Kit review USS Missouri (BB 63) - OcCre -1:200

[Kevin]

1/200 USS Missouri BB-63

OcCre

Catalogue # 16002

Available from OcCre 749-99 Euros

USS Missouri (BB-63)

 

 

 

 

Good evening everyone and welcome to my review of the new kit just released by OcCre  the USS Missouri BB63.

In this review I would like to show you some of the things to expect when considering purchasing this brand new release from OcCre, and to help find your way through I have split the review into several sections.

 

 

Wiki details

OcCre kit details

My kit

Wood package

Lasered wood

Photoetch

Fittings pack

Instructions

Construction

Conclusion

Photos

 

(taken from Wiki)

USS Missouri (BB-63) is an Iowa-class battleship built for the United States Navy (USN) in the 1940s and is a museum ship. Completed in 1944, she is the last battleship commissioned by the United States. The ship was assigned to the Pacific Theater during World War II, where she participated in the Battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa and shelled the Japanese home islands. Her quarterdeck was the site of the surrender of the Empire of Japan, which ended World War II.

 

After World War II, Missouri served in various diplomatic, show of force and training missions. On 17 January 1950 the ship ran aground during high tide in Chesapeake Bay and after great effort was re-floated several weeks later. She later fought in the Korean War during two tours between 1950 and 1953. Missouri was the first American battleship to arrive in Korean waters and served as the flagship for several admirals. The battleship took part in numerous shore bombardment operations and also served in a screening role for aircraft carriers. Missouri was decommissioned in 1955 and transferred to the reserve fleet (also known as the "Mothball Fleet").

Missouri was reactivated and modernized in 1984 as part of the 600-ship Navy plan. Cruise missile and anti-ship missile launchers were added along with updated electronics. The ship served in the Persian Gulf escorting oil tankers during threats from Iran, often while keeping her fire-control systems trained on land-based Iranian missile launchers. She served in Operation Desert Storm in 1991 including providing fire support.

 

Missouri was again decommissioned in 1992, but remained on the Naval Vessel Register until her name was struck in 1995. In 1998, she was donated to the USS Missouri Memorial Association and became a museum ship at Pearl Harbour, Hawaii.

 

Namesake	State of Missouri
Ordered	12 June 1940
Builder	Brooklyn Navy Yard
Laid down	6 January 1941
Launched	29 January 1944
Sponsored by	Margaret Truman
Commissioned	11 June 1944
Decommissioned	26 February 1955
Identification	Hull number: BB-63
Recommissioned	10 May 1986
Decommissioned	31 March 1992
Stricken	12 January 1995
Motto	"Strength for Freedom"[1]
Nickname(s)	"Mighty Mo"[1]
Status	Museum ship in Pearl Harbor
Badge
General characteristics (as built)
Class and type	Iowa-class battleship
Displacement	57,540 long tons (58,460 t) (full load)
Length	887 ft 3 in (270.4 m) (o/a)
Beam	108 ft 2 in (33 m)
Draft	37 ft 9 in (11.5 m)
Installed power	·8 × Babcock & Wilcox boilers ·212,000 shp (158,000 kW)
Propulsion	·4 × geared steam turbines ·4 × screw propellers
Speed	32.5 knots (60.2 km/h; 37.4 mph)
Range	15,000 nmi (28,000 km; 17,000 mi) at 15 knots (28 km/h; 17 mph)
Complement	117 officers, 1,804 enlisted men (designed)
Sensors and processing systems	·1 × SK-2 early-warning radar ·2 × SG surface-search radars ·2 × Mk-8 fire-control radars ·4 × Mk-12 fire-control radars ·4 × Mk-22 height-finder radars ·1 × Mk-27 fire-control radar
Armament	·3 × triple 16 in (406 mm) guns ·10 × twin 5 in (127 mm) DP guns ·10 × quadruple 40 mm (1.6 in) AA guns ·49 × single 20 mm (0.8 in) AA guns
Armor	·Waterline belt: 12.1 in (307 mm) ·Bulkheads: 14.5 in (368 mm) ·Barbettes: 11.6–17.3 in (295–439 mm) ·Turrets: 19.5 in (495 mm) ·Decks: 4.75–6.2 in (121–157 mm)

