1/700 USS Astoria CA-34 at Savo/Trumpeter+Vladi+FiveStar

[Vladi]

In the next step I focused on 5in splinter shields that seem to differ a lot from ship to ship in the New Orleans class:

1. As opposed to Astoria�s BOGP there was no (or an absolute minimum) overhang of the 3rd row of splinter shields over the hull�s edge as proven by several photos - note there is no shadow below the 3rd row shields on either side on Astoria. The same applies to San Francisco, but interestingly to neither of the second batch (Tuscaloosa, Quincy, Vincennes), where there were overhangs only slightly narrower than those of the 2nd and 4th mounts. These are highlighted with blue arrows.

2. Each ship had a different vertical profile of these splinter shields. Vincennes had the 2nd, 3rd and 4th pairs totally flat with no indentation on the top edge (only in the 1st pair). Astoria had a simple indentation (red arrow) of the outboard edge. San Francisco had a heavier, two-level indentation, and the New Orleans the heaviest. Also note that SF had the aft walls significantly taller than those facing forward.

3. It is a question if the third row of splinter shields extended as far inboard as shown in Astoria�s BOGP (green arrows) or not. San Francisco had the 3rd row shields narrower so they were aligned with the 2nd and 4th pair. On the contrary, New Orleans had them in full width. So far I haven�t found a photo of Arizona to decide this without any doubts. NH 97682 (above) seems to suggest the shield extended inboard as in BOGP. OTOH I found the following photo on ussastoria.org captioned �USS ASTORIA conducts SOC operation shortly after her departure from Pearl Harbor on 30 May 1942� but I�ve got some doubts if it�s actually Astoria, as the �dents� don�t match 80-G-21946. Also the ship�s and floatplane�s colours looks too light, like pre-war, so the caption may be off. Any help here would be highly welcome!

Looking at the FiveStar PE set splinter shields, they have the indentation about correct for SF. It�s a pity they did not capture the height difference fore and aft and the bracing like on the real ship.

[blacman]

great study !! that's what I love in shipbuilding ...
keep going

[Vladi]

Thanks, Greg, so do I!

Back to �real� work (while waiting for my parts to be manufactured ).

I hesitated how to best imitate portholes closed for combat. Options included PE and putty, but in the end I decided to fill them in partially using 0.6mm diameter �lids� punched from 0.2mm plastic sheet. It went really well and fast, for sure faster than aligning PE portholes. This left the last approx. 0.1mm depth open so I think that will be about right. I also removed the original hawser �ring� and replaced it with a slant cut plastic tube.

Unfortunately, my hole puncher broke when finishing the work on Astoria, so I�d be getting a replacement one for Vincennes.

Then I continued with assembling the hull and deck. The Trumpy kit does not fit the best, the deck (especially aft deck) attempts to submerge quite deep into the hull and I needed to add some pieces of thin plastic sheet to prevent this. The fit of the hangar to the hull is not the best either. I decided to use the FiveStar parts for hangar sides and bulkheads of the well deck to blend hangar sides into the hull better and to make them looking a bit sharper. It was not a really an outright solution as the FiveStar set is intended for San Francisco with her hangar roof overhanging the sides of the hangar, so I had to add an extra 0.5mm wide brass stripe along the roof to compensate for the difference. Using the PE reversed also paid off as additional puttying and sanding was needed in order to make the transition between the plastic hull and PE parts smooth, this would not work with the original relief etching. I found no proof of two large vertical hatches (?) on the aft side of the hangar structure on Astoria (neither on SF) so I filled them in. Also note the modified lower part of the aft bridge � there was an open part just aft of the mainmast at the hangar roof level (see photos and BOGP) as opposed to the Trumpy kit.

By the way there are two versions of the hangar overlay provided in the FiveStar set - one for 1942 version (with roof overhang) and another for 1943+ that differs in providing bulwarks in between 40mm tubs and the aft bridge. I wanted to use it (cutting of these bulwarks) only to find two mistakes in it: the height of the hangar walls has aparently not been adjusted to cover the excluded roof overhang and the aft wall is narrower than needed. It could be used with some adjustment but I decided to use the 1942 version and modify it as mentioned above.

By large I think the PE overlay is a good improvement of the hangar & well deck area. Not really easy to make it all fit, but better and safer than making the well deck bulwarks thinner by dremeling like I did in case of Quincy

[Vladi]

I continued on the quarterdeck that I equipped using my own PE for the 1.1 gun tubs and director tubs. Large vents were scratchbuilt from plastic sheets, small vent is Rainbow. Deck winch is an awesome 3D printed part by Shelf Oddity.

