Borodino by Captain Slog - Dom Bumagi - 1:200 - CARD

[Captain Slog]

Thanks for all the nice comments guys and everyone for the likes.

 

 

Grant I have thought about soldering but don’t have a soldering iron at the moment.  I have had a play around previously with the soldering torch but remembering the wire is only 0.2mm in diameter it was difficult to heat it up without destroying it!  Too gentle approach to save the wire affected the silver solder paste as it didn’t really get up to temperature.

 

There was a couple of times where it just flashed the wire enough not to destroy it but enough to get the silver solder paste to flow but the window of opportunity is very small.  I also tried using rosin core solder but it didn’t like the torch at all.  The plan is to get a soldering iron and some solid solder and a flux paste/fluid and play around again.

 

The problem comes down to holding the wire in place as it is so small just touch it wrong with the tweezers and it ejects itself across the room.  For a different project making up a grill with 0.5mm wire which I can easily silver solder I tried taping down all the pieces but of course it burned off with the torch and I guess the fumes contaminated the joints as the silver solder failed to hold.  I will certainly try playing around when I get a soldering iron.

 

Incidentally I could have done the handrails by bending the 2 outer supports from the handrail and would only need to worry about the centre stub which doesn’t need to be a strong joint as the handrail and 2 outer stubs would be one piece and self-supporting.  Hindsight is a wonderful thing LOL

 

 

Okay next bit of progress is structure 16 and all the parts are shown below.  I haven’t gone into much detail as the construction is essentially the same as the previous structure 15 posted earlier.  It was a bit more complicated due to all the ins and outs and I am not as happy with how it turned out compared to assembly 15.

 

Several of the side skins were over length and needed to be trimmed considerably to fit; also I ended up cutting instead of folding some parts to make fitment easier.

 

 

 

Here is a photo of the completed structure; doors? check, portholes? check, windows? check.  The only different items on this structure are the addition of some handles on the end.  I did double check to make sure these are vertical and not the expected horizontal of step irons!

 

 

 

My first fabrication of step irons (or handles in this case). These are 0.2mm diameter wire which I annealed using the soldering torch as this brass just snaps if you try to do too tight of a bend otherwise.  I checked the distance between the pin pricked holes with the digital callipers and then went around measuring everything I could think of to match the width.  It turns out two 6” steel rules gripped together was perfect.

 

The rulers were pressed down on to the wire and the legs folded up and then given a squeeze with tweezers.  The over long legs were trimmed back a bit with nail clippers.  The legs were fed into the pin pricked holes and a 0.5mm drill bit was placed in the hoop and the step iron pressed home for a consistent distance.

 

 

 

Here is the cheapo water colours I used to paint the iron work.  It goes on so much easier to the tiny wires than brush painting Tamiya paint and dries to a more complementary black also.  You can also use this type of paints for edge colouring but at the moment the PITT pens are easier and more convenient for me.

 

 

Final shot of it in its spot.  I have also temporally placed the 3^rd of the 3 skylights, which were made previously.

 

 

I only have 3 more days before I fly out again so will continue working on the sub-assemblies.

 

Cheers

Slog

[Captain Slog]

Hi All,

 

I have just been idling along the past day or so messing about and drifting in and out of the ship yard to pick and poke at things.  Grant (gjdale) got me thinking about soldering again so had a play around with what I had and after a few tries I can (almost) reliably solder the 0.2mm brass wire using silver solder paste and the gas torch.

 

 

Moving on.  Since I just finished assembly 16 I will keep with the flow and do assembly 17…Have I mentioned just how vague card model plans and instructions are? I did? Good because no matter how much I searched the assembly diagrams I could not find hide nor hair of 17!  I know there must be because I remember freeing up a small square hatch when cutting out other parts.

 

A search of the parts sheets finally yielded the necessary parts, all 2 of them.  Assembly 17 builds into a small square tube with the aforementioned hatch on top and they are labelled 17L & 17P (left and right).  Okay I can understand not showing a simple folded tube with an end but at least tell me where they will reside.  There is no point doing these yet because until I stumble across their final location I won’t know the orientation of the hatch.

 

 

Oh well, assembly 18 here we come, at least they have a big diagram showing them to be stairwells and they even show that they have 2 configurations; 1 both going in the same direction and 2 going in opposite directions…and that’s it.  They don’t tell what configuration goes where.

 

I know that I previously cut out 3 pairs of holes in the deck when it came time to fix that down so there is that and I can just make out from another diagram that configuration 1 is the foremost holes in the deck so guess configuration 2 go to the other 2 holes, which makes sense as these are turned 90 degrees to the long axis.  Saying that, they will be near impossible to see once all the other assemblies go over the tops of them.

 

 

 

Here are the steps (pun intended) taken from left to right.

