channell

I've been using some bits meant to clean the nozzles of 3d printers for my tiny hole needs... they seem to hold up a little better than normal micro bits and cut great on the soft Trumpeter plastic. 
 
I've been a man possessed this week; have been working every evening on Bissy.  I rimmed the wood deck with .010x.030 styrene strip and brought the entire perimeter of the hull in alignment through a mix of trimming the wood deck edges and sanding/shaving the hull sides. After that, I masked off the deck and got yet another coat of primer on.  
 
Looking forward to installing the hull photo-etch and hopefully getting at least the final upper hull grey sprayed on by the end of this weekend. 
 

 
 

I'd be happy with your results.......I've never done one before.  I bought the Revell Arizona kit and wanted to do one on it,  but no one makes one for it.  
    I guess I'll have to live with a painted one.  they look very nice though     well done.

I've been using some bits meant to clean the nozzles of 3d printers for my tiny hole needs... they seem to hold up a little better than normal micro bits and cut great on the soft Trumpeter plastic. 
 
I've been a man possessed this week; have been working every evening on Bissy.  I rimmed the wood deck with .010x.030 styrene strip and brought the entire perimeter of the hull in alignment through a mix of trimming the wood deck edges and sanding/shaving the hull sides. After that, I masked off the deck and got yet another coat of primer on.  
 
Looking forward to installing the hull photo-etch and hopefully getting at least the final upper hull grey sprayed on by the end of this weekend. 
 

 
 

Good to be back and building again! 
 
The Pontos advanced set also includes stanchions... Just the thought of 'em induces terror and panic in me though! Call me a wimp but I'll probably just stick with the regular (Pontos) railings on this build.  
 
Bismarck's rails had an extra bracing pole every other stanchion; I was thinking I could cut those off the individual stanchions and add them to the PE rails for effect; it's on my list of things to experiment with anyway. 

Thanks Kevin... trying to put my all into this one and I appreciate the encouragement! 
 
Scaledecks advertises the deck as being specifically intended to fit the Trumpy kit so I'm thinking either they just messed up or the decks are really prone to shrinkage. I live in a dry area with very little humidity so it happens... but if the deck shrank, it did so perfectly even and with no warping.
 
Oh well, at least it's still usable!  

Hey all, made some more progress... 
 
I ran into a bunch of issues with the Scaledecks wooden deck; turns out it doesn't fit particularly well.
 
First off, I noticed the width between the deck and the hull edges was gonna be very off; I thought I might have sanded the sides of the hull too much but now I wonder if the deck itself wasn't the problem. 
 

 
Both the bow and stern decks didn't fit properly either; the cutouts in the wood deck didn't quite match the corresponding moldings on the plastic deck. 
 

 
This pic shows how far off all the stern cutouts are; turret Dora and the molded deck fittings closest to it it fit OK but the further aft you go, the worse the discrepancy got...

 
I have 3 unused decks for this kit but I really wanted to get the look of individual planks that the Scaledecks offering provided, even though it was by far the worst fitting of my options. 
 
Anyway, I decided it would be best to jump ahead and get the deck installed before painting the hull so I could try to even out the edges of the hull and integrate the wooden deck better. 
 
First I painted the barbettes, stairways ect in the final upper hull colors (Model Master Acryl Lichtgrau with Vallejo grey-black "baseboards"). I airbrushed the grey-black bases first, then masked them off and painted the light grey. Then I went to work getting the deck down...
 
I had to patch the front of the deck in a couple of places and extend the "metal" of the prow to get everything looking good...
 

 

 

 
Unlike other wooden decks I've used, this one leaves it up to the builder to integrate the separate pieces together...
 

 

 
On the stern where fit was the worst I had two choices; split the deck into multiple pieces and assemble it piecemeal or shave it flat and rebuild the deck fittings... I chose the latter:
 
 
 


 

Somehow it all came together and other than a fairly lousy fit on the barbettes of the aft most secondary guns it turned out all right. I think I might add some kind of "molding" around the barbettes to cover the gaps for that issue. 
 
