DKM Bl�cher 1940, 1:350 Trumpeter/scratch

[Stein Gildberg]

For Norwegian, April 9th 1940 is a date of great significance. On this day, Norway was invaded by Germany.
The attack on Oslo was undertaken by Attack Group 5 lead by the brand new and untested heavy cruiser Bl�cher along with L�tzow, Emden and several smaller vessels.
Upon entering the Oslo Fjord, the Norwegian Coastal Artillery was alarmed, but all attempts to stop the the attack group was unsuccesfull until it tried to pass the final barrier in the narrow fjord: Oscarsborg.
A brave Colonel opened up with 280, 150 and 57 mm artillery and shot the cruiser ablaze. The other ships in the flotilla managed to halt, but it was too late for Bl�cher: As the ship passed Oscarsborg, its fate was sealed by two torpedoes, whereupon the cruiser sank it the cold water taking much of its crew and Wehrmacht personell with it.

This allowed the Norwegian King, the Prime Minister and the Government to flee and eventually evacuate to England to continue the fight.

So much for the history: To me, perhaps the sadest thing is the fact that there hardly exsist an accurate model of the ship.
Revell offers one in 1:720, but this is far from accurate.
A few models have been built in Norway and abroad, but as Bl�cher is far less interesting to the rest of the world than Hipper and Prinz Eugen, there are in fact few if any complete models around.

So I sat out to build no less than a Bl�cher more accurate than what has been seen before. Hmm.. - not a small undertaking....

[Stein Gildberg]

The 1:350 Hipper from Trumpeter was used as "baseline". Relevent photo info, drawings and books was provided to pinpoint the differences and add detail to the model. As photo and original drawings probably are the most accurate source, this used to advantage.
Wooden deck from ArtVoxModel and PE from White Ensign in addition to selfmade parts and parts from the parts bin.

Well, "everyone" knows that the difference between Hipper and Bl�cher is the bow. Yes, that is right, but I can assure you that there are lots of other differnces as well - small and large - that needs to be adressed if I shall be able to accomplish my goal

So - let's start with the bow: Bl�cher had a nicer bow shape than Hipper, and a bow anchor too. It also, like all the ships in its class, had additional armour fastened to the hull: Close to the bow and a thick armour plate to protect the magazines for turrret A (Anton).
A few portholes and the bow anchor were added. The "waterline" is 6mm thick (2 meters). Colors are White Ensign Dunkelgrau, Dunkelgrau 2 and Revell Matt 37.
Please excuse remarks in Norwegian: This was originally made for the Norwegian IPMS Forum (closed to non-members).

[Stein Gildberg]

This is a thread for completed models. So let's jump to the finished bow area with all "gadgets" in place.
Loops for the anchors as well as chain fasteners and small hatches are all from scratch. Wooden deck is to tinted to make it look like new, dry and untreated teak.
Turret roofs are painted yellow as ordered in the Weser�bung Directive. Templates for the swastika were made to scale and sprayed to the deck.

If you look closely, you will be able to sees the tiny little, 0.4mm hole just at the bow, above the black line. This hole was used to tie the ship to mooring buoys.

[mermaid]

Super! What about the rest of the ship and detailed conversion report, is it coming?

[Stein Gildberg]

It is - of course!
The idea is to present the changes compared to Hipper etc in this forum and then post a full seies of pictures of the finished ship in the Gallery.

I hope there are people around that will appreciate my attempt to build an accurate Bl�cher. From comments in this and other fora, it seems there is quite some interest in the ship.

[Stein Gildberg]

Four more changes to make a good Bl�cher:

-The three night range finders, one each side of the main superstructure, one in front of the same, were in 1940 not concealed in shelters, but were in the open on deck, only protected by a low shielding and canvas.
Made from plastic tubing, sheets and stretched sprue

-The rear of the bridge area is very much different fram Hipper. Much simplified platforms (no flag platform at all), different shape og Admirals bridge, fitting og mast, ventilators etc, etc.

-The platform for the main mast searchlight is very much wrong in shape for Bl�cher as well as for Hipper. New one scratched from original drawing, plastic sheet and parts bin.

-Platforms for 105mm heavy FLAK in forward and midship position were foldable (not fixed) in order not to be crushed against a quai when in port. This arrangement are similar in Hipper and Bl�cher, but not depicted in the Trumpy set.

[Stein Gildberg]

This is what it looks like as it is getting closer to he finished model:
- Gangway Admirals bridge to searchligh platform
- Night rangefinders in place
- Small mast on forward rangefinder
- Searchlight (rubbish in the set) is modified Revell with some PE parts
- Footperts (under the horizontal mastsarms) are square as they were after one of the last modificatiobs (built with wire footperts).
- ...and a lot of ladders and other PE- form WE and parts bin

And the 105mm platform. Note small piece of plastic sheet to compensate for the thichness of the wooden deck
The ArtwoxModel deck is very nice: Accurate, inexpensive and with the correct sizing of the planks. When tinted, the color is also nice. In original form, I find it too light and yellowish.

[carr]

..

[Timmy C]

Would using the Prinz Eugen kit have saved you some work on the bow modification? Or would the extra changes to the superstructure/other parts of the ship have made using the PE kit more work than the Hipper kit?

Beautiful work, as always.

[mermaid]

The searchlight platform is really a big wrong by Trumpeter then! Is there many such wrongs in their Prinz Eugen kit?

[Dan K]

Great subject, great build!

[MartinJQuinn]

Very impressive work on an often ignored subject.

