Group Build: Historical Warships of WWII

[Dan the Modeler]

It's a ton of work, but it sure does look nice

Thank you Sir. It is extra work, but in the end it is my hope it will be worth it. As long as I don't mess it up...lol.

 

[Edbert]

The Kingfishers came in, more PE and plenty of stickers, but the detail is really good.

 

[Dan the Modeler]

The Kingfishers came in, more PE and plenty of stickers, but the detail is really good.

View attachment 143819
View attachment 143818

Those look very nice compared to the kit supplied seaplane. I don't know why, I was expecting clear canopies...lol.

 

[Edbert]

Picture of the day, credits found in the link below...

https://inchhighguy.wordpress.com/2025/04/14/picture-of-the-week-68/

 

[Dan the Modeler]

Picture of the day, credits found in the link below...

View attachment 143885

https://inchhighguy.wordpress.com/2025/04/14/picture-of-the-week-68/

Great resource and picture. Those floats were huge. Compared to the SC Seahawk, the Kingfisher was a beast.

 

[kevin]

Very cool picture.......I have a long way to go before I'm ready to build my planes.
Just for general knowledge, Trumpeter's 1/200 Kingfishers in the IOWA kit are on clear sprues.

 

[Dan the Modeler]

Very cool picture.......I have a long way to go before I'm ready to build my planes.
Just for general knowledge, Trumpeter's 1/200 Kingfishers in the IOWA kit are on clear sprues. View attachment 143823

Trumpeter has some pretty good aircraft, but I found sometimes gluing the upper and lower halves can be tricky.

 

[kevin]

Thanks for the heads up.....

What's got me worried is painting the canopy frame.

 

[Edbert]

Just for general knowledge, Trumpeter's 1/200 Kingfishers in the IOWA kit are on clear sprues.

The Trumpeter 1/350th kit was the same. Mine was an older (BB-35) but I think they do that as a regular practice.

The argument in favor is it makes the canopies look better. But there are many arguments against. Mine fit VERY poorly. Clear plastic is hard to cut/cast/glue/manage in general, at least IMO. The clear part ended up fogged anyway, gray or silver paint would look better.

I thought I'd do well making them, aircraft are my main subject of modeling. But they came out REALLY bad.

I could claim they did not fit right, I could claim the casting was jacked up, I could claim there were not enough stickers. All of those claims would be right. But in the end I am the one who painted 1943 fighter (3-color) paint on them, which is wrong.

I'll show the old ones I ruined next to one of the new ones when I finish one.

 

[kevin]

The clear part ended up fogged anyway, gray or silver paint would look better.

That's because of the glue, right? Would that be CA , or Testors tube glue......or both?
I haven't messed around with clear parts since my thing has been armour. Would Elmer's white glue work without fogging I wonder.

 

[Edbert]

That's because of the glue, right? Would that be CA , or Testors tube glue......or both?
I haven't messed around with clear parts since my thing has been armour. Would Elmer's white glue work without fogging I wonder.

I'll accept all the mistakes but...

Mine was 1/350th, so 1/200th might be different. The fit was not good enough for the top/bottom halves to fit and hold with benign adhesives. I tried white (PVA?) initially and a huge gap showed, so I went to the modern ultra-thin with the same result. So I escalated the affair and used CA. That held, but obviously fogged the "glass". To be honest the canopy bit looked okay that way, but the bad fit and wrong paint and incomplete decals killed the overall thing.

 

[Dan the Modeler]

Well I'm glad @Edbert went into a bit more info about the clear plastic aircrafts...lol. I didn't want to come across as knocking the wind out of your sails. Clear plastic has always been an issue, hard to cast for tight fits and clean up if there is any flash. And forget about cutting wings to fold etc. I understand why Trumpeter went the cost effective route in clear instead of plastic birds with a small clear canopy.

I prefer the YZM Models for 3D printed aircraft where high detail is wanted. There are some in 1/200 on eBay if you're interested.

1/200 OS2U Kingfisher

 

[kevin]

I got a long way to go before I get to the aircraft on this build, I appreciate you guys schooling me on this.
I really like the one you posted a link to that has the open canopy and pilot figure. I was thinking of getting some figures to crew this ship, so those planes would fit in nicely.
I'll cross that bridge when I come to it......

 

[blakeh1]

The argument in favor is it makes the canopies look better. But there are many arguments against. Mine fit VERY poorly. Clear plastic is hard to cut/cast/glue/manage in general, at least IMO. The clear part ended up fogged anyway, gray or silver paint would look better.

^this

I am going through a nightmare of tying to glue a bunch of tail fins, fuel tanks, and landing gear on 1/700 Hornets and Super hornets from the Trumpeter 1/700 Nimitz. The effect of the clear canopy is nearly lost anyway at that scale, especially when nothing is inside
It doesn't glue as well as regular plastic and it is super hard to actually figure out the glue points/mating surfaces with clear parts that small

And masking the canopies at that scale is an undertaking in itself. I have resorted to masking liquid, but I have to still touch up the rough edges by hand anyway

on the flip side, the 1/350 Yorktown and 1/350 Nimitz I have are actually very nice because there are actually separate clear canopies for many of the aircraft (at least for the F-14s and all the WWII stuff) and the other parts regular plastic. The only ones that are all clear are typically ones like the helicopters since if would be much harder to have a separate clear pieces

 

[Edbert]

Just poppin in here to show the juice was worth the squeeze.