 

Firstly they were cut out to size and the bend lines transferred to the outside and scored quite heavily to get a sharp bend.  The part was held down face up and ruler pressed hard on the fold line and a razor blade slid under and folded up.  I started from one end and worked along so I could do all the bends with the wide ruler.

 

The open ends were edge glued and pressed together to close the box.  For some reason I don’t know myself I didn’t glue all the treads to one side before closing the box and then gluing the other ends of the treads once closed up.  I must have thought the next step would be easier…it was certainly longer!

 

The treads were placed in and glued one at a time starting from the top and working down.  Once I had a tread in place poking and pushing it with tweezers and needles I used a small paint brush to come up from the bottom and place a spot of glue to the underside of the tread.

 

Once the treads were in place it was just the combing to place round the top.  Not sure if my treads bulged the stairwells a bit or for some other reason but the combing strips were a bit short.  After cutting to width and trimming one end I thought I better check it against the box for size and luckily was able to leave one side of the combing over long to trim back once the circumference was glued up.  All other combings, were left overly long on both ends for ease.

 

 

 

Just a close up of the treads.  From the 6 individual stairwells a couple weren’t the best but as mentioned apart from the 2 on the foredeck most will be barely visible if at all.

 

 

 

The configuration 1 stairwells in place on the foredeck.  I will need to double check the diagram to make sure they are pointing in the correct direction.  Something which suggests these are slightly oversize can be seen by looking at the deck planking.

 

At the front of the combing can be seen a darker deck plank with white dots (for a frame for the weather canvas) well the darker plank with more dots should be down the sides of the combing also but I had to sand until the stairwells dropped in.  Also my careful cutting of the openings on the deck away back near the beginning of the log was unwarranted as I had to remove the centre bar also.  Not a big deal as I will just adjust the framework size so it still sits against the outside of the combing.  Overall pretty happy with them.

 

 

 

The other 2 pairs of stairwells in Configuration 2 shown next to one of the other locations.  The centre bar in the deck will be removed as per the previous photo.  The last location is actually between structure 15 and 16 which in real life would be awkward trying to cut across from one side of the deck to the other.  Both these other locations require framework for canvas covering as can be seen by all the white dots.

 

 

 

Lastly just included this photo to point out a couple of things I do/use.  Despite having a dedicated modelling room to myself it still hasn’t been furnished/setup so I am still working on the end of the kitchen table.  When I am working I bring out more and more tools and bits and pieces from the toolbox and eventually the cutting mat is covered with crap and I can’t find the right knife or tweezers or bit of brass for punching etc.

 

Well the other day after polishing off some chocolate biscuits I looked at the box and thought if I cut off the lid it would be perfect for laying the tools in when working keeping the mat clear.  So now I grab the knife etc from the box and place it back across the top ready for next use.  Unfortunately after a modelling session all the tools get cleared off back in to the toolbox.

 

Also in the photo at top right is a sheet of glass.  I use this for gluing up components as it is smooth and very flat so with this as a base I can keep flat things flat also using it as a base and placing a square on it I can get exact 90 degree corners etc.  Glue doesn’t readily stick to it also so if a part has some overspill I can lift the part off the glass without it sticking and getting damaged and the glass cleans up very neatly.

 

I never cut on the glass except masking tape where I can stick a length of masking tape down to the glass and then using a ruler and knife trim whatever width of tape I need or to clean up a tape edge for masking.  The tape then peels easily off the glass for use.  Even if you don’t card model I suggest getting a sheet of glass as it is a great addition for modelling.

 

 

 

 

Geez it looks like I like the sound of my own typing!!!  That’s it for this swing.

 

 

Cheers

Slog

Edited December 31, 2016 by Captain Slog

[hof00]

Yup Sir,

Looks good. Can visualise where your sub assemblies go.

The work is absolutely fantastic.

 

Awesome detail!!

 

Thank you!!

 

Cheers....HOF.

Edited December 31, 2016 by hof00

[gjdale]

Glad to hear the soldering worked for you Slog - should save some frustration with trying to glue them. Your work to date is looking great.

[src]

Looking good Slog.

RE the soldering. Could you drop down to a lower melting point solder like silver bearing solder? Here in the States its sold as plumbers solder. It melts around 450 degrees vs the 12-1400 degrees of silver solder. Your hand rails are not structural, I would think the plumbers solder would be just fine.

Perhaps some of the more experienced could set us both straight?

Sam

[Captain Slog]

Hi Sam, you are right about the silver solder. I have 'easy' which is the lower temperature one but still high compared to the electrical or plumbers solders.

 

I did try some electrical rosin core solder but it didn't like the torch which is all I have at the moment. The plan is to get some solid plumbers solder and an iron and experiment with a few different combinations of solders and heating.

 

Cheers

Slog

[laarmada]

Congratulations, it's a very nice ship, i love predreadnoughts, and a hard job to do.

