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king derelict

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  1. king derelict
    Yep, no second chances of you find you bent the part in the wrong direction. Just straightening it is often enough to break it. Likewise I've had parts break in the fret. Alan
  2. king derelict
    Thank you Mike, That is a really great photograph. It will be really useful both from a weathering aspect and also for the detail layout. The Trumpeter instructions are a bit vague and in some cases incorrect. The Trumpeter instructions shows the longer yard arms on teh fore mast being on the forward side. The WEM instructions for the PE shows them on the aft side. Your photograph confirms this so thank you very much. The dark grey decks look pretty grubby. Do you know how long she had been at sea at that point. Thanks again Alan
  3. king derelict
    OC, your photos already saved the day. The instructions are very vague and I had the 1006 Navigation Radar platform installed wrongly. It's now where it should be. Many Thanks Alan
  4. king derelict
    Those are great photos OC. Excellent quality. Thank you so much; they will be very useful Alan
  5. king derelict
    Thanks OC I hope I can make a nice job of it. It looks a nice kit with the PE added. I have a few pictures of Monmouth not very good for detail but this one might be handy for weathering. Alan
  6. king derelict
    Thanks Yves. Yes the logistics for this one are quite an issue. A lot different from using tiny amounts of paint on a five inch long ship. I got the second coat on this morning and I think I may need a third. Its a whole different aproach from 1/700 where a couple of ounces of paint will last for several ships. Alan
  7. king derelict
    The individuality of the faces still amazes me. Well done OC Alan
  8. king derelict
    Ahhh - back to the security of tiny world and 1/700 scale ships. While the parts are printing for the corvette and I play with the layout and order bits i decided to start a 1/700 scale ship as a break from the almost industrial scale project that is the Flower Class Corvette I have the Trumpeter kit of HMS Montrose, a type 23 frigate and I bought the White Ensign PE kit to add details. It turns out the Trumpeter kit has quite a decent set of PE anyway but it doesn't have ladders and importantly, no railings. The first curiosity came when thinking about fitting the WE helicopter deck and finding it is considerably wider than the aft deck on the plastic model. As far as I can determine its not supposed to overhang at least in any of the photos I have found. The WE PE is really aimed at their resin model and I suppose its possible that their 1/700 is different to Trumpeters. The safety railings around the helicopter pad fit with their deck so will need to be altered. The WE PE deck is going to be put aside; it doesn't bring much to the detail in that area and would add a step to the deck. I started the bridge structure with the first bits of glitter going on from both sources. The WE PE is finer (hand railings are really thin) but the fret is noticeable thinner than the Trumpeter or Flyhawk sheets so its going to require careful handling. The bending tool is very helpful as usual in forming the parts. This is my first full hull model. I'm thinking about setting it in a modelled sea rather than on a stand so rudders and props may not be used. My initial thought was to finish the ship as "The Black Duke" HMS Monmouth but that will depend on finding decals. As far as i can see the ships are identical in equipment so just the pennant number and name needs changing Thanks for looking and have a great weekend Alan
  9. king derelict
    After a bit more putty and an overall sanding down I put the first coat of primer on yesterday evening and this morning rubbed it down. It is going to need more primer coats but it looks quite good already and its hard to pick the section join lines from the printed weld lines. One coat used an entire 12 ounce can of primer! I bought two more cans tonight. In parallel I have been printing the sections for the chartroom. The mouse ear brims seem to have been working well and I set up and ran each print without any issues. Either that or the Gods of Modelling have found someone else to torment. I plan to pause updates for a few days while I print more of the chartroom, bridge and engine room and get a sense of how the deck and its superstructure are going to assemble. I need to sort out plastic shims and how to set the decks to the correct levels, find some wood strips etc. That's probably going to require some on-line shopping but I need to work out shim thicknesses first. I also need to decide on a ship and get the paints for the appropriate scheme. None of this is going to be terribly exciting unless the printer really gets out of hand so i won't trouble you with the daily progress until we start moving into the next step Have a great weekend and thanks for looking in I'll be back with the next installment soon Alan
  10. king derelict
    Thanks mark I'm trying to document my learning experience and solutions as I find them but I'm trying not to get too bogged down in it and become repetative. Alan
  11. king derelict
