WackoWolf

Well, it's been awhile since I posted, I've had many things to deal with lately that have kept me out of the shipyard.  Even my scratchbuild of Essex is suffering, but at least on that one I have been working on my drawings.
 
On Conny I have been adding deck planking slowly whenever i had time.  I actually had forgotten where I was when I last posted so there's been more progress than I thought, although it is slow going.
 
With that said, pics of current progress



....
 

Well, I thought I was done making hatch coamings, but I wasn't.....  Since I needed one more hatch under the main hatch I had to make it.  I did not have the size grates I needed, but I did have some extras I could cut down.  So I cut them down, then glued back together.  Not perfect, but they will do.


 
I made the hatch coaming with simple butt joints, (I know, I can hear the moans from here!) but it was easier and faster.

 
All done - not perfect but for the hard to see gundeck I'll take it.

 
Started cutting out the gundeck section for the hatch to fit.

 
I'm also still adding deck planking...

All hands on deck.............................he i said aaaalllllll haaaaands
 
After I make the many hooks, eyes and blocks (for the guns) have already spots before the eyes, was a small relaxation törn due for the eyes
 
Therefore, I once make another figure from the bulwark ornament.

The images come in the series of steps.
 
After the figure was transferred to paper and glued to the bone support, it was sawn on the contours.
 
And now have fun with the pictures:
 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 
Have fun

Well, wood lathes are acctually not really designed for this kind of centre-drilling, that's the domain of metal lathes, even when it is done into wood. The purpose of a wood-lathe is rough centre a piece of wood and then to work it down with chisels. That's why wood-lathes typically are built much more simple (and cheaper). By the same token, a wood-lathe tailstock-barrel (or least the one of the DB250) are not meant to work under load, they are designed to be set and then clamped tight. To work under load, the tailstock bore would have to be ground carefully in line with the headstock to a sliding fit for the barrel - at the price of the lathe this would be impossible.
However, scraping-in (the workmanship method) or filing-in (the amateur's way - I did it as well …) of tailstocks to the bed is possible, if there is enough 'meat'.
 
wefalck

This is my first model. Has anyone out there built one?
I got a good deal on ebay. Looking forward to doing this,
but would also love some input from anyone who has done this model.
I just received it today. The model by Dusek - Czech republic, sorry not made in the USA!
The instructions have a lot to be desired!
 

Fake lenses?  And no cross-hairs either?      Seriously wonderful work, Piet.  It's one thing to make the stuff look good and it's another to make it look good and actually work.  You're doing the look good and work part and it's great.

Well, I'm coming close to finishing the conning tower.  The remaining tasks are the foot treads in the rear, the handholds and final painting.  Oh yeah, let's not forget the AA guns, the antenna mast and the periscopes.
The foot treads are already made, they just need to be cemented on.  Remember that I had a problem with them not wanting to stay glued?  I'll have to retry it and hopefully reinforce them from the inside of the conning tower through the rear crew hatch hole    Fortunately I left the crew hatches un-cemented and they can be removed.
 
I cut the tubing for the periscopes and the antenna mast.  The actual periscope heads still need to be made and installed then they need to be checked for raising and lowering and adjusting the focus of the lenses    Kidding of course but I'll cement a simulated piece of glass to the scope tip, at least it should look like it has a lens in it    More detail work.
 
The cross arm for the antenna mast will have to wait till I'm ready to rig all the antenna wires.
 
Okay, now for the pics of today's work.  btw, today was our 51st wedding anniversary!     The Admiral said that she'll keep me a bit longer, am I lucky or what 
 

This shows all the conning tower doors installed, closed and latched.  The wide-angle lens distorted it somewhat.  You can also see that the rear AA gun has it's elevation rack installed and that the snorkel exhaust shroud is on and painted flat black.  The rear steps will go into the half-round holes in the rear. 
 

This picture shows all the doors open.
 

