HMS Gloucester 1910 1/700

[Ray S]

Hello all. I have finally chosen my subject for this Group Build. I had thought about USCG Itasca (found out it was not Navy), then thought about converting it to HMS Gorleston (too much needed and I preferred Itasca's colour scheme), so, after going through my stash, decided to get on with Stage One of a long term project I have in mind. Namely, building as many HMS Gloucesters as I can. I have this resin Pre-WWI kit, and also Dragon's Type 42 Liverpool/Gloucester, and am on the hunt for Flyhawk to release a WWII cruiser (hint hint) that is Gloucester, or an alternative I can convert.

 

This is the model I will be doing first:

 

 

A rather attractive but flimsy box. Inside, when I first opened it I found a load of white Wotsits (but less smelly) and found they were polystyrene chips (probably tastier than Wotsits) that protected a long, thin hull, a ziplock bag of smaller(!) parts, another with a fret of photo-etch, and the usual minimal instructions. No colour advice either.

 

 

When I said smaller parts, I really meant it! Pin-head size for some of the parts! They have been moulded well though, and thankfully none of the fragile resin is broken (that may well change when I get started!).

 

 

The hull of Gloucester is very fine, it looks reasonably flat and it does not rock when I press fore and aft when it is on a flat surface. and has lots of great detail moulded in, Reviews suggest it is pretty accurate. It is interesting to compare the hull with a Battleship of the same era, so here is an image of Gloucester next to HMS Dreadnought (another I thought about doing for Family reasons):

 

 

Finally, the small photo-etch fret - It looks okay, but not up to White Ensign standards. I will also be using some etch railings (Fine Pre-Dreadnought) by White Ensign or Atlantic models and, if they fit, some coaling scuttles by White Ensign.

 

 

I have asked elsewhere on BM about pre-WWI colour schemes but I am going to go with using Colourcoats GW02 (#2 Grey) as the main hull and superstructure colour, and as Combrig have supplied a bit of a rigging plan, will use either UNI-Caenis fly-tying thread or get some Uschi ultrafine rigging thread.

 

I will get this lot washed (carefully!) and then get started, but I will also be doing another build on Maritime WIP of a stalled scratchbuild, so I expect to be on and off with both regularly.

 

As usual, any advice, hints or tips, and especially warnings if I let you know what I am going to do is a right cuckoo, please let me know!

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Ray

Edited March 7, 2020 by Ray S
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[PeterB]

Hi Ray,

 

This will make an interesting comparison with my IJN light cruiser Jintsu, which was, as I mentioned, one of a series of post WWI light cruisers loosely based on the RN Town Class such as your Gloucester, or perhaps the later C Class such as HMS Caroline which is preserved in Belfast.

 

Good luck with the build - those tiny parts would be too much for me.

 

Pete

Edited March 7, 2020 by PeterB

[Robert Stuart]

Ooo, another Combrig kit.

I'll watch with interest

[rob85]

A great choice Ray, looking forward to your build.

 

Rob

[FIGHTS ON]

A very attractive ship from an era when the RN knew how to build good looking ships. I think you version came very close to firing the 1st shots for England in WW1 in her pursuit of Goeben and Breslau across the Med towards Turkey in the hours leading up to declaration of war. 

 

I salute you skill and ability to work in this scale, I see COMBRIG make some really great subjects in this scale, but they are really beyond my skill set

 

 

 

[Bugle07]

I'm in for this Ray, will be great to see what you can do with her!

 

Geoff 

[Ray S]

Hello all.

 

I want to do this ship in a seascape where there is a swell running, but not much chop on the surface. I needed to add some extra hull below the waterline, so I traced around the side of the lower hull onto some 30 thou plastic card. I attached that very carefully to the hull underside with medium CA, and then ran some thin CA along the joint as reinforcement (I used a piece of fishing line as an applicator - as the CA dries and leaves a blob it can be trimmed). I then pared down the excess plastic by running a knife blade along the shim and ended up with this:

 

 

I have used embossed card for my seascapes in the past, and this was to be no exception. I thought I might show how I do my seascapes, but this is the first time I have tried this way. The inspiration has come from Jim Baumann at Finewaterline.com, but I cannot find that site now. I will try out my printed instructions, and let you know how it comes along. If it fails, I will go back to my tried and trusted calm sea approach.

