It's been a bit of time since the last update. The ship is 96% complete. All that's left is rigging the long-range radio towers, adding many floater net baskets, adding a few minor railings, some very selective weathering, adding the air wing, and finally, putting some Eduard little aircraft carrier people on board. I've ordered plexiglass cut for the clear case and the model is permanently mounted on a finished oak plank (presently covered to protect it during construction). What started out as just a kit that was given to me has turned into another serious build rivaling the work I did on the Missouri 6 years ago.
Thanks to Loren Perry at GMM, I was able, on two occasions, to get some replacement PE to redo some things that got totally screwed up, or just lost. I suggested to him that every PE set should be doubled; one for practice, the other for the model. One area that needed much help were those 5 radio towers that are a noticeable feature of WW2 Essex-class carriers. I soldered these together which works very well to keep them stable. Even with that, I lost one in a crazy mishap on the workbench, and then deformed the remainder beyond help when attempting to press them down onto some brass pins I installed. In the new set, I also soldered them together and soldered on the ladder too. Then I filled the bottom with Bondic, a U-V curing glue that is wonderful to work with. I made the hole in the solid plug at the bottom with a drill a bit oversized from the brass pins so I wouldn't need excessive force to join the tower to the deck. This worked perfectly and the towers are now installed waiting for rigging.
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Essex Radio Tower Install 1 compressed.JPG [ 232.49 KiB | Viewed 2056 times ]
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Essex Radio Tower Install CloseUp 2.JPG [ 241.59 KiB | Viewed 2056 times ]
The elevator was another part that needed some help from GMM. I originally soldered all the PE under framing and CA'd it to the plastic elevator. It was beautiful! But then terror struck. The elevator slides on the hull were slightly narrower than the elevator and the PE details stuck out a tiny bit from the elevator perimeter. The combination of the two distorted the heck out of the PE to the point where the more I tried to straighten it, the worse it got. So with the new PE in hand I did it over. This time, I adjusted the elevator's width to slide into the framing and then adjusted the PE a bit narrower in the back so the elevator would slip in without distorting any details. It really pays to have a do over.
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Essex Elevator Installed 1 compressed.JPG [ 201.7 KiB | Viewed 2056 times ]
Before installing the island I completely rigged it with 8 signal halyards and 6 radio antenna. For the halyards, I actually was able to thread the E-Z Line fine gauge Lycra through the PE eyes hanging below the yardarm. If you recall, I made my own yardarm and soldered the GMM PE detail to it. To belay the radio antenna I inserted High E guitar string (0.010") into holes drilled the same. The carbide drill I use for this is so fragile that I usually break them just placing the pin vise onto the workbench improperly.
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Essex Island Install 4 compressed.JPG [ 162.3 KiB | Viewed 2056 times ]
Those cute little 20mm guns are 3D printed resin models from Blue Ridge Models. They saved me sooooo much aggravation attempting to glue microscopic PE onto the kit's oversized plastic guns. These models are very, very finely detail and even have the elevating hand wheel represented on the left side. They are brittle and you need to take great care when separating them from the base on which they're "grown". I probably had about 10% breakage. The shoulder rests and gun barrel are the two weakest areas. I originally ordered two-24 gun sets, but last week added one more to finish the ship. There are more than 50-20mms on this ship so two sets would have almost done it except for the breakage. At $20 per set (plus shipping) it's not inexpensive, but my sanity is worth something too. And these are a life savor. I know there are super-detail brass representations of these guns on the market, but I think that's an exercise in futility. For someone younger and steadier they may work, but not for my 72 year-old hands.
I added some Trumpeter 1:350 Corsairs and Helldivers to the air wing and got rid of the TBD Dauntlesses since I modeling the Essex as it was late in the war. Just to recap, the mods are: flag bridge pushed out to the extremis of the fore island, Adding later radar sets and changing their locations, removal of 40mm gun tub that was where the flag bridge is now moved, adding two 40mm quad mounts on the lower port fore sponson, adding floater net baskets, updating aircraft paint scheme, painting ship solid Navy Blue, not rigging the fore deck arresting gear and eliminating the cross-hangar deck catapults (which were never installed on the real ship).
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Essex Air Wing Complete compressed.JPG [ 241.66 KiB | Viewed 2056 times ]
I'm using mostly gel CA to adhere PE. It gives more working time, stays put, let's you apply very small controlled quantities, and you then set it quickly with a tooth pick with a tiny amount of accelerator on it. I just learned this from Brian Bunger, the owner of a wonderful hobby shop here in Louisville, Scale Reproductions, Inc.
Here's a look of the entire ship as it is today. It all should be done sometime next week.
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Essex Almost Finished compressed.JPG [ 141.58 KiB | Viewed 2056 times ]