Trumpeter 1/350 U.S.S. San Francisco CA-38 - Finished

Yes man, post a WIP. We can always learn from other peoples work. 

Absolutely I would post.  You have some awesome ship builders that can help with any issues you come across and then you have the novice ship builders (O.K., I have not done one yet ) who need some inspiration to get "on board" and do one!  

Eagle90

P.S. I do have a good selection of ships in my stash..everything from carriers to pirate ships!  LOL!

1943Mike;

 Hey , You know I specialize in them " Floaty Thingys " . Lets see it . The worst thing that can happen is you and I will get into  a discussion about your problems and maybe just help you fix them .We are after all a brotherhood of modelers !     T.B.

OK guys, you asked for it .

This may be a build that eventually goes in the trash. For now at least I plan to learn some more about working with PE, redoing that about which I don't feel satisfied, and challenging myself to attempt some "fixes" that may or may not work out. However, I'm not going to be attempting perfection on this build. For instance, the prop guards are on now to stay, even with the clumps of CA on the hull in their vicinity - I've redone painting the hull several times and it's just going to have to do.

I did, however, repaint those blasted blast bags again! (This was after having posted my thread yesterday ). They're now what I imagine a beige, canvass bag might look like. Maybe not the right color but they're acceptable to me for now.

I'm not sure if I can install the base and pedestals I've ordered to the ship hull if I go ahead with the first page of instructions and attach the decks to the hull. I suppose I could simply drill through the bottom even if the decks were glued in place but I'm totally ignorant on the proceedure for attaching pedestals to the hull of a model ship (never having done it before) so do I need to have one hand hold a nut or attach something else to the inside of the hull?

I've actually been working a little on the GMM PE that I bought with this kit and I'll include a few pictures of how I've assembled some of those pieces with this thread of an actual WIP.

Also, as some of you may have seen, I've already built the four float planes that the cruiser carried and will show a couple pictures of the process again.

This will be a build that will take a few months so be patient.

This was my starting point. The decks are dry fit on top of the hull.

Mike-  you can drill the hull for the mounts and epoxy a block of wood or styrene there.  Then drill and tap it for your machine screws coming from under the base through the pedestals.  Was shown in a thread here awhile back.  Or epoxy a nut to a piece of wood or styrene and glue it over the holes you drilled in the hull, before you attach the decks.

Goldhammer,

Thanks for that. I've now looked at several threads on the subject of mounting plastic ship model hulls to a baseboard using pedestals.

I may just use the baseboard and pedestals I'm getting on a different model and just use the kit provided display stand this time. It's really just going to go with my other 1/350 ships in one of the sections of my built-in bookshelves. I might use it with one of my other 1/350 ship kits (USS New York BB-34, the Admiral Graf Spee, or the Mikasa). Or maybe I'll use it for one of my sailing ship kits (The ERTL boxing of the Spanish Galleon or The Golden Hind, or, perhaps, the Lindberg Sea Witch or, if I live long enough, Heller's 1/100 HMS Victory).

Anyway, again, thanks.

OK, here's one of the float planes before painting:

And here's one of them after having painted it. I used liquid masking but I still over masked onto the fuselage. Very difficult for me to mask in this scale.

Here's shot of what depresses me the most - the glue gobs on and around one of the prop guards. As I said before, I don't believe I can fix it without ruining the prop guard so it stays this way:

Here's a shot of the hole at the bow that I'd broken off and then refashioned:

Here's an overall shot of the port side:

Here's the starboard side:

Here's the forward deck after I'd filed off the molded in anchor chain:

Here's the forward deck after I drilled out the holes and added the anchor chain and smaller chain as the anchor chain stop.

A closer look shows that the deck is not sanded as well as I would have liked but at viewing distance it's OK.

Here's the Artwox wood decks as I received them - unpainted.

Here they are at the beginning of the painting sessions:

Here they are finished and applied to the decks:

Here are the sections of PE that I've managed to assemble so far:

That's it for now.

Hello Mike!

Thanks for posting that WIP. Your PE work looks really good!

I'd like to encourage you to try to redo those prop guards. Once I have made similar guards for my 1:300 paper model of the USS Belleau Woods. I mean they can be built from scratch easily, what you need is some fine wire. Then the trick to attaching them is to drill holes in the hull, matching the wire diameter. This way you can get a nice clean and strong attachment points, even without glue at all.

Here's how my ship turned out:

Good luck with your build and have a nice day

Paweł

Pawel,

Thanks for the encouragement. I guess I will attempt to redo the prop guards after all. Your suggestion is a good one and I've thought about wire before but have been a little afraid of how I'd make it turn out. Drilling holes in the hull sounds like a smart idea.

OK, enough for today.

