Luca Bevilacqua wrote:
Hi Ron, hi Tracy, hi all.
To Ron, first of all many thanks for all the help (info and advice) you offered and for the in box review you linked to, which is absolutely excellent (very comprehensive).
Thanks, that's actually a build review, you don't find most of the problems until you start gluing things together.
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(I presume Trumpeter got their position right so since your Ron’s review does not mention such an additional error).
If they're not perfect they're close enough. I wasn't going to try taking calipers to photos.
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"acetone puttying" (I simply put a fair amount of Tamiya putty on a earstick, rub the putty on the seam to fill any gap, then grab a few more earsticks soaked in acetone and wipe out any excess).
There's an easier way, paint in some White Out (correction fluid) then use Q-tips with denatured alcohol to "sand" it. Also works with Mr. Surfacer. Tamiya putty, if it's the sliver/grey stuff, will "sand" using Q-tips and Mr. Color thinner from Gunze. Acetone can attack the plastic so I prefer either of the milder solvents.
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Reinvigorated by the deck 01 success I set about to correct the “too agile” stacks.
Drilling larger exhaust holes was easy.
Then I wrapped the main flanks of the funnels on .25 mm rectangular pieces of styrene, to fatten them up as much as I practically could.
I put 2 x .25 mm styrene layers in place (around the whole stack), sanded their joints, sanded (round contour of course) the added length as much as I practically could (if one sands too much the added sheets break up).
I have to say I am NOT satisfied with the partial results.
Lots of work still needs to be done on upper and lower portions of the funnels for a result that probably will never be perfect.
It would be wiser to buy some good resin, if available
Do you know if YMW would be willing to sell just the 2 stacks ?
Since I have the resin stacks you mention in the Classic Warships kit I compared them with Trumpeter's stacks. I don't think you can modify Trumpeter's and get a good result with any reasonable level of effort, you'd spend your time better scratchbuilding new stacks. I also worked with microfilm prints of some of the original plans and photos to determine how wrong Trumpeter got them. Contact Chris Decker at
http://www.tridenthobies.com and see if they'll run you up a set of stacks. Be forewarned, if you do that you'll have some serious work to redo the bases they sit on to make them look right.
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What was the correct height for the 40 mm tubs ?
I read Ron’s review about the fact that the 20 mm tubs are a 20 % too short.
I thought of a way of fixing the 20 mm tubs (gluing on a thin sheet of styrene - to the upper side not to ruin the positioning pins - then trim away the excess styrene).
I can't say if the Essex carriers have correct tub heights but from Hornet and North Carolina I would bet they're too short. Most of the problem seems to be Trumpeter usually gets it almost right *if* the tub hangs in open air, where the "too short" comes into play on those tubs is the inside, the floor is too thick and makes the gun/director sit too high but from the outside it look fine as long as there isn't a gun mounted. The root cause is mold engineering and overly thick floors. On BB-55 however the circular 40mm tubs are all just too short no matter how you look at them, since they're plain you could just cut away the molded walls and glue strip styrene in place. from the outside of the tubs .015" x .125" is the closest stock size to correct but you'll still have a problem with over thick floors. The 20mm splinter shields are too low too and they lack bracing.
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Ron please where could I get a picture that shows where the 40 mm director was on the aft turret ?
Easier to just tell you here. Draw a line down the center of the turret fore and aft, then a line centered between the first and second row of rivets (should be about where the small sight hoods are on the turret sides). Cut a piece of 5/16" diameter tubing (thin the inner wall if it's too thick) and make it .125" high. Glue in place centered on the intersection of your two lines. In Shoker's book you can barely see it on page 2, it shows on the lower drawing page 49 and most of the profiles for camouflage (it and the 40mm tub should not be shown on the profiles except for dazzle, Ms22 and the postwar grey).