I posted this on Modelwarships.com a while ago but another FSM member
mentioned they'd like to see some photos of it, so here they are! This
is my second completed 1/200 scratchbuilt ship (the first was a RN
Tribal-class destroyer and isn't very good).
It's a
Jaskolka- or Bird-class Polish WW2 minesweeper/minelayer,
a rather obscure type which as far as I know is not available as a
plastic or resin kit in any scale (though it seems an obvious subject
for Mirage's 1/400 range). I chose this ship to model as I have an
issue of the quarterly publication "Warship" which has detailed plans
of this ship in close to 1/200 scale (actually 1/220 so the dimensions
needed to be scaled up by 10%), and it is a small vessel - 45m long, or
22.5cm in 1/200 - with a simple bridge superstructure and only one main
gun, so it was a fairly quick and straightforward scratchbuilding
project.
There were 6 ships in this class, built in the mid 1930s, the
Jaskolka, Czajka, Czapla, Mewa, Rybitwa and
Zuraw. (I
modelled the
Jaskolka as the only suitable decal I could find
for the bow identification letter was a J!). Several saw action during
the 1939 invasion of Poland though none were sunk. After capture by the
Germans they were used for various utility duties such as torpedo
recovery, a number of them survived the war and saw service in the
post-war Polish navy. I believe one survived into the 1970s as a survey
ship.
Anyway, here's my model:
I assembled the hull by my standard method of cutting a piece of thick
(1mm in this case) styrene card of the correct (maximum) width and
length for the deck, marking it at intervals (2cm in this case), then
measuring the deck width at the same intervals on the plans and marking
the measurements on the styrene. I then cut between the marks using a
sharp knife and metal ruler, then sanded the edges to get a smooth
curve. The hull sides were made from a strip of 0.75mm styrene cut to
the right width, pre-curved with the handle of a knife, then glued in
place sloping slightly upwards to the bow (see above). As the bow of
this particular vessel is quite sharp, it was made seperately from the
rest of the hull.
Once the glue had set, I cut down the hull sides to leave a ledge of
about 1mm, then sanded the whole thing flat. Join lines at the bow and
stern were smoothed over with filler.
The superstructure, and many of the details such as hatches, were also
made from styrene sheet and stock of various gauges and types.
The model is waterline simply because of the difficulty of
scratchbuilding the lower hull. I'm not a particular fan of waterline
models, but they are much easier and about 10-20 times quicker to
scratchbuild than full-hull ones! One day I'll make a suitable sea
display base for this model.
Various details - winch, boats, machineguns, searchlights, etc. - were
added using parts from the spares box. It's surprising what you can use
with a bit of modification - the larger boat, for example, is actually
the hull of a 1/350 motor launch from a Bismarck kit, with the deck
removed, edge trimmed down and a rudder and "canvas" cover added. The
searchlight is also from the Bismarck. The winch is from an old
FROG/Novo oil tanker I built many, many years ago, since dismantled for
parts. Minesweeping floats/paravanes are made from 1/72 World War 1
125lb aircraft bombs with the fins trimmed off. PE brass ladders are
taken from a N-gauge (2mm) model railway signal kit.
Other details were made from styrene stock or scrap parts, the binnacle
for example is a piece of round sprue filed into shape. The two
machineguns are 1/144 military vehicle parts (overscale, but look OK),
and the 3in/75mm main gun is a heavily modified 1/72 scale 37mm gun,
which is close enough to 75mm in 1/200!
The model was painted with Tamiya and Revell acrylics, and weathered
with craft acrylic paint. The letter on the bow is from an aircraft
decal sheet. Overall, the model took about a week to build from start
to finish.
My next scratchbuild project is a much larger and more complex ship,
the RN Edinburgh-class cruiser HMS
Belfast. I have plans for
many more 1/200 scratchbuilt ships - I'll probably have to learn metal
or resin casting to make all the armament and fittings needed.
Anyway, hope this post is of interest! Comments are welcome, I'd be
particularly interested to hear from anyone else who's tried
scratchbuilding ship models from plastic, in any scale.