yvesvidal

Night sailing.... Yves

Again, a quick update after almost two weeks of working on one of the Galleries. What a royal pain overall..... The first thing was to position and glue (after bending in a jig for a couple of days) the rear stern wall: The construction of the galleries can then be started. Again, the parts provided by CAF are not matching exactly and need to be modified. It is extremely tedious, requires a lot of trials, sanding and CA glue is your best friend in this kind of endeavor. The most horrible parts are the slanted window frames: they are poorly machined and require each glass pane to be individually cut, with the most care. The wood is very brittle and the rungs are only asking to break in the process. It is so unfortunate that CAF did not print these frames in resin. They are printing so many other parts and these would look so much better in resin. Anyway, cutting nine glass panes on each window, gluing rungs and microscopic pieces of wood is not exactly fun and I will take a break before assembling the second gallery. Same goes with the pilasters: They should have 3D printed them instead of using that carved/machined wood which does not look very realistic at that scale. For someone with 3D design skills, it would be worth re-designing these parts and getting the window frames correctly aligned and matching the openings. Yves

What a lovely setting. Yves

A very short update. Still on the stern section, preparing for the quarterdeck: I put together six smaller guns (two have already been installed): Next, I will be installing the long beams that will be used to hold the rear quarterdeck. Yves

A quick update on the Bellona: I am back working on the rear section of the main deck. This is a mix of Session #3 (Planking of the deck) and Session #4 (building of the ward rooms and officers rooms). The Section "D" is added to the front of Section "E", placing a lid on the six 32 pounders guns recently installed: You can see the axle of the rear capstan, protruding out of the deck. Planking is then continued: I am using strip of about 20 cm long (10 meters in real life) and I hope it is not too long for such period ships. I am also trying to replicate the four planks staggered arrangement, traditional of these vessels. The Captain's Pantry and Wardroom Pantry is glued to the deck: The deck (at least the rear section) is treated with three coats of Wipe-on-Poly to darken the planks and make them more resilient. You can see the difference of colors on the pictures. We are now moving to Session #4 (I am no longer following the order of the CAF instructions). This part is the assembly of the Officers' cabins, also called canvas cabins, as they were divided by removable pieces of canvas. The walls are strengthened by some strips of wood. The glass panes are made with tracing paper. Yves

I love that rudder mechanism. So perfect and so realistic. Yves

Time to go back to the Main and Gun decks: I have prepared six 32 pounders guns to install in the gun deck: The process is identical: Drilling the holes for the micro-nails, blackening of the barrels, tedious hand painting of the chassis and final assembly. The guns are resting on their four casters and a drop of CA glue is placed between the casters and the floor. The capstan is fully deployed and will be connected to the main deck Capstan, actually rotating both at the same time. From the outside, it is looking very ominous.... Now, I can resume the work on the main deck, at least towards the poop. Yves

Yes, I do. I am using Future Floor (Pledge) before (2 coats) and after (2-3 coats). It is a tiny bit shiny at first, but the luster goes away after a few days and after gliding my fingers on the decals. You can see the Pledge bottle on some of the pictures. Decals are installed using Microscale-SET and SOL concoctions. Yves

With all these spare parts, I am starting to wonder if buying the kit is really necessary..... 🙂 Yves

The carving (CNC ?) of this wood panel is amazing. I wish CAF Model could consult with you.... and improve their parts. Yves

Beautiful model. Thank you for presenting your Build Log. Yves

Tom of CAF Models was kind enough to send me some additional pictures to help the stern construction. They came a little bit late, as I had already started. I wish these pictures could have been included into the original instructions booklets: And of course, the famous National Gallery model, source of inspiration for the CAF Model kit: I used that picture a lot for the decals placement and the overall shaping of the stern. There are some mis-labelling for the decals, in the CAF instructions (Session #5). Beware..... Yves

Time for another update. I have been working on the galleries and the decoration of the stern. It is very delicate work despite the use of 1/48th scale, due to multiple factors: The instructions are less than adequate and bring no precision to what has to be built. The parts are not exact in shape and dimensions. Because of these factors, a lot of research, creativity and building have to take place. Let's take a quick look at the instructions: I started with the installation of the balcony. This is essential in placing correctly both galleries (I am no longer following the CAF instructions overall). The balcony is delicately cut from the quarterdeck floor, and put in place separately. I have verified that the flooring of the quarterdeck will align and match perfectly with the balcony floor. This phase is essential to position correctly the rear wardroom lights and the upcoming pilasters. Below, you can see the quarterdeck floor in place: The wardroom lights framing is then glued in place: At this point, the galleries construction can be started. A lot of adjustments have to be done and quite a few parts were created, as I decided to not use the kit supplied parts, that are not fitting. After a lot of precise adjustment and work. Above, you can see how I increased the size of the 3D-8 parts, by adding four strips of 3x2 mm all around it.. Finally, we end up with something that looks like the stern of a Bellona: At that stage, we can start gluing the counter rails: And place a few decals. It is now coming to life: The wardroom lights will be installed later on as they are extremely delicate (carved in wood) and I still need to adjust the top fascia of the stern. For the time being let's enjoy some pictures of that delicate stage of the construction: I have added the "dot" after the name of the ship, as it was missing from the decal. The "drops" are made from resin (3D printed) and do require some filing to fit decently. Yves

You will have to start a new Build Log, when you decide to tackle the kit. Yves

I share your torments. I started thinking if it was worthwhile installing them on my model as well. I even went down the path of purchasing the Longboat kit from Syren, to install on top of these beams.... If I was you, I would leave the beams bare and would remove the cradles. They distract the eyes and ruin the purity of the Navy Board style model you are trying to achieve (and succeeding at it). Yves

It reminds me of some difficult and delicate phases during the planking of my Bellona. The wood was softer on the Bellona kit, but it still required a lot of heavy tools to make it bend and stay in place. You are doing a great job, Kenny. Yves

B.E. your model is an endless source of marvels for me. You are pushing the perfection towards new boundaries. Yves

If you manage to have this engine spin, you are a champion. Yves

Diversifying Kevin, diversifying!!! After the paper, you are back to the wood. Great kit that you are putting together. Yves

Yeah !!!!!!!! Yves

The rigging is never indicated by Trumpeter. It is typical of them and they don't care. Obviously, additional reference books will be required to turn this model into a realistic model. Yves

Nothing beats a few lead batteries to hold things in place. I use this technique a lot..... Yves

What a beautiful hull !!!! Yves

That is surprising from Trumpeter. I was looking at the Yamato 1/200 hull, which is made of two parts. Because of the aluminum bracing that is securing the two halves, it is hard to see the junction. If you don't pay attention, you would think the hull was molded of one part. I wonder if ROMA is an old kit..... Maybe it was done by a different team. Yves

Joshua, There may not be a discussion about this topic on that forum, but the consensus is that the old Nichimo kit was showing its age and that plastic injected models have made so many progress recently, that the old kit would not compare too favorably. FUJIMI introduced a complete revamp of the superstructure and guns of the Nichimo kit, and that helped a lot modernizing/improving the original kit. I suspect that the Nichimo kit requires a lot of extra work to turn it into a scale model as it was developed to navigate, before all. Most likely, PONTOS, MK and a few others will be offering add-ons and PE kits for the YAMATO in 1/200 scale. That will give you access to a vast pool of parts if you decide to build or improve your Nichimo kit. Yves