I've removed the prop guards and sanded down the area where the glue was globbed on. I then went a bit further and sanded/filed down some other areas of the hull where the hull halves join that were bothering me. I have to repaint anyway and that's no big deal - just more time.

I've put the PE prop guards in a little glass jar covered with Simple Green to soak off the paint. I may or may not attempt to use them again if I A) can rebend them to my satisfaction and B) find that I can imbed at least a couple of the points of attachment into the hull. If not I'll create the guards from some round wire and do what Pawel suggested - drill holes in the hull into which I can anchor the guards.

Any fibers you see in the following pictures have already been removed. The hull is as smooth as a baby's butt.

That's coming fine Mike. with fiddly bits like the prop guard and anchor chain I will usually install last. that way I don't worry about breaking them off.

With the beautiful PE you did, I don't see you having an issue with rebuilding / reinstalling the prop guards.

Mike;

   Slow down and take a deep breath . You are on the right track . Now , you want to re-use those prop guards . So do this . Get a pair of smooth jaw needle - nose pliers . Now press the contact points where the glue is and squeeze firmly .The C.A. should chip off .

   Now make sure they are shaped right and put them away for now . Do you have a " Five Below " store near you ? See if you do . Go there and see if they have a blister pack containing nineteen little bottles . Buy it . Go home and put your shaped P.E. in these .That way they won't get damaged .

      Now as to the ArtWox deck . Because I do mixed paint for decks I have Never used them . I have thought about it . I was thinking though . If it has an adhesive on it and you had to remove it . Clean the deck areas . Now clean the backside of the Art-Wox deck . Apply Micro-Scale foil adhesive . Foil Adhesive ? Yup .

      Let it dry well and you'll have new sticky on the deck that will let you re-apply it . Believe me it will stick again ! Then do those gun tubs as you described in brass .

    For forming gun tubs in 1/700 or 1/350 I keep three sizes of round dowels handy . I roll the brass around the one I  need and it is always Smaller than the tub needs to be .Why ? Well you just then open the little curl up to the size you need !

 To glue this in place I DO NOT use C.A. I use " Aleen's Sticky Glue " (Copper color Bottle ) The Aleen's gives you time to get it just right . If not , just wet a " Q " tip with water , wash it off and try again . I do.

 After the Aleen's is dry you paint over it just like any other glue . Oh , make sure you use as little as possible . Take your Aleen's and put a blob on a bottle cap and gently swipe the part in it just barely getting any on the edge or end .That way , No Blobs !

   Remember , if you have any questions I am just a post away .  Tanker - Builder P.S. Besides you got this far and stopped and decided a re- do was in order - See , You are on the right track ! !

Hey Nice brass ;

I like the little plane too . That Hawse ring is the same as a HawsePipe . If you climbed the ladder from the deck or engine room to command , the hard way it was said you " Climbed through the hawse pipe " Yours looks okay.

 I also think you done good on the anchor chain and stops .  T.B.     If you decide to weather , remember the scale you are working in , okay ?

TB,

Thanks for the toughts!!

I do not want to attempt to remove the wood deck - I'm not sure it can be done without ruining it. I do realize that, to many on this forum, leaving the splinter shields in their "wrong" configuration is something that should be addressed. I'm kind of with that group but would rather err on the side of caution in my case.

Were I to strip the wood deck without damaging it, and then follow your plan to apply Micro-Scale foil adhesive to the bottom of the (hopefully) cleaned up backside of the deck, I'd still have the problem of not having the newly and correctly shaped splinter shields align with the now incorrectly shaped area of the wood deck. But this is a moot point - I don't know if the wood deck can be safely removed. I wonder if anyone has had some experience attempting to do that?

As to Aleen's Sticky Glue, I have a bottle sitting on my hobby bench. I usually use Gator's Grip for PE but, were I to attempt to remove the deck and do it successfully, I'd follow your advise and use Aleen's for regluing the deck.

Pending other forum members chiming in with experience on having successfully removed Artwox wood decks from their models, I'm not up to attempting it.

Thank you for all the information.

Here's what I've done with two sizes of brass wire. It looks much sloppier close up but I thought you all should see the rough stuff as well as the "pretty". In one picture you can see the middle braces on the guard not quite reaching the "main" (larger) piece. I've since clamped them together in hope that the CA was still not totally dry (I use the "gel" type) and will stay attached.

The guards turned out OK but not good. I am done messing around with them though.

I'm going to move on to the next set of challenges on this kit which will be attempting to put together resin 5" guns that I bought. I am very, very poor at working with resin and find I have to be extra careful with the small stuff - much more so than with PE.

Hello!