I added portholes and watertight doors to hangar walls as well as engine room vent grills abreast of hangar door (all my PE). When I started to work on the well deck I realized that the bulkheads should be rounded up forward similarly to the aft part, but I didn�t want to have to take it all out and redo everything once again so I left this small inaccuracy as it was. I will improve on this point in my future Vincennes build I promise

Next came the catapult towers. Most importantly they need to be repositioned outwards from how they were in the kit so that they touch the new bulkhead. I used the FiveStar overlay on the towers and only then I realized it was quite incorrect. They should have four windows inboard on Astoria and all her first batch sisters incl. Tuscaloosa (but except Quincy & Vincennes that were even more different) and their outboard side should be flattened, the position of the ladder should be different and portholes arranged differently. So I put them aside and will amend them with the next PE version.

I thought the FiveStar catapults were the best I�ve ever seen in 1/700 from the very first time I�ve seen them. My experience now only proved this was the case. Each catapult consists of 8 pieces and the aircraft cradle. They are really delicate with relief etching and they even include the two small aircraft handling platforms at the back. Of course it is a lot of folding and extreme caution is needed while handling the part with walkways and railings. Actually, all the four small handling platfroms fell off when I worked on the cat and had to be glued back when done. I also added a piece of plastic rod into the inside (leading from the centre backwards) to simulate for the internal mechanism, and the prominent pipe on the left side of the catapult (looking along the flight direction).

[Vladi]

Haven�t done much on Astoria recently but it will for sure change now - my Astoria PE set arrived today!
It contains a completely new main bridge, searchlight tower, secondary conn & platform, 5in splinter shields plus some other parts.
Let�s see how will it all fit together

[MartinJQuinn]

That PE looks impressive - good luck!

[Dan K]

Impressive indeed.

I concur about the Five Star catapults, though I hope your instructions are better (and fuller) than the ones I have for those for the early BBs.

[Vladi]

Thanks, Martin and Dan!

The FiveStar instructions are quite ok for the catapult. Actually, MUCH better than instructions for my own PE as above - there are indeed NONE for it at all

[Kometa]

Great Job, and a excelent photoetched. I've done the Uss Vincennes and the Uss Quincy. They have quite a few flaws in their construction that you are solving with your great work.

PEwladi.jpeg (13.26 KiB) Viewed 3127 times

[Vladi]

Thank you, Manuel

If you wondered what are the parts that you circled on the photo, these (and the others not circled) are platforms on signal and navigation bridge wings to man blinker lights, pelorus and similar equipment.

[taskforce48]

Outstanding work!

Matt

[Vladi]

Thanks, Matt!

Tested the first two levels of the main bridge, looking quite good.

Manuel, note (two of) the small platforms you circled in the previous photo:

These are my two best friends for soldering PE - USB-powered mini soldering iron (my recent acquisition - very handy, really lightweight, ready to use in 15 seconds! Excellent value for the few bucks on Aliexpress) and soldering paste in a syringe. Recommended!

[MartinJQuinn]

Damn. That's some fine PE work. Well done.

[Vladi]

Thank you, Martin. Glad you like it!

BTW I just changed the title of my WIP - there will be definitely many more of my parts than Five Star�s in the end

[Pieter]

No that is an excellent bridge. Will it have a crew inside?

[Quincy]

Looking outstanding, Vladi!!






Bob Pink

[Vladi]

Pieter and Bob

Will it have a crew inside?

Would love to, just not sure if it would be reasonably doable at the navigation bridge level. I wanted to have no seam on the bridge face between navigation and battle lookout levels so the face is one part and it may be necessary to attach the navigation bridge roof before airbrushing all of it. Thus the crew inside would get oversprayed with 5-N - not really the best option but maybe the only one possible. Perhaps the detail of the crew�s paint won�t be visible inside anyway in the end...?

[Kometa]

It seems extraordinary to me. I've seen my model of the Uss Quincy over and over again and you're really doing a great job.
It is really difficult to make a model with such detail.

[Vladi]

Thanks, Manuel

So this is where I am now. It was a good idea to have the central brass rod as a pivot inside the bridge (where the central ladder shaft was in the axis of the 5in director/rangefider), it makes it lot easier to assemble and keep the proper alignment. Also the assembly will be much sturdier and less wobbly than a structure made only of 0.1mm brass would be.

The bridge is dry fitted, many smaller parts still missing, but the basic fit and geometry seems to work fine. I made two small errors in the PE design (the height of the inner part at the signal bridge level and missing back side of the RDF booth), but both can be amended easily by scratch. Photos of course reveal some details that will deserve corrections, that�s the burden of macrophotograhy . One has to look at the last shot for comparison with 1 Euro coin to realize how small the bridge in 1/700 really is.

Will it have a crew inside?

Now I think I should be able to spray the bridge partially unassembled and complete it afterwards, hopefully without too much spray getting to the inside when finalizing it.

So far so good

[Dan K]

Exquisite work, Vladi.