There is nothing wrong with building a kit to gain some experience, Scott. My first ship was Revell's Arizona. It turned out pretty bad but I learned a lot from the build and I have used what I learned on my Kitty Hawk.

Your pre-shading makes me wish I had an airbrush. Going to have to try on a scrap piece to see if it is possible to do with a rattle can or brushes.

Big update on the Kitty Hawk. Now that the hull has been weathered, the deck has been put on and got its final decals. I would post some images of the weathered hull but, the weathering does not show up well because of my camera's quality.

Below is a dry fit of the airwing. The plan for the display is to have an f18 taking off from catapult 1 and to have a Viking making its landing approach. What are everyones thoughts on what I should use to suspend the Viking in the air? I am pretty sure magnets aren't going to work due to their size.

I ordered the deck figures early last week and I should recieve them in another week or two.

Looooking goood keyserj! 
I would recommend clear acrylic rod. I used standard white plastruct rod for my Frigate and didn't like it in the long run. See my pic on pg1 or the close up build shots around pg21 to see the white rod.

Very nice work John, and not using an airbrush, is impressive.

Nice job John  I agree with Mongoose. Use a piece of clear sprue and stretch it ti make the stand. Drill a .07 or so hle in the deck and plane and CA the clear piect into the holes. This is what I did with my 1/700 Hornet.

TheMongoose

Hmmm, I think i see it. These things must be 3x narrower than the kit plastic pieces. Makes it very confusing. The base is about .8mm wide, then the hose wheels get a piece of plastic rod between them and the assembled reel then fits between the posts. 3 pieces of PE and 1 piece of plastic.

thanks MC

 

Did the plastic rod come with the PE?  I made these when I built the Bismark, and I'm sure it from Toms, where I had to use Evergreen plastic rod because the kit rods were too short. The problem was getting the correct length cut to get the wheels and the base to align.  Making some sort of a jig will help. Place the base in the jig, build the hose wheel and use the base in the jig to test fit and adjust the width of the reel, and when its correct, assemble it to the base in the jig.  

I can't even remember the last time I built a model with a clear sprue. I have an alternative though and it isn't very visible even though it is not transparent.

John: Your Kitty Hawk is coming along amazingly. Really tremendous work. I'm also impressed with your rattle can work.

Mongoose: Looks like you've got a handle on the hose reels. Look forward to seeing them completed.

Scott sounds like great advice. No rod came with them Unfortunately. Very poor directions on these. Think i figured it out with all the help. like your jig setup idea as well so will use it in assembly line i need to set up.

JOE RIX

John: Your Kitty Hawk is coming along amazingly. Really tremendous work. I'm also impressed with your rattle can work. 

Keyserj

 

 

JOE RIX

John: Your Kitty Hawk is coming along amazingly. Really tremendous work. I'm also impressed with your rattle can work. 

 

 

 

The Kitty Hawk is actually hand-painted. There are many deep crevices where rattle cans could not spray into.

 

 

Joe: I did use a rattle can for priming sprues if that counts.

After watching some videos of aircraft taking off and landing on carriers I noticed a few things.

1. Trying to hit one of those foul lines (I think that is what it's called) for catching the plane takes talent. 

2. When the planes are launched the catapult releases steam.

Here is my take on an f18 taking off.

You can't even see the wire I used to prop the planes nose up. 

I am going to be visiting the Grissom air museum this Friday. Really excited to see all the aircraft there and I can't wait to see the b-58 hustler exhibit they have.

EXCELLENT JOB! Love the steam!!!

One thing though. They lowered the antenna when doing air ops.

What do you mean by the antenna was lowered during airops? What is the antenna even used for?

The poles off the port and starbard sides of the bow. They are High frequency antennas for HF communications. They drop them during air ops so a plane won't hit them during take off or landing, except the one that looks like a flood light.

The cables which the landing aircraft engages with it's tailhook is called an arrestor cable. It's held about a foot off of the deck and has shock absorbers to which it attaches with shorter lengths of cable.

The folul line or lines are lengthwise lines behind which deck equipment and personnel must remain during landing ops.

Keyserj that's superb, the steam really creates the image of motion! You can be proud of that display for sure. 

That looks incredibly awesome John. Very well done my friend.

Kerserj,

She looks awesome! The 18 coming off the deck is really well done! Great job!

I will also be adding the Eduard PE detail set to my USS North Carolina.

Is it just me or does the Kitty Hawk look even more intimidating with the antennas down? I am pretty sure the antenna that looks like a flood light is molded upside down but it is not that big of a deal.

Steve and Bill: Thank for educating this land lubber on the different parts of the ship.

