The Ship Model Forum

And thanks to Dan, too! I missed your post likely due to the server problems...

Hi Martin and Stefano, thanks for your comments :thumbs_up_1:

I´m not sure about the clear sheet, I just used a piece of clear plastic I had at home, nothing special, maybe it was a piece of ordinary transparent office sleeves. I´d guess it´s roughly 0.2 - 0.3mm but I can´t measure it right now as I´m off till the end of the week :heh: .

Vladi! Great work with the glassed windows and search lights. How thin is the clear sheet you used? (any ref nr you can suggest?). The figure standing behind the window was an excellent touch. Well done! :cool_1:

Ditto that.

Glassed in windows look good.

Brilliant work, Vladi

Hi guys,

after another hiatus I continued with assembling the PE bridge. I decided to include “glass” in the bridge windows this time. At first I tried using Humbrol Clearfix but it did not work as expected for me. As the PE bulkheads are thin enough to look properly I then decided to use a thin transparent plastic sheet glued to the inside using PVA glue.

I also populated the bridge with sailors, both inside and on lower outside platforms where access will be limited after attaching the levels to each other.

The next step was adding lenses to searchlights. I used the same thin transparent plastic sheet cut using a puncher – 1.2mm for the searchlights and 0.8mm for signal lights on the bridge. The main searchlight lens was then formed using small ball-ended sculpting tool. I used Gauzy Shine Enhancer to attach the “glass” to Shelf Oddity 3D printed searchlights and signal lights.

Welcome back Vladi, good to know you're back at the workbench! The figures look crisp and detailed, especially the set with the sailors wearing helmets. Great poses too. Looking forward too see them painted and manning stations :thumbs_up_1:

Sorry for the long silence, proceeded very slowly.

Now I need to paint the crew to man the main bridge as there will be no access there later. Here are my sailors and gun crew by Shelf Oddity:

[attachment=1]20250306_USN_sailors_0731.jpg[/attachment][attachment=0]20250306_USN_Bofors_crew_0737.jpg[/attachment]

And these SOC Seagulls will suite her I guess :smallsmile:
Big thanks for the samples to Greg/Blacman!

More photos & quick review at http://www.shipmodels.info/mws_forum/viewtopic.php?f=85&t=397134

Good idea about painting/spraying the decal paper the same colour as the ship, definitely a solution to the possible yellowing of the decal, perhaps I should have done it that way. Unfortunately it won´t work well in case of a splotched camouflage like on Vincennes - I can´t imagine how to align the splotches.

Nice to see this worked out. I'd considered using it in the past. For some of the old-school filming miniatures they'd use vinyl tape for just such a purpose, and paint over it. The thing is it wouldn't last too long, but they only needed it to last for the shot.

A possible solution is to paint the decal paper first, then cut and apply. That would cover up any decals and weathering, though.

Thanks for your comment, Dan. I found one reason against the paint first method so far: possible yellowing of the decal in the future. Let's see.

I'd also be concerned about the peeling of the paint with a mask, unless the adhesive was very light. Don;t know if that's a possibility.

Painting first - well Astoria certainly looks nice.

You may have to experiment a bit with a hulk hull.

Thank you, Dan and Martin! Actually I started thinking about using this method on my future builds. I just hesitate at which stage it would be ideal to do this (in a planned way, not as a last resort like in the case above :) ). The catch is what if the ship was camouflaged, e.g. USS Vincennes in the Ms12 splotch camo, that one would like to use masking tape for. If the hull plating/decals are applied first, which is what my conservative part is suggesting, I´d be concerned about peeling of the first coat of paint - or even the decal! - while removing the masking tape. Using a matt coat for the decal instead of gloss may be an option how to improve the adherence of the paint. The other possibility is to do the painting first, exactly as on the Astoria. Vincennes even had less portholes so less area to avoid. What are your thoughts?

[quote="Dan K"][i]It actually seems this method provides a crisper appearance of the plating than spraying over the mask. [/i]

Agreed. Nice adaptation, Vladi.[/quote]
Yes, agreed.

[i]It actually seems this method provides a crisper appearance of the plating than spraying over the mask. [/i]

Agreed. Nice adaptation, Vladi.

Hi all, my Astoria build has been on hold for quite some time as I put more priority into finishing USS Wilson last year and then into my Australia project. But now it´s time to move on with Astoria, too!

Just after spraying her with the gloss coat and adding decals of hull numbers and the ships´name I realized I totally forgot I wished to add hull plating! My original intention was to create the plating using a masking tape and airbrushing Mr. Base White but for whatever reason I forgot to do it before painting the hull. So I was in a situation when the paint was there so using my usual method would mean doing it all once again, with an added danger of overspraying the base coat to where I didn´t want it, adding too much layers to the delicate railings etc.

What to do? I considered masking the plates and spraying more gloss coat but I thought there was a danger of messing up the build. So what about using a clear decal? I draw the outlines of the hull plating in Inkscape and printed them on a printable transparent decal paper. Then I applied three thick layers of Tamiya gloss clear with a brush to gain some visible thickness (how often do you want it to be visible :heh: ). The next morning I cut inside the printed lines by Exacto blade and applied the decals over the hull. Some corrections were needed so I removed them before they set. I also found out that using a decal softener should only be the very last step to get out any remaining air bubbles, otherwise it can ruin the work. The second attempt already turned out quite satisfactorily. It actually seems this method provides a crisper appearance of the plating than spraying over the mask. The obvious disadvantage indeed is it only works if there are no portholes or other details on the raised plates, so I had to just miss the prop guards and the open portholes on the bow.

I´ll continue with weathering the ship in my usual way using artistic oil paints. Let´s see how will it look like when the next steps are finished.

Lovely. I agree about skipping the oil canning.

I declined attempting to imitate oil-canning as it was unnoticeable on wartime Astoria photos because of her 5-N paint (unlike on e.g. fantail of USS Quincy).

Some corrections and additions done after airbrushing.
[attachment=3]20230304 Astoria corr 1.jpg[/attachment][attachment=2]20230304 Astoria corr 3.jpg[/attachment]
Status as of today. Deck painted 20-B, attached funnels and vent under the searchlight platform. Started painting details and railings. Adding details to the bridge.
[attachment=1]20230312 Astoria fwd.jpg[/attachment][attachment=0]20230312 Astoria aft.jpg[/attachment]

Some more work done although no updates posted in the meantime.

[b]Motor boats[/b]
Two 40ft motor launches and one 26 ft whale boat were located on the hangar roof of Astoria in July-August 1942. Maybe this was the whale boat originally found davits on the port side of the well deck?

I used the awesome Shelf Oddity boats, in case of 40ft launches with my PE rudders and railings. It turned out I forgot to address rudders for the 26ft boats so I adapted those provided in the GMM USN cruisers sheet. Life rings were made from 0.3mm brass wire bent over 0.5mm rod.
[attachment=2]20230227 Astoria motor boats fwd.jpg[/attachment][attachment=3]20230227 Astoria motor boats aft.jpg[/attachment]
Getting ready for airbrush!
[attachment=0]20230227 Astoria read for airbrush 1.jpg[/attachment][attachment=1]20230227 Astoria read for airbrush 2.jpg[/attachment]

I use CA the same way, put a drop on a used medication tray and then apply using thin wire or pin.
I use cloth to clean the nozzle but it gets clogged over time anyway. Using 1 gramm CA package means it would not get thicker as it takes less time to finish it.