HMS Victory by Kevin-the-lubber - Heller - 1:100 - PLASTIC - with 3D printed additions

[Kevin-the-lubber]

20^th February 2020

I started this build almost exactly 7 years ago (February 2013) but parked it after perhaps 2 or 3 months for a variety of reasons. Every once in a while I’d half-heartedly take another look but, with no end of other calls on my time – a house renovation, a large garden, a family – it was always easier to justify further procrastination. I finally got going again this January 2020 and am enjoying it immensely this time. One of the reasons I parked it, to be honest, was demoralisation - I hadn’t really appreciated what building a 1:100 Victory would entail and there are some very tedious, repetitive tasks from the outset. I think I was probably expecting it to be something like building planes as a child just with more and different parts. Also, the poor Heller instructions had me scouring the web straight away and landing on Pete Coleman’s site, which was both a blessing and a bane. For those who didn’t ever see it, it was like this site, full of examples of truly extraordinary skill and craftsmanship. The trouble was, having seen what I should do, I couldn’t possibly just whack this together straight out of the box, as intended, and that meant hours and hours on small modifications lay ahead. However, it was always parked, not abandoned!

 

I should say from the outset that this is my first go at high quality model-making. Other than helping my progeny with the odd bit of model-based homework I haven’t touched a model kit in perhaps 45 years. I chose the Victory for sentimental reasons, inspired by the books of Patrick O'Brian, not realising that this is probably the Everest of plastic sailing ship models. In fact the intention was that this would be the only kit I’d ever build, it was a project for one wet and miserable winter rather than a hobby. Who knows, that may change by the time I’ve finished the Victory (assuming I ever do).

So, the object of this build log is two-fold; it’s partly to share my learning with anyone else in the same position, novice’s taking on this huge challenge; and partly to seek advice, as I go along, from the many experienced, expert modellers on this forum.

 

It may help if I say what I’m aiming for. I’m not too bothered about true historical or nautical accuracy, just want a really nice looking ship at the end of the day. I’m unlikely to spend much if any time adding features below decks that can’t be seen, but I am making the ‘usual’ modifications like hull thickening, the admirals’ entry and altered side steps. It almost goes without saying that I’m constantly looking at the fantastic work of Dafi, Foxy, Bishophobbies and a few others, though I’m expecting my results to be more modest.

 

That's enough of the intro - in a moment I'll start adding build content.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Although I naturally went straight into building the guns – that looked like fun(!) – I’ll begin the log in the more logical place, the hull. This is because the hull requires a lot of work-up and even after many dozens of hours I’m still not ready to glue it together or put paint to plastic.

 

I started by dry assembling, to understand what went where etc and found that the red channel beams that support the lower deck are wrongly numbered on the sprues. On mine, 242 is actually 239, 241 is 240, 240 is 242,239 is 241, 238 is 238 and 237 is 237. Those for the upper decks appear true. It is worth cross-checking the Heller instructions against those of Imai, which seem a little clearer in places (though neither are great). They don’t all fit snugly into their lugs, some are tight, others loose but I’ve resisted the temptation to fiddle with their length as I suspect the variation is down to deformation in the hull mouldings, which will be forced true once decks are put in. On the subject of these beams, after several dry fits, where you have to bend the beams to get them in place, I’ve found these start to bend too easily, sag downwards under pressure and don’t necessarily hold the decks flat, so I’ve glued some thick evergreen on the undersides to make them stiffer.

 

Note the mis-sequencing of the top set in this photo.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

I’ve also found that some of them fall off while you’re trying to get the decks in place as they are not necessarily a snug fit, so I’ve temporarily extended the lugs with evergreen. I’ll probably remove these deck by deck once I’m glueing up, as they’ll break off easily enough. Similarly, I’ve added some support in between lugs, especially towards the bow end, to stop the deck flopping through when fitting.