And for fun, here's the newly "decked out" hull next to Bissy #1;  there is a BIG difference between this PITA of a deck and your standard "stick on" wood deck in my opinion, worth the effort though I think it should have fit better for what it costs. Buyer beware. 
 

From here I can seal the deck, even out the "gutters" around the perimeter of the main deck and then mask it all off easily before painting the hull. Until next time! 

I've been using some bits meant to clean the nozzles of 3d printers for my tiny hole needs... they seem to hold up a little better than normal micro bits and cut great on the soft Trumpeter plastic. 
 
I've been a man possessed this week; have been working every evening on Bissy.  I rimmed the wood deck with .010x.030 styrene strip and brought the entire perimeter of the hull in alignment through a mix of trimming the wood deck edges and sanding/shaving the hull sides. After that, I masked off the deck and got yet another coat of primer on.  
 
Looking forward to installing the hull photo-etch and hopefully getting at least the final upper hull grey sprayed on by the end of this weekend. 
 

 
 

Some light weathering and I’m finished. Parked up beside Yamato.
. 

So the desk is now empty awaiting the next build 

I've been using some bits meant to clean the nozzles of 3d printers for my tiny hole needs... they seem to hold up a little better than normal micro bits and cut great on the soft Trumpeter plastic. 
 
I've been a man possessed this week; have been working every evening on Bissy.  I rimmed the wood deck with .010x.030 styrene strip and brought the entire perimeter of the hull in alignment through a mix of trimming the wood deck edges and sanding/shaving the hull sides. After that, I masked off the deck and got yet another coat of primer on.  
 
Looking forward to installing the hull photo-etch and hopefully getting at least the final upper hull grey sprayed on by the end of this weekend. 
 

 
 

I've been using some bits meant to clean the nozzles of 3d printers for my tiny hole needs... they seem to hold up a little better than normal micro bits and cut great on the soft Trumpeter plastic. 
 
I've been a man possessed this week; have been working every evening on Bissy.  I rimmed the wood deck with .010x.030 styrene strip and brought the entire perimeter of the hull in alignment through a mix of trimming the wood deck edges and sanding/shaving the hull sides. After that, I masked off the deck and got yet another coat of primer on.  
 
Looking forward to installing the hull photo-etch and hopefully getting at least the final upper hull grey sprayed on by the end of this weekend. 
 

 
 

Good to be back and building again! 
 
The Pontos advanced set also includes stanchions... Just the thought of 'em induces terror and panic in me though! Call me a wimp but I'll probably just stick with the regular (Pontos) railings on this build.  
 
Bismarck's rails had an extra bracing pole every other stanchion; I was thinking I could cut those off the individual stanchions and add them to the PE rails for effect; it's on my list of things to experiment with anyway. 

Hey all, made some more progress... 
 
I ran into a bunch of issues with the Scaledecks wooden deck; turns out it doesn't fit particularly well.
 
First off, I noticed the width between the deck and the hull edges was gonna be very off; I thought I might have sanded the sides of the hull too much but now I wonder if the deck itself wasn't the problem. 
 

 
Both the bow and stern decks didn't fit properly either; the cutouts in the wood deck didn't quite match the corresponding moldings on the plastic deck. 
 

 
This pic shows how far off all the stern cutouts are; turret Dora and the molded deck fittings closest to it it fit OK but the further aft you go, the worse the discrepancy got...

 
I have 3 unused decks for this kit but I really wanted to get the look of individual planks that the Scaledecks offering provided, even though it was by far the worst fitting of my options. 
 
Anyway, I decided it would be best to jump ahead and get the deck installed before painting the hull so I could try to even out the edges of the hull and integrate the wooden deck better. 
 
First I painted the barbettes, stairways ect in the final upper hull colors (Model Master Acryl Lichtgrau with Vallejo grey-black "baseboards"). I airbrushed the grey-black bases first, then masked them off and painted the light grey. Then I went to work getting the deck down...
 
