Nimitz Posted December 30, 2019 Share Posted December 30, 2019 (edited) Hello all, I am working on Tamiya's 1/350 Fletcher with Eduard's PE set. Tamiya's kit is best Fletcher in its scale but still has inaccuracies and fitting issues, also Eduard's set suffers from same problems. You have to check your references before installing nearly every piece. I am not a ship expert and sometimes my models suffer from inaccuracy and mistakes but I am trying my best to build them close to the real one as much as possible. So, let the photostream begin Update 29 November: Beside these books, Internet is always your friend Let's start then! Ugly seam lines are sanded down. I really liked that plating on the hull, nice job Tamiya! Guess what is modeled accurate in anchor deck? Nothing. So I had to scrape them all Next on the line: Propeller shafts Rudder is movable, cool I also filled the gaps for propeller guards which will be replaced with PE ones. And this is my organizer for ongoing builds. Helps me a lot to not lose their pieces. Fletcher is currently using nine rooms. And we need to get rid of that mast First step. Choose the correct diameter for mast (1.5mm) and then angle it correctly accoring to the ref pics. Ref pic With her little sister, USS Cushing from Tamiya again. It was an old, brush painted model that I will convert her to FRAM Fletcher, hopefully soon Update 16 December : Main mast nearly finished. It is made of brass rods, sheet brass and plastic rod plus Eduard's set Looks better now, huh? And now for stacks, they need love too. Exhaust drilled The pipes that carry smoke to the funnels are made of plastic rods. Grills from Ed A little comparison with standard stack. The main pieces are not glued but it still needed lots of CA and glue... Little bit more PE The only remaining thing for fore-stack is pipes going straight above through the roof near ladder you can see in the photo above Before removing doors and ladders we had to check references to be sure... Then, attack! As you can see, there is a ugly gap between guard railing with fore-deckhouse, it will be filled with CA... Update 30 December: Also everything on the bridge is sanded down. And... Also these ugly stairs are removed and replaced too... It was the hardest part of this build so far... The torpedo tubes... Mid-deckhouse, %90 completed That's all for now. As you have noticed, this has been split in three update sections because I had posted them in Hobimaket before signing up here. But from now on, the updates will be launched simultaneously. This is my first ship build with a large set of PE, so I had done lots of mistakes and still doing but hey, it is for fun and i am enjoying the process. Hope you like my works and all comments are valuable and welcomed. All hands on deck! -Eren Edited December 30, 2019 by Nimitz 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ArnoldAmbrose Posted December 30, 2019 Share Posted December 30, 2019 Gidday Eren, a person who has never made a mistake is a person who has never tried anything. As long as you are enjoying the build that is all that matters. I have a couple of these but haven't started them yet. I usually work in 1/600 scale but I got these two for a price I couldn't refuse. I recall a critique a while back over this kit that states the turrets are a little undersize. I don't know but you might like to check them before installing them. Hopefully they will be OK. If not then I guess we have some scratch-building to do. Keep up the good work. Regards, Jeff. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nimitz Posted December 30, 2019 Author Share Posted December 30, 2019 (edited) 23 minutes ago, ArnoldAmbrose said: Gidday Eren, a person who has never made a mistake is a person who has never tried anything. As long as you are enjoying the build that is all that matters. I have a couple of these but haven't started them yet. I usually work in 1/600 scale but I got these two for a price I couldn't refuse. I recall a critique a while back over this kit that states the turrets are a little undersize. I don't know but you might like to check them before installing them. Hopefully they will be OK. If not then I guess we have some scratch-building to do. Keep up the good work. Regards, Jeff. Thanks Jeff, I am still waiting for metal barrels to arrive, so I could start the turrets. I didn't noticed that they were undersized but I knew they weren't correct. The real gun house of Fletcher's 5 in guns were not on center. So, I was thinking how could I correct this without major surgery, scratch building new ones or getting aftermarket turrets seemed the only way. Considering I am spending money for detail sets for my 1/350 Hancock, it is not very possible for me to buy new turrets for Fletcher. And about scratch building new ones, I am not sure is it worth the effort and time... Regards, Eren Edited December 30, 2019 by Nimitz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beefy66 Posted December 30, 2019 Share Posted December 30, 2019 Great start very neat PE work will follow along beefy 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Courageous Posted December 31, 2019 Share Posted December 31, 2019 Good steady progress. Keep up the good work. Stuart 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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