king derelict

Great figures. You see the colourful uniforms of the day and forget that they got dirty, dusty and ragged out in the field, The weathering is great Alan

I am definitely going to have to build a Lancaster. I was out on the hills in the Peak district when the Lancaster did one of the Dambuster memorial flights over the reservoirs there. Emotive stuff This guy is really crazy with his build - in a good way. 1:72 Avro Lancaster- Remembering the crew of ED412 - Work in Progress - Aircraft - Britmodeller.com Alan

A lovely Sunderland Andrew. Yes, those were the bomb racks. I have to get the Airfix Lancaster and Sunderland for old times sake. Sorry to disrupt your log. Alan

The Alexandria raid model is fantastic. Thanks Mark Alan

The depth charge racks were painted, he depth charges were added and lashings applied A lot of time looking at aft deck plans and as usual no two Flowers seem to have the same layout. In the absence of any definitive images of campanulas aft deck I decided to go with one hatch placed in what seems to be a poplar place for a lot of Flowers and the spare depth charge racks adjacent to the hoist which seems to make sense. This afternoon was spent looking for stretch 0.3mm thread on the web (no luck) and touring HL, Wally World, and Michaels (also no luck). 0.3 mm would have been a bit over 1/2 inch at full size. I have 0.5 mm thread which scales at just under an inch. I may try a few lines to see how it looks. Alternatively, I could use 0.25 non stretch and try to keep it all taut. I'm getting less happy about the falls for the boats so I spent some time looking and the nice people at Cornwall Model Boats have brass sheaves at about the right size at a decent price along with more hooks. I caved in and bought another set of stanchions and a possible white ensign. Their shipping cost to the US is not bad and they are prompt in sending it off. I may do a little touching up while I'm waiting but I want to finish the falls before rigging. The Lewis gins are going to be absolutely the last thing to be added. I don't trust my fat fingers even though the rigging goes nowhere near their location Many Thanks for looking in Alan

The railings look really nice Alan

I ordered the B and C mats from Sprue Brothers. I'm almost looking forward to masking something. Of course you can't just buy a couple of things. That fixed shipping cost needs justifying. This is what happened a couple of weeks ago when I needed to restock with paints and there was a sale. Alan

And the Short Sunderland had bombs that were supposed to slide out of the fuselage on rails under the wings - that didn't happen on mine. Great memories though Alan

Especially if you used that little bulb of glue that came with the kit! My great achievement was getting the floats to swing down from the wings on the PBY catalina. Beautiful work so far. its going to look excellent. Alan

Thanks to the wonders of Amazon the Type A turned up this morning. I had to play with it straight away and it works very well with Tamiya and blue tape. Definitely needs a new knife blade to get the best out of it. think its going to be great for masking decks and I have a Centurian tank that I want to do in the Berlin paint scheme and i think that will solve a lot of problems. Of course now I'm thinking I need some of the others. Alan

Still creeping slowly forward with the small stuff The raft lashings were completed. The oars were added to the ships boats and the lashing put in place. I added the manropes to the first of the printed life belts and put it on the bridge wing. Three more to go The bridge screen was made up and added. Its a cut down section of a spare printed ladder with a bit of old overhead projector transparency added The stretch cord arrived from Amazon and like its earlier friend is not stretchy. Different vendor but exactly the same stuff. Its labeled sewing machine thread made in Japan on the spool but its in packaging that says Stretchy Bead Cord - Made in China. So much for globalisation. Thanks for looking in Alan

I dunno Craig. It seems that most times I read your updates I find myself going off to buy something. You have some great tips. Thanks The Flanker is looking really nice Alan

Lovely paint work Jack Alan

Looking great OC. This is going to be a magnificent work. I see some fugure painters outlining belts etc in black. It looks quite dramatic but it lacks the realism that your use of wshes acheives. Excellent Alan

