Rebuilding the fleet by mikegr - 1/700 - restoring old plastic models

[mikegr]

I am in the middle of process restoring about 30 pieces of 1/700 items built 25-30 years ago with brush and enamel paints. I decided to concentrate all logs on  a single thread as some may not need heavy restoration and to save forum from opening too many threads, of mods agree. 

 

 

[yvesvidal]

That sounds like an interesting project or projects, I should say.

 

Yves

[Landlubber Mike]

Wow, good luck!  Did you build those?

[Old Collingwood]

Looking forward to this  - I know how difficult it can be to re-work models.

 

OC.

[mikegr]

18 hours ago, Landlubber Mike said:

Wow, good luck!  Did you build those?

yes i built these at the age of 15-25.

A couple of years ago i was browsing on ebay then bought a couple of kits. Now i have more than 100. But before start making these i decided to rebuild the old ones so i can practice with new materials and techniques (PE parts, rigging etc). I also doing scratchbuilt project which enchanced my skills a bit further.

[mikegr]

Before presenting my future project i will make a short review of some completed last year

 

USS San Diego by Matchbox. Rebuilt with some PE parts (AA guns ,rails and sme radar). Actually the whole model except hull sides need PE replacements but anyway

 

Alongside is DD 537 USS The Sullivans,  named by the 5 brothers killed  when their ship, USS Juneau, was sunk by a Japanese submarine

 

 

[CDW]

That's a fleet of built models! Do you have any plan on how much time you will spend doing restoration on each model? You could potentially sink a lot of time into restoration but it should be rewarding and fun. Looking forward to seeing your progress.

[Ian B]

Its that age old problem, where to display everything we make   looking forward to following this task.

[mikegr]

4 hours ago, CDW said:

That's a fleet of built models! Do you have any plan on how much time you will spend doing restoration on each model? You could potentially sink a lot of time into restoration but it should be rewarding and fun. Looking forward to seeing your progress.

Time...

 Obviously depends in what are you want to achieve. Here's is an answer from a time expert along with his work

 

"Painting is essential for the 3D look. I highlight and shade them like I would with any figure at any scale, according to the light coming from above. This emphasises the 3D-look very much, and makes the figures appear more detailed and refined.

Only drawback to these techniques: it is time-consuming. When working in series, I spend 1,5 to 2 minutes on the tickening of each figure, while painting takes about 5 minutes per figure. Together with preparation and installing, this makes about 10 minutes per figure. Not too bad, but it adds up quickly. Morris has 59 on her now, and I estimate the diorama will take about 1000 more...
But hey, good results do take some effort, don't they?"

 

 

[mikegr]

Next project was USS Independence CVL by Revell. The flyhawk kit of its time. Althouth there were some fitting issues, especially at the front, the overall details were  exeptional plus it had several sprues of spare parts which i still use today sometimes.

 

Edited September 3, 2021 by mikegr

[amateur]

Your display has also been upgraded (and will be certainly more space consuming than the old "display on a dusty shelf"

Did you only clean the model, or did you completely rework the paint?

 

Jan

[mikegr]

4 hours ago, amateur said:

Your display has also been upgraded (and will be certainly more space consuming than the old "display on a dusty shelf"

Did you only clean the model, or did you completely rework the paint?

 

Jan

Yes I make plexiglass cases for my models from now on. But the chloroform dilute is a top secret among professionals so I glue it with CA thus case looks whitish at joints.

The enamel paint lasted great all these years but new PE pieces added and since I didnt remember the code I had to respray everything

 

 

[yvesvidal]

There are special glue for plexiglass that will not whiten them, as the CA does. I think Micro-Mark sells these.

 

Yves

[mikegr]

Most recent rebulit was Yamashiro by Aoshima.

Really bad and inaccurate model. Note the turret after the funnel. It points this way because there is not enough space between funnel and aft tower.

Also the upper deck unlike forecastle and rear deck is smooth, without panel lines. Ordering a wooden deck sticker would set me back several weeks so i just painted it gray.

Al least i was satisfied with the sea bed even if i didnt use any special materials.

 

 

 

 

Edited September 4, 2021 by mikegr

[thibaultron]

How about a tutorial on how you make the seas for your diaroma?

[mikegr]

1 hour ago, thibaultron said:

How about a tutorial on how you make the seas for your diaroma?

I will do so from now on. Each built will have a different make approach

[mikegr]

Next project

Prince of Wales by Tamiya

 

Edited October 8, 2021 by mikegr

[mikegr]

Reverse engineering. Start building the project...from the end.

 

 

[mikegr]

i had to scratchbuilt some missing parts

 

[mikegr]

Model washed and stripped off partially

 

[mikegr]

Most upgrade on PE comes from the crane set

[mikegr]

I made the funnel caps. The ring where the cap will sit on, was not included in PE parts so I made them using 0.5 mm brass wire

Next are the 8 pom pom AA guns. They are comprised from various parts, the base, the barrels, the barrel case and two ammunition boxes. Shaping the latter into rectangle was out of question at least for my level. I just cut the boxes from the plastic parts and glued them

 

[mikegr]

I have finished the AA guns. The white marks are ammunition boxes made of 0,8mm rectangle balsa much easier than folding PE.

I am now scratchbuilding the front mast with 0.6 and 0.8mm PE brass rods. Later i will use other material for the top antenna.

[mikegr]

Done making the mast. Assembling the PE type 279 radar was a dirty job but someone had to do it. Lost few antennas, replaced them with brush hair. Will work on the other mast from Tuesday.

[mikegr]

Almost done making the rear mast

 

[mikegr]

For the Walrus aircraft there is not PE parts. So I had to based on my skills. There is a set Walrus aircraft from flyhawk offering amazing details but waiting some weeks to get them is not an option.  Besides this is an obsolete built, 100% perfection is impossible. I mostly use these models as a test field for materials and techniques that is haven't used in the past like PE, rigging and ofcourse making realistic sea bed.

 

[mikegr]

I upgraded the barrels. I make them from medical needles. They have thinner walls than brass. They even come in 0.03mm hollowed, make them ideal even for the secondary guns. They cost about 3$ per 100

 

[CDW]

The medical needles make excellent micro drills for plastic, too.

One of our little pooch has diabetes, and I save the U40 syringes for the needles. Lots of hobby uses.  

[Veszett Roka]

+1 vote for needles, i'm using them for drilling. They're extremely sharp.

 

I started following the thread, as i have a couple of childhood ships to be restore and improve (a lot).

 

(and sorry for remark, but i laughed when read Prince of Whales - if it was intended pun, then brilliant!)

[mikegr]

Done with the barrels. Boats repainted with toothpick