 

 

[Kevin-the-lubber]

For dry fitting, I’m holding the hull halves and bow parts together using miniature self-tapping screws (M1.4 x 6mm) and a few larger set screws on the fat part of the keel. This helps me understand what I should paint before glueing and which areas I need to keep free of paint. I drill a 0.8mm hole all the way through, widen one part to 1.4mm and partly countersink. This works quite well. As my bow section is slightly distorted and has to be pulled together to meet, I've screwed a thick bit of evergreen on the inside to hold it in place, but as the evergreen plastic is relatively soft it gives slightly, so it’s not brilliant but it’s close enough for a dry fit.

 

You’ll also notice I’ve opened up the two closed ports in the bows on each hull half. That’s just because ‘moulded in closed’ looks a bit rubbish to me and I’ll scratch build some lids from card later on.

 

The right hand photo shows that bit of evergreen mentioned above.

Edited February 21, 2020 by Kevin-the-lubber

[Kevin-the-lubber]

I’ve thickened the hull around the gun ports using 3mm, 2mm and 1mm thick evergreen respectively. This photo shows how I thickened the port side, by 'boxing in' around each gun port. I copied this idea from somewhere though that builder probably did it much more tidily. My thinking was that it wouldn't show from the outside so the scruffiness wouldn't matter. I'll come back to that presently. After creating the boxes around each port I then lined the inside of each one with 0.5mm evergreen, cutting strips from a sheet and leaving it long on the inside, trimming off the excess later; there's a photo of this. I tried to cut the liners as accurately as possible, to avoid filling and filing later, and set the liners depth in the port by eye. This whole process was, to be honest, very, very tedious. In some ways it led to me parking the project because by the end of it I'd realised there was a better way, thought I ought to start all over again and re-do the port side, but couldn't face it.

 

 

The holes you see in the evergreen are where I’ve drilled through from the outside for the gunport lid ropes. I think my thinking was that I’d have line running through these and tied off or glued on the inside. The holes are large on the inside to give plenty of room for the rope, from the outside they are only tiny pilot holes. The reason I mention these is because I broke a number of drill bits doing these, as they were sometimes right on the edge of the evergreen, which is why you see extra evergreen above, to give the drill something to bite into.

 

Edit: the reason you see gaps in the joints and 'trapezoid' shapes in the top row is because I was trying to line up against the edge of each individual port moulding. There lies madness, as these are no guide at all, hence the better, 'strip thickening' approach on the starboard side.

 

Edited February 21, 2020 by Kevin-the-lubber

[Kevin-the-lubber]

This next photo shows how I 'strip thickened' the starboard hull. In this instance I set the long evergreen strips on the two lower decks perpendicular to the horizontal rather than flat against the hull, so the sills and lintels would be true to real life, otherwise it'll look weird and there'll be hardly any space for the guns to poke through. I haven't worried about that on the upper deck as, at 1mm thickness, it doesn't really have that effect and a little filing before lining sorts out the top. I then (obviously) added the short verticals either side but didn't worry about precision as any gaps here are very easy to fill later. For the liners, this time I used 0.5mm evergreen of three different widths, 4mm, 3.2mm and 2.mm respectively, setting the back edge in line with the back of the thickener and tweaking once all four pieces of the liner are in place and the glue is still wet. I also didn't try so hard to cut the liners accurately, close enough is good enough, and have used vallejo filler to seal the corners and joints. This has been a much, much better method than that I used for the port side. It still takes a lot of time, I'd guess 10 or 20 hours including filing off the poorly moulded liners and tidying up, but the end result looks more like it's part of the ship than boxing in. I've found that vallejo is the best filler for that particular job as it has a very fine nozzle and you can run the filler into the corners quite nicely. It is also very easy to scrape and chisel rather than file off the excess, giving sharper lines. Conversely, Perfect Putty is good for larger, easier access areas like the joints in the evergreen on the inside. And I used thinner evergreen for the top strips, hoping to avoid, on this side, the drilling problem mentioned earlier. Incidentally, the gunports look a little small to me, compared to their size in relation to the guns on the real thing.