This is the conning tower painted with a primer coat and the antenna mast, periscopes and snorkel intake installed.  The tops of the periscopes are 1.5 mm copper tubes with a flat filed in them for the fake lens glass.  The hand-hold rail will be just below the top level of the doors and between the upper foot holes.  I'll wait with putting the O19 number on the con till the boat is completed.
 
Cheers,
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Thank you all for visiting, including all yuns who clicked on "like."
 
@ Mark: Thank you for your kind words and today we'll see the conning tower close to completion, with the doors open and closed and painted (primed only).  See next post.
 
@ Remco: Thank you!  Yes, the 0.5 mm brass tubes would have been a little too delicate for this work.  It would work but the plywood for the doors are too thick and actually out of scale and thus these tiny hinges would just disappear.  In retrospect the doors could have been made from brass sheet stock of - - - oh, about 0.15 or 0.2 mm thick.  But then we'd run into a whole other set of problems such as the door frames and etc.  So, where do we stop - - - and all metal boat?   Hmmmmm, now that's an idea - - - like the brass model steam locos - - - ????   Not!!  In my next life perhaps     As mentioned before, even this is way beyond what I had originally planned to do and it'll have to suffice - - - for now.  I may leave the aft two doors closed and just keep the forward one open so we can see some "stuff" inside, like a chain and cases of Heineken beer  
By the way, I also tested the deck slats by spraying them with workable fixative I use for my art stuff.  It works like a charm to seal the dye so it doesn't bleed when I put glue on it.  Problem solved.
 
@ Daniel:  Thank you for your very kind words but you give me too much credit   I love it though.  No, no jeweler.  Time for a career change is long gone at being 80 years of age.  I just like to challenge myself and see what I can still do.  Some of this stuff just can't be done with hard or silver solder, the flame blows things away and clamping or affixing it is not much of an option.  The biggest challenge is holding all these tiny parts together to be soldered.   I guess I'm too lazy to try at this point so I soft solder these things.  
 
Cheers,
 

Looks great, Piet. Can't wait to see the doors open and those smudges give her a used look. 

I like this very much. Please keep the pictures coming, I will always be watching as I know others will also be watching. Thanks for the build log.

Wow
Good Luck with everything as you have a lot of nice tools to protect.
Enjoy the drift from model engineering and steam work to model boats. But be always ready to drift with your flow of life. Enjoy is the main thing.
 
Try to stay dry.
 
Later Tim

Hi..
Today I had a delivery of new drill bits. And a letter stating that there was a mix up with me and custamer services.. LOL.
ALL the drill bits were excellent and had a good tip.
 
Thats a good outcome as far as I am concerned.
 
Regards Antony.

Main deck installed

There are contoured blocks of plywood that are fastened to the rearmost bulkhead. Part #18 attaches to the front of bulkhead #8, one on each side of the hull, and parts #28 and 29 are first glued together and then attached to the rear of bulkhead #8.The purpose of these blocks is to increase the cross section of the bulkhead to support the planking as it takes the sharp turn upward to end at the transom. The positioning of these blocks is not very clear in the plans, but is very important because of the planking and the transom construction.
 
Part #18 and its location are shown on plan sheet #4 and can be placed by taking a measurement right from the plans. Parts 28 and 29 which are now glued together should be parallel and butted up against the sternpost and even with the lower contour of bulkhead #8.
 
Obviously these parts and the last 3 bulkheads will have to be beveled considerably to allow the flow of the planking. Once they are shaped properly, I will post more photos.
 
Vince P.

Hello
I had trouble with health and work has been suspended but is ok and the wrapper is already completed.
And so now presents, and so is working as you can see in the movies. In my country sells quite well.
Total length 600 mm.
 
 

 

 
 
 
Regards
 
Romanov
 

Hello
The concept has changed and now it looks like it even works.
I did not have any rope so I used twine shoemaking.
Judge for yourself.
What is the lubrication of gears smear petroleum jelly
Regards
Romanov
 

I have to hand it to you Romanov,you keep coming up with some nice gadgets.I particularly like the fact all the moving parts are ballraced!
 