 

First, I traced out the outline of the ship in an orientation that pleased me, being set diagonally rather than going straight on this time:

 

 

I cut out the 'footprint' with a sharp blade, and then soaked the card with thin CA, which helps protect the card from moisture and makes it strong and stable structurally (you need VERY good ventilation for this, it smells, and the vapour stings the eyes and is not very good for you):

 

 

I then ran a Sharpie pen over the outline, and drew in the positions for some soon-to-be-cut-down cocktail sticks. I did this as double-sided tape would be used soon, and I needed to know where everything should go! The swell lines are parallel but the wide angle lens has altered perspective...

 

 

Now the double sided tape goes down, and you can see why I drew the Sharpie lines!

 

 

On go the cocktail sticks, having been trimmed by some cutters, although I did leave them over-length. They stuck very well to the double sided tape:

 

 

Then I pressed down the embossed card and ensured it was well stuck down between the double rows of cocktail sticks. This led to a nice, wavy sea surface, and I could not resist placing HMS Gloucester into position (very carefully as I did not want it to permanently stick to the tape yet!):

 

 

The extra lower hull now becomes visible in the swell troughs, and gives a better impression for the ship in a sea like this.

 

After successfully removing the hull, the cocktail sticks were trimmed back but they left gaps along the edge of the 'sea', so I used some Ispopon P38 easy sanding car filler to try and fill those gaps. I forgot how smelly that stuff was until my good lady wife came back from town! It also set really quickly, and I was not able to use all that I had mixed before it had set and had to prepare some more. I have sanded that down now, and still have some more gaps to fill, but that will be a different filler this time!

 

I hope you do not mind me show how I have done this, I will add some more images later in the week. It will be a learning curve for me. Tomorrow I spray the parts with primer before painting the hull grey and the lower hull red ready for doing some building!

 

Thanks for looking, all the best with your builds, Ray

Edited March 11, 2020 by Ray S
Tidy the post

[Andwil]

3 hours ago, Ray S said:

I hope you do not mind me show how I have done this

Not at all, a most interesting process.  If I was ever to build a ship model it would have to be waterline, because, well that’s how you see ships isn’t it?  Therefore it would need a sea base and it’s nice to see how one might go about constructing one.

 

AW

[Robert Stuart]

Good to see how you approach seas.  These waterline models do seem to sit low in the water, but your 30 thou shim looks right to my (inexperienced) eye.

[moaning dolphin]

Nice build, I love these Combrig kits, the resin moldings are so nice. Looking forward to seeing more progress on this!

Bob

[Davek72]

That is really interesting.   Forgive me but I have not used embossed card before. Where do you get it from?

 

D

[Ray S]

13 hours ago, Davek72 said:

That is really interesting.   Forgive me but I have not used embossed card before. Where do you get it from?

 

D

@Davek72 I got mine from a stationer in Worcester quite a few years ago. 

Concorde Stationery, Trinity Passage, The Cross, Worcester WR1 2PQ. I am not sure if they would still be there.

Hope that helps!

 

Ray

[Robert Stuart]

OT: @Davek72, or, failing that, take a look at watercolour papers from an art shop.  "Not", "not hot", or "cold" pressed (all the same thing) for calmer waters, or "rough" for choppy waters. 

[Ray S]

Hello all.

 

I have given HMS Gloucester a coat of Tamiya grey primer. It is incredible how detailed models become when you spray primer on!

 

 

The detailing looks really crisp and sharp now. All those circles in amongst the wooden deck are the coaling scuttles. I have a couple of frets of White Ensign scuttles, I may well add them once I have painted the decks as I think it could be tricky leaving the scuttles grey. Easier to add already grey ones!

 

I mentioned in my first post about the minimal instructions. They are quite nicely drawn, but parts positioning is a little vague. There is also a great plan supplied which will give some assistance.

 

 

 

It is a shame they do not do this model as a full hull, she looks really elegant!