Partially lined starboard side, top deck still to be done at this point.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

To return to the scruffy port side. Having dry fitted I could see that the boxes on the upper deck would be visible through the top deck so I've tidied these up and make them look the same as the starboard side. To me at least the starboard side looks great through the deck, the port side looked horrible. My tidying up is not brilliant, the 'line' is wonky but I don't want to undo the whole set of ports just to get a perfectly smooth flow - it'll never notice!

 

I suspect other builders would have known this beginners error from the outset, and I'd point you to foxy's build on this site (7732-hms-victory-by-foxy-heller) as an example of a really tidy piece of work. Note though that wide evergreen will foul the line of some of the small holes and less wide may be better.

 

 

Port side top deck thickeners infilled and puttied but still need sanding smooth

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Yesterday I took the plunge and opened up the admirals’ entries. This is where I’m varying slightly from Dafi’s mod, because the aperture looked too long (aesthetically) after I’d cut it so I’ve lowered the top a little just to look ‘right’ for me, and will probably also raise the bottom slightly so that the side step is in line with this. I bought the Amati entry ports back in 2013 and at this point plan to use them, rather than buy Dafi’s (which weren’t available then) but the engineer in me really doesn’t believe super-glueing metal to plastic is going to work that well! Although I’ve necessarily cleared off 3 or 4 of the side steps on each side to make room for the hood, I’m not yet decided whether to go the whole hog and replace them all with Dafi’s sidesteps or just do my own thing and leave most in place. This is what I meant when I said I’m more interested in the overall aesthetic than accuracy, as right now it feels like cleaning off all the steps is one more thing (no doubt several evenings) until I can start glueing the model together. It does get quite boring staring at two hull halves day after day, not least because there are things that I don’t think I can move on to until I have the decks in place, like the stern and bow section proper! Having said that, I probably will buy some of Dafi’s parts as these do lift the model significantly.

 

The photo on the right is a mini-saw I knocked up to cut out these ports. I mention it because I spent ages debating whether it was worth spending £5 on a ready-made item but then, in a rare moment of insight, thought of using a junior hacksaw blade. So, I just cut a section of that and it's fits perfectly in the pin vice. It even cuts to the line quite nicely.

 

 

Edited February 21, 2020 by Kevin-the-lubber

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Some questions or musings now, for the experts. I still don’t have a clear sense of the point at which I should at least prime the hulls. Please correct me if I’m wrong but I think I’m better off keeping glue points clear of paint altogether, is that right? My line of thinking is that, if I screw as much on as I can, this will effectively mask the areas that should be kept clean and I can then prime safely.

 

Also, I’m thinking of buying an airbrush, as it seems crazy to spend hundreds of pounds on this build only to have a poor, brush finish. I’ve seen several sub-£100 complete kits on amazon and ebay and wonder what those with experience think? I’ve never used an airbrush and don’t know what’s okay at the budget end, bearing in mind I may only ever use it on this one model. How sharp a line do you get with airbrushes, with good masking? I’m particularly thinking here of the bee-lines. Do you have any recommendations for a budget of £100?

 

And lastly for now, any tips or tricks on fitting the stern section? It looks particularly tricky and ill-fitting, with the hull ends seeming to run through the window lines.

[John Ruy]

Looking good... I love your story of completing this model of your past. I also like that you are enhancing the ship with more detail. It’s like creating your own pain be dies definitely grow your skills. I just want to encourage your completion. 
 

I have a similar story, where I started a 1/96 USS Constitution in my 20’s that was never completed and was eventually thrown away. A little over a year ago I found that same model on eBay and began my journey. Very rewarding once finished. Good Luck and may your perseverance win out. 