Matthew: Can't wait to see you build the NC. Should turn out great like the rest of your builds.

Everyone else: thanks for all of praise. 

BBorBust

I will also be adding the Eduard PE detail set to my USS North Carolina.

 

You got it brother. That's the same set I have. BTW, don't even try to bend the SK-2 radar, it won't do it unless you want kinks in it. It you want a serious SK-2 PE radar look at Infini. They make outstsnding, and almost impossable, PE sets. Take a look back on page 52 to see my building of it.

I'll get back to her as soon as I reach a certian point on the Akagi. mainly everything but the deck, planes, AA guns and crew.

Matt, yes she does. Good job on her! just let me know when you want to call it done, take a good pic, hopefully with nothing in the background, and I post it on the wall. I will usually take a shot of my completed build with a white board, $1 from the Dollar store, behind it. Ships are a little difficult with their size though. I'll take any pic for the wall though.

John: That's friggin' spectacular!!!  

John: Oh yeah. that looks much mure the part. Nice.

BB: Looking forward to your PE efforts on the North Carlina.

Really nice work everyone! I cannot include all of the individual remarks in this e-mail, but suffice it to say we have some skilled modelers doing beautiful work in this thread.

As for me....

Well there has been two different times that I was going to post an update, but I was not happy with the end result. The last was from the build of the OSU2 Kingfisher aircraft. It wasn't the modifications that I added, but instead it was the paint application and here is why...

One of the reference photos I was using shown the float plane with a dark blue topside and a near or white bottom side. For some reason I was focusing on this photo during the build. It also had the star and bars insignia instead of the older navy blue roundel with the white star. Also if you look close this photo is a try-color scheme. 



So I pressed on by painting the top side with navy blue ( a little too dark). I still wanted the blue roundel with white star and red dot, like in 1941 and earlier. Another issue I found with my paint application was the dark blue over light blue over light gray (white) which according to anything I could find is totally wrong. In hindsight I am not sure why I painted it that way (?). I immediately saw that the dark blue roundel disappeared in the darker Navy Blue color of the aircraft (that is not good). I also really liked the red and white stripes on the rudder (tail) so I added them as well. So here was my first attempt at the build (I have since cleaned up the canopy lines too):



Now if I am to stay true and accurate for the July 1941 ship, the aircraft need to be in the lighter blue scheme and use the older insignia. It is funny that none of the photos I was using for reference were correct for the 7-41 OSU2 Arizona Aircraft (go figure?). The correct two tone colors are Non-specular Blue-Gray (ACUS 06) over Non-specular Light Gray (ACUS 05) bottom (almost white). My choice of decal placement and the striped tail were also wrong. In January of 1942 the order went out for national insignia above and below both wings and the red and white rudder stripes all to make aircraft more identifiable. This means my aircraft for the July 41 Arizona should not have the tail stripes, needs to be the lighter color, and have only one roundel insignia on top of the left wing and below the right wing. Below is a photo of an actual 1941 USS Arizona OSU2 aircraft, as it should look on my model. 



Now I am building new aircraft with my modifications to make my model of the USS Arizona accurate. I will be mixing the Blue-Gray (ACUS 06) color. I hope to present some new photos soon. Till then keep up your inspirational work! 

Ben

Well, if it helps, the one you did looks good, a little dark but good. As Bill has mentioned somewhere on the thread, the smaller the scale the darker the paint looks. When you repaint your next plane, lighten the correct color just a tad and see how that looks. I have a feeling that new Kingfisher is going to look killer.

Ben: The detail that went into painting that Kingfisher would drive me crazy. They are really starting to look the part.

I finally got my figures today but, there is a catch. I am going on vacation tomorrow and won't be back at the bench till after the fourth.

The internet is non existent and the cell service is spotty where I am headed. really going to miss seeing everyones updates and hope you all have a wonderful time while I am gone. When I come back, I will most likely have some great stories to share though.

Also, color photos from that era are notoriously hard to take as is. Most are "colorized"; the ones from LIFE being an exception. And even then, there are many reasons why they can't be taken literally.

I got the decks painted and am doing the masking with the included masks using a sharp knife, tweezers, and toothpicks.

They come with a nice map that shows what mask goes where.

However, there are no number, or marks on the actual masks. I needed to really look and then plan out what order I was going to place the masks.  To complicate things, some masks are not diecut according to the map.  

Overall, its been a fun process.  The masks are diecut quite well and stick well.

Ben: Righteous painting of the Kingfisher. I'm sure your correct one is going to look grand.

Scottc: Pre-cut masks for anything rock. I have some mask sets for some of my other ship kits in my stash and I'm looking forward to that ease of painting.