The Ship Model Forum

Hello, johnd13 (scaledecks.com). I realize this thread is long dormant, but I've just been made aware of your products! Your decks look good, but they are mostly not in my preferred scale. Will you (or have you) produce(d) any decks in 1/700?
:wave_1:

John your decks are an amazing contribution to our hobby! I for one don't feel like cutting and gluing match sticks for days or weeks to get the correct look. I admire your work and business idea.
Keep up the good work and please don't let the guys that always have a problem with scale/authenticity/color, etc. bring you down. You are filling a void that has been empty for way too long.

Paul

Hey John the decks are looking great. I'm looking forward to getting one for my 1/200 Arizona when you all release those. Keep up the great work.

Neil

Hey, gang! I've been busy over the holidays, but unfortunately not on the Borodino.

Instead, I have done some work to become an official sponsor here, and I brought our website on-line over the weekend. So you can now follow the new releases and such here on the "suppliers and manufacturers thread" as well as read about the latest goings-on at http://scaledecks.com. With that done, I hope to be getting back into the Borodino shortly - as well as getting our January offerings out the door.

:thumbs_up_1:

John I like your Decks for the most part.I have not cared for the thickness of those on the market right now but @.010"(couple sheets of paper) that sounds good.I will say that the Maple appeals to me the best for the fact that the grain seems to stay N&S morso.Cheers Kevin

Hi John . I would like to have the decks for the Japanese hybrid battleship ISE to go on the futures list please . I always thought that it was a great looking and unusual ship .Fujimi in 1/350 of course . Cheers and seasons greetings to all . Martin :thumbs_up_1:

Well, from a selfish point of view I would say wait on the Arizona until you have the process nailed down to the point you're happy with it. :big_grin: But seriously whatever the community is demanding... have fun and go for it.

Every message from you brings great ideas and potential for this method.
Dave

[quote="Weebles"]One thing I would like to see if we can find a solution for is addressing the perimeter deck pieces that border the hull and ships fittings. It may be as simple as scraping off the printed lines and redrawing new ones in? I don't know. Maybe if we all put our heads together we can figure that out.

I agree that there is a lot of potential beyond Battleships and Cruisers with natural decks. I hope you keep at it John because I think you have an excellent idea and product here. :thumbs_up_1: [/quote]
Thanks, Dave. I'm definitely planning to keep at it, as there's already a lot of time invested here and I want to see it through. And, not to mention, there are a lot of kits that I want to build myself, and I want to put these types of decks on them. I personally like the way that they look, but they also save a TON of time when building in that 1) you can fill and sand the heck out of the seam between the hull and deck plastic pieces and not have to worry about engraved deck plank lines since you're going to cover them up anyway, and 2) you paint the fittings and bulkheads the color that you want, and then you glue the deck down and the edges are perfectly crisp, straight and smooth between deck and metal - eliminating all the time spent in trying to get clean edges painted at those intersections.

In terms of the edge and perimeter pattern, I think we're closing in on that problem. It seems that the laser printer that we are using tends to distort the image a bit when it prints. Not much - only about 1/8 of an inch when printed over a 17 inch piece of wood. When we're just printing long plank lines then that doesn't matter at all... Once we start doing edges around fittings, then we really have to make sure that the printing and cutting align perfectly, or all that edge work will be off-center, and I know that won't be tolerated. We can either fiddle with shrinking all of the plans by that amount so that when they are stretched that they will print properly (ICK! - but if it works...) and/or we are looking at other printers that might have better print quality. I certainly like the idea of going to a color printer, then we could print camouflage patterns and insignia on the deck in addition to plank lines - and if we can print semi-transparently... Well, picture a Kriegsmarine deck with bold swastikas printed on it and the plank lines perfectly lined up showing through faintly underneath... I don't think ANYBODY is doing THAT yet...

So rest assured that we are really looking at this issue and working to get a solution to it, but in the mean time we are also trying to get our next round of products through final fitting and into release. Coming up very soon will be the Tamiya I-400, Missouri (WW2) and New Jersey (Modern), Prince of Wales and KGV, the Dragon Scharnhorst, and the ICM Konig all in 1/350, and the Trumpeter Arizona in 1/200. Following on the heels of those will be the Revell Missouri (WW2), New Jersey (Modern), and Iowa (Modern) and the classic Banner/MiniHobby Arizona in 1/350. All of the previous kits are already well into engineering and are at various stages in the fit cycle, with the I/400, Konig and Scharnhorst being the closest to release.

Also over the Christmas break I will work to get my website on-line, and will become a proud sponsor of ModelWarships.com as of the start of the year.