Kind Regards Nigel

Friday, January 17, 2014 - Ropewalk machine   I have read in many diaries that some modelers have built their own ropewalk machine to prepare the ropes with which set up the standing and running rigging on their models.   Obviously there are many examples of such machines , both on ship modelling texts or surfing the internet and therefore they are machines that are within the reach of the construction capabilities of many modelers . Many kit manufacturers will also have some models in their catalogs.   Yesterday I had the opportunity to see and photograph a variant of this machine, which, unlike most of the standards, which are usually quite long, is characterized by a very limited length.   This instrument , made by a modeler whose nickname is " Vass " , is a little building gem, entirely self-made, starting from standard items on the market ( electric motors, coils for sewing machines, etc) .   I enclose below the photos, though certainly not of excellent quality due the lack of light.   01 Ropewalk Machine\CAM00115.jpg

 
02 Ropewalk Machine\CAM00116.jpg

 
03 Ropewalk Machine\CAM00120.jpg

Hi All,
Since I won’t be ordering the replacement book and laser etch frames to start the hull again until the end of Feb/March I decided to work on the photo-etch 37mm twin cannons.  As mentioned above I had 2 sheets of photo-etch each making 5 guns giving a total of 10.
 
One gun assembly consists of 65 individual parts and since I am doing all 10 at once I will have eventually cut and glued 650 parts
 
Starting from the bottom up, parts 1 to 8 make up the mounting pedestal, the base plate and the main body.  All 10 assemblies  cut out and cleaned up.

 
 
Close up of the components for starting 1 gun.  The etch on the base plate is quite impressive considering its size.  It shows a perimeter rail and checker plate pattern.

 
 
The pedestal is made up of a circular base, a flat strip and a couple of flanges.  It took a bit of head scratching where the bolted flanges were supposed to go but a quick look in the AOTS made it obvious.  The two flanges were glued together then the flat strip was bent round a drill shank and placed inside the flanges.  The strip has a groove down the middle which the inside edge of the flange sits in.  Then it’s a case of gluing the circular base to the bottom of the strip.

 
 
All the pedestals completed.  I filled some of the internal cup with 2 part epoxy as the CA didn’t like holding the circular base to the edge of the strip.

 
 
The main body which sits on the base plate is bent from a single panel into a rectangle and the top and bottom is closed off with little end caps.

 
 
All the bodies bent and the end caps glued in.  Again I used epoxy to secure the end caps.  Using epoxy is slowing the build as usually have to wait several hours or the next day before can clean it up.  CA although quick isn’t suitable for parts where I need to clean up with files etc.  Once the end caps were on a good filing cleaned up any sticking out edges and flushed everything down nicely.

 
 
The front panel is a single plate which needs the sides bent to sit on to the main body.  I actually lost one of these panels.  I have no idea where it went.  I thought to only make 9 guns and get another sheet when I order more stuff to finish the 10th but decided to see if I could make one.
 
The only photo-etch sheets which had a large enough panel to cut out a replacement was on the railings sheet.  4 attempts later I made a new front panel which is average at best but once all the other parts are on shouldn’t be noticeable. 

 
 
The main body of the gun has a large bulge on both sides, which according to the AOTS are hinged, so imagine they contain some of the gun training mechanisms.  Here is 80 parts all cut out which is needed to do 2 bulges for each of the 10 cannon assemblies.  A perimeter strip, a bulge panel and a top and bottom cap makes on side.

 
 
I thought the perimeter strip would be the most difficult part to do on the guns due to the size and shape but turned out relatively straight forward.  The main body has the shape etched in to it to show its position.

 
 
Here are 10 bodies with the end caps on, the front panel attached and the one side of the bulge perimeter strip fitted.  They look quite messy but that is epoxy and brass dust from filing the complete assembly prior to fitting the perimeter strip.

 
 
Next up is to fix the other side perimeter strip and then finish the bulges.  Once that’s done I will attach the pedestal and main body to the base plate and then the really fiddly parts start with the seating and gun training wheels etc.
 