 

I have started to paint the hull. I have blue tacked it to an old tile to make handling easier, and given the main hull a couple of brushed coats of Colourcoats GW02 grey #2. That was thinned with their Naphtha thinners and brushes really well. A little later on I will mask that off and get the red underwater colour added. Hopefully it will be an easy masking session! 

 

The etch is starting to be added. I have used the watertight doors from the kit fret, they have some hinge detail and a handle, so there was relief etching - another detail that I could see only after priming!

 

 

When I was at a loss and unable to build anything the other day, I took some time to look at the instructions (it is true!), and I found a part shown and despite looking high and low on the fret, could I find it? No, was the answer, and a quick check on 't internet showed that it was a known issue. I pushed cries of 'UNBUILDABLE' to the back of my mind by turning up my stereo which was playing 'The Space Ritual' by Hawkwind and realised I would have to do some 'proper modelling' by scratchbuilding the boat rack between the two aft deckhouses. Here is the bit in question:

 

 

I used Glu'N'Glaze to glue the doors I mentioned previously, but the ladders needed a different approach. Firstly, I used some vertical ladders from a White Ensign set (for an old destroyer) as they were a lot finer than the Combrig ladders. I used some matt enamel varnish to fix those in place. I am hoping that, because they are not load-bearing, strength is not an issue, and that future coats of paint will seal them in.

 

 

I have also been continuing with the sea base. I had some gaps after I had sanded down the Isopon, so I filled them with Polyfiller. Not only did I fill the gaps along the edge of the base, I also filled those along the hull cutout. I then added the first layer of paint, again by brush. I used Humbrol enamels, and mixed up 5 Dark Admiralty Grey, 25 Blue and 3 Brunswick Green (paint numbers NOT ratios!) and some thinners. Then a couple of days later I mixed Revell acrylics 374 satin Grey and 52 Blue gloss (and water as a thinner) and stippled that on over the enamel and also on the sides of the base.

 

(The second covering was being applied but shows the difference in the colours).

 

 

The second coat is now complete, and a little of the greeny-grey still shows through. I should now be able to add some gloss white enamel (or very pale grey) and mix it in and try to create the wake. The Gloucester will not be added until I am happy with the result, as I do have contingency plans if this goes wrong...

 

That is it for now, good luck with your builds.

 

Ray

Edited March 18, 2020 by Ray S
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[Seahawk]

You've got to hand it to Combrig: that's a beautifully crisp and clean moulding.  Think I'd be worried about desecrating it by waving a paintbrush around anywhere near it.  Looking forward to seeing how this one develops.

[AdrianMF]

Doing a ship in a Naval GB? How very strange...

 

Those details are certainly tiny. The sea base is looking good too.

 

Regards,

Adrian

[ArnoldAmbrose]

On 3/20/2020 at 1:33 AM, AdrianMF said:

Doing a ship in a Naval GB? How very strange...

Gidday, Yeah, some of us are a bit funny like that. 😀 But you're right about the tiny bits and the sea base looking good.

 

HMS Gloucester is coming along nicely, Ray. PE is beyond me but yours is going on very well. Regards, Jeff.

[Ray S]

Hello all!

 

23 hours into our 'lockdown', I have managed to get a little bit done to HMS Gloucester. I have painted the hull with Colourcoats GW02 #2 Grey, and have given the underwater section a coat of RN WWII Antifouling Red (I know it is the wrong war!). The added baseplate was pretty easy to mask off, and I only needed to give one or two small areas of grey a slight retouch after the inevitable seepage. I was amazed at how well the grey covered the red! Nice one, Colourcoats!

 

 

Having completed that job, the next was to add 37 coaling scuttles to the main deck. These are titchy!:-

 

 

I thought that the extra detail compared to the circles moulded into the deck was worth the fact that these stand proud of the deck and would these days be classed as a severe trip hazard. The scuttles are smaller than a pinhead, and it took me a few sessions to add them. Each was attached to the fret with two joins and were tricky to clean up, kept getting cramp in the hand that was trying to hold the scuttles in place and stopping them flying off into the ether. One still escaped though! I fixed them by using a cocktail stick to place a dab of matt enamel varnish into position, then a moist cocktail stick to pick up the scuttle and pop it into place - taking care to ensure each stick was used for the right job...

