Mr. Church

Thanks for posting EJ. You don't see too many late war pictures of her showing her final Oerlikon layout.

Probably just to cash in given how popular Yamato models seem to be. Annoying when other Second World War IJN Battleships remain to be seen in 1/350 plastic, like the all gun pre-carrier conversion Ise Class.

A shame they did another 1945 version and not the 1941 version.

L'Arsenal of France do a 1/400 sheet of hull number and letter decals. If you decide to replace them: https://www.larsenal.com/marques-de-coques-marine-nationale-pa-croiseurs-1-400-c2x15951629

I forget who uttered the quote but I believe the answer to the all main guns forward issue was that the Royal Navy never flees from a battle... Main benefit was a reduction in the length of the main armoured belt and consequent weight saving. Weight figuring heavily in the design due to having to comply with the Washington Treaty.

Now confirmed as 1/350 HMS Nelson. Excellent.

Now confirmed as 1/350 HMS Nelson. Excellent.

Definitely Nelson: Hopefully 1/350.

Definitely HMS Nelson anyway: Only question now is what scale?

Hopefully 1/350. Full photoetch detail set, brass barrels and real wood deck. The lot!

Again,

It looks darker here alright. But then again the flare of her hull towards the bow could be playing tricks with the lighting: https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205119506 The possibly darker splotch aft is very difficult to see in this view.

Another IWM photo dated 1940 according to the caption, but her starboard side disruptive scheme seems to be in place here: https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205143254

Very nice job on her. The worn deck planking around the AA mounts is a lovely detail touch.

Very very nice indeed. Many hours of work went into that paintjob and it shows. Hard to visualise her at 1:200, if you get a chance would love to see a photo with a paint tin or something alongside her for scale.

It depends... I would waterline a ship hull if depicting her at anchor or at very slow speed in a flat calm sea. For rougher seas I leave them full hull and can cut a hole in the sea base for the hull and fill the gaps with cotton wool / sea foam, Chris Flodberg style. Don't think it is a silly idea and pretty sure I have seen similar attempted before either here or on other boards. Some lads have achieved great results with clear poured resin too. Depicting either full hulls underwater or even submerged submarines. But then resin is awkward and has issues with curing temperatures melting the models and all that. Plus you need lots and lots of it for a ship of any size. I've never tried it myself to be honest. Maybe some day.

I definitely second both those pieces of advice. Chris Flodberg's model seas are amazing. I used his method for my last build of H.M.S. Revenge. I aim to try out more different sea states and colours hopefully get them to look as good as Chris' ones! Enjoy your builds and best of luck with your model seas.

I get what you are saying as regards the sea colour. I have sailed the Irish Sea many a time and more often than not it is that dull misty grey green you speak of. Broadly similar to the North Sea I imagine but probably not quite as storm tossed. The trouble is that that colour is incredibly difficult to accurately model, without it ending up looking like pea and mushroom soup. H.M.S. Revenge's 1918 camouflage scheme has bluish colours so I thought they would look better against a blue sea. And the whole point of my building the model was to both enjoy building it and for it to look well and (hopefully..) give visual pleasure to all those who view it when finished. Even the seas around my dear old native Ireland can look like the Mediterranean when you get that very occasional nice clear day. Equally in winter / spring can you get clear sunny days but with heavy wind and waves. So I purposely chose to depict the model on one of those (admittedly rare-ish) days. As regards the rusted anchors, (admittedly Second and not First World War) colour footage of HMS Nelson dropping anchor clearly shows both the anchor chains and full width of the chafing plates to be a rusted mess. Perhaps the anchor itself was better painted? But it is out of sight. So I made an assumption there, for better or for worse and depicted the anchors, chains and chafing plates as rusted. Also as regards the camo extending up to the ship's boats. It is is difficult to see conclusively on the black and white photos of H.M.S. Revenge, so again I made an assumption, for better or for worse. In relation to the bow and stern flagstaffs. These were demountable as far as I know, with an A-frame support bracket remaining once the main flagstaff had been removed / stowed. I have depicted them in this stowed state, as seen here: https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205252645

Indeed, many thanks for sharing and I look forward to the future book!

Very nice job on the camouflage painting. The grey underwater hull looks really well too.

Battleship Row on December 7th must have been quite a kaleidoscope of colours. Between all the aerial recognition colours on the battleship turret roofs and all the ships being in various camouflage schemes or even transitioning between them as Arizona was most likely doing at the time. There are numerous examples of this when you think about it, which if not photographed people likely would not believe it had happened. I have seen a photo of HMS Howe in 1944 with a light grey British Pacific Fleet hull with the blue rectangle, but simultaneously sporting her old Admiralty Disruptive scheme on all her superstructures. Also there is a photo of the Italian Battleship Littorio in 1942 where her hull is in her old medium grey and green 'double fishbone' splinter type camouflage, while her superstructure has her new light and dark grey disruptive scheme. Presumably orders to sail came mid way through the repaint and fighting the war took preference over appearances.

Very cool model. I had heard of her as the story came up randomly on my Youtube feed one time. A harrowing ordeal for the survivors. And rest in peace those lost with her. Looking forward to more updates on the model. The wreck of the real thing was only recently discovered too.

That's annoying. We have all been that shipbuilder where the masking tape lifts our paint! Hopefully you can recover it. Could you try using a thinner masking tape? And stick and unstick it to a random clean surface a few times to lessen the adhesion? Or cut out a greaseproof paper insert to cover most of the upper hull. Tape off the waterline then tape the greaseproof paper to that So as to minimise masking tape contact area with the upper hull? I did that with my HMS Revenge model recently. As masking tape has a nasty habit of removing all the photoetched portholes.. Ask me how I know...