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Today I've been having a go at making the sidesteps from scratch, just for the fun of it. It would almost certainly be cheaper to buy some from Daniel but I want to see how much I can do myself first, fat fingers and all. So I spent a pleasant morning in a model shop and came home with more Plastruct sizes than I'll ever need and, of course, some additional tools, equally un-needed! After quite a lot of experimentation trying to build the profile from flat shapes, I've settled on 3.2mm x 0.8mm for the top plank and 1.2mm angle for underneath. I've made a simple jig to set the offset depth at 0.8mm, which looked about right, plus I now have plenty of 0.8mm thick with which to set a depth in the jig....

 

This is my prototype; not too bad, but I think I need another 0.5mm depth for the bulge, put a more round edge on the flat and experiment with using milliput, which I've never used, to create a radius inside the angle.

 

Along the way I had another look through my photoset from a visit to Portsmouth back in 2013 and realised the ports in the model must be wrongly aligned, as here the lower deck is offset from the top deck by maybe 12 inches. Not that I plan to do anything about that.

 

Edited February 22, 2020 by Kevin-the-lubber

[GrandpaPhil]

John McKay’s The 100 Gun Ship Victory (The Anatomy of the Ship series) is an excellent resource for building the Victory. 

Edited February 22, 2020 by GrandpaPhil

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Hi Phil, that’s one for the shopping list, along with another trip to portsmouth in the spring. Luckily for me it’s quite close to home.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Side steps part 2.

 

This is my heath robinson (look it up) vernier height guage / setting platform for getting the side steps in exactly the right position and exactly horizontal. Patent pending of course. That small sheet of evergreen is double-sided taped onto the piece of wood and you can see me offering up the first step in the first photo. All that's needed from there is a bit of CA, let it set for a couple of minutes, then next step. As a proof of concept piece it definitely does the job, allowing me to position the steps to 0.1mm, but either the wooden platform is slightly off the horizontal or the entrance itself is slightly off the vertical. We're probably only talking one degree here but with such tiny objects in series it's enough to spoil the effect. The other problem I've had is that glue gets onto the plastic platform, espacially CA as mine doesn't have a very fine nozzle,  and the object can too easily get stuck to that. I have a solution for this for Mk2 - I'll first glue the steps to some strip as a kind of sprue that sits back on the platform, maybe with a tiny bit of weight to stop the step falling off, so I can have the step itself protruding maybe 4 or 5 mm in front of the platform when I apply glue and position. (If anyone has better suggestions I'm all ears). In case you're wondering why I'm going to all this trouble just to get the steps exactly right, it's because I've always been a bit rubbish at manual superfine work, and even as a tradesman I made up for this by finding ways to get the tools to do what I couldn't. Besides which, it's fun.

For anyone interested, here is a table giving the exact gap size between the steps (3.3mm). Don't use the measurements as true heights from say the keel, they are the relative positions reading off my height guage. I wouldn't mind betting that this 3.3mm pitch is precisely what the die-makers used, as the 66mm distance was exactly that, not even 0.1mm out.

 

 

The end result is not as good as I was aiming for. For one thing, the steps are way too big and out of scale. I now think the thin part should be about 1/20th the width of the gunport whereas mine is about 1/3rd. However 1/20th is tiny, only about 0.5mm so I'll probably try something like 1.5mm. Which means the moulded steps are probably about right as the correct depth of the fat part of the steps. The messiness underneath the top planks doesn't really look anywhere near that messy to the naked eye, it's just the camera accentuating every blemish. You can see that slight 1 degree misalignment here, can't you, especially on the top step. I can also see that next time I need to double side a guide strip on the LH side, to get them all perfectly aligned.

 

A bit of trivia - the lower deck on the model must be 3mm or 4mm too low, as the rigols should be coming out just below the second step down, not the third. Even if I shifted the entrance and steps down a couple of mm this still wouldn't align to reality.

 

(The aperture itself is roughly made at this point and I'll be squaring that up after I've got the steps sorted out. Actually, it was meant to be the finished article and I haven't the slightest idea why I thought that top bit was square).

