 Robert wrote: |
| Why did you omit the blocks? |
|
Part of the reason for this is that I just don't enjoy rigging anywhere
near as much as assembling, scratchbuilding or painting. The thought of
spending a month building a model and then another 3-4 months rigging
it would drive me insane! As it was, it still took me nearly as long to
rig the Kearsarge as it did to paint it.
If at a later date (when my skills have improved) I decide to replace or add to the rigging, I can always do so.
The main reason I didn't include the blocks, however, is that I
couldn't face the job of cleaning up, painting and drybrushing all 200+
of them! I've recently built the Heller
Nina kit (will post some
photos of this soon) which I rigged fully with all of the blocks and
rigging lines, and although there are only 15 or so blocks in this kit,
cleaning up and painting them was still a fairly time-consuming
process. (I found the best method was, after cleaning up the mould
seams, to put a block on either end of a wooden toothpick, paint one
half of each block, then rest the toothpick on a small box or similar
so the blocks are not touching anything. Once the paint has dried,
reverse the blocks and paint the other half).
Due to the lack of blocks, I had to simplify the rigging layout somewhat to accommodate this.
The ratlines were left off as I was afraid of breaking the rather
fragile moulded plastic deadeye/chain assemblies when threading the
ratlines through the shrouds (which would put a fair amount of stress
on both the shrouds and the deadeyes they are attached to). It was
tricky enough drilling holes in the deadeyes large enough for shrouds
of the correct thickness, and several broke off and had to be reglued
and reinforced with CA glue! Ideally, the chain plates and deadeyes
would be replaced with scratchbuilt or aftermarket parts.
| Wilbur Wright wrote: |
Nice effect on the cannons, they look like real cast metal.
I'm using MM sand (darkened) then washed with oils, for my deck I'm going to use the sails as well.
|
|
Cannons were painted flat black and then lightly drybrushed with
"granite" craft acrylic paint, which gives a very convincing "cast
iron" appearance. I'm not sure how accurate this is, however as I know
guns were usually painted in overall gloss black or dark brown (in
which case satin black would be more accurate)
As I think I mentioned in a previous post, the deck was first painted
with Revell earth brown, then heavily drybrushed with Revell stone grey
(this is fairly close to a "bleached teak" colour) then given an oil
wash of dark brown and black.
The lower hull is drybrushed with several different shades of brown to
give a lightly oxidised/weathered effect. I didn't add any green
corrosion/verdigris as I wasn't really sure how to represent this
realistically.
There weren't any sails in my kit (a recent Revell AG reissue). (Does
the reissued
Alabama include sails, or is it only the earlier
issues) I usually leave sails off as they obscure so much of the deck
detail, and I'm also not too keen on vac-formed plastic sails, although
I did use the sails on the Heller
Nina as it looked very "bare"
without them.
This kit also required a lot of cleanup of flash and (especially) mould
lines. Very irritating, especially with the smaller parts (some of
which are hard to clean up without breaking them) although I'd far
rather have a reissue of a 40- or 50-year old kit than no kit at all,
given that it's very unlikely any other manufacturer will produce a
plastic kit of a subject like this!
Anyway, thanks for the replies. This will hopefully be only the first
of several "steam and sail" models. I also have the Imai Susquehanna
and Pyro Harriet Lane/Blockade Runner kits (still looking for a
Hartford!), and have plans for several scratchbuilding projects. Along
with the pre-dreadnought/dreadnought eras (1880s to WW1) this is
probably my favourite era of warship design.