reklein

WOW........oh yea, wow.
I am acquiring a few odds and ends to start a build of Dragons 1/350 USS Independence CV22.  Read your thread from start to last entry.  Could not but help to look w/awe in the 1st photo of all the accessories you have purchased, plus kit!
I know the pain for details and the hit it takes on a wallet.  My little AC Carrier has already hit the don't tell the wife, please status.  Your skill and attention to detail is most excellent.
Looking forward to more.
Rick

Hangar bay 1 has multiple aircraft. Starting with the SH-3's from HS-4. On one I cut open the sliding door and the other one I folded the tail. The picture of the actual helo is one I took while aboard. There was some details I needed to add like the strut from the landing gear pod to the fuselage and the intake cover.

Filling hangar bay 3 with the F-14's from VF-51 and VF-111. The only disappointing part of these is that Trumpeter decided to mold the windscreens with the fuselage in gray plastic. Do not understand why this was done. All the other Trumpeter aircraft have clear canopies.





 

At this point I realized due to the routing and wiring the flight deck and island needed to be put on the hull together. This required the hangar bay to be filled and detailed first. I started with hangar bay 2 which was home to the A-7 aircraft of VA-37 and VA-105. I scratch built a cockpit maintenance platform and cut one canopy to show the canopy raised. Tom's Modelworks photoetch details were added to all aircraft. All the decals were made by me except for the EA-6B's. Star Fighter decals were available for these and the deck tractors. Anyone who has been on a US Navy aircraft carrier at night will remember working in the yellow glow of the hangar bays.

Ever since Trumpeter came out with the 1/200 Missouri I've wanted to build her.  What has always stopped me was the mass of PE that would go into the build and just how difficult it would be to get all those minuscule rails and bits on and attached neatly.  Watching your build has done nothing to allay those fears.  Your work looks terrific.  Very, very clean and precises.

Thanks again Popeye .
 
There are two 20mm Guns on the aft funnel platform, so I thought I'd have a go at making them. These are the smallest guns on the ship, so if they came out OK the rest of them should (theoretically ) be easier. They are also the smallest guns I've ever made - the barrels are 9mm long, to give you some idea of the size. Here's the PE card of them all, there are 12 guns in total, and each has 34 parts :

 
I started by rolling the support base into a cone and CA gluing it to the base :

 
Next is a rack to hold four spare magazines. Each magazine is made from 3 pieces, and there is a triangular divider between each of them :

 
I didn't take any more pics of further sub-assemblies until I'd finished them. Some of the pieces were a bit tricky to get right, but they didn't turn out too bad. The Breech comes in 5 pieces to make up the thickness, the 3 middle ones have a scallop in them to accept the barrel. The barrel itself came with the set of CNC lathe-turned barrels. It's amazing how small and accurate they can make things like that these days :



 
Here's a pic to give a sense of scale. The Australian 5c coin is 19mm in diameter :

 
There is a spent cartridge collector basket which is supposed to be fitted to the side opposite the magazine. I found out I'd actually fitted the stock and barrel back-to-front, so I can't fit the basket to these two guns. Something to watch out for on the rest of them :

 
Here's one of the guns after painting - quite acceptable, and further ones should turn out even better as I've worked out a few tricks on how to work with the PE :

 
  Danny

Popeye, thanks for the praise. I do not know if other people are the same as me, but I am a strong critic of my own work. I know where I would like to have made a better job and where I think I could have made a better job. However I am also realistic and know that if I keep remaking anything that I think I could have made better, progress would be so slow that eventually I would give up. There has to be a happy middle ground and I think the key word here is 'happy'. As long as I am happy with what I have built I can progress to the next step.
 
 
I decided to next build the booms for the mainsail and the foresail, as I could see that these presented some problems. They are both roller furling booms, though the kit ignores this and provides parts for a very rudimentary gooseneck that would have limited movement. Though I have called them roller furling, in practice they seem to be only used for shortening the sail; there are no reefing bands on these sails. Also the supplied foresail boom is tapered, something that would not work, as to wind the sail round the boom it must be constant diameter.
 
Here is a picture showing the mainsail shortened.

To achieve this there is a mechanism that forms part of the gooseneck, where you haul on a chain and it rotates the boom along its long axis. There is also a device at the end of the boom that is free to rotate on the boom so that it stays in the same place as the boom rotates; as shown in the following enlargements.

These are based on something shaped like a bobbin:

So how to make these? Given I do not have a suitable lathe, I can assemble them from a short length of brass tube and two brass disks, soldered together. The problem was how to make the disks accurately with a hole in the centre. I spent a long time pondering this until I had a blinding flash of the obvious. A disk with a hole in the centre is a washer. So I had a search in the tin that contains every odd nut, bolt, screw, nail, washer, etc. that I possess and came up with 15 identical brass washers. These are the only brass washers I have and they were precisely the size required; lucky. They fit perfectly over some 4mm o/d bass tube that was supplied in the kit and not required for my build.
 