[Stein Gildberg]

Thanks for nice remarks folks!
I'll try to answer some of your questions:

- To use Prinz Eugen instead: The bow in Prinz E is more in line with the one in Bl�cher. Still, it is even sharper in the Prinz, but yes - less work to modify compared to Hipper.
But the rest: Forget about it unless you really love extra work and take the "it's a challenge!"- view. There are such great differences , and hardly any part are similar. Even the overall lenght and the lenght at the water-line are different.
I have seen it done (Prinz Eugen Heller 1:400 -> Bl�cher), but I am not impressed.

It should be remembered that the Prinz by is considered by most people to be a modified Hipper-class cruiser.


- Searchlight-platform: I suspect that Trumpy made the easy way out - to me, the searchlight-platform in Hipper/Bl�cher looks identical to the one in the Prinz Eugen 1945. The one in Prinz E probably was narrower too as built, but in Trumpys kit of the ship, it is no longer a searchlight platform, but an AA-platform!! And to handle a 20mm Vierling (or at the end a 40mm Bofors), you need more space, hence the platform was rebuilt and enlarged.

- Accuracy in the Trumpy Prinz Eugen: Well, I have built the ship, but not done research as I did on Bl�cher. To me, it seems Trumpy has done a somewhat better and more accurate job on this one. I suspected the height to be wrong, but it was only 3mm off from keel to top of superstructure, - 1mm due to the use of wooden deck, so this is absolutely acceptable!

Well, some more photos:

A searchlight platform was planned each side of the area aft of the hangar, the one to Starboad with a foldable outer �tip�.
No searchlight was ever installed.

To the rear of this Starboard platform was installed a small boat in a special cradle.

And in the areas of turrets C and D the detail need to be addressed: Blue � in the kit, red: PE or self made. A sharp eye will spot that the deckhouse below the main mast is of same shape as in Hipper. This is wrong, but I discovered this much later (and corrected it).

The main mast is too low, so I had to insert 9mm to the thich part and build a complete new upper part. Also in the mast, the footpert was rebuilt to be square and made from tubing (not wire).Mst arms were much too short, so new arms were made from .3mm brass tubing. Mast top was painted "black" April 9th 1940. (I never use "clean" black or white etc, but uses graphite, off-white etc)

[Stein Gildberg]

The (almost) finished mast: Frame for lanterns (lantern made from drops of glue and painted) and Top lantern - scatched.

Detail of turret Dora (D): Dragon ladders (spaced), rear preforated platform and small crane scratched.

Detail forward superstructure, PE form White Ensign and parts bin, some small parts scratched.

[mermaid]

Beautiful Dora and mast! With all your amazing scale precision in detail in color could you think of the way to make the portholes look more realistic? I was long thinking that those p.e. portholes enchantments used on many models look way too protruding then they are in real life. The main frame especially look exaggerated, too thick, making the window opening too narrow. It stands from the hull as far as the rain cover which does not make sense. I was thinking maybe to use the porthole covers and rain covers only to enhance the portholes.
Are you going to make a "glass" or leave them as they are?

[Stein Gildberg]

Portholes main frames and covers ARE exaggerated, too thick, making the window opening too narrow...

For this kit I used the White Ensign PE- Bl�cher kit (not incl portholes) plus parts for my parts bin. So- the porthole frames also happens to come from White Ensign.
In my models of Bismarck and Scharnhorst, I have used the Lion Roar PE-kits which I find much more "refined", also when it comes to portholes. I had some portholes left over from these kits, but far from enough, so I decided to use the same type all over - the "thick" ones from WE. (well, do need macro to spot the error...).

Solution: Buy aLion Roar PE set of Prinz Eugen and use those portholes instead. Pending that cost is not a factor, of course�
Or prey that Lion Roar or Flyhawk will make a Hipper/Bl�cher set.

I did not put in any "glass". I my opinion the scale is too small to make it worth it.
Most of the �holes� in the superstructure were drilled through prior to installation of portholes. All portholes in the hull were painted �black� with a hint of silver and coated by satin finish to make it look like glass.
Remark: It is not wrong to paint portholes in the hull in hull color as the portholes were equipped with sliding covers/shielding that could be put in place when needed.

Picture: From the building of my Bismarck. Note the portholes

[mermaid]

Remark: It is not wrong to paint portholes in the hull in hull color as the portholes were equipped with sliding covers/shielding that could be put in place when needed.

Yes, indeed, or with closing covers, just like outer ones. And the color then could be also off-white, light blue.

Picture: From the building of my Bismarck. Note the portholes[/quote]

Is it also finished, or in progress now? Is it Revell?

[Edward Wilson]

I am really enjoying this. For a while now I've wanted to pick up a second Hipper to convert to Blucher, and it's inspiring to actually see it being done!

[Stein Gildberg]

Edward: Nice to hear that this is inspiring to you. Do not hesitate to build the Bl�cher. I think I have covered at least 90% of the changes, but not all (I now know at least three tings that should have been adressed - minor changes, but still room for improvement.) The nicest thing about such a model: It becomes one of a kind!

Mermaid: My Bismarck, a 1:350 Revell, was finished about two years ago, and is presented in the Gallery in this Forum: http://www.modelshipgallery.com/gallery ... index.html

Stein

[Stein Gildberg]

Small items, quite basic from Trumpy, but nice when they are equiped with all "garnish" that should be there in the first place: Top and Rear Range Finder, complete with footperts, ladders, ventilator, handles and met. equipment. The square "frame" at he top of the Top Range Finder is a frame onto which lanterns are attached.