    Thanks Craig These printers really are sensitive to the print head height. An eighth of a turn on the adjusting screws makes a huge difference in print behaviour. I don't know how much a turn of the screw changes the height but its in thousandths of an inch I suspect. I checked the rollers and guides for excess play and the belt tension and it seems good. That is the worry - that there is some as yet undiscovered variable in the machine that has me chasing my tail - or waving my arms about 😄
  12. king derelict
    Lovely PE work Alan
  13. king derelict
    Hi Mark I think I am guilty of using poor terminology. Its really bed alignment rather than absolute level. It is about calibrating to get the print head to move completely parallel to the bed and the correct distance above the plate at all points. So when it lays down the first layer the distance between between the nozzle and the bed surface is close enough to press the filament down enough to stick to the plate but not too close where it will bulldoze the filament around the plate or skip parts of the layer. There are adjusting screws at each corner of the plate to move it up and down and in general a piece of paper is used as a feeler gauge to check the level between nozzle and plate at each corner looking for light drag as evidence of contact between nozzle and bed. Its a bit like using a micrometer. You are looking for enough drag to indicate good contact but not a hard clamp. I have been using a levelling print routine which prints a three layer ring around the edges of the bed and a square at each corner. The appearance of the print tells you where to adjust to improve the result. I like it because I can watch the first layer print and determine where a change is needed. I suspect I may be making the experienced printers wince with this but I find it seems to work better for me than the paper feeler gauge. It is possible though that it is only getting me close and I need to get better so developing skill with the feeler method may be the better long term solution. It seems that print speed, nozzle temperature, bed temperature and nozzle alignment (levelling) are the basic knobs you can turn to affect the final print - and that seems an overwhelming series of options when you are new to the technology. Of course as with every important topic the internet is full of opposing theories with something new to try. At the moment the corner brims seem to work well. I did pick up some stick glue and hair spray but haven't tried them yet. Thanks for the interest and help. Excuse my poor skills at written explanation; I do much better when i can wave my hands around Alan
  14. king derelict
    Hi; I'm using Overture PLA filament and the cooling fan is on for the first layer. Do you think I should change that in Cura? The corner brims are a plug in to Cura and are a little strange. They are supposed to print as a solid single layer disc. However i find that depending on the size of the corner brim there is often a section that is just a grid of filament. Maybe its something to do with my version of Cura versus what the plug in was written for. The corner brim on the left is intended to be smaller than the one adjacent to it because I was running out of room on the plate. I will recheck the bed level; it has been holding up in recent days but may be out a little again. Many Thanks for your help; I feel a bit out of my depth with the details of printing. Alan
  15. king derelict
    I returned to the completed hull after letting the epoxy cure for 24 hours. This time there was very little need for any serious viciousness and more a case of adding putty to the remaining gaps. With the over spread of the putty it looks worse than it is. Most of this will scrape or sand off Most of the joins really only needed a touch of putty The printer has been working away too. I re-sliced the aft deck files to add the corner brims and reprinted the section I deck. Compared to the previous days version (at left) it is a much nicer print. Its still not an infallible solution. For some reason on the current work in progress (deck H) it failed to print the corner brim at the bottom right corner even though it is present in the gcode file preview and you can see the skirt has made an allowance for it. I also don't understand why the printer occasionally missed sections of the layer as seen in this photo. Its all a black art still! I am using the book Flower Class Corvettes as a reference to select a suitable candidate for the model. The extended forecastle means it will be a later corvette although earlier ships were refitted. The mast aft of the bridge also is a feature of a later vessel but the lack of aft Oerlikons means its not a really late one. I would like some wooden decks which tend to disappear in the late builds so I'm looking somewhere in mid war period I think. I need to print a lot more parts to see what I have and what can be changed (is it possible to move the mast forward of the bridge?) before making a decision). Plenty of time really. Next objective is to finish the deck parts and sort out wood planks for the deck sections that need it and some plastic strips for shims and levelling then an order to those nice people at Sprue Brothers. Thanks for looking in Alan
  16. king derelict
