BLACK VIKING

The creature got it´s creature jaws. After finishing the fuselage lozenge camo, I added the shark? mouth and the fuselage markings. The serial number of my plane is not known, but the command is and so I used a fictional number for the correct unit.
With the lozenge decals, I had some unexpected troubles, when I used the hairdryer carefully onto one fuselage side, it wrinkled terribly and I was next to bin the kit, but leaned back and continued with Micro Sol and trying to push the wrinkles away, with every tool come to mind. Finally it was ok-ish but not perfect.
I hope for the matte finish and tinted overlayer, to look good in the end.

I also started with the tail, applying lozenge camo decals. It proved to be hard to fit them around the corners, which needed several applications of Micro Sol and hairdryer treatment. I could have used a stronger decal solvent, but decided against it, after I´ve seen, how sensible the decals are with thinner. Patience is the key here, a virtue I´m a bit short of possession, unfortunately.


 
Then it was decision time about the shark mouth or maybe better whale mouth. WNW supplies two different options, one only in white and one with bluish brushstrokes around. Further, you can decide if the inner mouth should be dark or red.


 
The red was omitted initially and after inspecting the very good existing front section photo, I decided for the one with the blue brushstrokes around. No worries, the last wrinkles will be gone after some more Sol applications.
 

 
This all looks a bit stark now, but will tuned down a bit due to the use of tinted varnish, matte coat and weathering.
 

 
Cheers Rob

Further planking of the rear castle.
I started with the part that was planked according to the clinker build method. These planks were not sawn but made from tree trunks that were split. length of the planks no longer than 2.70 meters
The first of these planks was tapered.

Above the tapered plank it is marked how high the upper plank may be

Further planking

And then there was a week's holiday in the sun, which was put to good use doing research .

Back home and continue planking. The intention is to have 6 layers of clinker build, in total I should end up with 9. Above that there will be shields.

That's why I first have to place the 2 dales, which determine the correct location of the upper deck in the rear castle

English lesson :
Dale.. old English word. The intention of these two dales is to drain the pumped water from the hold outside.
And if you have to pee....Do it in the dale (so their 2nd name : pisdale... 😳)

Seat is done.
 

A few other mods I’ve been working on include: replaced skylight with Dafi’s etched brass version. I glued a thin strip of carbon fibre to give the base some added thickness. Added etched brass hammock cranes with integrated fire bucket holders to the poop deck. For some added detail, I printed a tiny picture of King George III coat of arms and added this to the bulkhead directly above the binnacle. Speaking of the binnacle, I rather made a mess folding the brass etched version so opted to stick with the original plastic one from Heller. I’ll add the eyebolts and tie-down lines later. Outer hammock cranes are yet to be added. Since I built the hull several years ago, I’ll be replacing all of the other original plastic hammock cranes with Dafi’s etched pieces. I fashioned railings for the ladders from the poop deck to the quarter deck. I discovered my Dremel tool could double as a mini-lathe. Pictured is an early proto-type with more size reduction yet to go. I pre-drilled it to accept a 0.4mm wire railing.

I suspect the netting I added to the railing may, in fact, be more of a modern day measure to keep the tourists safe vs being historically accurate.

It was educational for me just to learn what those two rather nondescript looking boxes at the back of the taffrail were in the first place. Who knew they were signal flag lockers. That said, I couldn’t resist the challenge of modifying these to include the segments for the various flags. At this scale I managed to cram in only 10 segments suggesting the good admiral would have to have used some sort of shorthand messaging. Otherwise, I fear any signal instructions provided from the flagship could easily be misconstrued. God forbid had the fleet misinterpreted the message to split the “French line” as being, don’t forget the “French wine” 😁Ok, that was pretty sad🤦‍♂️ I also added a wooden cross piece between the two knees to support the ensign staff. On the deck between the knees I added a block of wood to act as the the step for the ensign staff. Btw, is the flag staff natural wood colour, painted black or the lower portion only black?