If by squeeze you mean effort. I think the silver (plain old XF-16) looks better as a canopy. I'll admit that the one on the right is not finished, I gave up on that, and the color being inaccurate was the final straw or kicker.

If you include cost in the squeeze calculations, maybe not, YMMV!

 

[blakeh1]

Just poppin in here to show the juice was worth the squeeze.

View attachment 144210

If by squeeze you mean effort. I think the silver (plain old XF-16) looks better as a canopy. I'll admit that the one on the right is not finished, I gave up on that, and the color being inaccurate was the final straw or kicker.

If you include cost in the squeeze calculations, maybe not, YMMV!

That silver canopy does look quite good. I may have to try using silver on the 1/700 stuff I am working on

Also, great color for the Sea Blue on that new one

 

[Dan the Modeler]

@Edbert I have to say I had to look twice at the silver canopy, looks great and is a great improvement over the other.

 

[scottrc78]

I never understood why the Trumpeter Kingfishers looked like they had flat fuselages and grossly out of scale wings. I have replaced them with aftermarket on every kit I built that had them. They are the same on this 1/700 Texas. I have some old resin one's I am using that look much better.

 

[scottrc78]

I downloaded some 3D kingfisher and 40mm Bofor stl files and am going to see how they turn out printing them on my SLS printer. I finally have an excuse to print something for a model.

 

[BarleyBop]

how they turn out

... nice!
Have been wondering about that as well... don't have a printer, but our public library has a bunch I could use for the cost of the material.
I'd have to figure out if the printer is good enough for 1:35 scale parts.

 

[Dan the Modeler]

I downloaded some 3D kingfisher and 40mm Bofor stl files and am going to see how they turn out printing them on my SLS printer. I finally have an excuse to print something for a model.

Please show and tell once you've printed!

 

[scottrc78]

... nice!
Have been wondering about that as well... don't have a printer, but our public library has a bunch I could use for the cost of the material.
I'd have to figure out if the printer is good enough for 1:35 scale parts.

If they are FDM printers, then its limited on the how well they will print surfaces and fine detail, especially at small scales. I just bought a SLS resin printer a few months ago and I'm blown away on how fine of detail it will do. I just printed a bunch of deadeyes and blocks for a sailing ship project that are 1/8" in diameter and are nearly perfect. I do 3D modeling and printing for my job, so its all second nature to me.

 

[Edbert]

I do 3D modeling and printing for my job, so its all second nature to me.

Topic-Hijack Alert!

Do you think you could make a set of 1/24 F1 mirrors?

 

[scottrc78]

Topic-Hijack Alert!

Do you think you could make a set of 1/24 F1 mirrors?

I probably could, except I am booked solid with work projects and what time I do get, trying to work on my own.

 

[Dan the Modeler]

So it's been a bit since I was able to get back to the bench after being under the weather for a few weeks. I have to wait for my resupply of CA glue from Poland that's enroute as we speak for the finer photo etch details going in place, so it's back to the hangar bays to get it all modified to have open Bay doors and some SC 1 Seahawks, displayed.

There is no real clear photos or plans I can find on these bays, so I have to take much artistic license about the approach and details I add to this. I've had to modify the depth of the bays by shortening the kit parts, but luckily I have spares of these parts to play around with before I cut and fit the actual parts.

So there is two bays, and what I envision in my mind was that there is a workshop between them. I will open lead between watertight doors that might be seen from the hangar deck. I've also used the kit provided seaplane to mock up for the two that will be in stowed configuration and one on catapult ready to go.

Anyway, here's the measuring up and mock up of the bays walls before I get them fitted and detailed up. I may have bitten off more than I can chew going this route with the bays open, but fingers crossed.

 

[scottrc78]

I picked up some stl files off Yeggi for about a $1.50 for a Kingfisher and reduced it to 1/700 scale. They turned out pretty good on my SLS printer. Not flat and frumpy like the ones in the kit.

 

[Dan the Modeler]

I picked up some stl files off Yeggi for about a $1.50 for a Kingfisher and reduced it to 1/700 scale. They turned out pretty good on my SLS printer. Not flat and frumpy like the ones in the kit.
View attachment 146064View attachment 146065View attachment 146066

Those turned out amazing, especially at 1/700 scale! To top it off, a $1.50 and I'm sure it wasn't a whole spool of resin later...lol.

 

[GCB]

Whaou! Guys (any lady?) you have done an impressive work on those ships. I will be too late to join the group but learning a lot and hope mine will look as good as yours!

 

[Dan the Modeler]

Whaou! Guys (any lady?) you have done an impressive work on those ships. I will be too late to join the group but learning a lot and hope mine will look as good as yours!

@GCB You may not be too late to join in on the group build. I know my build is very far from being done any time soon. Hell, I haven't even put one little dot of paint on anything....lol. I knew my build was going to be a long one do to all the photo etch and scratch building that's going into it.

 

[GCB]

@GCB You may not be too late to join in on the group build. I know my build is very far from being done any time soon. Hell, I haven't even put one little dot of paint on anything....lol. I knew my build was going to be a long one do to all the photo etch and scratch building that's going into it.

Anyhow, will build it.. should receive it next week and will start as soon as I finish the M54.