I cut four 4.5mm lengths of the brass tube, which along with 8 of the washers would provide me with enough bits for the two booms. Two of the assemblies require a small hole in each bit of tube for a small nail to anchor one end of the chain. The other two require some brass tube to fit over the 4mm tube that will then rotate freely. To this I then need to fix some parts to which the rigging will be attached. The rotating parts are based on some 5mm brass tube, also supplied in the kit and not required.

The following pictures show the foresail boom as it is at present. The fittings for the mainsail are the same except the one at the end of the boom needs two eye rings. The most difficult bit was bending the D shaped bit of wire and soldering it symmetrically.

However, though I am happy with the fittings, I am not happy with the boom itself. It is made from 6mm dowel and when presented to the model it looks too bulky. I will remake this from 5mm dowel. Luckily I had not got any further and have not permanently attached any fittings.
 
I have also done the port and starboard navigation lights as shown below. It was a fiddly job tying the knots to hold these to the shrouds. The pair at the back are plastic, as supplied in the kit. I remade these out of 1mm lime. There is a peg on which to mount each lantern and I painted the inside black. The fittings on the back are to ensure the lights are level.

If I was doing these again I would make them from thinner material, but as I am not unhappy with the result I will leave them as they are.
 
I also mounted that cleat visible on the deck between two of the shrouds and its companion on the other side. They are both glued and pinned. I had made these some time ago but could not find them when I came to put them on so I made another two. I then found the originals.
 
That's all for now. I am determined to do updates more frequently, but it has still been 10days since the last one. I do not know how some people find the time to do the modelling and update their build log so frequently. Thanks to everyone who looks in and hope it was interesting.
 
Glenn
 

Hey Glenn, I lost track of this build somehow. You have really come a long way. I like how you have all that documentation. It takes a lot of mystery out of the details. The struggle with French is good for a person. It forces us to learn stuff and maybe a little different way of thinking. Nice work all throughout .  Bill

Nice work Steve.  You're gonna love building and flying that cub. Friends of mine built it years ago and it was really fun to watch flying around low and slow.
   PS get the set of floats for it,even better.

I did try my hand at carving the figures but nothing I did was up to my measly standards. Well I did do a bit of carving on the head itself. I couldn't figure out how to make the eyes. Again I could carve them in. Well one evening I has reloading some shot shells for a skeet match I had and bingo! #9 shot, that's the ticket! I drilled into the head just a wee bit for a socket and whala eyeballs. I initially painted them red but they didn't stand out enough against the color of the wood. I first made a tongue from a piece of brass but it was to thin. I attempted to make it from scrap wood of the burl. It came out to my liking. I added the beard for grins and giggles.
Oh a picture of my crew.
 
I apologies for the VERY lame photography. I'm using my phone with the crappiest of backgrounds. I wasn't going to do a lot so I didn't think that far ahead. Hopefully they'll get better.

I'm back and healthy(ish) again! Better still, I have updates on the build! I managed to get the hull sanded and coated with a satin urethane. I also spent some time painting the planks that will be used on the upper bulwarks. While I know there will still be touch up paint needed after they are installed, this will eliminate a lot of the painting needed later which will decrease the risk of getting paint where I do not want it. Now I can continue onward and upward with the hull construction. Once all the bulwarks are topped out, I will give the entire hull another coat or two of finish to complete it. Enjoy!


 

As promised I am back in the shipyard and working hard. I raised the planking up to the 6th wale. From here up the planking will be painted blue with the wales still in walnut. I plan on pre-painting the planks before I install them to help ensure clean lines where the paint breaks against the wales. I will also give the lower hull a good sanding and apply the first coat of finish.
 
The break from the build was nice and refreshing but now I'm ready to get back to building. Now just hoping that whatever bug has the Admiral sick and in bed stays away from me!  

So I know I was planning on getting back to work on S.R. now that vacation is over but the past few days I have been distracted as my inner child got to play with his favorite toy. While on vacation I picked up the Lego Disney Cinderella's Castle. It is built with 4,080 pieces, stands 29 inches tall and 19 inches wide. Comes with 5 characters; Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Daisy and Tinkerbell and has an amazing collection of details from several Disney movies. As both the Admiral and myself are huge Disney fans this was a great addition to our collection. It took me 14 hours to build so that is what happened to my ship yard time since Saturday. 
 
Now I can get back to work on ship modeling as I shouldn't have any more distractions!!
 
 

Made a good final push before vacation starts. Doubt I will have much time over the next couple nights before we leave so I figured I would call it good and post the update.   When I get back it should not take too long to finish up the lower hull planking. Maybe another 20 hours give or take a few. Then I will resume upward planking to top out the ship and start framing and closing up the stern. Lots of fun work ahead!

Finished the lower hull planking on the starboard side today! Wow that feels good to say that. Better yet but I did it without drops or stealers. Bow, stern and everywhere in between contain 22 strakes from the lowest wale to the keel. Of course now I have to do it again on the other side but I always feel better with the second half after I know my plan has worked on the first. Hopefully have less waste too as I should have fewer do-overs. More to follow!
 