 
 

It starts to get cozy in the front office. It´s time to add the numerous details and it´s a good idea, to follow the manual with the progress. Guess how I found out. I had to wiggle one bulkhead in, because I glued the sliding pad too early.
The seats are oil painted on sand yellow and accentuated with toned variations of the base color. After a coat of flat, I had a semigloss finish, which was treated carefully with 4000 grid sandpaper, to remain glossy leather patches and some worn dull areas.
On most of the metal parts, I applied a very slight rub of iron pigment with a cotton swab, a technique, I use very often to enhance the metal appearance of these parts. Somehow it looks right scale wise.
There was a lot of detail painting in places and I used CA mostly, as it´s not so thin to spoil surfaces and bonds well, even with painted surfaces.
 

 

 

 

 
Cheers Rob

Hello and welcome!
 
I have decided that I will occasionally break up the slog of building a wooden ship by taking a break here and there to do a side project. So, having finished the basic hull structure of Phoenix, I will now take a few weeks to knock out a card model. This time around it will be kit #1/2002 from Halinski -- a Hawker Hurricane Mk. I wearing the colors of Witold Urbanowicz's mount during his stint in the RAF's 303 Squadron, circa September of 1940 (click here for more about Urbanowicz). Urbanowicz shot down nine enemy aircraft while flying this particular Hurricane. I chose this kit for several reasons:
I haven't built a Hurricane yet. I have built a Bf-109E-4 that fought in the Battle of Britain, but not one of the British fighters it would have faced off with. The Spitfire Mk. Vb I built earlier began entering service in 1941. I wanted to have one of Walter Oesau's potential adversaries sharing a shelf with his Emil. I now have more Halinski kits in my stash than from any other publisher, so it seems appropriate to thin out the Halinski herd a bit. This will be my fifth crack at a Halinski build. This kit comes from Halinski's "transitional" period -- a time when the company's kits didn't quite come up to the standards of kits produced even just a few months later in terms of complexity, artwork, and quality of diagrams. It's still a great kit, only it's just a half-step down maybe from the usual Halinski standard of excellence. This is not necessarily a bad thing, cuz it means the kit should be slightly easier to build than some of the massively detailed kits the company has published more recently. In addition to the basic kit, I have the laser-cut frames, molded canopy, and a set of resin wheels from GPM. First task, as usual, will be to match some colors for edge coloring. Look for first cuts soon!
 

 

 

 

Witold Urbanowicz (image courtesy of Wikimedia)
 
 

Here's the new shelves that mysteriously appeared while my wife was away in California.
 

The new AL Victory cross section has finally been released here in Australia and found I one for a decent price so grabbed it while it was in stock!
Received it today and I have to say I'm pretty impressed with the quality and and amount of materials in the box ,reminded me of when I got my victory models Pegasus with whats in there!
All the wood is bundled and clearly labeled with sizes , same as the thread for ropes and all the laser cut parts are clearly numbered and labeled!
I'm not going to start straight away as I want to get Pegasus up to the rigging stage or at least made the masts and yards ,I thought I would post this so people can see whats in the box if their thinking about getting the kit!
 
now for the photo bump😎🤣
 
Edit - I forgot ,there's also a colour parts sheet as well
Edit 2 -One thing I will say is this kit is Cheaper than the Corel cross section , larger scale and miles in front on quality and detail!
Richard

The gun ports I opened up are trimmed out and painted along with the lower hull. once I complete the starboard side and the hull is glued together I'll finish modifying the stern/rudder post, rudder, pintles and gudgeons.
Thanks for looking.
 
Michael D.

Installing the floorboards started with a plan, much used throughout the build, and now well worn....

In keeping with the nautical flavour there was only one method guiding the laying, the four step butt planking pattern.
Once a board was cut to an appropriate length fixing holes were pre-drilled with a 12 mm spade bit and each piece secured to the sub-floor. 

A 1/2" plug cutter was used to convert offcuts of boards into covers for the screws.

Mixing metric and imperial tools in this way resulted in a nice tight fit. Once these plugs had been glued in place a sharp chisel made quick work of getting them level and flat.

The floor after sanding -

No, not quite treenails, but visible at this scale?