    Thank you Yves You set a high standard to follow but I'm doing my best. The forecastle decks will move forward a bit; there are some loose strands of filament on the bow section where the print was trying to print the fore deck in mid air and it took a few passes to establish a fused piece. I think it might just about work out. I am still getting warping with a bed temperature of 60C. Very frustrating but the mouse ears at the corners are helping a lot. Thanks again for all the help Alan
  17. king derelict
    The beast is back together again! I made the last two joins today and it is now sitting to cure fully before adding a little putty and tidying up the hull before priming. Sorry for the ad-hoc photos but this thing is a challenge to place somewhere to photograph so the backgrounds may be more interesting than the model at some points. I added some of the deck pieces to check out how they are progressing. As I hoped the joins are better this time so much less putty and fettling will be needed this time. Then a first coat of primer and we shall see what we have. I'm still printing deck pieces. I got over confident after reading several articles about preventing warped parts but I am having mixed success. Several articles blamed having too hot a build plate after the initial layer so I have reduced the build plate temperature to 60C from my previous standard of 65C. I have also slowed down the print speed. Adhesion to the build plate is still good but the warping is still present. I got a couple of nice prints but the stern most deck piece is horrible even after a dip in hot water and manually flattening it. I think the distortion is too great. I have the next piece printing (section J) with an initial bed temperature of 60C and then reducing to 55C and it is starting to warp at the corners too. The on-line community has mixed views on the cures for warping so I may be going in the wrong direction with this. I think I will go back to adding the corner brims for the next piece. I'm finding the lack of consistency to be the frustrating part of this project. especially as repeating a bad part might take hours. It was meant to be a learning experience but sometimes I would prefer to not have to learn it all the hard way. Thanks for looking in Alan
  18. king derelict
    Thanks Lou Wow that guy has quite a launch technique. I don't think we will be trying his structural test - unless it is done by the smaller sister of my cats. I think the MEK or Acetone route may give a stronger join but the fumes scare me a bit. Alan
  19. king derelict
    Agreed; the attention to detail on the faces is really paying off Alan
  20. king derelict
    The recovery continues. The stern sections are back together and although still not perfect the gaps at the joints are much improved. A little putty should result in a reasonable finish. I switch to BSI slow cure epoxy and I am letting it cure as long as possible before moving on to the next section. I should be able to mate the two hull halves tomorrow morning and then leave for twenty four hours before puttying and fairing the joints. In the meantime I am continuing with printing the deck pieces. The bed still shifts a little as time goes by. I got several deck pieces completed but it tripped up over this piece, Section E, and I had to run the levelling print and adjust a couple of the corners a touch. The second attempt is shown. The BENWORX logo caused problems with adhesion to the bed in the first print. The deck piece was too big to add corner brims and unfortunately the top right corner is lifting. I'm hoping a bit of hot water will flatten it out post printing. I am not sure of the purpose of several of the deck pieces and its not obvious looking at the instructions. One of the pieces, the deck dagger plate doesn't look like the piece in the instructions so maybe its changed in the course of development. I ran a trial of priming methods on some scrap pieces. Three thin coats of gesso, Rustoleum automotive primer and Mr Surfacer. The Rustoleum primer looks like the best result so I plan to go with that unless anyone has an insight that would make it a bad idea. I had a quick look on the web and couldn't find anything to suggest that it would react with the PLA and result in damage. Thanks for looking in and thank you all for the support Alan
  21. king derelict
    Thanks Craig I roughed up the mating surfaces as I was cleaning out the old epoxy so it should be better this time round. Alan
  22. king derelict
    Thanks Yves; its a definite improvement and tidier to apply too Alan
  23. king derelict
    Thanks Lou I think that's a valid point. The slow cure I am now using is much thinner too and its easier to press the parts together and get a tighter join and also spread the glue over the whole surface. The thirty minute working time is optimistic - more like ten minutes. So far its working well Alan
  24. king derelict
    Craig Thats very, very nice. Its definitely worth putting PE on something like that. The moulded detail would very be as good. Railings and girders really pop in PE. Alan
  25. king derelict
    Thanks for the information Lou That looks like a good candidate. I just changed to the BSI slow cure 30 Minute Epoxy | Slow-Cure (bsi-inc.com) Alan

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