter Deck it makes sense to me, having given it more thought, that they would probably have carried Narn 28 around the front face and not terminated it vertically as I originally painted. With the rear, given that there is no Narn 28 on the starboard side inline with the back of the deck, then is seemed possible that there may have been a vertical transition. Photos to prove otherwise much appreciated! Anyway, I have modified the Narn 28 pattern and also added the Narn 31 effect. Next up will be the final colour, Narn 33 (blue) followed by a little touching up with the Narn 22. I also followed Jamie@sovereignhobbies advice and painted the inner face of the uprights in the appropriate colour to suit that on the outer face (probably doesn't show that much in the photos). Once finished I plan a gentle wash/filter, add the rear wooden deck piece and then stick the Shelter Deck to the main deck, which will be a big event for me as it will be the first piece of superstructure to be fitted. Build now at 256 hours:

Back on the build! Jamie at Sovereign Hobbies has come up good with the Narn 22 and we're back on track. Here we are with the Shelter Deck painted with overall NARN 22 and then the NARN 28 (Black to you and I) sections on the starboard side. A few areas to touch up once completed but happy with it so far: I wasn't sure how the transition worked on the forward face of the Shelter Deck so went for a vertical effect (again, a little touching up needed). Anyway, it's good to be back on the build.

Hi Jamie, Are you sstill suffering from machine issues? I see NARN22 is still out of stock. Is there another colour in stock close enough that it would be hard to tell the difference? Especially with my eyesight!😃