Oh yes, but nice and subtle.....
The first coat of finish has been applied,

the second and final coat will go on tomorrow evening after a light sanding.
Cheers,
Graham
 

Somewhat of a crowning moment, besides some minimal fine tuning, the gilding on the port side is more or less complete along with making the as cast lanterns look as good as possible, they'll suffice.
 
Michael D.

How  did  I miss  this  build  -  serious  face palm  from  me  -  I will   follow  along  with  much  interest   -  lovely  job.
 
OC.

Haven't worked on the Dutchman in a while, as I have been focusing my time on the Bluenose.  While I was waiting for some additional rope to come in for the Bluenose, I finished up the starboard side of the hull.  I decided I wanted to have the hull planking go all the way to the stem, vs leaving the plywood bow fillers exposed as per the instructions.  Still in need of a good sanding.  I also installed the below deck lighting while everything was still open.

I started on the port side planking and, in between rows of planking, started on the stern cabin and details.  I planked all of the balcony flooring and exterior cabin walls to give them a little more texture and keep the door details the same as the others on the ship.  I painted the cast pieces with flat black enamel and highlighted with white with a few red details.  I used tiny faux, red jewels for the eyes on the cabin figures.  
Will continue on the planking in-between rigging work on the Bluenose.
 
Tim

Hi all,
 
Patrick – yes, the magnetic panels - seemed to be the best idea given that I much later in this build decided to add lights. 
 
Peter – as always thanks
 
Mark - thanks as well - your work is so excellent happy that you like how this bit of the build is looking
 
Richard – so glad that you dropped by and are again working with your awesome Bluenose - thanks for the kind words.
 
--------------------------------------
 
It’s been quite a while since I’ve posted an update.
Started work detailing the carriages. Short text - images have some notations.
 
Thanks so much for your still continued interest in this very “slow boat to China” build log.
 
Enjoy your year-end holidays….
 
Cheers,
 

Hi there  all,   I  decided  to  have  another   mess about with  my  photo  files  -  so  in  my Lightroom  I  cropped  a   few  then  lifted  the light  levels  added some   contrast  -  Black  levels  -  Colour  and  reduced  the  High lights   then I sent them into  my  Topaz   de noise   before  saving back into  Lightroom  where they had some  selective  sharpening  and  saved  back into my files.
 
Hope  you  enjoy.
 
OC.

Hi all,
 
Some more build pictures etc on the Archer self propelled gun.
 
There are a lot of parts to it, much more than the Tamaya Churchill tank, so I'm only posting pics of significant stages.
 
Below, shows how the Upper Hull is fitted, plus some of the hull parts.

 
The paint is mostly drab olive, applied with brushes. I've started adding a bit of weathering but lots more to come.

 
Below, some of the internal fittings installed eg moveable gun mount, seats etc. I'm not sure if the seats would have had padded brown leather upholstery, or just be plain sheet steel. But to add a bit of colour contrast I've given the crew the the benefit of brown upholstery, and added some shiny (worn) metal highlights.

 
Another pic of the above, from a different angle. The change of colour is due to me using the Flash on my phone, or not.

 
A good look inside an actual Archer is available here....  'Inside the Chieftain's Hatch: 17PR SPM Archer, Pt 2'
Above - As you can see, everything has been painted drab olive green. This may have been part of a 'refresh' for the museum, but I suspect the paint job isn't that different from what was used in WWII.
 
Talking of paint, I have moved away from the AK Interactive 'wet palette' to a small mixing dish. The palette was prone to the colours running in to each other if moved....otherwise, it's still a useful tool.

 
Now preparing the Fighting Compartment sides for fitting to the hull. The shells should be a shiny brass colour, but the closest I had was a dark yellow.

 
Instructions on how to attach the sides.

 
And now it is beginning to look a bit more like a self-propelled gun.

 
And a final pic from above.

 
I still haven't figured out a compact scenario for this Canadian Archer.... but there are a couple of wartime pictures here that might give me some inspiration.... https://tank-afv.com/ww2/gb/Archer_17pdr_SPG.php ie ...in amongst a few comrades and some supplies - 'The Archer conducting fire support. Goch, Febuary 1945.' and in a treeline - 'An Archer near Nutterden, 9 February 1945'. 
 
