GazzaS

I reckon a lot of lives were saved by the fact that the main fleets didn't engage until late in the day. It was a calm day with good visibility early on. What was your grandfather's job/position? I've read a book by one of the German guys at the battle. He was below decks... so there wasn't a lot for him to tell.

Welcome back, my friends! I've been working on the two main structures of this vessel all week... when I wasn't doing my day job, anyway... and there are only six pieces of plastic to go. So I'm feeling really close to the end. ...Except for the big photo-etch hump barring my way. One of the things I consider odd is the lack of photos and film footage from the Jutland Battle. Despite all of those great advancements made since the days of Matthew Brady, we only have a few stills from the battle. One shot that purports being from the battle is this one: This is definitely taken from the crow's nest of a König Class battleship during a major action. It was captioned as being from Großer Kurfürst during the Jutland battle. And for me, that's great... because it was my intent all along to portray this ship at Jutland. This photo has a ton of information for those willing to look. Even though it is a unremarkable photo in many ways, it tells us many things about how dreadnought battleships went to war. At Jutland, the Kaiserliche Marine ships had their after funnels painted red for identification purposes. Another problem for admirals of the day was the way their ships were constructed. Many had wing turrets and amidships turrets that were usually surrounded by cranes and the ship's boats. The muzzle blast from the wing and amidships turrets would quickly turn the boats into matchwood. So, when a big fleet action was expected, they all unloaded their boats. And this photo gives us a rare glimpse onto the top of one of the boat carriages. And this was one change I had to make. I left the boats off, and constructed enough structure to hold wooden strips that cradled the boats on their carriages. Fortunately, I hadn't thrown away the Artwox deck leftovers away. Another thing that was removed were many of the railings. The ones in danger were removed, and the ones not in danger were left in place like those at the base of the cranes and the searchlight batteries. Großer Kurfürst's large cranes were lowered and partially disassembled to protect them from muzzle blast. The booms would have laid on the deck, I imagine. What follows are my photos as of this afternoon. Happy modelling!

Only in Australia. Not my house...

I built the Monogram Corsair in 1979. I can still remember the terrible mess I made of the wing joins at the fold. You make it look easy, John. But I still don't think it would provide me stress relief...lol

haha... you got it right. The main difference is that the Aussie one doesn't have candied fruit. And is a little bit more moist. Unlike the American door stop.

See... you can do it. I'm trying to clear some out. Working on a ship model really eats up the time thought with slight progress.

John, Very nice looking builds. You do a nice mottle. That's something I don't get to say very often. I always do the open crosses with my Silhouette Portrait. It's probably one of the best investments I've made. I wish ZM would have handled the upper sides of the cockpit tub in a better way. It's really a horrible place to try to fill and sand.

Same in Australia. But I still prefer to have American pies on the holidays. have to say, Aussie Christmas fruitcake is slightly better than American Christmas Fruitcake.

Wow... looks great... but so tiny.

Looking good, Peter.

Never heard of a meat pie with Vegemite in it. And I live in Australia. I had to eat a half a vegemite sandwich at my citizenship ceremony to please my family. Nothing like being on the edge of vomiting for 10 minutes straight. Aussie meat pies are pretty nice.

Are you building, yet?

Very nice, Guy. Figures look good.

Looks very nice, Ern. Decals look like paint.

Edgar Brooks describes the seat as plastic. Not Bakelite. Just plastic.

Great start, Peter. That's gonna be a big kit when done, I reckon. Those Quinta sets are nice.

Well... I'm not very happy. I was waiting on a bloke from TOS to make some decals that would be Aussie specific BoB pilots. But after a month of waiting, it seems they won't be happening any time soon. So, it seems like I'm gonna be doing an in-box scheme just to get it done. I hate it when other people's time tables don't meet mine.

The only problem, Rog... is that the A5 only exists in peoples stashes... or for blood money on Ebay. Only the A8 seems easily attainable. With nobody but PCM offering the early versions. And of course we're all waiting on ZM who seems to be saying they're only gonna make as many as are pre-ordered. So it's easy for Border to sell.

Very nice paint and weathering, mate. Wouldn't guess it was a smaller scale at all.

Thank you, Carl. Sometimes I'm glad I had the break, and sometimes I don't. On the positive side, so much is new. But on the minus side, I wonder just how much I have missed as AM providers retire or quit producing... like Northstar mentioned to DocRob above.

Thank you, Phil! I still don't know that my current ship would be any better.

