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1/350 HMS Exeter (1939) - York class cruiser


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On 1/3/2019 at 3:54 PM, Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies said:

I think you're right there - there are numerous images showing awnings erected around there. This is where a bit of geekery does help, I think. One should question what coating / paint system they think they are seeing. Cream coloured paint for a deck doesn't sound all that sensible when the implications of such a conclusion are stated as plainly as that.

 

Here's the results of today's efforts. My scribing is, as always, a bit shonky. I could have tried again but I have no reason to believe a second, third of twentieth attempt would be any better so I just carried on:

 

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Hopefully it's a bit less noticeable when it's all built and the quality of the planking scribing isn't the main focus 😕

 

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That's brilliant mate!

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6 hours ago, Geoff Bizley said:

Got my Exeter between Christmas and new year and have been an avid follower of this thread ever since. I have just (yesterday) received my replacement main armament set from Shapeways and, having already de-waxed them and applied a light coat of Tamiya primer, I cannot sing their praises too highly. The surface detail is superb and vastly superior to those supplied with the kit. Unfortunately, I had already painted my bridge deck in AP507A (colourcoats of course) since this was indicated by Trumpeter's colour guide and I will now have to re-paint it Corticene which leads me to ask , would the deck of the after steering position (Part B15) similarly be Corticene  or would this be AP507A as shown by the colour guide?

 

Geoff Bizley

 

Hi Geoff,

 

For clarity, here is the forward bridge zoomed in. You can see (red arrows) the battons securing the linoleum here and get an appreciation for how the tone of grey looks:

9c3a1653-c546-4737-b88f-e0e3364b7e54.png

 

Here's the aft end of the same photograph blown up at the same scale. Your milage may vary but the decks look darker and I can make out no obvious strips to secure the stuff, so on my model everything except the bridge is getting dark grey paint.

65e3622a-d24f-45e7-b303-a5db920ed615.png

 

I am thinking of getting the 3D printed turrets, but all extra-curricular spending is on hold right now.

 

I have continued painting though - I want the hull about done before adding any delicate bits topsides. I need to decide very soon whether this is going on a stand or in the water also, as if it's the former it will need its rudder and screws fitted before I go further.

 

I started with the boot topping - these tend to protect the anti-fouling red underneath, but the sea does take a toll. I happened across some excellent colour photographs of a Colony class cruiser completely beached for scrapping and am using that for colour and weathering guidance below the waterline.

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The paint below the boot topping will be faded to near beige.

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Thanks for the enlarged overhead view. It has clarified quite a few points for me. One relatively minor whinge re the kit is the fact that the kit Walruses (Walri?) are depicted with the wings deployed. I doubt my ability to modify them to what would be their normal (folded) cruising position so it seems I will be stuck with leaving them off completely depicting the situation after Graf Spee had been sighted and the planes ditched but before the shells started to fly.

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17 hours ago, Modelholic said:

The Walrususususus wings folded backwards so cutting them outboard of the ceter section should work.

see here:

https://www.flying-tigers.co.uk/2016/the-supermarine-walrus-seagull-latest-oxford-diecast-news-and-tomcats/

Just scroll down a bit

Cutting off the wings is not my major problem, it's reattaching them. In 1/350 scale the contact area would be miniscule and consequently very weak.

I am currently suffering from an inner ear infection which is keeping me away from the modelling bench but is also giving me time to think about some hidden form of re-enforcement. I will let you know if I come up with anything.

Further on the Walrus subject, I don't believe the colour suggested is correct. Looking at the top down 'photos on this thread the upper surfaces look very pale and certainly not the dark green proposed. Any ideas anyone?

Edited by Geoff Bizley
missing word
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1 hour ago, Geoff Bizley said:

Cutting off the wings is not my major problem, it's reattaching them. In 1/350 scale the contact area would be miniscule and consequently very weak.

I am currently suffering from an inner ear infection which is keeping me away from the modelling bench but is also giving me time to think about some hidden form of re-enforcement. I will let you know if I come up with anything.

Further on the Walrus subject, I don't believe the colour suggested is correct. Looking at the top down 'photos on this thread the upper surfaces look very pale and certainly not the dark green proposed. Any ideas anyone?

The Walrus would have been silver dope finish in that top-down photograph :)

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Geoff,

Think more lower wing. It lays alongside the fuselage so a strategically placed 'extra'  could be added. I depicted mine in the hangar on QE (currently on hold until i find a way around fat finger syndrome and a total ineptitude in 1/350 etch!)

 

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21 minutes ago, Modelholic said:

Geoff,

Think more lower wing. It lays alongside the fuselage so a strategically placed 'extra'  could be added. I depicted mine in the hangar on QE (currently on hold until i find a way around fat finger syndrome and a total ineptitude in 1/350 etch!)

 

Good scheme. I will think about a way to do this as soon as the pain in my ear allows me to think at all! Being 69 years old with shaking hands I also suffer with P.E but the more I use it the easier it seems to get. I find glueing it on with PVA helps since it gives time to reposition before it sets.

