DocRob

I call the USS Arizona project done. I did a lot of little things over the last days, like a simplified rigging, added flagpoles, painted lots of details, added the anchors, I had forgotten before and took some final pictures. It was a demanding but also satisfying project, where I learned a lot of new stuff, as it was my first small scale ship build. The most important lesson was, not to limit myself with upfront fear of the lots of PE and small detail stuff. Finally, I also learned something new about photographing, focus stacking, which my camera is able to do in house. It means, that a lengthy object, which normally would have out of focus areas can be photographed without these areas. It takes some pictures of different focus points in one file, which later are merged in the camera to generate a completely focused image, cool stuff. Cheers Rob

You may ask in our co-forum ModelShipWorld, lots of knowledgeful members there. Cheers Rob

Hi Phil, like you, I bought the Mossie kit and the AM a long time ago. I'd say, the kit doesn't really need a lot of AM, but hey, aren't we all a bit strange with that. I test glued the wheels, ingenious Tamiya design and found them good enough, to not exchange them. The seat belts are a must for me and for the front office I have the Eduard set. With my recent Tamiya Corsair built, I decided against a previously bought Yahu IP, because it was wrong, with yellow dials, which should have been white and tweaked the kit supplied one. I may go the same route here, If the Eduard set isn't satisfactory. I haven't decided on the plane, so maybe add the Aires rockets. The Brassin stuff is for extra detailing, but I think your choice of Master barrels will do as well. I will use masks for the markings and try the wet transfers for stenciling, but with my shaky history with HGW's wet transfers, I might opt for 1ManArmy masks for the job. Cheers Rob

Eduard has some 1/350 signal flags in PE or printed decal, but nothing German WWI. I'm sure about coding, even in Napoleonic times flag communication was coded with false signals blended in and changing codes. To detect right or wrong signals, sometimes canons were fired or different colored flares were used, indicating which is which. Cheers Rob

Don't you think, these signals were coded, Gary? Cheers Rob

Bring it on Phil, I really like to see your Mosquito developing. I have one in stash and was pondering, if I start it soon. I have a completely different set of AM for mine though. Cheers Rob

Sorry Gary, I've no idea about these flag signals, other than knowing about their existence. Dr. Andreas Herzfeld seems to be an expert and he has written a book about the subject, which is available at big A Germany. It is called 'Die Signalflaggen und Signalbücher deutscher Kriegs- und Handelsmarinen seit 1815'. There are some graphics shown on his homepage, as well as the table of contents of the book, obviously in German. The second graph might be interesting for you. Deutsche Signalflaggen (dr-herzfeld.de) Cheers Rob

Thanks Peter, I even consider adding one more. I have been tempted by the WNW Felixstowe, since it appeared on the market. Maybe it's the last chance, to buy such a crazy object for a decent price. It's huge, but I may build her with retractable wings or even without wings in a maintenance / construction scenario. Cheers Rob

Nice show, great cars, enjoy your visit, Martin. As an ex West Berliner, I know most of the types, as we had lot of opportunities to see cars from the 'East' as well. I especially like the Citroen and the streamlined Tatras. Cheers Rob

Sorry for the late reaction, amigos, I temporary halted the tiny racer, because I ordered some more blue paint, which will take some days to arrive. I continued working on the USS Arizona in the meanwhile, adding some rigging and details and will soon present her as finished. Cheers Rob

Fantastic result Mike, the interacting two- and four legged participants made me smile. I always overlooked the scheme you chose for your Hannover as being boring, but your rendition proved me wrong. Cheers Rob

Nice catches Bill, I have the Göring Fokker as well, but I will build it in another livery. The Pfalz was my first WNW built and was absolutely enjoyable. The Komet was a completely different experience. I wanted to build the 'Kraftei' closed up, but couldn't get all the fuselage parts aligned properly. Could have been my fault, but care has to be taken to get better results, I guess. Yesterday, I took the half finished 163 out of the box and considered to bin it or to make a semi crash landing dio out of it. Cheers Rob

I know, it's not LS, but are the 1/48 GWH Devastators so bad, that there is so much hype around the Trumpeter kit? Cheers Rob

Great attention to detail as ever Gary. 'Klar Schiff zum Gefecht' call must have been quite a task, given the preparations for battle, you realized for your GK. Cheers Rob

