Lindberg USS Manchester

You picked a doozie to start with.

This is a re-release of a kit which easily dates to the sixties, if not before.   It is not the current state of the art.    This kit is in 1:600 scale.   There are no dedicated aftermarket support for the kit, and very little otherwise in that scale.  The current "standard" scales are 1:350 and 1:700.  

My recommendation to novice ship builders is to work on a learner kit such as the Tamiya Fletcher destroyer, Trumpeter England destroyer escort, or Revell Emden/Dresden cruisers.  For an advanced NOOB who has built a Dragon tank, I would recommend the Dragon Buchanan be added to the selection.  

These are all 1:350 scale kits with aftermarket support available.  Starting in a larger scale will be easier to learn the techniques and transfer to another scale.   In 1:600 scale, railings are about 1/6 inch tall.   In 1:350 they will be about 1/4 inch.   Size does matter - to a beginner - trust me.  

Learning to apply photoetch details is not difficult.  It just takes practice and patience, and the knowledge that you will likely mess up.  That is the reason for the learner kit.

Like the Manchester, the Lindberg Gato also 40+ years old and is not up to the current state of the art.   I don't believe that there is anything which can be used to add detail the kit (weird box scale).    

Thanks for the followup so quickly Ed.  I still sort of like these kits and don't want to just abandon them either.  But your suggestions for a different starter kit make sense too.  I'm not sure I want to go out to purchase one of those for practice, they sound very nice in their own rights.  I do have a Tamiya USS Indianapolis though, and a Revell USS Arizona.  Would they be better?   The Arizona I think is 1/350 and the Indy is a waterline kit, I think of 1/700 scale.  Appreciate your interest in helping the new old guy.

Dave B.

Another arguement for a destroyer-sized project is that it is smaller and being smaller it is easier to see the end of the project.   Large battleship sized projects seem to last forever -- or the myriad of small parts represent an 'Ohmigosh what am I in for moment".

There is nothing wrong with the Tamiya Indianapolis. It is 1:700 scale.   My recommendation for a 1:350 sized project will help train your 15 dancing thumbs to do what you want them to.  In 1:700 scale the parts are half as small.  As in sport muscle memory comes in handy when building.  

The Revell Arizona is 1:426 scale.  Unlike the Manchester, there are aftermarket details for the kit.  The kit is like the Lindberg kits -- 40+ years old.  It is a good kit, but you must understand that on kits of this vintage -- you will likely need to do some destruction before construction can begin.  The battleship may provide a couple of Ohmigosh moments when you open the box -- and when you look at the photoetch fret.

Revell also made a 1:700 scale Arizona.   It is remarkably bad.  It is the single kit that may be most responsible for many modelers swearing off ship models forever.

I agree completely with EdGrune.  The Lindberg cruiser offerings were remarkably bad even for their time.  There are many kits available today that would serve as far better canvasses to learn the art of ship modelling.  1/350 scale is probably the best, especially the destroyers that are now available (Tamiya USS Fletcher, Hasegawa IJN Yukikaze).  The 1/144 scale submarines are also good choices.  Revell of Europe offers several excellent choices there (Type VIIC, Type VIID, and newer German boats).  Trumpeter also has 1/144 scale submarines of lesser quality but they are big enough to keep from going mad when adding PE details.  However, nautilus Models had excellent resin detail sets for those kits. Good luck with your efforts!

Bill Morrison

Thanks for your response and interest Bill.  I take both yours and Ed's suggestions to heart. Like with my Lindberg 1/48 scale Cutlass jet however, these models for better or worse are already in my possession and I just don't want to let them go to waste.  This might be a little silly, but I kind of just have a soft spot for them preventing me from auctioning them off or providing them to some youth group which I've occaisionally done in conjunction with a few seminars I've put on.  As you say, the latter might not be fair to the kids anyway as to these kits.  Lindberg is, under J. Lloyd in the process of rereleasing every single model they ever issued or aquired the molds for and most are being made in Iowa, so I appreciate their effort to provide this history for us and keep it in the good ol USA I'm a lifelong very accomplished automotive modeller, far from the best but good enough to win the occasional award in spite of myself and get a photo in sister publication Scale Auto.  I don't mean this in a bragging way, just that my patience for modelling in these new areas will probably be better than an altogether novice and I understand how to work through the inevitable frustrations, like the wiring, throttle linkages and return springs, belts, detailing instruments, Bare metal foil etc. on the cars.  Theyre 1/25 scale of course, but the details are tiny.

Bottom line is, I've got 'em and would like to bring them to life a little bit and get them into an intersting and presentable condition.  For these lindberg kits, I realize no show winners are  in the cards but I just want an improved product in the end.  So anything you have in the line of tips for scratchbuilding even, ie at least some railings, blast bags, rigging, antennas, what the planes looked like that were there to catapult off etc. would be good.  I'm a very good detail painter on even the tiniest things.

Thanks again to all.

Dave B.

I think a few faint words in defense of the old Lindberg light cruiser kit are in order.  All the previous posts in this thread are certainly correct:  it doesn't represent the current state of the art, and even in its day (the late fifties or early sixties, I think) it didn't stand out as one of the industry's most distinguished products.  It was, however, for a very long time the only plastic light cruiser kit on the market.  (Revell and Aurora both offered Baltimore-class heavy cruisers quite early in the jurassic era of the plastic kit, and Renwall eventually did a Cleveland-class light cruiser updated with missile launchers replacing the after gun turrets.  But if a plastic modeler wanted a WWII-vintage light cruiser, of any nationality, the Lindberg kit was the only option on any scale.  Maybe somebody can correct me on this point, but I think that situation continued until the advent of the 1/700 "Waterline Series" in the mid-seventies.)

