USS Nimitz, Trumpeter 1/700

[alex]

Good morning,

a few weeks ago, I started my biggest modeling effort so far: the well-known and praised USS Nimitz from Trumpeter. A fine kit, and to make it even better, I got the Eduard set, the Starfighter decal set and some more airplanes. After all, it should look rather busy. My idea is to have the carrier look like this: http://www.thunderstreaks.com/spotting/carrier-visit-uss-nimitz-august-16-17-1976/#prettyPhoto , with some minor changes on the aircraft layout.

Let's start with the aircrafts: first problem, the trumpeter ones have folded-out wings, but on the original, almost all wings are folded. So, fist step, is to cut the outer wings, are reglue them straight up. That's however nor possible for the intruder/prowler/skywarrior, since the wings overlap. Corsair and phantoms are easier, they point straigt up, thus painting and decalling should still be possible. After glueing, they receive a small blob of maskol, and a black priming. You see the difference later.

That's some 60 aircrafts, of many different types and colours. And that's why I build the old one, still with the phantoms.

After the black priming, I airbrushed the white, and then brush painted the light gull grey. The decals are the ones provided with the trumpeter kit, only 6 corsairs of the "sidewinder"-squadron. And you can see, the cockpit without the black priming is far too bright.

And that's a corsair with black priming and the starfighter decals. They are nice to handle, but still can drive you crazy. All decals are separate, where they could have been grouped together. In the front fuselage, there are some 6 decals on each side, which could have beed grouped easily together. Oh, another nice point of the black priming: the intake looks rather realistic. If you don't spray the white head-on, it looks like the real thing, as it is dark grey.

With some more 60 aircrafts to go, don't expect an update too soon... it took me 90 minutes for one aircraft, but the others have a bit less decals than the corsairs.

Alex

[davetwin]

Great start, looking forward to seeing how this progresses

[longshanks]

Good start

Kev

[alex]

The Corsairs are painted, they need a coat of future before getting the several hundred decals (seriously, why not group them??). The Intruders and the Skywarrior got the canopy masked with maskol, and are ready to get the black primer.

Alex

[alex]

The first Intruders are painted; the priming shows some nasty sink marks. Since it was only on two aircrafts, and I do have some spares, it's not that bad. Priming was done woth dark grey, as opposed to black on the corsairs.

That's how they look after painting. I like the tan nose of the colourful times of the USN.

The first and only Skywarrior is almost finished. It now needs a gloss finish and a few decals. In the end, I will add the refuelling probe.

The first three types compared in size.

The Corsairs with the kit decals are finished, they lacked the orange parts and the black walkways. I added them with a fine brush.The orange is not the same as the red lozenges on the rudder, but it's not easy to spot. By the way, you can clearly spot which one didn't get the dark priming before the white paint.

Alex

[Ex-FAAWAFU]

Oh yes indeed. Yum yum

[alex]

The Skywarrior got the decals and canopy framing, brush painted. Looks OK so far, the macros are very unforgiving. After all, it's 1/700... some small details still need to be added at the end (like the AAR probe and the painting of the gear)

The first Intruders are almost completed. Decals from the Starfighter decal sheet, which are more complete than the Trumpeter decals. Printing is very crisp, one can read the USS Nimitz stencil. On the other hand, it looks like some nozzels of the printer were clogged, since there are some missing lines in the black. You can spot it clearly on the walkways. It needs some fixing with the brush in the end.

So far, 11 airplanes are almost finished, and some 50 to go...

Alex

[alex]

The Intruder decals from Trumpeter lack the walkways, so I had to add some custom-made decals (wings), and paint the fuselage walkway. The walkways should be grey, and not black, by the way.

Wings detached and re-attached in folded position. The folding mechanism has been added later with a bit of streched sprue.

Same for the Skywarrior.

And now, for something completely different... the Phantoms and Viligantes. Same procedure as last year, black priming, white undercoat, brush-painted light gull grey.

The Phantom left and in the middle are with starfighter-decals, the right one with the Trumpeter decals. You can clearly spot the difference with the missing walkways

So far, the box with the completed aircrafts fills up slowly, but steadily. 18 aircraft completed! (8x A-7, 6x A-6, 1x A-3, 3x RA-5)

Alex

Edited August 3, 2014 by alex

[streetfighterjeff]

they are great, your eyes must be falling out of your head lol. how big are the aircraft?

jeff

[alex]

Thanks, It's 1/700, so the Phantoms are roughly 25mm (1") long, the Skywarrior is 33mm. Phantoms have 21 decals each...