What Harv said, mmmmhhhh, enjoy. Cheers Rob

The egg is perfect for smoking. I tried both, first hot smoking at about 80-90 degrees Celsius with mixed results. Salmon was delicious, but other fish, like Yahoo or Tuna were too dry. I think their meet has not enough fat, to keep it smooth. Cold smoking at about 20 degrees Celsius is where the Tuna family shines, with a taste like a really good ham with tuna aroma. I cover the washed and dried fish with a mix of brown sugar and crude sea salt, and some mortared juniper seeds and pink pepper for 24 hours in the fridge, remove the salt / sugar mix, dab on a tiny amount of palm honey and then make two smoking sessions of about 12 hours each, with the overnight time to rest (for the fish, not for me ). The tuna is best, after letting it ripe for another two or three days in the fridge, if you are able to resist the urge to eat it. Cheers Rob Cheers Rob

Nice Carl, I used my Kamado barbecue recently for smoking fish, using wood powder for cold smoking. Today, I finished smoking Salmon, Peto (Wahoo) and Rabil (Yellowfin tuna) after two days in the smoke. As we have a heat streak and even more atypical, a quite sea, there are lots of fish on the market. Yesterday, I bought three kilos of Yellowfin tuna fillet and another three kilos of Peto. Today, I even managed to get some kilos of Red Tuna and have now some fish in the ice for the next weeks. The Yellowfin Cheers Rob

After working on the bottom fuselage seam, I added all the major components to the fuselage. You glue the wings together first, push them into the fuselage and than add the intersecting cowling piece. Smart engineering and the fit is perfect. The tail was glued into place and now I have to wait for the delivery of my hopefully good looking blue color. Because size was an issue in this thread, I wanted to make a short comparison with other 1/48 planes, I built. The mighty MIG is no real match, the Caudron looks like an external tank with wings. The Hellcat is a monster against this tiny racer and even the small WWI Siemens Schuckert D.III has a lot more wingspan, but a shorter fuselage. Cheers Rob

Thanks Kevin, the IP will be added later, The PE is already painted and the instruments are made with acetate film. The part of the cockpit, where the IP sits needs further painting, before I add the IP. Cheers Rob

The cockpit is a sparse affair. I added an oxygen bottle, some levers and pedals, but most will stay unseen in the pit. The seat belts are made from PE and are the ones supplied with the kit. I sprayed the interior matte aluminum, as I think, the constructors would have gone for weight reduction at all cost and omit paint. By the way, I glued the fuselage halves together, an easy task, given the overall quality and fit of the resin, which is even equipped with guiding pegs. The seam on the lower fuselage was filled with some black CA, on the upper side, there is virtually no seam. Cheers Rob

Looking forward might not be the right term Phil, at least not for the pilot . This is a nice little in between project and it made me buy my next racer kit for funs sake. Cheers Rob

Peter, I hear you, when color discussions (and others) become dogmatic, but the discussion on MSW is a good one, with facts and opinions supplied b knowledgeful members. I don't want to copy the discussion, but post the link. Caudron C.561 French Racing Plane by DocRob - S.B.S. Models - 1/48 - Non-ship/categorised builds - Model Ship World™ Thank you Hubert, the blue discussion seems to be difficult. If I google your mentioned Caudron Simoun and choose pictures, I get different renditions of blue on actual photos, ranging from Bugatti blue to dark blue. The kit you refer to has three incarnations in Scalemates, which all show very different blue tones as well. I have no idea, if it is especially difficult to render the blue tones correctly on photos, but until now only one color (colored) picture of the C.561 showed up on MSW. I tend to use something between GSB and French blue. A member on MSW offered the blue of the French flag as a possibility and that doesn't look too far off. Cheers Rob

Interesting first project Gary, I reentered the hobby at about the same time like you, but I chose a Tamiya Birdgcage Corsair with the full galore of AM for my debut. I like how your Zerstörer came out. On the pics, it looks living and not only because of the nice figures. The water doesn't look to bad either, the sea is not always blue and white. I have the same Zerstörer kit in my stash, with some extras and it urged me sometimes in the past to build it. Some days ago, I learned that NorthStar closed business, at least temporary. That's a bummer, because they seem to be the only company offering 1/144 British sailors for my Flower Class Corvette. Cheers Rob

Woah, these funnel rings look fiddly, Gary. Paint will help to hide the slight imperfections. Real ships watched closely don't look completely straight everywhere. Cheers Rob

Thank you Peter, I'm not decided about coloring, it's a bit complicated with the little the sources reveal, with only one not contender built of this airframe. Over on Modelshipworld, where I post as well, a color debate has ignited, which brought up interesting aspects and pics, which lead to a dark blue tone, similar to GSB. I do remember the issues we had with fogging, and therefore will mask the canopy inside out and spray it separately. Cheers Rob