 

I have seen written information that states that many pre-WWI RN ships had their funnel decks painted black (presumably because of all the coal-smoke staining), so I have painted these decks with Revell 9 Anthracite acrylic. That gives a slightly less black 'black' and looks okay to me, and is a suitably named black:

 

 

I have picked out most of the deck details with GW02, and the anchor chain races(?) with Colourcoats GW04 #4 Grey, a suitably darker grey for that area. The fore deckhouse is dry-fitted at the moment (it has the two fore funnel positions), but will be fitted shortly.

 

I have also had a look at the sea base. I felt the colour I had finished with last time was a little too light, so I mixed up another batch with added Anthracite to darken it a bit, and gave the base another couple of coats, the first hand brushed on, the second (after the grey satin and blue gloss paints had started to separate) was stippled on, with paint being taken from different areas of the mix. That gave a subtle variation on the sea surface:

 

 

It also darkened the sea to something that looked better to my eyes. The colour variation does just show up, so it is not too stark. The inner seven-year-old in me got to play now, and it was with great good humour that this overgrown boy put his boat in the sea:

 

 

Crumbs, what a difference using the flash makes! The sea is not that light in real life, honest! One thing I did find (very much to be expected), is that the ship now no longer fits into its slot like it did before, but at least the pollyfiller that I used to fill the sea gaps is easily carved and it should not take too long to adjust (says he).

 

Yesterday I spent a happy couple of hours looking through the instructions and comparing them with the parts that have been supplied, and marked on them some notes to say what bits go where. I think I have got it sorted out now. 

 

Hopefully there will be a bit more to this in the next few days.

 

Thanks for looking and for the likes and comments, they are really appreciated as always, but especially at this time.

 

Ray

Edited March 24, 2020 by Ray S
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[Ray S]

Hello all, hope you are all well!

 

You know I said that it should not take too long to adjust the sea base so the ship fits? Well, ignore that! Having found I could not adjust the Pollyfilla and the base, I needed to modify the base a bit, so I cut out another hull base-plate from 30 thou card, but a little smaller this time and stuck that into the place where the ship should go (having checked that the ship would fit on top!)

 

 

It needed a bit of clamping down to ensure it was flat. Thankfully I had serendipitously made sure the clamps were going to fit in this eventuality when I set the ship in the sea! I took the opportunity to remember now that I needed to drill out the openings for the three anchors. I also had given the sea a couple of brushed coats of Revell Gloss varnish acrylic.

 

One advantage of having put on a plastic 'extension' to the hull and now having put an extra plastic plinth into the sea was that I could use polystyrene cement to fit the ship into its ocean, and that gave me time to adjust the 'sit' without it instantly setting with CA. Out of hitches come benefits...

 

 

I used clamps again just in case the sit was not quite solid, but the ship sat in quite nicely.

 

 

Now I needed to start the wake pattern. I have decided that this HMS Gloucester was going to be sailing quite serenely in the gentle swell. There was a bit of a gap in places along the waterline, so that needed dealing with. To make the wake, this is my list of ingredients:

 

 

I used the brush to feed in a line of Glu'N'Glaze along the waterline, that fills the small gap between ship and sea, and then I used the probe to dab on some of the Pollyfilla. I keep dabbing at each application and gradually tease it into a swirly pattern along the hull side.

 

 

In the areas where the gap is a bit larger, if you try and fill it with the G'N'G, it keeps wicking away into a blob. The way I get around that is to create some 'bridges' by putting a bit of G'N'G into two or three areas a little apart from each other:

 

 

I allow that to dry slightly and then add the infill G'N'G, and that does the job:

 

 

Half an hour later I had completed the first fix of the wake pattern, only that section along the hull at the moment. When I was putting the Pollyfilla along the hull, I was able to wipe away some of the excess that found its was up along the hull. The G'N'G had been put along the whole length of the hull, and that helps the Pollyfilla stick, and any excess along the hull shows up the wet from the sea and it runs along the hull.

 

 

 

I have also just built up a bow wave, but that is still work in progress. I used the white glue and just popped a little bit of Polyfilla onto the bow and shaped it with the probe.

