HMS Illustrious

Me too. I remember buying it shortly after it was released in the USA. It probably was the best of the original Revell 1/720 series - which, as I recall, slightly predated the 1/700 Japanese 1/700 "Waterline Series."

It's worth noting that that kit and the mediocre Aoshima  Illustrious/Victorious are the ONLY British WWII carriers ever in 1/700 (or 1/720) scale in plastic - and both are about thirty years old. There's a big gap waiting to be filled.

Mike,

That kit came with a Tribal class destroyer. I remember it fondly!

Bill

I believe you can get ahold of a 1/720 scale Ark Royal that comes with a destroyer. I believe it was Revell of Germany I definitely want to build that one again especially with the plethora of 1/700 RN aircraft put out by Trumpeter.

I got the deck down inside the hull halves. I am using much more styrene solvent than I usually do as opposed to CA.

Hellers plastic is soft, almost gooey. It's very hard to sand, it balls up. OTOH the Testors clear glue melts it so fast that joints cure in a night.

Then I filled the seam, which is on the flight deck all around the perimeter.

I masked off the hull red and sprayed a 1/2" or so band of black all around.

Put down a 1mm piece of tape on the black all around on the top edge of the red mask. I usually do it differently- black first then below, then above.

But this model is a different kind of ship.

The hull sides are like a building.

All kinds of openings and all kinds of projections. To the point where I seriously considered brush painting the whole thing.

I have really been working on that skill- Stik I did not use an airbrush on my Neptune in your GB.

But it's a big model so I will rely on the Badger.

Anyways, next stage is camouflage on the sides.

I plugged up all of the galleries with tissue.

During all of this all three Model Master RN colors came in.

One thing missing is the resin replacement island- out of stock at WEM.

John?

Last question- paint the deck first and mask it, or paint the sides?

Again it's a very unusual hull for us USN carrier builders.

No overhang, just a sharp edge.

Question- a lot of parts glued all along the edge of the flight deck that are these 1/4 round scoop shapes that are open upwards, beyond the edge of the flight deck.

Vents?

The PE has grilled that go over the horizontal opening.

Oh I hate that... my ASUS tablet does that all the time with this site...

Just lost a whole post.

ARRRRGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Have you made any further progress?

Bill

I'm very pleased that you all are interested!

The design of the flight deck fit to the hull is a first for me.

I suppose that the same people who designed all of those excellent Heller sailing ships did this one as well. The deck fits down in to the sides of the hull. in a certain way this makes sense as the ship was a flush edged deck, but it really compounds minor alignment and mold flaw problems, as those of us who model mast kits know all too well.

It will also cause a fair amount of filler and sanding before painting.

But I started at one end and have spent a series of evenings gluing down a couple of inches at a time.

Tonight I glued the stern together, leaving about 3 inches to go amid ship.

It's a good example of why having the model on a solid base really helps. I have also run a Sharpie around the seam forward so that the joint in the horizontal surface is apparent.

GM,

An interesting subject and build, thanks for posting your build and I will be following this.

Steve

Great!

GMorrison, try this link if you haven't already to download the pdf drawings of the bogue class. www.hnsa.org/.../cve53-d79.pdf

Well done and carry on. We all should be used to long eons of wait time for finished projects. I myself am starting to commence to maybe think about my Liberty aircraft transport project.

Fred

I'll refrain from more stupid iPhone photos until I get outside Saturday.

Tonight I glued down the front 1/3 of the flight deck. Its designed to set down inside of the hull sides.

Like most every other part of the kit, there are no ledges, locating lugs etc. so it takes a lot of care or else there's going to be Patrick to pay for a big seam and sand job later in plain sight.

I've also ordered Model Master 507 A, B and C online.

The general design of the hull brought back a memory of a kit dad brought back from England; the Airfix 1/600 Victorious.

At the time probably 1966 or so I was banging out Revell Essex class carriers and thought that it was a hard to build and badly detailed kit. But I do remember those Sea Vixens, curious boom tailed beasts.

The 1/600 Ark Royal is also around; both on Amazon for dinner money. Fulmars, Swordfish.

Fred, after I get this beast in final approach, I really am going to tackle that CVE/ Bogue project using the Hawaiian Pilot hull you gave me. This kit yields up six decent little Martlets in 1/400 that would set on her Ruler class deck.

The stumbling block- I ordered Bogue class drawings from Floating Drydock. Irritation- although they are photocopies, they are "blueline" drawings. That makes them faint and almost impossible to reproduce as enlargements for station sections, etc.

But I'll be willing to try again.

Cheers and Rum for all.

The setting will be the set up for the first wave attack on Taranto. I am going to put 11 Swordfish on the deck, plus one on the elevator (folded wings). One on the deck just ahead of the elevator will still have folded wings.

I cut out the rear elevator.

I scratched up a well and will put the platform down in there when I paint the deck.

Thanks, guys!

My WEM set came in last Friday. A couple of sheets of PE plus 10 little resin and brass Swordfish. Not a bad thing at about $ 2.00 each as they will be the focal point of the model.

It's been interesting to read about the RN carriers and the operational differences and design of the three major carrier navies in the war. Like the IJN the RN kept a clear deck.

One other interesting bit- the several RN carriers that had two levels of hangar decks had two story elevators. That meant three moves to get a plane from the bottom to the top.