I had to patch the front of the deck in a couple of places and extend the "metal" of the prow to get everything looking good...
 

 

 

 
Unlike other wooden decks I've used, this one leaves it up to the builder to integrate the separate pieces together...
 

 

 
On the stern where fit was the worst I had two choices; split the deck into multiple pieces and assemble it piecemeal or shave it flat and rebuild the deck fittings... I chose the latter:
 
 
 


 

Somehow it all came together and other than a fairly lousy fit on the barbettes of the aft most secondary guns it turned out all right. I think I might add some kind of "molding" around the barbettes to cover the gaps for that issue. 
 
And for fun, here's the newly "decked out" hull next to Bissy #1;  there is a BIG difference between this PITA of a deck and your standard "stick on" wood deck in my opinion, worth the effort though I think it should have fit better for what it costs. Buyer beware. 
 

From here I can seal the deck, even out the "gutters" around the perimeter of the main deck and then mask it all off easily before painting the hull. Until next time! 

Yeah, I saw that one way back when... pretty impressive work. It's definitely the "Big Bissy" build to beat on the interwebs. 
 
 
 
I'm still putting through endless prep work on my build...
 

 

 
cleanup on the propshafts and bow, from this:
 

 

 
... to this:
 

 

 

 

 

 

 
And more hack-n-slash on the superstructure in preparation for PE: 
 

 
Lots of work that isn't immediately obvious (or quite finished) but it's still necessary in my opinion to get a really great build. 
Even though I keep building 'em, I've been a somewhat vocal critic of Trumpeter 1/200 kits as they come "out of the box"... they are basically like Trumpy's 1/350 kits blown up to 1/200 so they tend to take any small accuracy issues and multiply 'em. LOTS of details that are OK to be missing in smaller scale end up being glaring omissions in a larger scales too, such as the center anchor hawsepipe (completely omitted on the standard kit). This means lots of extra work and additions if you want to end up with anything better than a bathtub toy. 
 
Still, I think it's fun to rework these monsters into something really cool... don't know for sure if I've just been sucking up too much sanding dust but I feel like the shape of my modified hull helps my version of the kit take a large step away from "toy" and towards realism, which makes all the work worth it. 

Hey all, made some more progress... 
 
I ran into a bunch of issues with the Scaledecks wooden deck; turns out it doesn't fit particularly well.
 
First off, I noticed the width between the deck and the hull edges was gonna be very off; I thought I might have sanded the sides of the hull too much but now I wonder if the deck itself wasn't the problem. 
 

 
Both the bow and stern decks didn't fit properly either; the cutouts in the wood deck didn't quite match the corresponding moldings on the plastic deck. 
 

 
This pic shows how far off all the stern cutouts are; turret Dora and the molded deck fittings closest to it it fit OK but the further aft you go, the worse the discrepancy got...

 
I have 3 unused decks for this kit but I really wanted to get the look of individual planks that the Scaledecks offering provided, even though it was by far the worst fitting of my options. 
 
Anyway, I decided it would be best to jump ahead and get the deck installed before painting the hull so I could try to even out the edges of the hull and integrate the wooden deck better. 
 
First I painted the barbettes, stairways ect in the final upper hull colors (Model Master Acryl Lichtgrau with Vallejo grey-black "baseboards"). I airbrushed the grey-black bases first, then masked them off and painted the light grey. Then I went to work getting the deck down...
 
I had to patch the front of the deck in a couple of places and extend the "metal" of the prow to get everything looking good...
 

 

 

 
Unlike other wooden decks I've used, this one leaves it up to the builder to integrate the separate pieces together...
 

 

 
On the stern where fit was the worst I had two choices; split the deck into multiple pieces and assemble it piecemeal or shave it flat and rebuild the deck fittings... I chose the latter:
 
 
 


 

Somehow it all came together and other than a fairly lousy fit on the barbettes of the aft most secondary guns it turned out all right. I think I might add some kind of "molding" around the barbettes to cover the gaps for that issue. 
 