 

The full wiki can be found here:

USS Missouri (BB-63) - Wikipedia

 

OcCre kit details

Scale - 1/200

Height - 320mm

Length - 1355mm

Width - 178mm

Number of pieces - 6096

Difficulty - Advanced

Construction time – 1400 hours

 

 

 

My kit

The outer carrier cardboard box arrived in good condition directly from Spain. On removing the kit it had a lot of rattling going on, so I presumed that maybe one of the fittings cases had lost some of its contents, so more care was used on opening the box for the review. The box is cellophaned to avoid content loss in transport but this is the third kit I have received where small items have come out of the plastic trays, The kit box is quite sturdy and generic so lifting the lid off reveals that the contents are stored the same as all other OcCre kits within a compartmentalised structure which is folded to separate the strip material from the sheets and plans etc, this system works quite well, and all loose items have been accounted for with no loss.

 

 

Wood package

Lime wood is supplied to make up the hull and decking, with balsa for the block fillers between the frames, it all looks to be of a uniform colour and quite nicely cut with no splintering showing, the scale of the decking is my first concern, going to be vastly over scale, personally I think the purchase of smaller width planks is going to be required, would have been so much easier to have has a laser etched deck template.

lasered wood

 

There is a lot of this, and all seems to be very nicely cut with very little char on the reverse.

Made up off plywood for the bulkheads and upper deck sections, MDF for the keel base, superstructure and larger equipment such as turrets and secondary equipment. There are no identifications numbers on any of the sheets, but the instructions show handy map locations.

 

Plywood 11 sheets.

Hull/bulkheads 3.7mm 5 sheets.

Upper deck 2.7mm 4 sheets.

Superstructure thats not MDF 2.3mm 2 sheets.

 

MDF total 11 sheets

Centre line 6.0mm 2 sheets.

Keel/bottom plate 5,0mm 2 sheets.

All MDF for sub assemblies 3.0mm 7 sheets.

 

This is a sample of the lasered wood supplied.

From the instructions, each part can be identified. This way of doing things takes a few moments longer to locate each part, but saves the manufacturer laser time from etching the parts onto each sheet.

 

[Kevin]

Photo etch

 

Well, there is certainly a lot of it in different gauges (15 sheets in total), and is this found wrapped in tissue, hidden amongst the wood package. I'm very pleased with the way it looks, it certainly helps explain the weight of the box contents.

This is used heavily throughout the kit to sheath the MDF sub assemblies, (explained in the construction section).

 

Fittings pack

 

There are two fittings boxes with a staggering number of metal parts, and these are quite heavy. The metal looks like a zinc alloy and the parts are all very sharply cast with nothing in the way of flash present. In here, you will find the bow profile, ships boats, turret barrels, amongst many recognisable items...and lots that are not! I recommend that any cast parts are washed in soapy water first and then primed with a metal etching primer before you use them. Also in this box are pins for planking, turned wooden parts, eyelets, glass beads and chain etc.

Instructions

There are almost no written instructions: ½ a page of some rather obvious text, however the photo instructions are brilliant, with step by step stages of the construction. Each page has its reference letter which coincides with the parts index to help identify items. The full instructions are available online, as well as step by step videos. I will post a link at the end of this review.

 

Written instructions

There are many pages of fittings with references to the page number in the instructions book, quantity and material.

This is one of the pages highlighting the detail placement of fittings.

And a few pages from the photo instruction booklet. Photographs, illustrations, and nomenclature all appear to be easy to follow and understand.

 

[Kevin]

Construction

Of course, every builder will have their own way of building, but I am going by the the instructions.

 

Hull

The hull is plank on bulkhead with 20+plywood frames onto a MDF centre line, between the frames is where the balsa is cut to size and fitted to help support the planking. I'm not sure this will be needed with the number of frames, which is a vast improvement on my last OcCre kit.

 

At this stage the keel base and upper deck sections are also added.