Canopy Frame....
From the ships wheel, I am moving back to the companionway canopy frames.
I must comment here, for any future builder of the Constitution.... As easy as Ken made this fixture appear in his build log, DO NOT BE FOOLED!
This has got to be the most extreme difficulty level I have personally experienced in over 10 years of scratch building ship models....
If Ken's log had not made it look "easy as pie", I would have been happy to go with no canopy frames.  All your fault Ken..... yahahahaha!!!
My personal advise.... DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT!
 
Having said all that.... here is the third canopy frame just completed.

Two more to go, then the sky light fixture.
 

I have not recently purchased from Tower Hobbies but back in the 80s and 90s they were the premier supplier of R/C planes and supplies and very reliable often receiving orders in Alaska within a week. I'd bet on them.

So I took Chris's (Vossy) suggestion and added a skirting board or base molding around the stateroom structure, using some walnut I had left over from previous kits.  Looks really nice now.   
 
Thanks, Chris!   
 
Regards,
David

Stateroom level done now.  What you see isn't glued down yet, but even when it is, there will be more gaps where the sides meet the deck than I'd like.  Fortunately, all of that will be pretty much hidden by the railing..
 
The instructions say to mount the compartment and then install doors and windows, but I did the doors and windows before mounting, and I think it would be lots more trouble to do it the other way.
 
The grating shown isn't varnished yet (I'll do it when I break out the varnish again), but I didn't paint it.  I have that same grating in another AL boat (Sanson Tug) and it varnishes to a nice brown.
 
Regards,
David

The first level structures are complete and mounted on the deck.  A few construction comments:
I noted above my use of wire mesh vs. acetate on the doors.  Antony UK -- thanks for the wire straightening tip.  Worked great and the other 3 doors look much better. Re the horizontal windows you see in the detail picture:  I aligned the two long pieces and drilled them together before mounting them.  That gave me aligned vertical holes for the pins. The doorknobs on the small doors are actually leftover bollards from the Revenge  that I cut off.  The instructions seemed to call for the same thing as is on the hinged doors, and I thought that would look off on these, so I improvised. Re the hinged doors:  the instructions actually call for creating working hinges by folding over the hinge you see and using two, with a pin.  I tried it and couldn't get it right, so since I don't care about working doors I just used 1/2 hinge as you see, and it looks fine to me. The rear structure for the paddlewheels isn't varnished yet, and I want to put nails in for looks.
 
I've started on the second deck with the herringbone pattern.  Mindful of S. Coleman's comments on his experience, I took a lot of measurements and pulled some old trig out of dusty memory.  Have laid a few planks, and so far so good.  Fingers crossed.
 
Regards,
David

I have now completed the hull planking.  Pictures after the first coat of varnish are below.
 
I think I'm going to like this boat and like building it, but I have to say that I'm not completely happy with how the walnut hull turned out.  The wood Artesania Latina provides for this is flimsy, and chips easily.  More comments on the kit itself in the next post.

Well, day 1 of the build and I've already made my first doofus move.  I wasn't being careful and had the plywood sheet flipped over relative to the key sheet, and took the wrong frames out and glued them to the fore part of the false keel -- using CA glue.  Fortunately, discovered the mistake about 30 minutes in and was just barely able to knock the frames off -- but not before the last "knock" broke the false keel into two pieces as shown in the first pic.
 
The fix was to assemble the two halves of the false keel, the frames, and the bottom board simultaneously -- so that the bottom board aligned the two halves and also created structural strength.  All fine again.
 
On reflection, assembling frames, false keel and bottom board at the same time is the way to go, so that the frames can be properly aligned (and necessary tab sanding done as you go), but with other ships I've built it was false keel and frames first, so that was the reflex.  Need to slow down and look ahead.
 
Regards,
David

I have not recently purchased from Tower Hobbies but back in the 80s and 90s they were the premier supplier of R/C planes and supplies and very reliable often receiving orders in Alaska within a week. I'd bet on them.

Still making gradual progress on the hull but decided to change it up a little bit and knock out the first piece of deck furniture. Parts were very easy to work with and I'm really happy with how it turned out. Cut one of the side moldings a hair short but was able to add a tiny shim to fill the gap and, once painted, couldn't even tell I'd made a mistake.

Had some success last night fixing the mast holes. I had to make a little guide to make sure I got the angle right for the drill. For the front hole, I was able to use a clamp to hold everything in place. For the rear one, I had some trouble using the clamp due to the clearance available with the size of the hull and after figuring out to pre-drill holes for the nails (the guide was a lot bigger to start with) I nailed it to the hull and was able to get a successful drill completed in the right place.

I haven't filled the excess parts of the holes in at this point as with dry fitting it with the deck, it seems like they'll probably hold their position well enough. I may get some wood glue to add to the bottom of the hole (making sure it's not so much that it squeezes out onto the deck) to give some extra support.
 
While this wasn't something I was expecting to have to deal with at the outset of this build, it was pretty satisfying to see a good result when all was said and done!