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The color scheme of the Walrus airplanes on the HMS Exeter in December 1939, was still aluminum or were they already camouflaged as Trumpeter’s instructions suggest?

 

marco 

Edited by Marco1965
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On 12/01/2019 at 18:42, Modelholic said:

Geoff,

Think more lower wing. It lays alongside the fuselage so a strategically placed 'extra'  could be added. I depicted mine in the hangar on QE (currently on hold until i find a way around fat finger syndrome and a total ineptitude in 1/350 etch!)

 

I am finally back among the living and ready to join the fray again. A search of the internet showed that an obscure company called Sovereign hobbies (joke) sell a PE fret for the 350 scale Walrus that includes the interwing struts. It should therefore be possible to attach the lower wings alongside the fuselage then attach the upper wings to them using these struts. I won't be trying this just yet since the Walrus is not a time critical item and can be added after the main build is finished but it sounds like a tempting idea

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We're having a short pause whilst I get a decorative edge machined onto another board of Iroko. Whilst my HMS Imperial sea-base mounting ultimately went well, I had the wooden based edged after making the foam sea base, and when it came back the final dimensions were about 5mm smaller than the sea base which the ship was already mounted in. This required wet sanding new edges onto the sea base with the ship in it. I got away with it without any damage to the ship but I am not stupid so won't be doing that again. This time I will get the base together before mounting the ship, and I've no appetite for doing any fiddly bits on the ship without having it mounted.

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Since it's not actually attached to the model, I decided to get the first bits of PE over and done with. Sometimes I like PE, but sometimes I don't feel like doing it whilst I always want it done.

 

The funnel caps are now on though.

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The injection moulded funnel halves were notably poor and took a lot of remedial work. The raised detail did not in fact go all the way around the original parts. Even if it had, it would not have survived the remedial work the parts needed. I am thinking of reinstating it with heat stretched sprue affixed with Tamiya thin cement. Whilst many love that glue, I find it fairly useless for almost all tasks as it's such a weak join that is achieved with it which loves to crack apart during paint prep setting me back several steps - it is the water based acrylic paint of glues. Here however, it might prove useful.

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      Jamie. I agree with you about the poor job Trumpy have made of the funnels and have considered replacing the raised detail with thin copper wire.

      I am actually getting on very well with the P.E. I usually find kit supplied P.E either too fragile or too brittle so that attempts to bend it wind up breaking it but not so with this kit. Trumpy seem to have got the gauge of the metal and the degree of tempering just right. It is far nicer to work with than most I have tried.

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I have had some success, I think, with the funnels. I am not finished but did take photographs however am finding my current choice of photo hosting site to be down at the moment. I have also been given a cracking high resolution scan of the high oblique image of Exeter taken in 1934 on Wiki which shows a lot of great detail. Sadly it has also shown me another Trumpeter omission, but I may be too far gone to correct it already. It may help others though - there is an access way on main deck level through immediately behind the bridge. The Trumpeter kit shows solid bulkheads but it's plain as day in this photograph.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Exeter_(68)#/media/File:HMS_Exeter_(68)_at_anchor_in_Balboa_harbor_on_24_April_1934.jpg

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Still no luck with photographs, but I've now removed all those rings on the funnels except for two on each, the top one and the third one down. Studying photographs (simultaneously the best and worst thing one can do in this game) it's clear that those two were much more prominent and were where the stay cables were attached to. The rest were just rivet rows and were no more prominent horizontally than vertically, so for an easy life I've just removed them. Those narrow platforms high on the forward funnels are missing from the kit, but the kit does include PE ladders to get up to them. Kinda the reverse of the bridge situation really as far as the kit goes. No way to get on to the bridge, and ladders to get you high enough to realise you're afraid of heights and start straight back down again.

 

3bd815a719763d5264cd1cd7fa4ea1ac--navy-s


Better still, I was wrong about the passageway under the bridge - I hadn't glued the superstructure on afterall so I can correct that.

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We're back! Here's how the funnels turned out.

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And here are a couple of WIP images of the little passageway that needed to be added. I've also had to slightly expand my modified plated deck area which aligns with the forward bulkhead of the passage whereas mine stopped around 2mm short.

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I think I'm going to have to have a go at those little platforms on the forward funnel.

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There's no evidence of fastening strips for linoleum there, and its definitely not planked. It'll be a non-slip deck paint probably, as it looks a bit dark compared to similar views of what is known to be latex coatings (e.g. Semtex).

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Based on US Naval construction I would be very surprised if there weren't watertight doors in that passageway. Otherwise we have, it looks like, two doors to get out of the superstructure and on to the main deck - one on each side. I don't suppose anyone has a Royal Navy equivalent to a Booklet of General Plans or access to other plans that might confirm this?

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been following this Model - build with great interest , wonderful modelling so far , thank you for the details

I hope someone like Flyhawk or Infini does a comprehensive etch , octuple pom-pom and brass masts set for the 1942 Battle of the Java sea version

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