[Captain Slog]

Hi laarmada, thanks for dropping by and the comment and to everyone for the likes.

 

 

Okay it’s been a while but I finally have an R&R partially to myself to do some modelling.  I still haven’t plucked up the courage to attach the upper hull skins I prepared earlier so will continue working through the assemblies  in the plan order.

 

 

Assembly 20 is the conning tower deck which as the photo below shows has very little parts.  The photo shows the top and underside of the deck and surprisingly (I double checked) there is no form to be sandwich between the 2 skins.  The long strip is a skirting strip which goes around the perimeter but more on this later.  There are 2 coamings (part 20c) to go round the openings for the stair wells (W) but not shown as I couldn’t find them!  I am sure to stumble across them later but not needed to progress at this stage.

 

 

 

To join the top and underside skins together I cut the straight sections first on both parts; noting that the underside skin is shorter as the top skin sits on top of the deck bridge structure and the underside butts against it.

 

With the straight cuts made I had a reference for clamping the 2 parts together in alignment with clothes pegs. Then gently pulling them apart at one end I applied glue with a brush and then pressed the parts together, rolling the knife handle over them.  Once left for a bit the process was repeated several times working to the other end and once finished was placed down on a sheet of glass and weighted down and left to dry.  The curved sections were then cut out.

 

The plans were vague on the placement of the skirting strip.  The plans show the underside of similar decks and shows the strip is flush with the top surface and extends down so this is what I did for this deck.  The strip also had 2 bend marks which I can only guess the ends bend back on themselves to double thickness for the rear curve.  I decided to chop them to length to single thickness for the complete perimeter.  Note the rear section of the deck doesn’t have the skirt as this sits on the bridging structure.

 

 

 

Assembly 21 is a box type structure with some beams fixed underneath which I presume are for items to be laid across.  The underside skin has the lines printed for the beam placement as does the laser cut form.  The side skin only goes on 3 sides of the structure since the back side butts against the bridging structure.

 

 

 

All the parts cut out and formed up ready for assembly.  With regards to the box structure since only a top and bottom form were provide I measured the height of the skin and used various offcuts of card to achieve the required height so the skin sits flush top and bottom.  This was done to ease trying to align the top and bottom forms on the skin edges separately.

 

The beams were scored down the middle and folded against themselves for double paper thickness before cutting out.

 

 

 

Part 22 sits between the main deck and the conning tower deck shown above.  There are no openings, doors or windows and I believe it is to support the mass of the conning tower above.  Not a great deal of parts; 5 pieces of laser cut card to make up the underlying form and 2 skins.  The braces (parts 26) will be discussed later.

 

Only point of note is to be mindful of the skin orientation.  The white horizontal line is slightly off centre and I determined that the line should be closer to the bottom of the structure due to slight curve to take into account the main deck curvature.

 

 

 

The laser cut forms glued up and as usual a perfect fit.  I keep saying and will say again the extra cost of the laser cut forms are worth it for ease and accuracy of fitment.  The skinning is only as precise and accurate as the underlying form and I believe these have helped my skinning measurably.

 

 

 

The finished structure.  I attached the front skin first (the one with the 2 concave cut outs). I firstly scored the back side of the sharp bends and preformed the concave curves with the knife handle. Then placing the form upside down on a glass sheet the skin was glued along the flat top and bottom edges and the centre support before offering up to the form and pressing home with a flat ruler.

 

Then each of the concave sections were glued and pressed home with the knife handle.  The rear skin was done in a similar manner but only had the 2 convex curves preformed.

 

 

 

Returning back to the support brackets the photo shows the paper parts, according to the legend are folded down the middle.  This is as per supplied by the kit.  The laser cut forms are additions and are from thinner card to the rest of the underlying structures used so far.

 

This gives me 3 options for making the support brackets.  I can either use the paper parts by themselves.  Glue the skins on to the forms or the quickest and easiest option of just using the laser cut forms by themselves.  This was what I did and just painted them with the black watercolours shown in a previous post.

 

 

 

The finished deck with the 2 structures glued on to the underside.  The deck developed a bit of a bow between the 2 structures but won’t interfere with final glue up.

 

 

 

And shown in its place on the deck.  This isn’t glued down yet, hence glimpses of white round the base of the front structure and I will need to tweek the rear structure to allow the whole deck to slide back fractionally.  The beams can just be seen on the underside.  There are still 5 items to be made and fitted in the space between the 2 structures but once the secondary gun turrets are in place little of this area will be seen. 

 

 

 

That’s it for a couple of weeks.  Really thinking about the hull skins being next!

 

Cheers

Slog

[CDW]

I'm really impressed with your model, Slog. It's truly outstanding. So clean, neat, and professionally built. 