Cheers
Slog

Hi,
 
Welcome to the restart of my Bismarck card model build log 
 
An explanation of why I decided to redo my log is in order.  Around the end of December 2012 I received my card kit of the Bismarck and worked on it until the middle of February 2013 and in that time I did the lower hull ribs, the funnel main structure and partially built the spotlights.  The minimal log from that time was lost in the crash and I reposted a couple of pics to get going again in MSW 2.0
 
The build fell by the wayside due to space and time constraints and as time wore on I became less happy with the work I had done and after seeing various logs of the Trumpeter Bismarck I decided I wanted to do that version of the Bismarck with the Pontos accessary pack down the track at some stage.
 
Lately though I decided I still wanted to do a card model and started looking again for a suitable replacement, thinking I would get something different around March.  Well after some serious thought I decided to continue with the card GPM Bismarck and will order another so I can redo some of what I have done already and essentially get 2 bites of the cherry for each element 
 
 
 
Okay, on with the build log.  There is nothing new to show at the moment that hasn’t been seen either MSW 1.0 or 2.0.
I ordered the kit from GPM (http://gpm.pl/en ) and shortly afterwards some of GPMs own 1mm and 2mm card stock since (IMHO) the whole, which card stock to use and weights etc is very confusing.  Experienced card modellers will have a list of usual stuff that works for them but starting out I thought it would be easier to use what the manufacturer stocks.
 
I also ordered various photo etch components which I will cover below.  Lastly, I bought the Anatomy of the Ship ‘The Battleship BISMARCK’ book from Modellers Shipyard (http://www.modelshipyard.com.au/ ) here in Australia as it was on sale at the time.
 
The kit (do you call a printed book a kit?) is an A3 size book of 20 plus pages.  The inside cover is the history and specifications of the actual ship. The following pages are double sided and have about an A4’s worth of instructions, 4 pages of assembly plans showing the parts assembly and where they go and a general arrangement plan showing major assembly positions.
 
There are around 9 thin single sided pages for all the ribs, forms underlying structures etc that need to be glued to thick card and make up the hull, structure etc.
 
There are 16 pages of thicker paper which contains all the printed colour parts, details etc . These are used straight from the sheet and glued to underlying formers or attached to thinner card before use. The printing and colouring appear very good (although I found some components a bit dark). 
 
The overall ‘paint’ job has a degree of weathering which I think looks nicer than straight blocks of single colours. It also depicts the Baltic paint scheme (I think?) with the black and white diagonal stripes and the aerial recognition swastikas on the decks.
 
As expected everything is in Polish but I typed all the instructions in to Google Translator and then pasted into Word, saved and printed out the English translation.  On the whole it makes sense with a couple of strange bits but nothing to worry about.  Any words on the plans themselves I just enter the word and then write it on the plans.
 
The numbering can be confusing initially but once you get used to it is pretty straight forward. Each individual part has a part number which when completed into a specific item becomes an assembly with another assembly number which is shown on the arrangement plans for placement.  Previously as I completed parts and assemblies I would highlight the part and assembly on the plans with a yellow highlighter to show they were done.

 
 
The brass Photo-etch detail set consists of 3 sheets and is used to replace some of the finer details which would be either 2 chunky or basic if paper.  The stand out items are the radar antennas and aircraft catapults.  Compared to a plastic kit detail set like Pontos or MK1 there isn’t nearly as much but enough to sharpen it up.  Next to each part there is a number etched in which corresponds to the part numbers on the plans it replaces.  I went through and highlighted the plan numbers to show a replacement etch part is available.

 
 
The 20mm cannons are replaced by this photo etch sheet which makes 12 cannons.  The GPM website recommends 1 sheet for the build.  The sheet also comes with a little printed piece of paper with the assembly diagram.  Each gun has 20 parts to it excluding the ammo magazines which are made of 3 pieces each.