Deck planking,

This is my first criticism of the kit. This should be a lasered overlay to represent scale planks, in this kit we have 3mm wide lime strips. I feel these are over-scale, and I'll seek a realistic alternative to this when it comes to building Missouri. 

Hull planking

Very basic planking here, using the 1mm x 5mm lime strips. No special techniques are required. The bow and stern have metal parts added to represent the shape required.

Shafts, portholes and other hull details are added with the aid of 1-2-1 scale drawings.

Superstructure building

Again, using the over scale decking the sub-assemblies are built up.

Then we have the magic of photo-etch, which is secured to the MDF with C/A (superglue). There is rather a lot of this, so if you aren't a fan of PE, then this will vex you. However, the finished result should look spectacular, providing you take your time.

All photo-etch can be quickly identified by the reference number on the photo and found on the etch sheet using the plans map. You will need good tools for removing this from the sheets, and also tools for rolling and bending these parts.

Conclusion

 

Photos

[Kevin]

Conclusion

 

This is actually a very nice, beautifully presented kit that shouldn’t prove too difficult to the average modeller. Construction is straightforward and very well illustrated. All parts are mapped so they are easy to find, and the kit castings are sharply made with excellent definition.. You’ll need some space to display the finished ship too, with her being 1.3m long when complete! She is definitely worth your consideration if you fancy building something without masts or sails, but don’t want to be unfaithful to your hobby of building ships in wood!

 A big Thank you to OcCre for suppling the kit for review and @James H for his help in this review.

 

I hope to build this in the near future and look forward to sharing it with you, any questions please let me know.

 

Photos from the instructions and OcCre site.

 

 

My sincere thanks to OcCre for sending this kit out for review on Model Ship World. To buy this this kit directly, click the link at the top of this review.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[AgesOfSail]

FYI, we have a number of these kits available now, ready to ship. Note that this also qualifies for free domestic shipping (all orders of $150 or more).

 

https://www.agesofsail.com/ecommerce/new-items/uss-missouri-bb-63-(occre,-1-200).html

 

In any case, it's a very nice looking kit. Hope to see some build logs soon!

 

[GrandpaPhil]

Looking forward to a build log!

[Hank]

Well, not to throw a wrench in the works, but from the info (photos) provided on the dual 5"/38 gun mounts, I'm wondering if these are the correct version. The 5"/38 dual mounts that were installed in all the newer U.S. battleships (NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH DAKOTA, IOWA class ships) were Mk. 28 mounts, not what appears to be the Mk. 32 - but I could be wrong.  Suffice it to say, here is a cut sheet of the Mk. 28, Mod. 2 5"/38 dual gun mount that would be correct for this class of ship -

The Mk. 32 dual 5"/38-gun mounts were primarily used in cruisers/destroyers. I ran into this problem as well, in building my model of BB-62 which is a kit-bashed 1/200 scale Trumpeter USS MISSOURI kit - those 5" mounts were incorrect and I replaced them with 3rd party parts at the time.

Here is a photo of the 3D design/printed 5"/38 dual gun mounts that I've made for my model due to paint issues I've had with those earlier 3D printed (commercial) parts that I originally used when I built this model -

This is the 3D rendering of the mount body only - barrels are separate.

 

Perhaps Kevin can confirm whether or not these gun mounts are in fact, the correct models, etc. 

 

Hope this helps!

Edited November 11 by Hank
Clarified my comments.

[Gregory]

What are the notable differences? 

[Hank]

4 hours ago, Gregory said:

What are the notable differences? 

Gregory,

The difference between the Mk. 28 and Mk. 32 has to do with the front/angled face of the mount body. Here is a cut sheet of the Mk. 32 (I should have provided this in my orig. post) -

Comparing the side elevation on this view with the earlier one of the Mk. 28 mount, you'll see that the Mk. 28 mount has an angled front face of 45

If you compare this to the Mk. 28 you will see that on the side elevation, the angled front face on the Mk. 28 is 45 deg. and somewhat higher from the bottom of the mount floor than the similar face on the Mk. 32. But, it's important in building models (esp. EXPENSIVE ones) to get these small details correct. At least IMHO that's a no-brainer!