[Captain Slog]

Hi Craig, thanks for the nice comment and to everyone for the likes. 

 

In all honesty though I still have a long way to go in modelling in general and card modelling in particular; probably everything I have done to date I have thought it could have been better.  Constantly telling myself to remember and do this or don’t do that for the next time LOL.

 

A bit more progress, I had hoped to have done a lot more before making a progress report but unfortunately I can’t get in to the groove plus I wanted to try posting in the new site!

Okay parts 23, 24 & 25 are sections of the lower mast and what I can only guess are services trunking/ducts.  Surprisingly, particularly for the mast section, these are made separately for each level of deck rather than continuous full length pieces fed down through holes in the decks.  I guess both methods of assembly have their pro’s and con’s.

 

 

The parts are fairly simple requiring rolling for the mast and scoring and bending for the trunking.  Unfortunately the trunks didn’t turn out exactly square despite being cut out accurately; I think maybe the bends might have been slightly off giving one side a slightly longer or shorter side throwing the squareness out.  I am not too bothered as they are virtually hidden under and behind other structures but more care will be needed for the upper sections.

 

The mast section also had something funny about it in that I cut out, rolled and edge glued the join as shown but the diameter of the finished part is greater than the placement marker it gets fixed to so I will slice the join apart and re-glue with an overlap to match the deck placement circumference marked on the deck.

 

 

 

Hopefully I can sit down and get back into the swing of it and do some more before I fly out again.

 

Cheers

Slog

[Captain Slog]

Hi all, continuing on with assembly 29.

This is the conning tower and I have been looking forward to doing this one as it builds up into a nice structure.  The designer has put a lot of thought into the construction of this part.  Typically the conning tower has some of the thickest armour on these ships and I believe for the Borodino it would be in the region of 11” to 13” thick or there about.

Rather than wrapping a single skin round a form the structure is built up to give the impression of weight and scale thickness of armour. Of course it does add to the complexity of the part but comes across as a solid object.

As usual the required parts all laid out.  Looking at the assembly drawing and the parts and numbers it took a bit of thought on how it goes together but once started it becomes obvious and there were no problems encountered.

 

The finished bottom section.  I made a couple of mistakes here. The top skin was slightly longer than the form although the width was fine.  When gluing the top skin to the form I held it flush with one end before I realised so the other curved end overhung the form.  I decided to trim the top skin flush with the form to prevent problems with attaching the side skin but this resulted in the top black border being slightly thin on one end.  It is probably only about 0.25mm difference but the eye is drawn to it. (Another lesson learnt)

Also the side skin was overly long by about 1mm and despite measuring and marking and double checking I still cut it short.  It is not too bad though as the slight gap is at the rear and hidden by what I assume is an armour plate and once the upper sections are attached the border won’t be so obvious.  As you can see I still have a lot to learn with this card modelling thing!



The strip with the viewports was next and as usual the ‘windows/ports/openings’ were just coloured grey.  I thought I would open them up.  I am pretty sure in real life they would just be openings with no glazing etc.

I removed the ‘viewports’ with my usual method of grinding old blades down to the desired width chisel.  I have touched on this in the past but will run through it once more as this is a good example.  The blades were ground down to 0.9mm and 1.9mm.

As can be seen I haven’t cut the skin to size yet as I wanted to keep as much waste as possible for support of the delicate areas when cutting out the holes.  I did the short vertical cuts first starting from one end and doing each cut on one edge before spinning it round and working back down doing the other edges.

The longer horizontal cuts were made next doing all the tops and then all the bottoms last allowing the waste to drop out.  By following this method the dangerous weak areas i.e. the very thin window tops and vertical bars are fully support during all the cutting out.

The edges were coloured using the artist pen from the backside. The edges appear raggedy on the close up after colouring but they look fine with the naked eye.

Although the viewports are just openings I will ‘glaze’ behind as usual and did this next to support the very thin window tops and the vertical bars.  Once the floppy disc glazing material was glued in oversize I then trimmed the strip to final height so again the thin tops are supported by the mylar.

(NOTE THE ARROW on the right hand side of the skin.  More on this later!)



The viewport skin with the mylar ‘windows’ glued in place and the strip placed next to the top and bottom forms. I don’t know if they expected you to glue the forms to the top and bottom edges of the skins individually but this would be extremely difficult to do successfully. 

To make it easier I determined that I only need to sandwich a single piece of scrap of the same card the forms came from to make a one piece perfectly aligned form to glue the skin to.  I cut the scrap packer slightly undersize all round so the skin is still only glued on the top and bottom edges to the form.



Here is the viewport section temporarily placed on the lower section with the viewports to the top as determined by the ARROW in the previous photo.  Although not obvious in the photo the white stripes for the additional supports line up nicely.  Despite the couple of mistakes mentioned earlier I like how the conning tower is shaping up.