 

Well, that is it for now, thanks for looking in,

 

Ray

Edited March 28, 2020 by Ray S
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[Robert Stuart]

That looks like good progress Ray, and great to see your process.

[Bugle07]

Good stuff Ray, the sea is looking really good! Thanks for showing your techniques as well, good to see how someone else does it!

 

Geoff 

[Ray S]

Hello all!

 

I have now just about finished the wake pattern. Along with the Finewaterline information about making sea bases (thankfully I printed them off 7 or 8 years ago), I used this reference too:

 

http://www.steelnavy.com/WavePatterns.htm

 

It goes into quite a detailed description of wakes , but I eventually used image #5 as my guide. I still need to tweak the results a little bit, but I am reasonably happy with the result.

 

 

 

I need to add a little 'sea colour' towards the hull between the boundary layer and the foam wake, and to add a pale greeny-blue along the foam a bit to add that lighter tint that is seen. The swell looks like it might be over-scale and the peaks maybe too close together, but I am not worried by that too much! The addition of the under-hull plate is now visible with the underwater red showing in a few places, just as I wanted:

 

 

 

The bow wave is just about done now, hopefully it does not look too bad:

 

 

I think the overall effect is that HMS Gloucester is going a little faster than I had originally planned, perhaps she is in hot pursuit of Goeben and Breslau.

 

Hopefully I can get gluing bits on soon, but I did want to get the sea base done first, it gives a good holding platform for the intricate work ahead.

 

Thanks for looking in and the comments,

 

Ray

 

 

Edited March 29, 2020 by Ray S
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[rob85]

She looks great on that base, and really nice work with the waves! Really is looking very nice.

 

Rob

[vf143_tomcat]

nice work, after a recent trip to Scapa, I have picked up a real interest in WW1 warships, I follow this with interest

[Ray S]

8 hours ago, vf143_tomcat said:

nice work, after a recent trip to Scapa, I have picked up a real interest in WW1 warships, I follow this with interest

Hi, it is a very interesting era, I find the warships all have their own character and look rather exotic in comparison to the current crop of ships. My interest came from an old comic annual I was given in 1966, the Victor Book for Boys. It had an illustration of the SMS Konigsberg on the cover, and probably a politically incorrect story inside, but we knew nothing of that then, especially as a 9 year old lad!

 

Anyway, I have actually glued some resin to resin now, and I thought I would start with the larger capstans:

 

 

There are six smaller ones to add, but my nerves only allowed me to try these today, plus one slightly smaller. I pondered for a great time on how to pick these up to position them onto the ship, and ended up using the tried and trusted damp cocktail stick method. Just cutting them off the casting block was fraught with hazard, the carpet monster was waiting with gaping maw. I eventually figured out how to try and prevent that happening, and judicious positioning of fingers around the part (not too close to the razor blade) and all was well.

 

 

I used Glue'N'Glaze to glue them in, a little drop into the perfectly sized location hole was okay to set them properly. I then started to think about something that was missing from the kit:

 

 

This was the aft boat rack, which should have been in the etch supplied but was not. It also should have a cork life raft, I will need to check up on that later to see what I need to do to produce one. I cannot produce my own etch, so I thought I would try and tackle this another way. I measured up the gap the rack needs to cross, and found it was 5.5mm square (ish). My first idea was to try and make it from paper. I drew out a rough plan of the shape:

 

 

You can probably tell that this was my second attempt at this, the first one I mis-measured at 4.5 x 5.5mm! I used a 3H pencil, newly sharpened but the pencil tip was ragged. The next thing I did was coat the paper with thin CA on both sides to stiffen the paper:

 

 

Then, with a fresh scalpel, I cut out the surplus paper. Thankfully I had already decided that this was a test piece, because one bar pulled out when I was trimming it:

 

 

I needed to trim the remaining bars by about .5mm and then the part fitted nicely where it should. Now I know it can be done, I will try to redo it tomorrow, and also try and make one out of plastic rod which should produce a finer result (and hopefully will not disintegrate when I try to pick it up).

 

That is it for now, thanks for looking,

 

Ray

 

 

Edited March 30, 2020 by Ray S
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