And for fun, here's the newly "decked out" hull next to Bissy #1;  there is a BIG difference between this PITA of a deck and your standard "stick on" wood deck in my opinion, worth the effort though I think it should have fit better for what it costs. Buyer beware. 
 

From here I can seal the deck, even out the "gutters" around the perimeter of the main deck and then mask it all off easily before painting the hull. Until next time! 

Really great work here, this is the first of this kit I've seen go together online. 
 
Keep up the awesome work! 

Good to be back and building again! 
 
The Pontos advanced set also includes stanchions... Just the thought of 'em induces terror and panic in me though! Call me a wimp but I'll probably just stick with the regular (Pontos) railings on this build.  
 
Bismarck's rails had an extra bracing pole every other stanchion; I was thinking I could cut those off the individual stanchions and add them to the PE rails for effect; it's on my list of things to experiment with anyway. 

Thanks Kevin... trying to put my all into this one and I appreciate the encouragement! 
 
Scaledecks advertises the deck as being specifically intended to fit the Trumpy kit so I'm thinking either they just messed up or the decks are really prone to shrinkage. I live in a dry area with very little humidity so it happens... but if the deck shrank, it did so perfectly even and with no warping.
 
Oh well, at least it's still usable!  

Really great work here, this is the first of this kit I've seen go together online. 
 
Keep up the awesome work! 

Good to be back and building again! 
 
The Pontos advanced set also includes stanchions... Just the thought of 'em induces terror and panic in me though! Call me a wimp but I'll probably just stick with the regular (Pontos) railings on this build.  
 
Bismarck's rails had an extra bracing pole every other stanchion; I was thinking I could cut those off the individual stanchions and add them to the PE rails for effect; it's on my list of things to experiment with anyway. 

My first job has been to improve the shape of the kit hull to make it look closer to the real thing while still allowing myself some artistic license and not getting too bogged down in making it 100% exact. In the end, aside from simply chasing accuracy in scale I guess it's really all about making the model more "mine" instead of the work of some nameless grunts and a huge injection molding machine. 
 
Here's a smattering of Bismarck hulls to illustrate:
 

 
Top is a 1/100 fiberglass Bismarck hull, middle is my original hull and bottom is the hull I'm gonna use to finish this build.
 

 
I used the plans of the 1/100 version scaled down as a guide to get a fair approximation of the hull shape and built up/shaved down the hull from stem to stern to match the plan profile using reverse cross-sections as a guide. 
 
I also replaced the bow portholes by drilling fresh circles in styrene sheet and inletting them into the hull:
 

 

 
I did this because the kit portholes are warped due to the curvature of the hull and the realities of molding the hull in 1 large piece.
 
I was able to drill and grind the stern portholes from behind to get the same effect:
 

 

I also re-profiled the stern itself as the kit interpretation is too sharp and narrow. 
 
 
 
 
 
 

good evening everyone
 
not much to show for the weekends work, still tidying up the front end lines and making sure they are going to the right place, all my points of reference differ,

the cathead was rigged and ancors made but for some reason i only have qty 2 and not 4, lol i dont think i can moan about it 7 years down the road

i dont quite know where the chain is fitted to on the hull near the flukes (when in the stowed position, so i am still experimenting 

good evening everyone

im actually quite excited to be back at work on the Victory, and she is presently being worked on most days, (subject to being at work 5 days a week)
the Bowsprit work continues, and the spirit yard is now complete (i think) lol i keep finding another rope to be attached

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spritsail 



    

Really great work here, this is the first of this kit I've seen go together online. 
 
Keep up the awesome work! 

Good to be back and building again! 
 
The Pontos advanced set also includes stanchions... Just the thought of 'em induces terror and panic in me though! Call me a wimp but I'll probably just stick with the regular (Pontos) railings on this build.  
 
Bismarck's rails had an extra bracing pole every other stanchion; I was thinking I could cut those off the individual stanchions and add them to the PE rails for effect; it's on my list of things to experiment with anyway.