 
 
The 37mm cannons are replaced with 2 photo-etch sheets with each sheet containing enough parts to build 5 twin 37mm cannon assemblies giving a total of 10.  The assembly diagram shows 40 numbered parts but since there are more than one of some parts the total is 65 parts per complete cannon assembly.

 
 
The website suggests 1 sheet of 2 rail hand rails and 6 sheets of 3 rail handrails for the build.

 
 
1 sheet is needed for ladders and stairs.  The stairs actually have a tread pattern in them.  The detail set above contains quite a lot of specific size ladders so these must be supplementary to that.

 
 
I also got the gun barrel set which contains the 380mm (15”) in aluminium, the 150mm (6”) in brass, the 105mm (4”) in brass and brass 37mm.  All but the smallest barrels have bore holes in the ends.

 
 
Here are all the hull components glued on to thick card.  The lower hull ribs in the bottom of the picture on the cutting mat, which will have been seen before, are all cut to size and fitted. Everything above P4B still needs trimming to final shape and fitting.  As can be seen there is still a mass to do.  The GPM website sells the Bismarck in a set with the laser cut card hull forms which replaces, I think, everything in the photo.  Previously you could buy the Bismarck book by itself so since I have to purchase the set I will hold off continuing to trim the remainder until I receive laser cut forms to see.

 
 
When I order the replacement Bismarck I will also get a photo-etch sheet of portholes, a sheet of photo-etch 1:200 scales figures and elastic thread for aerial wires.  The figures are flat but I think the process is to build them up to shape with blobs of glue and then bend them to position. 
 
Again, apologies for going over the same old stuff but; fresh start, fresh log.
 
Cheers
Slog

Hi Nick,
 
Dry brushing is a technique where you remove virtually all the paint from a brush before applying. Basically, lightly dip the brush in paint and then dab it off on a piece of paper towel until the brush leaves just the barest hint of paint. This trick is useful for highlighting details, such as bolt heads or other small protruding objects, in a contrasting colour.
 
Andy

You will find that the point of your knife will wander less working in one direction that the other, depending on the grain pattern. Go in the direction that works. Also, a really, really sharp blade, light pressure and several passes work better than trying to cut through in one.

I have experienced the same problem when trying to complete the cut in only a few passes. So I started to first score the cut line with a point from a divider using a number of light passes. This creates an indentation that helps guide an number 11 blade. Then I will cut using multiple light slicing cuts. I also change blades often. I buy them in packs of 100.
 
I have gotten a little better with the knife so for most cuts have progressed to using multip light slicing cuts withou the scoring.
 
Richard

First an update and then some questions.
 
The update: I 've now added the hatches, ladders and shot racks on the gun deck. The coamings were made from boxwood strip, the gratings are the laser cut pieces from the kit, the shot racks are boxwood strip and the ladders down to the lower deck are made from boxwood strip. The gratings were stained with golden oak stain and all of the pieces were finished with Wipe-on Poly. The "cannon balls" provided in the kit seemed much too large, so I used smaller ones that I had on hand. Predictably, after installing these pieces the work previously done on the lower deck sections pretty much disappeared.
 
Now for the questions:
 
(1) I'm going to add two cushioned benches in the great cabin as shown in AOTS. Does anyone have an idea as to what color the cushions would be?
 
(2) The kit shows only one partition on the gun deck. AOTS shows three, with the great cabin partition and a partition for the captains bed space aft of the one in the kit. I'm assuming that these are correct, but there is nothing to show their appearance. Would they be simple board construction, or paneled construction on one or both sides?
 
(3) There are cannon in both the great cabin and the captains bed space.Should these be shown any differently than the other cannon on that deck?
 
I would be appreciative of any help you can provide.
 
Bob 

Thanks, Kevin. Two days ago I would not have been able to distinguish a Spruance from an Arleigh Burke. That's why I enjoy this game, it forces me to learn about ships outside of my primary interest in "wooden ships and iron men."
 
I'll be back in a short while with something made of wood. 
 
Dave