IJN Nagato by rumbeard - FINISHED - Piececool - ~1:837

[rumbeard]

I started this one back in 2018 as my first serious foray into ship models of the metal sort after I had already built a Hindenburg and USS Enterprise from Star Trek for practice.  This kit caught my eye and I loved the brass highlights.

[ccoyle]

Hello, Andrew.

 

First, welcome to Model Ship World! These are interesting models, but posting a single link in a post is not really what we intend a build log to be. Because metal models are kind of a niche medium, we don't have a designated area for them. I'm thinking the best option would be for you to create an album in the kit models gallery and show us some of the finished models. You could certainly provide the link in the description of your album. In addition, your description should tell us something about the Piececool kits in general, as I doubt that many of our members know of them, but they would probably be curious about them.

 

Cheers!

[Snug Harbor Johnny]

    There is a brief build log of a small-scale metal USS Arizona I posted ... it was a 'break' from a much longer project of a wooden model.  The the metal  medium may be of interest to some (like me) who would never attempt metalwork if it were not in kit form - thus fully engineered.

[Snug Harbor Johnny]

2 hours ago, ccoyle said:

Hello, Andrew.

 

First, welcome to Model Ship World! These are interesting models, but posting a single link in a post is not really what we intend a build log to be. Because metal models are kind of a niche medium, we don't have a designated area for them. I'm thinking the best option would be for you to create an album in the kit models gallery and show us some of the finished models. You could certainly provide the link in the description of your album. In addition, your description should tell us something about the Piececool kits in general, as I doubt that many of our members know of them, but they would probably be curious about them.

 

Cheers!

  Ahoy Chris!  'Had to do a double-take on certain metal ship models offered by the Piececool brand, since I have a couple by Metal Earth (Iconix) kits that are 'ringers' for the photos in the link.  So I did some research and found that Piececool and Metal Earth  are different brand names for the same products engineered by Tenyo, a noted Japanese manufacturer of an eclectic variety of 'thin metal' assembly models (ships are a small subset) ... there is no piracy involved. 

 

  Metal Earth is intended for U.S. sales, whereas Piececool is marketed in China - same ship kits.  You can get either legitimately on-line, and Amazon carries some of the both brand's product line.  The quality level (according to a metal molders' review) sets the standard, whereas the ARE some 'other' brand names that are copy-cats with lower quality (e.g. thinner metal that breaks easier).

[Dave_E]

Greetings and welcome Andrew. Go to the New Member Introduction area and introduce yourself. Tell us a little about yourself. This is where you meet the folks. 👍😀

[rumbeard]

I'd love to do a specialized area for this genre.  The Piececool kits are like Metal Earth but a lot more detailed.  If you look at the Missouri which is printed in both brands the Piececool one is far more detailed, better textured, and has more sheets.  In the card genre where we translate from Polish a lot the Piececool sheets have to be translated from Chinese or Japanese sometimes and there are folks that do pdf translated instruction sheets for the kits that don't have english specific releases.

[rumbeard]

I did a lot of the kit reviews on reddit but I can post some highlights and commentary from those in a special gallery soon.

[rumbeard]

On 6/25/2022 at 12:38 AM, Dave_E said:

Greetings and welcome Andrew. Go to the New Member Introduction area and introduce yourself. Tell us a little about yourself. This is where you meet the folks. 👍😀

Thanks, will do shortly.

[rumbeard]

On 6/25/2022 at 12:24 AM, Snug Harbor Johnny said:

  Ahoy Chris!  'Had to do a double-take on certain metal ship models offered by the Piececool brand, since I have a couple by Metal Earth (Iconix) kits that are 'ringers' for the photos in the link.  So I did some research and found that Piececool and Metal Earth  are different brand names for the same products engineered by Tenyo, a noted Japanese manufacturer of an eclectic variety of 'thin metal' assembly models (ships are a small subset) ... there is no piracy involved. 

 

  Metal Earth is intended for U.S. sales, whereas Piececool is marketed in China - same ship kits.  You can get either legitimately on-line, and Amazon carries some of the both brand's product line.  The quality level (according to a metal molders' review) sets the standard, whereas the ARE some 'other' brand names that are copy-cats with lower quality (e.g. thinner metal that breaks easier).

 

The one thing often sold by third parties is taking a kit and recoloring or colorizing the silver only or silver+brass kits.  In this genre also some people paint them and discuss their experiences as the material sometimes doesn't take paint well and you have to do some things to get paint to stick.

[rumbeard]

Had to buy tools

 

Cutting is fairly easy and straightforward as is sanding the burrs.  I got quite adept at using the straight flat edged tweezers for a lot of crease work.  Don't bend more than 1 and a half times or things do snap.  That's when I bust out the Weldbond.

[rumbeard]

Starting to take shape.  The superstructure gets assembled top down to the deck and then the hull is formed and attached.

[rumbeard]

For Nagato I don't have as many build images as I do for the later kits.

[ccoyle]

Nice work!