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PostPosted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 5:40 am 
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I would prefer the typhoon... :thumbs_up_1:

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PostPosted: Thu May 03, 2012 9:03 pm 
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What all is wrong with the akula's sail?


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PostPosted: Fri May 04, 2012 1:33 pm 
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redoctober27,

As I understand it, based on photo's, drawings, and other reviews, there are about 3 things wrong with the conning tower. All 3 are because the model is labeled as the Gepard. The Gepard is one of a kind and is different from all the other Akulas. The tower is probably correct to portray any of the others.

Problems:

1) Based on another review, the pair of forward most periscopes are set a little too far towards the stern and need to be moved forward.

2) Based mostly on drawings, the entire conning tower is a little to short in height and length. It needs to be a little taller and by working in the sloped angle at the back of the tower will also make it slightly longer.

3) Based on photos and drawings, the bottom edge of the conning tower is shaped wrong along the side edges where it attaches to the hull. The model curves outward from the base of the tower and blends into the hull smoothly. The tower actually needs to meet the hull and have a hard edge. And only keep the smooth blending along the front face of the tower.

I think it would be easier (fewer corrections) to build it as any other Akula than to build it as the Gepard.

Dan.


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PostPosted: Fri May 04, 2012 4:28 pm 
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Hmmmm thank you very much Dan, I hope someone will come out with a good Akula class one day . Maybe hobby boss I hope.. Have you ever worked with there kits before? Are they more accurate than bronco? And do you know if there PLAN subs are good at all? I know a little of topic but got some of them on the way and now hoping I didn't go with a more inferior company :(


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PostPosted: Fri May 04, 2012 7:00 pm 
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redoctober27,

I don't have any info on PLAN subs. I only collect information on ones I plan to build, not subs in general.

I think the Bronco Gepard is probably the most accurate Akula you can find. It would be pretty good and can be built almost completely OOB as any other Akula as long as you don't mind having to make the large towed sonar array on the rudder.

I've only got experience building two Bronco's and now the one Hobby Boss. The Gepard you already know. The Bronco Borei class has more detail than the Hobby Boss version yet also has the propeller shroud all wrong. If you're not concerned with open missile hatches I'd go with the Hobby Boss.

I'm also building (correcting) the Hobby Boss Yasen class. It's accuracy isn't as high as their Borei offering but also not as wrong as the Bronco Gepard.

In my own limited experience with these two companies and only these 3 subs, I've found Hobby Boss to be better. Your experience could be different.

Dan.


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PostPosted: Mon May 14, 2012 9:20 pm 
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Just to let you know that progress is continuing on the Typhoon. Most of the putty work on the stern is done, just have to refine it now. After that, the rest of the build will be just plastic sheet. I don't know when the next actual update will be. This is three weekends now that I've been unable to upload to TinyPic. Instead, I just keep getting an error message.

Dan.


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PostPosted: Fri May 18, 2012 4:52 am 
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California Bound wrote:
redoctober27,

I don't have any info on PLAN subs. I only collect information on ones I plan to build, not subs in general.

I think the Bronco Gepard is probably the most accurate Akula you can find. It would be pretty good and can be built almost completely OOB as any other Akula as long as you don't mind having to make the large towed sonar array on the rudder.

I've only got experience building two Bronco's and now the one Hobby Boss. The Gepard you already know. The Bronco Borei class has more detail than the Hobby Boss version yet also has the propeller shroud all wrong. If you're not concerned with open missile hatches I'd go with the Hobby Boss.

I'm also building (correcting) the Hobby Boss Yasen class. It's accuracy isn't as high as their Borei offering but also not as wrong as the Bronco Gepard.

In my own limited experience with these two companies and only these 3 subs, I've found Hobby Boss to be better. Your experience could be different.

Dan.


Hi there,
if I may add on top of what has already been said (and having reviewed the Gepard for another website), I can tell that the only viable option to make a "quite accurate" Akula out of the Bronco kit is if you shoot for the Vepr (K-154).
This is the only actual boat built to Akula II standard (Gepard is Akula III - for whatever these desigations are worth anyhow) and the only one of the other Akulas to have a "similar" shape of the sail, when viewed from the side, of K-335.
Yes, you would have to scratch the towed array pod on top of the stern rudder and also the raised lip aft of the sail of the doors of the communication buoy housing.
If you want to go for an OOB build, I would say that only somebody with some experience in the different details of the Akula class would be able to spot the differences, that is: it would still look like an Akula. One thing I believe would really help the look of the boat even in case of an OOB build, is if you carve out the "limber holes" on the outer hull so typical or Russian submarines (due to their double hull design for high reserve buoyancy). Once assembled, the ones in the kit will just not look the part...

The best and very accurate kit (if it can be called that way!) of the Akula class is the Pit-Road resin one. It is OOP since many years now (I found one and paid a fortune for it!), but sometimes Pit-Road re-pops their kits for a limited time on the market, so never stop hoping.

I cannot comment overall on accuracy of either Bronco nor Hobby Boss, but from my own experience I can say that it seems that Bronco are basing their kits on different reference profiles that have so far (Akula and Borey) proven to be not 100% accurate. Unfortunately these days there are different sources and one must do a long and time consuming work of checking and double checking with pics which also (as it is the case of Borey for obvious reasons) are somewhat hard to come by.