Incidentally, if you remember I glued the mylar oversize and it got trimmed along with the viewport skin when the final top cut was made.  I didn’t have any problems gluing the mylar to the edge of the card form using the Deluxe Materials Roket card glue.  If I remember correctly I think their blurb says it will glue most materials together as long as one of the surfaces is card or paper.  Well I can vouch for that.  The mylar grabbed to the card form edge right away and after a few seconds pressure I was able to continue working round the perimeter gluing the skin on in stages.



The roof section is the last of the major components and as can be seen in the first photo  it is a single piece which is folded to give a double thickness roof.  I went straight to scoring, folding and gluing the halves together and then cutting to final shape when dry.

The last piece of the roof is a strip which is glued round the perimeter, flush with the top and hanging down.  This was glued up by placing the roof upside down on a sheet of glass and progressively gluing the strip in stages using a ruler to press the strip home to the roof edge.

This turned out a lot better than the same process used to do the perimeter strip on the deck section shown in a previous post, probably because it is wider.  The photo shows the part upside.  The inside of the perimeter strip was coloured in using the artist pen before gluing to the roof edge.



Then it all went pear shaped from here and narrowly avoided, as it turns out, unnecessary damage!

To glue the 3 main sections together I determined it would be easier to glue the viewport section to the roof section first so coated the white section as shown in the photo above with glue and flipped the viewport section upside down and after aligning pressed it home for a few seconds.  Turning the glued assembly right side up with the viewports to the top I was pretty happy with myself.

Hang on; the perimeter strip hanging down totally obscures the viewports…that can’t be right? After checking and double checking the orientation of the arrow I jumped to the conclusion that the arrow orientation is wrong, after all it’s not the first time I have come across mistakes in part numbering.

After a moment of panic I reckoned I could get the viewport and roof sections apart (hopefully without damaging either) after all I use glue pretty sparingly and it’s still fresh. So I went at it with a thin blade and after what took an age slowly working it in and prising and going a bit further in each time I finally got them apart without damage and with a massive sign of relief.

Right, the diagram shows the viewport and lower section together so the supports can be placed before the roof goes on so placing the viewport section with the viewports ‘correctly’ down on to the lower section it was job done…except the white stripes for the support placement don’t line up?!   I was really clutching at straws and at one stage thought I would just colour in the white stripes with black and continue on.

Then I thought I would check the viewport position with a 1:200 scale figure, after all he is a scale 6 footer (1800mm) so placed him alongside and the only way he would be able to see out would be to bend his knees. Arrrrgghhhhhhh.

So after all that it turns out the arrow was correct, the viewports are at the top, the white stripes align, the crew can see out and the perimeter hanging done obscuring the view is correct.  In my defence I still don’t like the viewports being obscured (especially all the work I put into opening them up).  I am sure there is a moral to the story here but just not sure what it is LOL

With that saga out of the way it just remains to do the 3 supports and the armour plate which turns out isn’t actually attached to the conning tower but sits on the deck behind it.  These last parts are just simple scoring and bending so didn’t bother showing them. The 3 supports were tricky though.

Here are a couple shots of the finished structure.

 

 

That’s it for another swing.

Cheers
Slog

[Captain Slog]

Hi all,

 

Well I've gone and done it now; first upper hull skin is on.

 

A bit of starved cow effect going on but happy enough.

 

Not to worried about the lower edge or the vertical cuts as a lower belt covers most of this.

 

 

Cheers

Slog

[CDW]

Looks great, Slog. Is there a magic bullet to protect against starved cow effect, like maybe some type of filler between bulkheads and decks? It's not really noticeable except and until you pointed it out. 

[Captain Slog]

Hi Craig, thanks for the comment.

 

You can fill in between the bulk heads with say balsa or more card and I tried this to a certain degree with the Bismarck hull but it takes ages to do and can introduce other issues.

 

I am going to try expanding foam the next hull I do to see if that works for me.  The best thing though is to take care and not press the skin against the edges of formers with the fingers, best to use something else which bridges more than one former edge; in this case though I used my finger as it is a bit of a compound curve and I wanted to make sure it was against the horizontal former to get the curve up to the anchor deck correct.

 

Can only learn from each piece and try and do better for the next one.

 

Cheers

Slog

[Captain Slog]

Hi, thanks for to all the likes.

 

Continuing on, I have fitted the port bow and a side skin. Progress shot of where it is at right now.

 

 

The side skin; which during the fitting dry run was a perfect fit but of course once glue is involved it was slightly off but nothing some judicious trimming and colouring with watercolours couldn't fix and I am happy with the way it is shaping up.

 

 

With both bow skins fitted, which was actually worse than the starboard side and again hoping the lower belt hides most of the issues, the front is closed off and both anchor shelves completed which turned out not to bad.  The centre join looks okay with the naked eye and the photo-etch eagle crest and the lower belts with a torpedo hatch should cover up most of the rest of the join.