Looks much better now! For the future - those diagonal pieces would be much easier to work with if you used three V-shaped wires instead of six straight ones. Maybe file the ends of those straight pieces a little, and it will be OK. Plus those babies will not come off too easily now! Good luck with your build and have a nice day

Paweł

Nice save Mike.

Pawel,

First, Thanks for your input regarding the wire and drilling holes for it. It works well enough for me.

Second, you're absolutely right about bending the wire to have made 3 pieces instead of six for each guard - too bad I didn't think about that when I was working on them .

OK, so I couldn't stop thinking about how much better it would be with 3 pieces rather than six pieces of wire attached to the main arm of the prop guard that Pawel had suggested for "next time". Already one or two of the single pieces had dislocated themselves (as if by magic ) from their support on the outside. And, even though it means the skinnier wire (the way I did it) will overlap the outside of the main wire, I went ahead with Pawel's suggestion.

I'm pleased. I do have to fill in the misplaced holes I drilled and do a little sanding/filing, but, overall I'm satisfied.

I just put the rear deck on temporarily to see how it looks without all the wires showing on the inside.

Hello!

Cool, now it looks even better! Good luck with your build and have a nice day

Paweł

Hey Mike !

 Good save , guy ! T.B.

Well it's going rather slowly. I've had my problems with the join between the two hull halves - they kept coming apart on one side. I finally used good old Testors Plastic Cement to weld the section of join area that would not stay together. So far, so good. Keeping my fingers crossed.

I also realized that I was not happy with the obvious join area of the hull halves - that is to say it was too visible. I've since sanded and filed a lot in the areas that were annoying me. It's not perfect now but it's better and I'm satisfied.

I've had a rough time trying to do the boot stripe on this model. I suppose I can lay part of the blame for that on the armor plating, the join line, and the imperfect fit I created for the stern section of the mating of the two hull haves. I've ordered some 2mm Tamiya masking tape which won't be here until the end of next week. I'll paint a swath of black along the hull which will extend a bit higher and lower than the width of the actual boot stripe. When that's cured I'll run the 2mm tape around the hull at it's proper position and make sure it's burnished down really well. At that stage I'll mask off the hull from the middle of the 2mm tape either up or down and paint either the Navy Blue or the Hull Red and then, when that's dry, mask the opposite side and paint it.

In the mean time I've been working on several other small (but, for me, time consuming) things on this model. I bought two boxes of the Veteran Model 1/350 5"/25 single gun (open mount) resin guns (Four sets in each box) to replace the eight guns the kit provides. I'm not sure why I wanted to do that other than the pictures I saw on the 'net looked as if they were really detailed. They've been a little bit of a hassle for me to put together but after a few days of working a little bit on them they're done. Not painted yet but as good as I can make them.

I also put together the GMM PE for the depth charge racks and finished building the stacks with the GMM PE. Again, not painted yet.

That's about it for now.

The little fiddley bits that generate large swear words look great!  Two steps back and three forward, she will get there, doing well.

Another brief update. After what seems like a loooong time trying to get the hull halves sanded/filed to my satisfaction and patiently (for me) waiting on some 2mm masking tape to finish painting the boot stripe and the rest of the hull, I've managed to get steps #1 and #2 completed .

I also painted the 5" guns.

Not a major update but it will have to do for now.

As an aside, I'm always nervous about displaying close ups - they show all my mistakes and sloppiness to a degree about which I'm grateful (for the information in order to correct/redo) but embarrassed by the less than stellar work. Oh well, that's the way this works when I do a WIP.

Hello Mike!

That's just why posting a WIP is a good thing on many levels - helps you build a better model! Good luck with your build and have a nice day

Paweł

Slow progress. Some hours spent putting together the 1.1 inch machine guns and adding the GMM PE. They look OK from a distance but not so great close up. I'm just not that talented when it comes to assembling these little parts. Nonetheless, it's progress.

I also attached the 5" guns to the deck and added the props, shafts, and rudder.

Please don't laugh too hard about my method for protecting the forward flag staff .

I really should have left it off until near the end of the build.

OK, I'm going very, very slowly! The 20mm AA guns I'm putting together with the GMM PE are taking me much longer than I had thought they might. C'est la vie. That's the nature of the modeling game. I have twelve to put together (4 PE parts, a small bit of surgery on the original plastic parts, and some bending of two of the PE parts per gun) and these minuscule rascals are trying my patience. I can do about two per day or I'll go nuts. However, I should have another update before the weekend is through - my car's in the body shop until Monday, we have snow and freezing rain coming in tonight and tomorrow morning, so I wouldn't have any use for my handsome steed anyway for a few days. (2013 Subaru Outback ).

that is some very nice work mike , we have a balmy 30 degree's here , in your lingo that's about 87 F .