Any other suggestions gladly received.
 
Well, that's it for this week, back soon,
 
Richard

And here are the Adder laser cut and PE parts, not on A3 like Sherbourne, but 50x70cm sheets. Also one of the profile plans, where the 'droop' of the foredeck is clearly visible. 

Making good progress and trying many things for the first time, as I'm still a very new modeller. I had a go at pin washing the panels and also put in Eduards seat harness after adding a touch of brass paint to it. I also had a go a making the seat look a bit orn. I'm pleased with it so far.
Tomorrow, if I have time, I might try a bit of dry brushing, another thing I've been learning about (YouTube is my best friend at the moment!) to add a bit of light wear to the instruments and interior items. I also have had a change of heart with the scheme I was going for, I've decided to use scheme A which has the invasion stripes now and this meant that I had to change the throttle lever, according to the instructions, so that was some more fiddly painting to be done.
 

Deadeyes racks and gunport doors installed to the ship.  This is no small task...  amazing the number of little parts... all having to be fixed with nails.  The good news, it is done and no major break (couple of minor ones though). Mark, drill and push in... all the while holding my breath that nothing fall apart.  And those little corner parts on top of the racks!!  each need to be adjusted to fit, what a pain.
 
With this done, this officially start the rigging segment of the build, starting with the deck cannons.
 

 

I've been a bit distracted by my other build, the Golden City paddlewheeler, but I've also been working on crewmen for the San Marco ship. Here are a bunch I've already finished and have now painted,

and two of them I've also shaded. I've exaggerated the light and shade as otherwise they look bland.
  
 

And two new crewmen letting go and hauling on the shrouds as the ship tacks. (Big lateeners had to move the yard to the other side of the mast every time they tacked, and to do this the shrouds had to be loosened off - after tacking the lee shrouds would be somewhat loose and the weather shrouds tight.)
 
Crewman hauling down on (new) weather shroud.
  
And opening up the gap between his arms
  
And the legs . . .
  
Normally I'd do his face early in the process, as if I got that wrong there'd be no point in continuing - but in this case I couldn't get at it until I'd opened up the arms
  
And the hands and fingers . . . (I'm getting better at fingers).
  
  
And another crewman, belaying a shroud.
 
   
Looks a bit like Sir Ralph Richardson at the moment, but that will change. Now more like Noel Fielding . . .
  
Or perhaps Richard Harris?
   
Yep, Richard Harris . . . 

I've decided to discard the two helmsmen (in the top picture - one in yellow and one in green) in light of the Black Sea discoveries about tiller location on quarter rudders, and I'll be making new ones. So I had to get some photos taken to base their arm positions on.
 

And here are the two helmsmen just started:

 
Steven
 
 
 

So lots of hand painting of the various cockpit items this evening. There is loads of nice detail in this kit I have to say. The cockpit panels are glossed as well so I'll have a go at some light weathering next before assembling it all together.

So, a bit of an update, we're underway with the cockpit. I'm using a combination of the instructions and a build log featured in the Spitfire review and build magazine that you can buy with the model from Airfix.
I've decide to drill out the holes in the bulkheads and airframes, as per the magazine article and then I've started to get some paint on.
   

Bowsprit Shrouds
I have managed to reattached the broken sword to the figurehead. I also reattached the rails.
 
It was then a case of adding the 4 shrouds for the bowsprit. The rigging of the shrouds was relatively easy to do.
 
Next up will be to add the foremast stay and preventer.

 

Hello,
the carpenters started with planking the QD. Here first the balcony and the parquet in the great cabin for the captain. At that time only the great cabin had a parquet. 





And here the painter has oiled the floor

I've been looking at this kit so I'd like to follow along. I have 2023 Triumph Bonneville and I was wondering if I could adapt it to make a Bonny instead of the 3HW. There doesn't seem to be any Bonny model kits out there that I can see. Great job on the spoking.