 

I'm a little torn now between making mk2 from strip, having a go at 3D printing as that looks interesting and I'm seeing printers on ebay for as little as £70, or trying resin casting, something else I fancy dabbling in as I have a few household jobs where either of these could prove handy. I'm finding myself sometimes wishing I was still in my trade (precision sheetmetalwork) as I'd have been able to make these beautifully from aluminium using the CNC's. Either way, these ones will have to come off.

 

Edited March 9, 2020 by Kevin-the-lubber

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Last post on March 9th... and I went down the 3D printing route, and have spent much of the last spent 8 weeks learning just enough about designing and printing 3D parts to be close-ish to being able to apply it to this model. Along the way I’ve made dozens and of side step sets, entrances and gun port inserts, while learning how to get the result I’m after. Here’s a little sample, this is a good print of side steps version 1; version 2 is going to be ever so slightly shallower, 2mm deep rather than 2.5mm, a more true bottom profile and with the angles set with more accuracy, all relatively painless modifications done entirely on my PC. 

 

Wish I could do another visit to the ship - it’s a day trip for me, but may as well be the other side of the world while we remain in lockdown.

 

Edited May 8, 2020 by Kevin-the-lubber

[Kevin-the-lubber]

This evening I finally finished making a tool that does two things; a) it’s a better version of the gizmo I made to precisely set the steps dead level and correctly spaced; no doubt I’ll some back to that in a few days or weeks, when I’m ready to glue; and b) it’s to let me precisely measure the different angles on the hull. In the immediate term that will let me ‘cut’ the steps to the right angles in the 3D software so that, in theory at least, no post-production fettling should be needed.

Right now I’m still working on creating the canopy, quite a complex and detailed thing to do from scratch in the software, and a final version of the entrance itself;

 

 

These are a couple of test pieces, largely to see how good I could get the panel moulding detail. The photo doesn’t really do the result justice, even in this untouched up state the finish is much smoother to the naked eye and of course these are dead square, perfectly angled and so on.

 

The prize though may be the gunports themselves. I’ve never been that happy with the work I’ve done on these so far - the finished model would kind of have a good side and a not so good side, and it’ll be Sod’s law that this will vary according to which bit of the model you’re looking at. So what you see above is my spare hull, untouched so far, and I’m thinking I could probably do a much, much better job of the gunports if I made all-in-one inserts and thickeners on the printer. Key to that is knowing the precise angles on the hull, hence all this work making the tool.

 

So, all going well I’ll be able to get going again shortly.

 

 

 

[Hubac's Historian]

Hello, Kevin!

 

Your approach to this kit, and your engineering work-arounds are fascinating.  I appreciate your commitment and will follow the project with great interest.  You are making a fabulous job of it, so far!

 

All the best,

Marc

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Hello Marc. Blimey, where did the last 6 months go? Well, mostly on refitting a bathroom, converting my squalid workshop into an office-cum-hobby room, and various other essential home maintenance jobs. Anyway, today is my first day back 'home' (the new hobby room) after having to put everything away while doing my duty and I'm reviewing where I'd got to, now that I'm able to print plastic again. I just hope I can find all my sketches and measurements! I should have mentioned, all the tools shown above are 3D printed apart from the vernier itself. It really is an excellent piece of kit for those of us with 5 thumbs on each hand but an interest in IT.

So, I'll be doing some more over the next few weeks I hope, maybe finally get the entrance and steps glued on.

(If there's a prize for the longest, slowest build I think I'm definitely in with a chance).

[jim Landis]

On 3/9/2020 at 5:33 PM, Kevin-the-lubber said:

Side steps part 2.

 

This is my heath robinson (look it up) vernier height guage / setting platform for getting the side steps in exactly the right position and exactly horizontal. Patent pending of course. That small sheet of evergreen is double-sided taped onto the piece of wood and you can see me offering up the first step in the first photo. All that's needed from there is a bit of CA, let it set for a couple of minutes, then next step.

 

 

This is a great idea, I've been having the same problem mounting Dafi's resin steps...