I seem to remember an article in Ships in Scale a few years back about how a modeler sliced off the hull of the old Lindberg kit at the waterline, mounted it on a nice "sea" base, and dressed it up with photo-etched aftermarket parts.  As I remember, the result was quite impressive.  Unfortunately I have no recollection of the date of the issue or the name of the modeler.

Aftermarket parts on scales other than 1/700 and 1/350 are indeed rather hard to find, but some are out there.  Gold Medal Models, for instance, offers an excellent set of generic warship components on 1/600 scale:    http://www.goldmm.com/ships/gms600-1.htm .

If I were browsing around a hobby shop looking for a warship kit to build (geez, is it possible to do that nowadays?  Certainly not in my neck of the woods), this one probably wouldn't be it.  But I do think it's capable of being turned into a nice model.

I've been lurking with my conscience thumping away at me on this thread.

The father  of a friend served on USS Birmingham (CL-62) in 1944-45.  I resolved to make a model of the ship for him.  I wasn't about to take a first stab at a huge price 1/350 resin kit, and I hold the Renwal/Revell 1/500 CLG in such low repute that I decided not to try to backdate the CLG to a CL.  That left me with the Lindberg 1/600 kit.

 First I decided I would just "clean it up" and add some photo etch.  Then the definition of "clean it up" drifted all over the place.  As Prof Tilley mentioned, I sliced off the lower hull, to present it in a seascape.  The plating on the hull had to be cleaned up. The superstructure parts all seemed to need reshaping, and a little bit of sheet plastic here and a little bit of sheet plastic there.

The 6" turrets are shaped all wrong.  They should be taller (I put .030" sheet underneath) and the front face should stick out further and slant much more (putty plus plastic). The 5" mounts should be .020" taller, sharper around the edges, and the blast bags can be made from putty.  The directors benefit from sharpening, bits of Evergreen stripon the back, and photo etch radar on top.

The 40mm gun mounts were in the wrong place for Birmingham in 1945 (per photos at navsource), so that needed a solution.  Evergreen tubing made the midship towers nicely.  And the tubs and guns came from Skywave/DML/ Dragon 1/700 parts.  (I always felt those looked pretty big for 1/700 anyway)  The 20mms and other photo etch was from Gold Medal Model 1/600 parts, as Prof Tilley mentioned.  I intended to use the thin brass runner/frame from the photo-etch set as the shielding around the 20mm mounts on the deck.

Aircraft?  Not a clue.  I don't know of anything presentable around 1/600 scale as a Seahawk, so I was going to just remove the float and carve away the plane until it looked reasonable, then reattach the float.  And make wingtip floats.

 And in the meantime, Buck Potter, former Machinist's Mate Third Class, of the after engine room of the Birmingham, passed away at age 89.

I echo the nay-sayers.  If you don't have a really good reason to work on this particular kit, just don't bother with it.  There are too many good kits, and too many plain kits that don't need to be taken apart before starting, to make this anything except a waste of time.

And here I sit with a Lindberg cruiser, 75% complete.  What do I do, finish it and give it to his daughter?

 Rick

Well, in your case sure I'd finish it and give it to her.

 You'd feel great, she'd feel great. A noble endeavor.  As for me then I guess I'd give it to a kid who doesn't care about accuracy but is just trying to learn some real basic modeling skills and have fun.

So, in my inventory is a 1/700 Tamiya Waterline Indianapolis, Revell Arizona in 1/426 scale, and a Lindberg USS Gato 1/?  Which of those should be taken on first in your opinion?

Thanks for the input.

Dave B.

Of your choices there, I recommend building the Tamiya Indianapolis first.  It builds straight from the box, and photo-etch rails and radar are simple enhancements.  People have built lovely Arizonas from the 1956 Revell kit, but as Ed said above, you must first do a lot of destruction before beginning construction,  With the special photo etch set, it can be a really nice kit, and you may like the larger size better, but it is a much bigger project.  The Indianapolis is a really nice, modern kit. 

The Lindberg Gato is a nice antique-looking curio.  You're not going to get to a really good model from it, but it is a simple, fun build.

Good luck,
Rick

thanks Rick, I'll keep you posted on the progress and so forth.  A little encouragement goes a long way.

Dave Bayer

UnderdogF7U - As a ship modeler who had a Come to Jesus moment when I opened the box on my first 1/700 kit, I found that it's a much more manageable and enjoyable experience if you realize and accept one thing: You will mess up.

But each kit gets a little easier, the mistakes become fewer (or at least less telling) and the enjoyment level increases. For me it's all about the journey, and getting there is most of the fun!

P.S. - Just because it's on the PE fret doesn't mean you have to use all those fiddly little parts ... I almost always have some bits left over from each build, which is great because it adds to my growing spare parts stash.

Thank you.  Common sense tells me thats great advice.  My LHS did not have a Portland class or Indianapolis Cruiser set, but did have a 1/700 USS Arizona set which was cheap so I took it as it appeared a lot could be adaptable to the Indy at some point in her carreer.  I've done photo etch quite a bit on by cars, this I could see right off the bat is a whole different story so I didn't figure it was necessary to have a more expensive or exact set for my first time around but I could moderately increase the pop of the model.  So Ill be embarking soon remembering, quitters never win and winners never quit.

Dave B.