Oh, and I hope to put in a lot of time on my Borodino, too. And, if I work really fast I may even finish it and then start work on my next kit. Of the ones mentioned above, which of those would you all like me to tackle next? If there is one in particular that you all really want to see executed with a wood deck let me know, and I'll move that to the next slipway. :thumbs_up_1:

John and all,

This is looking great and the patience in getting the cut right has really paid off. What I really like about this product compared to other laser cut wood decks are..

- Because it's so thin it doesn't give the ship fittings a look of having sunk lower than they should be if that makes sense. At least it is far less than anything else out there. A little "modeling" can overcome those issues.
- The printed lines are superior to engraved lines. They look more convincing than recessed panel lines.
- The pattern in the teak itself and the printed lines does not leave me with the feeling of long continuous out of scale planks. Quite the contrary, it actually breaks up the look quite nicely. I don't see any over sized grain effect at all with this material. Put another way, if I'm looking at the deck from a reasonable distance (say 18") it has the same look I've seen of photos of actual ship decks.

One thing I would like to see if we can find a solution for is addressing the perimeter deck pieces that border the hull and ships fittings. It may be as simple as scraping off the printed lines and redrawing new ones in? I don't know. Maybe if we all put our heads together we can figure that out.

I agree that there is a lot of potential beyond Battleships and Cruisers with natural decks. I hope you keep at it John because I think you have an excellent idea and product here. :thumbs_up_1:

Dave

[quote="Timmy C"]I'm not sure where you're seeing the $179 price - Hobby Search is selling it for a decent $83 (hmm, cheaper than I thought):
http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10075817

You can also see the parts and PE fret and instructions there as well.[/quote]
For quick price checks I always go to ScaleHobbyist.com. They show the list price and their offering price. They sometimes have really good prices, sometimes a little high. But the best thing about their site is their amazing search feature - you can zoom in on kits by scale, nation, time period, brand... If I want to see a classification of what kits are out there and their relative prices, I haven't found any site better for a really fast search and comparison. And, when their prices are okay I buy from them, too.

The Aoshima PE fret looks pretty lame; I think the average modeler is going to be way better off getting the ICM kit and going with WEM, Toms, or GMM brass...

I'm not sure where you're seeing the $179 price - Hobby Search is selling it for a decent $83 (hmm, cheaper than I thought):
http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10075817

You can also see the parts and PE fret and instructions there as well.

[quote="Timmy C"]Because they're the same kit, except Aoshima threw in a PE fret and jacked up the price ;)[/quote]
Really? WOW! Jacked up the price from a list of $76.95 to $179.00! That's pretty significant.

I was looking to get the Aoshima kit to study it for a possible product, but I guess I can save myself well over a hundred bucks now. Is it some spectacular set of etched brass? I could by the sets from White Ensign, Tom's AND Gold Medal - [u][i]three full frets of brass[/i][/u] - for less than a hundred bucks...

[quote="johnd13"] We have the ICM Konigs, and Aoshima Konig (Come on! Why do the same ship twice when there are so many others to choose from?!) [/quote]
Because they're the same kit, except Aoshima threw in a PE fret and jacked up the price ;)

[quote="cerberusjf"]Well, I'm not that bad (I hope) :jest: But I doubt there will be another Borodino type in 1/350 and it's a pity that this one is not as good as I'd hoped.[/quote]
First of all, no... You are not [u][i]that[/i][/u] bad. Actually, I find your posts here incredibly valuable. I will use your insights and add the two extra guns. I am afraid that it is far too late to narrow the structures under the stacks to make a walkway underneath there, but that will be our little secret.

Although this is not a top-of-the-line kit, it does present certain challenges and there is great enjoyment that comes from solving them. I have not built a ship of this era before, and I think it's great that we have this kit in 1/350. I have the Hasegawa Mikasa waiting in the wings, and the Glencoe Oregon in 1/225 (I think). But pre-dreadnoughts seem awfully difficult to come by. And for that matter, early dreadnoughts are too. We have the ICM Konigs, and Aoshima Konig (Come on! Why do the same ship twice when there are so many others to choose from?!) but that's about it - apart from the Arizona in 1941 configuration.

I think we have WWII pretty well covered - certainly German, Japanese and American battleships. And there are good kits of the KGVs, Hood, Repulse, Richileiu. Toss in the Roma, Queen Elizabeth, Fuso which are scheduled to be released - and now you're down to the fringe players in the various WWII navies. I'd love to see a Rodney, and a 1944 Tennessee, for example... But if I wanted to do World War Two ships, I have literally dozens of choices.

Meanwhile, there is a huge gaping hole of World War I ships from the great fleets available in 1/350 styrene. Any idea why that is? Do you think that with the centennial of World War I approaching that the model makers will start to render some of those ships in 1/350?