 

 

That's enough skinning for this swing.  I find doing hull skins laborious and feels like I push my luck if try to do to much in one sitting.

 

Cheers

Slog

 

[Captain Slog]

Hi All,

 

A bit more progress on the hull skins.

 

First up is the upper  rear port skin to match the starboard side done last time. Not perfect but happy enough.

 

 

 

With both rear side skins on I could do the rear bulkhead.  The hatches 14b are supplied with inner and outer surfaces so decide to remove the entrances so I could attach the doors ajar later down the track.

 

The hatches 14c are also doubled but didn’t remove them as will just attach in the closed position.

 

 

 

A photo showing the other side.  The rear deck is only temporary in place as I will wait until the lower skins are fitted so I can do final tweeks before fixing.  I am not sure if the little white triangles left between the rear and sides have a part to cover them; if not I will either just paint black or fit little paper ones.

 

 

 

The front upper starboard skin now attached.

 

 

 

I was able to determine I can manoeuvre the 3” guns through the gun ports later, which is a relief as they wouldn’t have survived the skinning process otherwise.

 

 

 

A close up of the skin going up and over the bridging structure.  This is the only area of the side skinning so far I am not totally happy with.  Despite taking care to pre-roll the curve and press home with a rolling motion using a flat smooth ruler I got a bit of buckling right on the bend.  I am a 100% certain this is due to the porthole being right on the curve and the mylar ‘window’ behind it.

 

The side decking is only trial fitted for the same reasons described earlier.

 

 

 

On the whole really liking how its shaping up.

 

Cheers

Slog

[gjdale]

Nicely done Slog.

[src]

Catching up here. Well done. I may have missed it earlier,but how does the printing hold up to cleaning up adhesives?

Sam

[CDW]

I'll bet you're right, Slog. That stubborn spot on the side panel is probably due to the mylar as it won't hold a curve shape. Maybe too late now to remove the mylar, but white glue can be used to create clear portal windows like that after the panel has been shaped and secured to the model.

I always keep a bottle of Micro Krystal Klear handy for just these kinds of projects where I need to create small clear windows, or instrument panel lenses, etc.

https://www.amazon.com/Micro-Kristal-Klear-Microscale-Industries/dp/B0006O029E/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1490462277&sr=8-1&keywords=micro+crystal+clear 

[Captain Slog]

Thanks to all for the likes

 

 

18 hours ago, gjdale said:

Nicely done Slog.

Thanks Grant.

 

13 hours ago, src said:

Catching up here. Well done. I may have missed it earlier,but how does the printing hold up to cleaning up adhesives?

Sam

Hi Sam in this case not to well, especially the black which quickly turns grey, but…I am not sure if this due to the change of glue or the print itself.  Previously when I used wood workers PVA any excess, as long as it was relatively fresh and hadn’t been touched could be cleaned off easily with a soft damp paint brush with no issue.

 

But on this build I have been using Roket card glue which has the consistency of skimmed milk so doesn’t sit on the surface like PVA so trying to clean this up can damage the print. But in its favour because it is thin can be spread like paint on the mating surface without squeezing out.  Most of my issues with this glue going on the wrong place is trying to get a glue loaded brush into a tight area and inadvertently touch it against something I shouldn’t.

 

12 hours ago, daddyrabbit1954 said:

I'll bet you're right, Slog. That stubborn spot on the side panel is probably due to the mylar as it won't hold a curve shape. Maybe too late now to remove the mylar, but white glue can be used to create clear portal windows like that after the panel has been shaped and secured to the model.

I always keep a bottle of Micro Krystal Klear handy for just these kinds of projects where I need to create small clear windows, or instrument panel lenses, etc.

https://www.amazon.com/Micro-Kristal-Klear-Microscale-Industries/dp/B0006O029E/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1490462277&sr=8-1&keywords=micro+crystal+clear 

Thanks for the info Craig, I went with the mylar due to the effect it gives.  I have been looking at the photo and although the mylar probably contributed to the buckling (by holding the port hole firmly in place) I now think the issue is with the brass photo etch port hole.

 

The area where it sits is unsupported from the rear and being right on the apex of the curve it had nothing to bend the brass against.  A close look at the photo shows the port hole is still flat.  I think without the mylar backing it would probably have popped out.  For the other side I may try and remove the porthole and refit it after bending and fitting the skin.

 

Cheers

Slog

 

 

[Eddie]

Hey howya goin Slog, so how hard is this card building looks great so far 

[Dan Vadas]

Hi Slog,

 

I've finally had time to read your Log to this point - wow, there's some stuff to learn. Thanks very much for the in-depth tutorials on each step, particularly the way you solved potential problems and also for showing the mistakes that can be made. This log is an excellent learning tool .