[Hubac's Historian]

Welcome back, welcome back, welcome back!!

 

(pop-culture reference, intended!)

[Kevin-the-lubber]

 

 

Work in progress this evening. The canopy is straight off the printer and needs fettling, though I have a further iteration printing as I write, as the angle to hull is off by about 4 degrees . The rippling is grossly exaggerated by the flash, looks a lot smoother in the flesh, so I won't do too much smoothing. Shapeways appear to do an amazingly good version of this, but I imagine they are printing using stereolithography, whereas my machine is Fused Depositing Modelling. I did a version with all the relief detail but this was just too small for this type of printer and it comes out a bit blobby, so I think I'll settle for trying to paint that on. Panelling on the entrance came out fairly well though.  

[dafi]

Very nice 🙂

 

XXXDAn

 

[Hubac's Historian]

That looks very good, indeed, Kevin!  I’m also glad to pick up a new vocab word in fettling.

Edited December 11, 2020 by Hubac's Historian

[Ian_Grant]

Hello Kevin!  You won't remember me, but we joined Pete Coleman's website on almost the same day and exchanged a few messages. Glad to see you're back on the build; I had wondered where you had got to!  I was just finishing my Victory as Pete's web site disappeared so I put a few build log pics on here. She took me 5 years so you are not far behind  ;-)

 

Your printed entry port looks great! I am currently working on a Heller "Preussen" and trying to get some 3D printed parts too. In my case my brother is the one with the printer, albeit 400 km away. In this kit the ladders are deficient plus my stern railing was bent and broken so I used TinkerCAD to draw some replacements. Hope they turn out as well as yours! I suppose you're using more advanced mesh software?

 

You're bringing new ideas to the Victory kit. Will be interested to see what you come up with next.

 

Best Regards,

Ian

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Hello Ian, nice to hear from you. It's such a shame Pete's site came to and end but luckily some people, like you, were kind enough to upload their journals to here. I think I might have not re-started if I hadn't been able to find these fonts of inspiration. I've been tempted a few times to buy the Soleil Royale when it's come up cheap(ish) on ebay but I've sworn to at least be a decent way through the Victory before even buying another kit. For me the choices will be limited, I don't think I could bear trying anything smaller than 1:100!

 

Progress report coming shortly....

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Glue-ing... yes, really. Today I've gone where Kevin-the-lubber has never gone before and started glue-ing the steps.

 

 

 

This is a jig to get the steps perfectly aligned vertically. In theory at least. I measured the hull contour at 0.5mm increments, transferred those into TinkerCad and tweaked out any errors. Ian, I too am using TinkerCad, it's brilliant despite it's limitations, but I haven't had the will to learn the more complex mesh software. I've tried loads of those that are free but haven't found anything that's intuitive so far.

 

 

And this is it in action, held in place with a couple of the tiniest screws I've ever seen. The hull is upside down because I set the steps using their top surface...

 

 

This is an improved version of the height gauge for setting the steps at exact spacings and true to horizontal. I wasn't sure just how well this was going to work for actually glue-ing but it went pretty well. A tip for anyone else looking at this method, work upwards, it's tricky to see if the step has aligned and attached if, like the over-excited me, you start with the biggest shaped steps. I'm quite looking forward to finishing these steps and reclaiming my big vernier!

 

 

 

 

And here's todays product. I need to recheck the maths before re-printing the top one's, as I'm loosely working off a photo of the real thing and they dogleg a bit to dodge stuff. 

 

I think this is probably as good as I can get it with this printer (Creality Ender Pro) but I'm happy enough with that. The scale looks about right and, hopefully, I can soon move on a bit.

 

I've had another go at creating the crest above the entrance, the pic below is of the 3D model. However, I haven't yet been able to get a usable print as this is such a tiny object. At 10mm across most of that relief is less than 0.1mm across and the entire thickness is only 0.4mm. If I do manage to crack it I figure it may be possible to rub it facedown on some gold paint, to get the highlights.