Some small progress and a bit of a re-do today. I used tan washes to weather the rafts and the life belts. I air brushed the extra depth charges and wondered why they were taking so long to dry. I had picked up the Tamiya X-1 instead of XF-1 so I had painted them gloss black. They will get dulled down tomorrow. The rafts got placed on the racks and I spent several attempts trying to get something like the lashings I have seen in photos. Eventually I used some small sections of 1/8" styrene tube cut in half and glued onto the racks. I then threaded the cords through and glued them. I'll tidy up loose ends tomorrow and do teh same to teh second side. THe pelorus finally snuck into place on teh bridge Thanks for looking in Alan

Thanks Mike The FDM printer works at this scale. In some ways the surface texture adds to the model I think. It breaks up the walls of smooth surfaces. I think that would be a drawback at smaller scales though. The resin printer starts to look an interesting option. Alan

I have the Mr Metal Primer in spray can. Its good but wasteful on small parts. I'll buy the brush on version next time. The paint really sticks well to metal after treatment with the primer. Alan

I looked at the first image and thought it was a reference photos of a real aircraft. Great work. Keep pushing back on real life. Echoing every sentiments and good luck Alan

A bit of work on the details today. I printed the life belts but I think they come out too thin so I scaled the thickness up by 2.5x. Its a nice feature of this way of building that you can change dimensions and resize parts. And keep printing them as needed. I also made up some mounts for the Lewis guns. The depth charge is about the right diameter for the base so I reduced it in height to 1mm and printed a few. With some styrene rod they will work fine. The pelorus is in progress in the background More depth charges have been printed and primed I look at the area where the door to the radar room is and it seems to need a set of railings at that open corner otherwise moving about in that area in a big sea would be highly hazardous. I have run out of the 20mm stanchions and I'm reluctant to buy more just to use one so I will experiment with some homemade options. The stretch cord I ordered off Amazon turns out to not be stretch cord at all so I have reordered and hopefully will do better next time. So rigging will be later in the week. The flag is the next challenge. Thanks for looking in Alan

Thank you very much OC. A place to display her is the next problem. At just over four feet she needs quite a bit of space. There may have to be a major reshuffle of the shelves and cupboards Alan

For some reason the prop and rudder has been sitting on the side being ignored so i painted and added them. I gave the prop a coat of matt black and then a thin coat of gold to try to make it fit in with the "slightly used" concept. I finished rigging the falls for the boats and added the cable drums Lashings and oars need to go on next. For some reason the oars have been in the same pile as the rudder and prop - being ignored. The aft deck looks a little bare. I'm thinking about adding some extra depth charges. Also I may add a couple of hatches. Some Flowers had them and some didn't. I can't find any information on Campanula one way or another. Maybe the hatches and a few depth charges between the rails would fill it up nicely. Thanks for looking and have a great weekend Alan

Thank you very much Craig. Its appreciated. Yep; I jumped into this with both feet without realising some of the challenges. Its been a big learning experience at very many levels and I'm grateful for all the help i have received on the forum Alan

A great job on an interesting subject. Very nicely finished Alan

I looked at the hull this morning and decided that I had got a bit out of hand with the rust in a few places. I used washes of the base colours and some dry brushing and now I think I am happy with it. The anchors got the heavy weathering treatment and were added. The chains need to be tidied up at the windlass once the glue has fully set. I am still not sure about weathering the superstructure but I didn't like the clean appearance so I added some light rust at the ventilator bolt rings and at the joints in the galley funnel. I fixed the ships boats and the davits in place and have started rigging the falls. I think I have a better wy of setting the ropes so I will try again tomorrow Thanks for looking in Alan

Weathering continues on the hull. I added the light rust washes to the dark rust at the panel joints and below the scuppers (may have overdone that). The coloured images I have don't show any significant rust around the portholes which slightly surprised me but I have left it off. This may be a bit too heavy in places but I wanted to get an Atlantic convoy look. Those little ships really took a pounding out there. I added rust to the bridge supports and started on the bandstand and 2 pounder gun tub supports. I;m not sure whether to add a light touch to the ventilator stacks otherwise I plan to leave the superstructure relatively clean. I have rigging thread arriving tomorrow and I'm trying to work out a rigging plan. As in everything else it looks like every Flower was different. Thanks for looking in Alan