I came across such a design many years ago working on a remodel of what was then called the Sears tower and no I did not design those glass balconies.

The trick was to get folks sorted on the several lowest floors off the street into either even or odd levels of the cars.

As far as educational anecdotes, never lose sight that we parents really need teachers like you. My one and only graduates this June and off into the world.

One story, she was in HS 20th C history class and the question came up

"Describe the importance of Sigmund Freud".

Hands goes up in front of her,

"Those are the guys in Vegas with the tigers".

Perhaps in the future, we will be able to open their heads and pour in knowledge. Until then . . .

Anyway, as for the HMS Illustrious . . .

Bill

More likely he/she spent most of that night in one of the many "supper clubs" near the campus, and/or entwined with a member of the opposite gender. Just about everything in the typical college freshman's existence is more important than a history exam.

But my gripes about the wretched backgrounds and more wretched attitudes of freshmen pale beside what my wife has to endure as a high school world history teacher. As I tell the students in my museum studies course every year, the typical high school kid is interested in precisely six subjects. In ascending order: automobiles, rock music, beer, marijuana, sex, and sex.

Having worked myself into woeful depression (my normal state), I suggest  we return to H.M.S. Illustrious. GMorrison's model is shaping up most impressively.

Must have been up all night cramming for that test ;-)

I wish I could be confident that my students were RETAINING what they've been TAUGHT. But every college teacher has a collection of horror stories. One of my favorites (which I saw with my own eyes): the student who, on a final exam in U.S. history to 1877, wrote "Treaty of Paris, 1763: the treaty that ended the War of 1812."

John,

I know that none of my history students believe there were eleven world wars! But, I have given many of them model kits.

Bill

Bill, by describing them as "quite undetailed" you're being generous. All the ones I can remember were even by the standards of the late fifties, downright crude. But you and I aren't the only ones who wax nostalgic about them. I understand that they were issued in sets: the Battle of the River Plata, the Pursuit of the Bismarck, etc. Plastic scale modeling has come a long, long way since those days, but they sure were fun. And I doubt that any kid who built an Eaglewall set thought there had been eleven world wars.

John,

They are actually on eBay occasionally. I have a search set up on that site. I recently bought the Eaglewall HMS Ajax and Achilles for $35.00.  Eaglewall actually had a more extensive line than the Pyro versions, although I don't know if they ever had the Ark Royal. I'll send you one of the two if you like; they are actually the same plastic.

That said, we old fogey's (at least me) look at these kits fondly. But, many of them were quite undetailed. But, they were affordable and fun!

Bill

Mea culpa, Bill.  That Airfix 1/1200 "Sink the Bismarck set actually does look rather nice.  I never got my hands on any of the old Eaglewall kits in their original incarnations, but I did (many years ago) build some of them in Pyro boxes.  I don't remember an Ark Royal, but I think I bought the KGV class, the Warspite, the Town-class cruisers, the Bismarck, the Prinz Eugen, and maybe a couple of others.

The Eaglewall kits seem to be scarce as hen's teeth nowadays.  Oldmodelkits.com doesn't even list the company - and the only Pyro 1/1200 kits it ever seems to have are the later ones (North Carolina, Essex. Yamato, and Shokaku classes.  I'd jump at the chance to get a genuine Eaglewall - though I suspect the price would be out of my reach.

John,

You are forgetting the Airfix 1/1200 HMS Ark Royal (newly revived), and the old 1/1200 Pyro/Eaglewall HMS Victorious.

Bill

I wondered whatever happened to that Potemkin! You should revive it!

Bill

Thanks Bill.

I copped to a new build board ($ 1.95) as my trusted old Bondoshipyard plank still holds a 3/4 completed Potemkin. Funny that; Heller on 1:400 the same scale as this creature.

Those who need direction on mounting- here's a good example.

I went down to the lumberyard and paid monies as above for a 24"  piece of pine 1x6.

I looked hard and long at the completed hull of the "Lusty" and made a decision about where the pedestals might be. I picked 1/2 hull length between; i.e. 1/4, 1/2, 1/4.

As the hull is 22"; went with 5 1/2", 11", 5 1/2".

Used 8-32 x 1 1/2" screws as that added up from some depth on the keel; 3/4 " pedestal and 3/4" board with a slight amount of countersink for the bolts.

Bolts from the top; CA applied.

The top of the Rustoleum Red is approximate. Next I'll mask the bottom edge of the the boot stripe and go with black above,  The Heller model has decals for the boot stripe, but they go into the ever not enough basic black decal stock supply, and I will spray on this.

I just noticed that there is a beautiful build of the Illustrious over on www.steelnavy.com. The builder shares what he did to detail the ship. Check it out; It might help.

Bill

I will watch this thread with intense interest! I have the same kit, but the port side hull half is badly warped. I am slowly bending it back into shape using hot water immersion.

Bill

Molded on bilge keels are always a bug.

I could not find a drawing of the hull below the waterline. That's fairly typical. But I just put together a set of four, to be safe and follow common practice in the 1930's.

Here's the first two, plus ancillary other fittings below the waterline.

And the kit has a deep recess down the flight deck, so you don't get the position of the centerline stripe wrong. Sheesh!