Alex

[alex]

I did a small test today, I arranged the whole fleet on the deck, just to get an impression how it will look like in the end.Rather busy... I added a third Vigilante, and the Hawkeye on the catapult.

Alex

[alex]

First two attack squadrons completed - the Intruders of the "Black panthers", and the Corsairs of the "Sidewinders". Until now, 30 aircrafts completed, and 24 more to go. At least, they're all painted now. So, "only" a few hundreds decals left...

Alex

[Guest]

Wow and I moan doing my Air wing for Hermes,very impressive ,great detail

[alex]

ah, time for a small update: the be-devilers phantom phleet is completed, and I started also with the marauders. They look like that:

the phantoms of the Shamrocks:

Now, just the two sea kings, 4 corsairs and 3 hawkeyes missing (uff!)

Alex

[Jockster]

Phantoms look great Alex, have you done much with the carrier?

[alex]

thanks! no, I'll start with the carrier when I'm done with the aircraft....

Alex

[alex]

Both Sea Kings and the three Hawkeyes done, now only four A-7 left. Oh, and the Nimitz, of course!

24 decals on a Sea King. And I omitted at least 6 more!

Alex

[camponubla]

Amazing!!!!

[alex]

The last aircraft of the air wing is finished!

The whole fleet, packed handily in three pencil boxes. 55 Aircrafts - 18 Corsair, 10 Intruders, 16 Phantoms, 3 Sea Kings, 3 Vigilantes, 2 Sea Kings and a lonely Skywarrior.

And the decal sheet after completion. Just some 800 decals, roughly. As you can see, I did without some of the very tiny one (like some rescue-arrows)

Alex

[stevej60]

Alex that is superb work,you are of course mad,but i,m following with interest!

[alex]

Do you remember? I'm building a Nimitz. After having finished some other project, I try to concentrate my efforts to the Nimitz. Here is the progress of the last weeks:

The hangar deck is one of the parts many builders try to detail with much love and after markets, but I won't. There is not much to see anyway.

That much will be visible in the end. Still, I will add some parts and airplanes. This is one of the three sponsons carrying the Sea Sparrow launcers. The raised bit will be scraped away.

And then, it will get a PE part for that. Here's another sponson.

The Sea Sparrows are made of three parts (plus the stand), and will get a PE part on top.

The elevators got the safety net removed, as it will be repaced with etched parts.

So much for today. Does anyone know if there is a good source for deck vehicles in 1/700 for the US Navy?

Alex

[Guest]

Yes Company called Blackdog I have set for USS John C. Stennis

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1-700-Deck-Tractors-Flugzeugtrager-Fahrzeuge-von-Blackdog-/351674695884?hash=item51e17200cc:g:ZEsAAOSwmmxW4d2E

On ebay just now

[alex]

wow, almost one year since the last update... shame on me!

 

The rails of the hangar doors have been painted with a pencil, which leaves a nice dark metallic shine. It's better to do it before the door is glued into place.

 

 

And with the opening glued in place. looks ok. After all, not much to be seen anyway when the ship is completed.

 

 

The Nimitz compared to the first Japanese carrier, the IJN Hosho. She would fit into the hangar!

 

 

The first PE-parts from eduard. They are a bit thick, which means it's hard to bend them into a round shape where needed, on the other hand, they have pre-etched folding lines, which makes their use rather simple, as long as the parts can remain straight. Here is the railing of the platform at the end.

 

 

And the same part after glueing. Some retouches needed, but fitting is good.

 

 

The fleet which goes into the hangar deck. They are not that detailled as the ones on deck, but as I wrote - hard to see anyway. maybe I will add some more F-4.

 

 

The deck vehicles which are included in the kit. Some more will be added from bigblueboys, which look rather good.

 

 

First part of the island. No idea why they made it with transparent plastic, don't like it at all...

 

 

Safety nets cut off, as they will be repaced by etched ones from Eduard.

 

 

And the first parts of the masts. Look really nice with the added PE. I like especially the big AN/SPS-48, it looks amazing with the etched part (see shadow)

 

 

That's all for now...

 

Alex

 

 

 

 

 

[Alan P]

Hi Alex, did you finish this build in the end?

[alex]

Not yet, it's a bit stalled...   After the problems with photobucket, I stopped to post build reports where I only could link to images, but not upload them. I was not in a mood to re-upload some 1800 pictures and re-link them.

 

Those who want to see the little progress so far, are welcome to do it at scalemates (https://www.scalemates.com/profiles/mate.php?id=11437&p=albums&album=32818) or on the german site modellboard.net.

 

Alex