Thanks again for all your help. Know that it is greatly, GREATLY appreciated.

[quote="johnd13"]So where do the two extras go? In the fighting tops? On the forward searchlight deck? Poking out of a hammock stowage? (I've been following the CASF thread with much interest!)[/quote]
They were on the upper aft bridge on Borodino, 2 pairs rather than 1 on the plans :-)
[attachment=4]boro1a.jpg[/attachment]
[attachment=3]boro2a.jpg[/attachment]
[attachment=2]boro3a.jpg[/attachment]
The Borodino plan with only 18 47mm guns to compare. This was the plan I was familiar with first and used to follow them as I had no clear photos of this area at the time.
[attachment=1]boro_18.jpg[/attachment]
I also now rememeber that these plans are also missing the extra pair put on the forward bridge. The kit I think includes both pairs, something they got right! :woo_hoo:
[attachment=0]boro_fore.jpg[/attachment]
[quote="johnd13"][quote="cerberusjf"]"a" was how the ship was... "b" is how the kit is. :mad_1: :[/quote]
There. I fixed for you.

:big_grin:[/quote]
Well, I'm not that bad (I hope) :jest: But I doubt there will be another Borodino type in 1/350 and it's a pity that this one is not as good as I'd wished.

John:

Greetings. I think your wood decks are excellent! I second Bondoman's suggestion. Make some for the large plastic sailing ship model kits. Revell did the 1/96 scale Constitution, Cutty Sark, Kearsarge, Alabama and Thermopylae. Heller did the Victory and numerous 1/150 scale ships such as the Preussen. The Revell's really need a replacement deck as the main decks were all in several pieces leaving a seam between each section to sand and rescribe. I think there would be a big market there as these kits were produced for decades! You could even do some of the deck houses. Also no one that I know of produces any after market parts for any of the sailing ship models.

Sincerely

Michael Lacey

[quote="cerberusjf"]"a" was how the ship was... "b" is how the kit is. :mad_1: :[/quote]
There. I fixed for you.

:big_grin:

[quote="johnd13"]There is an outer bulkhead that you have to glue in place in front of the hammock stowage, so you need to be really careful to place that staircase hole between that bulkhead and the boiler room skylights. Interestingly, it leaves very little room for the crew to walk that passage with the staircase in there. Perhaps just another Borodino mystery...[/quote]

There's no mystery really, it is onen of the kits errors. The kit makers made the funnel bases too wide and put the skylights where the ladders should reach the spardeck, leaving little room for the ladders.

red = funnel base
blue = skylight

"a" was how the ship was
[attachment=1]a.jpg[/attachment]
"b" is how the kit is. :smallsmile:
[attachment=0]b.jpg[/attachment]

Ditto on the what looks right. I painted my deck houses brown wood to match the museum model. I painted the interior bulwarks white, all to keep it from being a black hole.

The Heller Victory model has four decks, each about 24" long, and a poop deck about 12" long. The visible ones are the poop, quarterdeck and the middle section of the upper gun deck, through the openings between the skid beams where the boats rest. I've got all of the dimensions somewhere, but basically the planks are oak and 9" wide by 30' or so long, except for the kingplank in the center which is about 12". On sailing ships, there's a definite series of patterns to the staggering of the plank ends, which is important to modelers.
Making wood replacement decks is a chore, because the decks have camber and sweep, at least on an accurate model. Wood overlay plank by plank is difficult because the cannons sit too high in the ports. Even a rectangular sheet of your thin planking would be a very welcome thing. I'd be happy to help if you ever decide to develop such a thing. That kit is OOP however the big Constitution is very popular.
Again, I think the thinness of the material is a big plus, and at 1/96 to 1/100 or so, the concerns I have about grain are certainly reduced.

[quote="Bondoman"]Hi John- she's looking very good. I think the gray roofs are not correct- there seems to be a lot of that gray color in the instructions but not much support for it being correct. I painted mine black. But I painted my inner bulwarks white and that's controversial too.

(snip)

A great subject would be the Heller 1/100 Victory....[/quote]
I think for both of us we're just going to have to go with a "Borodino-Type Paint Scheme" as there are still so many questions. I am just going to go with a combination of what the instructions say with what I believe to be correct and pick and choose the parts that I think will just look best. I wanted the gray roofs to stand out as a different color between the boats; I felt that black would be lost down there. It may be right or wrong, but I think it will work and it's not too unreasonable. (No pink battleships here!)

As for the 1/100 Victory... Hmmm... Plastic Sailing Ships. I hadn't thought about that. I know there is a big Constitution kit, too, that might be a great subject. Well, you got the ol' brain spinning now!