king derelict

Nice work on the masts Mike alan

Congratulations Mike. The rear mast assembly is a gem. The vice you are using looks very handy, what make is it. Alan

I realized that I could use the hull from Monmouth 2.0 as a fit check on the seascape which would let me continue with the build of the model itself. So, the three main superstructures were added along with the gun and Harpoon missile launchers. I made a mistake in build planning, completing the structures separately meant that they were very fragile and hard to grip firmly when placing them on the deck. A total of five small pieces detached in the process but were all found and reinstalled. The major remaining task is to add the side decks and the barrel life rafts. Oh and the dreaded foremast. i put a coat of gesso on the seascape and I think it’s going in the right direction. The next decision is to decide on the base colors for the water. North Atlantic under heavy cloud suggests to me that it should be shades of grey green, lighter where air is mixed with the water. Thanks for looking in, the likes and comments. alan

Thanks Mike, I’ve tried the crinkled foil approach and it works well. I like the papier-mâché way because you can push the wet paper around to create small ripples and waves with some control over the process. I think toilet paper, paper towels, newspaper all work but you have to be careful to eliminate any patterns on the paper towels. You are right about the addition of another layer of paper towels, I’m going to add some gesso and see what it looks like. alan

Thanks Mike, that’s sort of my intention but the lighting doesn’t show it up as well as it looks in real life. I think some adjustments will be needed once I get some gesso on and can really see what I’ve got. alan

A fascinating build Yves, with some serious 3D printing work. Very enjoyable watching this develop. alan

Congratulations on your lovely Spitfire. The subtle weathering is really excellent. alan

Nice, neat PE work. alan

Today I used torn paper towels soaked with diluted white glue to soften the scuptamold surface and then pushed around the wet paper to form smaller surface details. Some edges have been left to help the modeling of the wakes around the hull. This is now drying. I may add another layer tomorrow. Thanks for looking in, the likes and the comments Alan

Thank you very much OC

I don’t think I can progress Monmouth any further until I have the seascape ready to take the ship. So, onto the seascape! I’m using my usual one inch thick extruded polystyrene sheet, bought in a twenty four inch square and now cut to five by twelve inches. I find this material much easier to cut and shape compared with expanded polystyrene. I used a scalpel to cut out the outline of the hull. Then I used a hot wire cutter to carve the rough wave shapes I want. According to my ancient copy of Allard Coles “ Heavy Weather Sailing” a seventy mph wind on open seas can be expected to generate waves of around 65 feet. So at 1/700 anything around an inch would be acceptable. The dressmakers pins are holding pieces together while the glue dries. Then Sculptamold was added to break up the flat and smooth surfaces and to further define the waves. Once this has dried I will add torn up paper towels soaked in diluted white glue to refine the surface and build small waves. As always this is very experimental and may evolve in unplanned ways. Thanks for looking in, the likes and comments. alan

Thank you very much OC, the PE is giving me fits this time but most of the tiny stuff is done. Lots of railings and lifeboats still to do though. l’ll take a bit of a break with the seascape for a bit. alan

Wow, the aircraft look amazing, congratulations on what must have been seriously fiddly work. alan

Hi Mike, thanks for the information, very helpful. As you can see I’ve been using old pill containers for holding hulls and assemblies. The child proof top means you can rotate the model without any risk of unscrewing the lid which I find useful when painting the miniatures. I usually fill them about three quarters full of water which helps with stability. I’ll look at the Dspiae vices, that may be a better solution. The idea of tracing the hull outline to use as a template for the seascape is a good idea, I’ll give it a go. I need to start some serious planning for the seascape. Thanks again alan

In spite of the lack of updates some work has been done along with some backwards steps. I’ve mostly in tiny PE world but thankfully I think it’s mostly done now. Heres the two frets showing the gaps. Trumpeter on the left. I still need to add the side decks but they will need to wait until the structures are added to the deck. And it suddenly occurred to me that I’m making a diorama around this model and that’s going to involve a lot of trial fitting of the ship into the seascape so I probably shouldn’t wait until Ive got a very fragile model to do that. So I think it’s time to address the seascape which will be light relief from tiny bits. i just finished making up the Harpoon launchers. The plastic kit parts are horrible so I used the WE PE frames and pieces of .020 diameter plastic rod. This was going quite well until I lost one of the PE frames. It’s taken me two days (really) to find it. It had jumped into the spares box somehow but meanwhile the workbench area is now the cleanest part of the house! plastic kit parts are shown to the right of the WE launchers. bridge structure is complete apart from adding the foremast which will wait until the bridge is secured to the deck. midship structure is also complete The hanger needs a few very small PE bits adding but the mainmast is thankfully complete. yardarms on both masts are a disaster waiting to happen. Every move I make seems to end up with me knocking one of them off. Luckily they are still the proper shape. it’s felt like I was making no progress but I think it’s going to move a bit faster now. Thanks for looking in, for the likes and for all the supportive comments. Alan