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Battle of the River Plate - HMS Ajax ##FINISHED##


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I have chosen to step outside of my comfort zone again and have decided on a naval subject for this GB. Two of my favourite films when I was growing up were Battle of the River Plate and Sink the Bismark, and once I became interested in sticking bits of plastic together I built a few ships with HMS Ajax being one of them. I'm sure that it would have ended up with gluey fingerprints all over it and with the paint roughly applied, not much different to my modelling standards today :winkgrin:, so I thought it was time to revisit the subject.

 

48799013741_1ea4646118_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr

 

48799013596_598ed2cc74_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr

 

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I was around   8 or 9 years old when i built this kit,it was a Christmas  present along with a book of sea warfare, long since gone but mainly pacific based,

I remember starting it Christmas morning ,( not very well)  got any extras for it john?

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  • 2 weeks later...

I'll be interested to see this come together, the Battle of the River Plate is a story that resonates strongly with Kiwis, us slightly older ones anyway. I do like the boxart, what a fantastic painting that is.

Steve.

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Cheers guys. I hope to make a start soon, I have been looking around for some bits to add/improve details and have come across some interesting items on the Shapeways site, I just have to check if they are available

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  • 3 weeks later...

Apologies for the lack updates folks, but there has been a little progress. The hull is together and the decks have been primed and are ready for painting before I fix those in place. I have also ordered and received the etch set linked by @73north above, as well as some replacement barrels and whilst these are for a 1/700 scale model the overall lengths are comparable to the kit parts. I'll take and post some photographs tomorrow. 

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As promised in my previous post, here are photos of progress so far. I have started to drill out the port holes on the hull once all that is done I can get on with some painting. I am thinking about doing my very first waterline diorama but I need to check up on how to go about this first, and I also hope to link a planned Fairey Seafox build over in the Flying Boats and Floatplanes GB in with this build too.

 

48966568838_e86b3a5524_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr

 

48966568748_eaf6d36e41_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr 

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On 27/10/2019 at 18:04, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Credit to you ... I cant even see the portholes on that.

 

Thanks Dennis. I completed the drilling out of the portholes and set about painting the lower hull over the weekend adding the boot topping yesterday. The rear deck section is in place and I will fix the forward deck once I have painted the grey on the areas that are awkward to access once it is in position, Then I can remove the details that will be replaced with etch parts and complete the painting of the decks and hull.

 

49011908883_57d331e060_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr

 

49012647512_6ef4cd53c0_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr

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A great choice John and the PE should lift it into something special.

As with others here, seeing Airfix's Ajax is a great nostalgia trip for me.  A few years ago I had a rather expensive holiday to Antarctica and on the way we had an overnight in Buenos Aries.  Despite all the other fantastic things that we saw on the trip, one of the highlights for me was seeing the frankly dull and featureless River Plate estuary.  My wife never did understand my excitement!

 

Cliff

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  • 2 weeks later...

I have been plodding along with this one, adding the forward deck section yesterday. The funnel has been assembled and I plan to add some pipework to the front before further detailing with some of the etch parts. I also assembled the bridge section and filled the sink-marks on the main turrets, then couldn't resist having a quick test fit to see how things were shaping up. Once I have tidied the deck to hull join I can continue with the remaining assemblies before I paint those and fix them in place.

 

49068593258_64b1836f03_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr

 

49069115546_a6e6760670_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr

 

 

 

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On 15/11/2019 at 19:24, Hewy said:

 Nice build 👍

 

2 hours ago, stevej60 said:

Coming along nicely John.

 

Thanks fellas. Yesterday, I spent a small amount of time on assembling a very tiny Fairey Seafox, adding the lower wing to the fuselage then filling the lower surface before shaping and blending it all in with the fuselage. It is now ready to have the etch struts/bracing wires fixed in position before I add the upper wing. I thought that 1/144 scale aircraft could be tricky, this 1/600 scale bi-plane is proving quite a challenge but I am enjoying trying to see what is possible.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I decided to push the boat out and made a somewhat extravagant purchase for this model, picking up some 3D printed parts for the bridge structure, along with the associated bits and a couple of torpedo tubes. Airfix should be commended for their efforts in representing all of these details back in the day, but the 3D printed parts are a great improvement, as can be seen in the following photos. After a clean up I gave the parts a coat of primer and brushed on the top colour, then added the completed assembly to the deck structure.

 

Airfix kit parts.

 

49163872443_e5643618b4_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr

 

3D printed replacements

 

49164588922_6ba9d1c549_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr

 

I have also had a look at a solution for fixing the 6in brass barrels to the turrets and think that I have a come up with a workable idea. I removed the small web from behind the forward centre portion. I then filled the gap with a piece of plastic and drilled this out to accept the barrels, here is the result of my first attempt.

 

49164355141_02f1a154c2_c.jpg

by John L, on Flickr

 

 

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On 9/26/2019 at 11:00 PM, stevej60 said:

Great choice John I watched this film last week!

For its date (1956) it is still a good film but even that early after the war they had problems getting the ships as all the Graf Spee types had been sunk and likewise Exeter and York, whilst the most of the Leanders and Counties had been either scrapped or sold. These days of course they would use CGI, but in the film they managed to get 2 of the originals and used substitutes for the rest. The Graf Spee was played by the Des Moines class heavy cruiser USS Salem (9x8" instead of Graf Spee's 6x11") Exeter (6x8") was played by the Crown Colony class light cruiser HMS Jamaica (9x6"), Ajax (8x6") by the Town class light cruiser HMS Sheffiel;d (12x6) and Achilles played herself but by then was the Indian Delhi. The County class heavy cruiser Cumberland (8x8") also played herself in the shot where she arrives after the battle, but by then she was an armament trials ship and her guns had been removed and replaced with the turrets intended for the Tiger class light cruisers - 2x6" forward and 2x3" aft, In the closing shots Jamaica stood in for her.

 

No doubt these days all the rivet counters would be up in arms, but they did the best they could back then. It was nice to see that they did not treat the Germans as being either idiots or "nasty Nazis", unlike a lot of war films.

 

Pete

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