Thank you, Rob. For the Grosser Kurfurst I needed more figures. I couldn't find any from Northstar. even a few years ago... so I went to Shapeways. I still have to separate the figures from their computer printed casings. So I'm not certain they are as nice as the Northstar figures. But at 1/350... it won't matter too much. And unlike a destroyer, most of the battleship guys are at work enclosed in turrets, barbettes, and other armored structures.

going out in style....

I did some digging around and discovered that I returned to the hobby back in 2014... June 2014. And the kit I chose was Dragon's Z-39 in 1/350 scale. I hadn't learned much about the hobby since I left it in 1984. Z-39 wasn't a very famous, or lucky ship. It spent more time in dockyard hands than it did out of it. It didn't take part in any famous sea battles... it just ended up in US hands at the war's end. So the kit came with a US-flagged option. I bought the kit when I saw it online. I can't even remember who I bought it from. But since it was a Type 36A (mob.) Destroyer, I knew I had to have it even before I knew the history of the ship. Once I knew the history of the ship, I decided to kitbash her into Z-32, another Type 36A (mob.) which was destroyed at the battle of Ushant, 1944. The main differences between the kit Z-39 and Z-32 the ship were the AA outfits. All of the German destroyers were meant to have the "Barbara" outfit where the number of AA weapons was heavily augmented, with one of the after deck main guns removed. But Z-32 never got the refit. This is one of the pics I took at the end of the build. I downloaded a picture of cloudy skies to set the mood. There were a bazillion firsts for this build... and I knew so little when I started it. First water base. First photos. and many others. Some I'll mention as we go along. There are 86 men at their action stations on the deck. And the flag is made from cigarette paper which was taped to copy paper, then ran through a printer, cut out and then crumpled into a tiny ball before being glued to stretched sprue... another new thing... to me, anyway. It's looks much more realistic than a decal, with some light passing though it, and a wind-whipped appearance. Finding crew members wasn't easy, especially as I wanted guys to look like they were actually in a battle. Luckily I found three sets by Northstar models. Two sets were German, and one set was an American set of a boxing match. But they are so tiny..; once you paint them, they can belong to any navy. I used bits of clipped brass rod to depict empty shell casings. Not Nothing looks good in macro. Especially when your crew is falling over the railing, and dust filaments are taking over. Three men operated the gun directors. the middle guy... who looks like he is busy at his job, is actually from the American set who is cheering the boxers on. The main battery gun on the right was my first ever resin casting. The curved rails were for ammunition and weren't part of the kit. I scratchbuilt one, and cast the rest. I tried to cast shells, too... but it didn't work. I didn't know anything about using a pressure pot. The enemy are out of range of the vierling gunners... So they aren't aimed at anything. This area behind the main gun had to be reconfigured. And i kept knocking it over and re-gluing it... so it looks really rough up close. One of the attractive features of this class of ship is the forward turret. Here on the bridge there are many visual instruments as well as the signal flag station. You can see that my stretched sprue signal lines are looking a bit shabby. During this build, I wanted to settle the riddle of the railings. When you buy generic railings, they only come with one distance between stanchions. So, your stanchions end up in weird places, instead of at the corners where they belong. And I tried to find a decent way, with my limited knowledge, to get stanchions in the corners where they belonged. In the end, I couldn't find a material that would do the job cleanly with an easy measure of control. For there to be a measure of control, the part had to be long enough to hold long enough for the glue to set. But another piece of railing is too short to control. In the end, I gave up and just did what most other people do. Nothing is pretty in macro. My first solder was the star at the top of this mast. It was a huge soft weld which I filed and sanded down. I'm amazed it's still holding together. I don't remember the top spar tilting at that angle. Two men in the Crow's nest... But the rot has set in... The base was made of acrylic medium, acrylic paints, and cotton balls . But now it looks like a sea of sewage... My once clean white foam and wave action is turning yellow and brown. She won't be long for the bin, I reckon. But she's kinda been one of the favorite things in my display cabinet.

One of those parts of the ship build I have been dreading is the funnel maintenance rings... or whatever the heck they are called. On many ships. these bands looped around funnels and sailors used them to access all kinds of places normal men would fear to tread... without a safety rope or a net.. But for me, they represented a task I didn't think I could make look good. And well... they don't. They are by Tom's Modelworks, and went on easily enough... the first few. But then the rest seemed to be some tiny increment too short. If I had to do it all over again, I would have drilled the holes necessary and then thinned the funnel a bit. Hopefully paint and distance will help to make things less awful. Metal barrels? Always!!