 

I can't wait to get my Bismarck, but of course I'm still going ahead with my "practice ship" .

 

  Danny

[Captain Slog]

Hi Eddie, thanks for dropping by.

 

Hi Danny, glad it is of help, look forward to you starting your AMATSUKAZE.

 

Thanks to everyone for the likes, it is greatly appreciated.

 

Well I have finally got spare time on my R&Rs to get some modelling done.  It was near the end of March since I last picked up a knife!  Hopefully the rest of them should be free for a bit.

 

Some progress to show.  If you remember the port hole and mylar on the upper starboard hull skin caused a bit of buckling where it bent round the curve.  Well before fitting the port side skin I managed to pick out the photo-etch ring and slice the mylar off the rear without damaging the skin.

 

I glued on some new mylar ‘glass’ and fitted the skin to the hull and it still had a bit of buckling around the curve although not as bad as the starboard side with both mylar and porthole.  After fitting of the skin I cleaned up a new porthole and bent it to a bit of a curve and dropped it back into place.

 

 

 

With both upper skins on I could finally glue into place the rear lower deck followed by both side decking.  I had to spend a fair bit of time trimming and offering up until satisfied with the fit.  I reckon this is a result of my previous form work and not a deficiency of the kit.  The side skins have been a perfect fit to date.

 

 

With the rear and side decks now fitted I can now continue with the remainder of the skins.  The rear skin was pretty straight forward noting that the fore section of it tucks under the side deck and is covered by the last side skin.

The thin line of former showing below the skin is not an issue as there is a final belt to go over this lower section which will hide a lot of sins.  This belt also closes off  the very rear of the hull  

 

 

 

A couple of shots of the skin where it wraps round the 3” gun openings.  This was a bit tricky due to the close together changes of direction but turned out not to bad.

 

 

 

 

Although I still have the rest of the day to model I like to stop after doing a hull skin or two as I find them quite stressful  and don’t like to push my luck LOL.

 

Cheers

Slog

[RGL]

Nice. I'm tempted to do this ship (in plastic as I'm scared of paper cuts: almost as bad a man flu). So much detail can be added  given her (his, the Russians use male) rigging. 

[CDW]

27 minutes ago, RGL said:

Nice. I'm tempted to do this ship (in plastic as I'm scared of paper cuts: almost as bad a man flu). So much detail can be added  given her (his, the Russians use male) rigging. 

Me and you both, Greg. Have been eyeballing this model in plastic for a while now.

[CDW]

Your work continues to be superior, Slog. Simply beautiful.

There are several (or more) 1:200 card models I have my eye on and may buy them. However, unless there are some 1:200 photo etch and/or other brass details available, I may pass as I just can't see myself rolling up paper/card gun barrels and stuff like that. So my question is, where are some of your favorite places to source details for your card models? I assume a lot of these are eastern european or Russia as that's where a lot of the card models seem to come from.

[Captain Slog]

2 hours ago, RGL said:

Nice. I'm tempted to do this ship (in plastic as I'm scared of paper cuts: almost as bad a man flu). So much detail can be added  given her (his, the Russians use male) rigging. 

Hi Greg, I am sure you know this already but Borodino is available in 1:350 scale by Zvezda and looks like White Ensign do a PE set for it as well.  Gun barrels are also available but not sure about wood decking.

I like how Trumpeter have released a 1:200 pre-dreadnought I hope more of these type of ships are released at this scale.

 

 

1 hour ago, CDW said:

Your work continues to be superior, Slog. Simply beautiful.

There are several (or more) 1:200 card models I have my eye on and may buy them. However, unless there are some 1:200 photo etch and/or other brass details available, I may pass as I just can't see myself rolling up paper/card gun barrels and stuff like that. So my question is, where are some of your favorite places to source details for your card models? I assume a lot of these are eastern european or Russia as that's where a lot of the card models seem to come from.

 

Hi Craig, most 1:200 scale card ships will have brass gun barrels sets available and many also have photo etch detail sets but these are nowhere near the size of the sets available for plastic.  Typically 2 or 3 smallish frets specific to the ship but generic railings, ladders, stairs etc are readily available.  I always say this, but I recommend getting the laser cut forms also if available.

 

I nearly always use GPM from Poland for my card model orders.   The link is in the first post of this log.  Its been a while since I ordered from them and it can be a pain (I am sure Danny will agree with this) but unless someone knows otherwise they are the best stocked company I am aware of. 

 

I have one more 'must get' IJN battleship to get  but have another potential one; never mind all the Russian Pre-dreadnought and military vehicles I 'need' LOL

 

 

[Captain Slog]

Hi All and thanks for all the likes,

 

The hull is nearing completion with the fitment of the last 3 skins; these being the rear port skin as per the starboard one shown in the last progress post and both midship skins. The starboard midship one is shown below.  These close off the mid-section and cover the rear, tucked in, sections of the tumblehome.  Ignore the thin line of former showing as this will be covered as discussed below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now that all the skins are fitted there are a few bits and pieces to do for finishing the hull, which is covered below.

