GazzaS

Thank you, Peter. Really, there’s nothing much different between the Genres. It’s more a matter of research and knowledge. That being said, painting those 1/72 guys won’t be overly easy, unless I simplify a lot.

Thank you, Rob. I have seen the Mikasa built. Seems to be a good kit.

Welcome back... yes, two Reader's Digest episodes in one week... Today I separated all but the railings from the sprues, cleaned them up some... seems I always miss something... and spray painted them. Including the crew. The crew: Airfix modeled them in late war uniform with a pre-war build. So, I've cut off their side caps and replaced them with proper sailor caps with tails... sorry, no pics of them. They just got a coat of paint just like the rest of the pieces I cut off today. I also constructed the mast, and using Bob's Buckle's eyelets, prepared them to rig. I also added three rigging lines which only attach to the mast. I used stretchy line. Then I got to painting the wood and linoleum. I dry brushed the metal strips in the linoleum but they don't show very well. I didn't want them to stick out too much and my subtle dry brushing only makes them catch-able at the perfect angle. I'll let the photos say the rest...

Thank you, Chris. You've got plenty of skill, I've enjoyed your builds for quite a while now. I'm still pretty weak when it comes to photo-etch. I generally try to avoid it.

Looks fantastic, Kevin.

Wow, Chris, Pilot, crew, and bird all coming along fantastically.

Thanks, Kevin. That covers the railings and small deck details.

As my wife would say, they're "bigger than Ben Hur".

Thank you. Again, blue is not necessarily the only color you could use. It would depend on the rest of the color on the subject. Heller makes a few kits in the oddball 1/400 scale that I have considered. But I can imagine needing to replace so much of the upperworks that it makes the task seem daunting. Then there is procuring railings for the scale... I don;t know if anyone makes them. I might as well build a boat from scratch, tbh.

Thank you, Peter. I only used blue in this case because I didn't think it would wreck the gray. You might be able to use other colors in other circumstances.

I wanted this kit so badly when I was young. Looking back at the build so far, I wish I had replaced any vertical tube-shaped structure with metal. Because cleanup has been a bit of work, and often a failure to keep them round... if they were round to begin with. I'm sure there is a long OOP dress up kit for it out there in somebody's attic. There are a lot of KM models I would like to visit. Many have never been modelled and a few, have been done by... let's call them "companies known for a low standard of accuracy". But I am happy to be visiting this kit now. I saw some build photos of one in this class in 1/35 scale with a more late-war fitting. That would have been fun to do.

Fantastic job, Peter! The end result looks wonderful. Perfect paintwork!

Tres smooth surface!

Looks awesome! Love to see so many weapons on one little boat.

Welcome everyone,to another Reader's Digest Senior Edition of my update. Things haven't changed much since last update. I glued the torpedo tubes in place, which turned out to be a nightmare. The main deck has a gentle turtle-back which was not the same curvature as the lower edge of the torpedo bulkhead. In making it so that it fit better, it also lowered the height of the torpedo tubes themselves which necessitated some heavy reshaping of the mounting brackets. I'm not happy with the final result. But if you don't look too closely, you won't notice. There are also other parts affected by the height change, but since they aren't even painted, we'll let that pass. I did a dark gray pin wash at the end of last weekend. Friday night I used white acrylic paint to lighten all of the bolt and rivet heads. Some stand out a little too much... but I can live with it. And last night, spent a lot of time lightening the gray of the upper works with white oils, thinned a little, and tinted with the tiniest amount of blue. Why a hint of blue, you ask... Well, I have found in the past that plain white seems to look wrong once dried. So I always add something. But never use brown over gray... it looks bad. Mainly I used a dry brush to blend it into the gray, hopefully not obliterating any of the pinwash. The same treatment was given to the hull. There are still plenty of parts to do. I won't be weathering this one very heavily. It's a prewar boat, and since they lived tied to tender vessel... and the hulls were wooden... there's no need to rust it up. I still have to make a 3d brass part for the boat. All Kriegsmarine ships prewar carried one or more semi-3D brass Reich Eagles. Destroyers carried it over the bridge. Capital ships carried it on the stern. Early S-boats carried one on either side of the bridge on the torpedo bulkhead. I'm going to try repousse to make it work. Otherwise I may have to make a plastic alternative. And I'd much rather have brass. Anyway... enough typing, here are some current photos.

You are correct.

Wow, Guy! I love it! You're really knocking it out!

Welcome to the next stage, Harv.

Rob, Your brasswork looks excellent. The ship is coming together so nicely. I can almost feel a desire to build a ship model.

Zeus and Tori were both euthanized when their joint problems began to affect their lives too much. Zeus had hip displasia, and Tori had what we suspect was bone cancer in the knee which had been reconstructed when she was younger. Their pup, Gypsy is still here, though very old and starting to suffer another joint problem.

Chris, The cockpit crew looks great. Glad to see you are getting through it.

1/350, Peter.

Hi Rob... At your request here is my current progress on GK. I generally try to avoid putting pics of my model on other ppl's threads. Last thing I did was place all of the coal chutes and boat rails on the wooden deck which I dulled down with a grey-brown wash. I still can't remember why I painted the tops of the coal chutes brown. I have seen wood-covered coal chutes on earlier Kaiserliche Marine ships... and I have seen modellers represent them in black. In a subsequent photo, you'll see my poor fitting of the too-thick secondary armament barrels. There are other impedances to my progress. One is the fact that I have added torpedo nets for a Jutland fit. But the kit has the masts of a later fit. Another is the ships boats. I have seen written that cranes and boats were left behind when going out for action. Or that the cranes were lowered for action. These steps supposedly cleared room for the central turret to operate. You can see I have a water base partially made... the ship is only sitting on it, and not attached. I have crew figures for her, and was even going to add a couple shell splashes. I've actually only completed one ship in my adult life. Pics available upon. request.

Thank you, Peter. The truth is that everybody used linoleum. Lighter than wood, more durable than paint on steel... remember, mostly it was on the upper works... so it didn't get wet except in rain. When I say Kaiser's linoleum... I was just trying to connect the WWI past to this pre-WWII boat.

Thank you, Rob. I have toyed with the idea of laying rails on the deck. But unfortunately, one of the raised, linoleum patches is in the way... and I don't want to have to remove it. So it may just be another case of accepting the model for what it is. I hate it when you discover a possible improvement, only to have it negated by your state of progress.