 

 

 

Which brings me on to a question. I want to buy an airbrush kit and have never used one in my life. Anyone got any suggestions for something under £150 including the compressor?

 

[Ian_Grant]

Kevin that's pretty amazing looking for TinkerCAD, love all the leafy greenery and I have no idea how you did that.

 

Funny you should mention the SR. When I finished Victory I had a stash of two ships to choose from: Soleil Royale and Preussen. The SR is beautifully engraved but there are as always it seems with Heller's ships some big problems. The underwater hull is hard to believe; there seems very little "curve of the bilge" near the stern meaning there's no buoyancy right where the hugely tall and presumably heavy stern juts up. The topmasts are too long, and the crosstrees are an odd construction to my eye.

 

Anyway I decided I couldn't face another 5-year build so similar to Victory (100 guns, deadeye rigging, mods required) so I started on Preussen. It will be another beauty when completed.

 

As for the SR, when the time comes, I'm torn between her and building an RC square rigger. I would love to have one, I still have my 50/800 sailboat I sailed in my teens. If the SR it will be a waterline build, or I'll cut the underwater hull off and add a "strake".

 

I may not have enough years left to do both  🙂

 

 

Edited December 13, 2020 by Ian_Grant

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Hi Ian, it’s easier than you think. I took an image from a suitable photo and converted it via a free web portal called convertio into an .svg file, which creates relief based on colour and pattern differences. I then imported it as a shape into tinkercad. From there it’s just a matter of snipping out what you don’t want and scaling etc. It does require a good, contrasty photo though. This is where you hit the limitations of tinkercad. Looking ahead, I’m probably going to want to make my own masts, spars, rear gallery etc, and would need to learn how to use normal cad, as ideally you want to be able to do this by plotting measurements rather than forming shapes etc. It’s a shame tinkercad doesn’t give you a full table of properties for objects, but then again, I wouldn’t have got anywhere without tinkercad.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Not happy enough with the results so far. Regarding the side steps I have a good-ish side and a not so good side. As luck would have it these are on opposite sides to the good and bad hull thickening sides, so there might always be something on view to spoil the effect. Since I have a spare kit, I've started again on the hulls. Different method along the lines mentioned above; I'm making inserts on the 3D printer that go inside each gunport once it's been fettled to suit.

 

This allows me to have identical frame/surround sizes throughout, make the frame 0.3mm thick, avoid getting glue everywhere as they can be glued inside and generally get a better, tidier appearance. Starting again from scratch isn't as bad as it sounds, 90% of the time spent so far has been thinking rather than doing and things are always easier second time round. Not yet sure what to do with the side steps. The work to date is 'okay' but just doesn't look quite right, and I learned stuff along the way that should make a second go come out better. 

 

Meanwhile, playing around with the stern, as I need a change of scenery; this is a test piece for the lettering, at the proper scale. Printed at 1mm thick for the test but I quite like this raised effect so might keep it fairly thick, maybe 0.5mm - 0.8mm instead. Doing it this way isn't entirely about the aesthetics for me, it's to compensate for my apparent inability to draw, paint, cut or file a straight line on anything. So I painted the letters while on their sprue, CA'ed them on once dry, snipped off the sprue and tidied up, then only had to do some touching up of the paintwork (black still a bit wet here). While scouring the web to find a suitable font to snip and 3D, (using Daniels as the reference) I saw that the sign has been all sizes and styles over the years, including that used on the model. This one came from Victory - ABYME, who appear to have been contracted to do the real thing. 

 

Question: Anyone got any good tips for painting the balustrades on the stern? 

 

 

[Hubac's Historian]

I understand your mentality, Kevin, but I think you are being to hard on yourself.  The stairs and entry port look incredible from my seat in the gallery.

 

I think the best way to tackle the balusters is to black-in the ground and then dry brush the yellow.  Even if it takes a few passes, you will get there.  Dry brushing is less daunting than it seems.