 

The rearmost bulkhead on the ‘veranda’ deck (Captains walk?) is now installed along with the deck itself.  The gun ports were cut out as detailed previously throughout the log but I chose to leave the rearmost hatch in place despite having ‘scissors’ for removing; the reason being that a vertical former would run right down the middle of the opening!  The rearmost deck was then fitted. 

 

 

 

Getting on to the finishing bits now.  These are the closing panels for the underside of the 3” & 6” gun bays where they protrude outside of the hull.  They have received the usual 2mm photoetch porthole and mylar treatment.

 

 

 

Next is a photo of the lower belts which tidy up the bottom of the hull skins, hiding any forms showing and the vertical cuts in the skins.  The rear end has the ship name printed on it and I do like the printed colours and Google translator confirms they do indeed say BORODINO.  The detail set comes with photo etch name plates but I think I will stick with the coloured paper ones.

 

Also parts 125 can be seen and these are bilge?/deck? drains?/scuppers?  which need to be installed between the belts sections and there are 3 per side (124, 125 &126).

 

 

 

 

I decided I will attach the eagle figure head at this stage also and again I do like the colours of the paper part but would be difficult to cut out satisfactorily.  The photo etch one from the detail set is shown next to it and I will use this as is.  I may tone it down a bit later but will see how it looks in place.

 

 

 

The next post should see all of the above fitted.

 

Cheers

Slog

[ccoyle]

For those that are tempted to try paper but would prefer to have more of the fiddly parts in the form of after-market detail sets, you have some good choices out there.

 

Orel, out of the Ukraine, has probably the largest selection of 1/200 pre-Dreadnoughts (and other ships of that era) of any publisher around, and they have an extensive offering of laser-cut formers, PE detail sets, and turned brass barrels. Click here to visit their web site. I have ordered direct from them once before with no problems.

 

The German firm HMV publishes in 1/250 and has a good selection of ships from the Kaiser's Navy. Their details sets are in laser-cut card, which is much easier to work with than brass or nickel-silver, since the parts don't require painting. Their web site is here. There are several eBay shops in different countries that carry HMV products. I have found this a convenient way to buy here in the U.S.

 

There are other publishers with pre-Dreadnoughts in their inventories, but Orel and HMV have the two largest one-stop offerings. As Danny did, it is wise to start with a relatively simple model if you've never worked in card before, as it has its own learning curve, but it is definitely a fun medium to work in.

[Captain Slog]

Hi all,

 

Well I didn’t get everything fitted as I had hoped as the lower belts were quite time consuming plus I had to do a few things in preparation for fitting them, which included fixing a mess up I did previously.

 

I mentioned away back when I fitted the port bow skin that I messed it up with a severe case of starving cow, which was an understatement.  I actually cut the bottom of the skin too short and it missed the former and sunk right in between the hulls.  I never showed this as it was too embarrassing.

 

I knew the lower belts would hide some of it but remedial action was necessary.  So knowing I had the height of the belt to play with I cut a slot in the skin and then slipped a strip of 1mm card in to the void to support the bottom edge of the hull skin.  I then took a length of brass tube and bent one end to 90 degrees and using this pulled the strip against the inside of the skin and pulled it out flush with the surrounding area and then applied glue whilst holding it in position.

 

Not perfect but at least I will be able to show the port bow once the belt is on!

 

 

With that out of the way (whew!)  I made the drain tubes which are simple U-shaped channels with curved tops.  These were tricky due to the size and shape of them and turned out just okayish but won’t be noticeable once in place.

 

 

 

Finally I can get start getting the belts on and finish with the hull.  The starboard rear belt cut out and trial fitted being held in place with Tamiya masking tape.  I then did the same for the other side to get the centre joint aligned.

 

 

 

Once I was happy with the positioning I removed the tape at the end to allow the belt to be held out to apply the glue and was pressed home.  I then did the same for the other side and then worked them together to form the join.  The photo shows the 2 ends glued up just as far back as the tape on each side.

 

 

 

Once the stern join was made I removed all the tape and then worked forward gluing and fixing short sections at a time.  The belts end at drain 126 shown in the first photo above.

 

 

 

 

 

Pretty happy so far how they are turning out and as expected they hide some untidy areas and clean up the hull skin joints etc.  I notice in the photos the black boot topping is starting to chip so once I finish the belts I will go in and touch them up with a small paint brush.

 

I had hoped to get the hull finished this swing but is unlikely due to the time the belts are taking but still have tomorrow to go at it.

 

Cheers

Slog