HELP!! 1/125 U-99

I've been working on this kit on and off for a couple of years.  Trying to scratch-build a full interior for some reason - it's been so long since I started I can't remember why any more.

There's no question that this kit is showing its age.  I agree with Fighterfan's general approach here: you need to move carefully, with a lot of improvisation.  Do a lot of test fitting, and be prepared to sand and reshape pieces to get a good fit.  You will need putty and whatnot to fill the inevitable gaps, which will probably be larger than you can fill with a drop or two of superglue.

I used the Nautilus resin kit and its quite good.  It definitely helps, although at the end of the day this is still an old model of mediocre quality.

 I have just finished building this old boat. Dating back to the 1980s, the molds are showing their age. Lots of flash-the railings are too thick for the scale-the deck does not lay down properly, the sail is very simplified and the armament is bordering on plastic blobs-the general shape is good, but lots of inaccuracies.

I would suggest contacting Nautilus Models (www.Nautilusmodels.com) and see if they have any of their resin and PE kits left specifically designed to fix this old kit up (TYPE VIIB U-Boat- 1940/Kit U-01)-This kit works wonders as you can chuck out all of the malformed plastic and replace it with resin and PE.

As I am not too great with PE, I used a combination of kit parts and the mod parts.

The kit railings are a tad difficult to remove from the sprues because of poor molding-try cutting them away with a small saw, then shaping with small sanding sticks and SHARP Xacto blades 

I ran into the same problem with the main deck-in my case I carefully sanded away the deck section where it slides under the hull at the bow. Lots of test fitting/sanding and it finally lay down smoothly.

The old Revel Germany U-99 will give you a decent representation of a Type VII B, but if you want more than an advanced toy, it requires aftermarket parts and fiddly detail work.

Jeff J 

Chris,

The problem is with the deck support pins that run along the edge of the inside of the hull.

Cut them back a little at the time or remove them completely.

The tower rails need to be cleaned up with an exacto blade as there is much flash in this

area. Any broken parts can be glued back, I suggest liquid cement for this.

Cheers,

Joe 

I dont know if this will help but if your railing is totaly messed, try using a bit of spare sprue (tree) for the railings, stretch it over a candle untill its the right width, i know its a trick alot of ship builders use for railings, i dont know what to suggest about your deck other than to sand round the edges untill it slots down.

Andy