Off-topic: California Bound, I may have to contact you if I get to build the Yasen as my knowledge on this boat is limited: are you finding many things to correct? Thx.

HTH

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PostPosted: Fri May 18, 2012 5:06 am 
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California Bound wrote:
Just to let you know that progress is continuing on the Typhoon. Most of the putty work on the stern is done, just have to refine it now. After that, the rest of the build will be just plastic sheet. I don't know when the next actual update will be. This is three weekends now that I've been unable to upload to TinyPic. Instead, I just keep getting an error message.

Dan.


Dan,
one thing I forgot to mention is:
AWESOME WORK on those Russkie Subs!!!!!!
:woo_hoo:
I wish I had half the guts of yours when it comes to chopping up things!

For the mods: I know that this would be very VERY late, but I am building the Micro Mir 1/350 Alfa SSN for another project. Do you think I could enter it in the group build?

Thanks!

:wave_1:

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PostPosted: Fri May 18, 2012 10:53 am 
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Anyone can enter the group build at any time. I think I may start letting people with "started" kits enter just to get more participants. Several months have already gone by, so there won't be any huge unfair jump anymore.

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PostPosted: Sun May 20, 2012 1:09 am 
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_viper_,

Thanks for the compliment.

After risking everything by cutting the bow off of my Scharnhorst, I found that it was quite liberating and that cutting into a cheap sub is nothing in comparison.

My observations for the Hobby Boss Yasen:

There are a couple of what I would consider "poor" choices but not mistakes on their part.

There is no waterline stripe decal.
Although one is shown on the box cover, there is no bow symbol included in the kit.
I wish they would have included both of these decals. I plan to make my own.

Possible mistakes:

The rear most 1 or 2 "limber holes" on each side of the hull might be slightly out of position. But I'm not sure, so I'm not going to change them.

The conning tower might be a little too short in height and the front slope might not be steep enough. Again, I'm not sure, so I'm not going to change them.

Actual mistakes:

There is a raised bump on each side of the upper hull, near the rear half of the conning tower. The raised bump is too short in length. It should start where it does, but it should be about twice as long as it extends back towards the stern as it currently does. I currently have one of these fixed and plan to make a duplicate of it for the other side.

The bow is no where near streamlined and tapered enough. The model looks to begin its taper near the forward most depth marker decal. The taper really needs to begin with a sharper angle back under the beginning of the conning tower, (representing the transition from the double hull body to the single hulled bow) then continue with a more shallow taper beginning near the forward diving planes. Very few photo's capture this detail. Most seem to either be unclear (wrong angle), or accidentally blocked (tug boat), or purposefully covered over since it is also the torpedo tube area. I have this taken care of already. Details were lost in all the sanding, but I think it's worth it for the correction of the overall shape.

The final mistake is what I will call the "hazard stripe" decal on the bow. Whether accidental or on purpose (to hide the bow taper error) I don't know. The instructions show the decal positioned too high on the hull. They show it positioned above the bow diving planes. It should be positioned lower on the hull. The decal should be centered, half of the decal above the bottom edge of the bow diving plane hatch detail and the other half of the decal fully below the bow diving plane hatch detail. With the "hazard stripe" in the correct position you can see even more clearly that the bow slope is wrong. The other mistake is that the "hazard stripe" decal is too short. It should extend further back along the hull. I would say closer to the half way point between the rear edge of the bow diving plane detail and the first "limber hole". I'll attempt to make my own decal for this longer stripe.

Typhoon progress:

I've finally managed to get tinypic working again.

Here is the stern with the newly hardened putty pieces in place.
Image

And here it is with them mostly shaped now. I can tell that I'm not going to get quite as good of results as I was hoping for due to the complicated shape required and my limited skill. I have also placed tapered wood dowels on the ends to represent the new ends of the propeller shafts. (what a bad cell phone camera)
Image

I hope you find this useful and thanks for looking,

Dan.


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PostPosted: Sun May 20, 2012 9:29 am 
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Hello :wave_1:

Hope it's not too late to enter the group...
I'd like to introduce my build of a project 671RTMK Shschuka (NATO: Victor III) Soviet SSN.
1:700 scale resin kit from OKB Grigorov with some improvements.

I started the kit in late February. The boat is now about 90% complete.
Here is the kit just out of the box:

Image

Very simple, although accurately detailed kit with minimum number of parts: hull, two PE propellers, propeller "tail".
I choose "early career option" with two "old style" counter rotative propellers instead of a single "later style".

I scratch built both dive planes after photographic reference.
I designed and printed the full set of decals, including this narrow white waterline.
I designed and ordered a custom turned brass set of aerials (no parts in the kit)

I wanted to show her full hull (I'm a waterline addict) as most of the interesting parts of the boat would be visible.
To give an impression of weight and size despite the tiny scale, I dropped the kit base for a "slip" made of Evergreen "blocks". This also helps to protect the kit and its very delicate aerials.

The boat after laying the decals. She's been gloss varnished for better decal sticking and will soon receive her final flat varnish coat:

Image

The bow showing the six torpedo tubes with white seals (decals):

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The brass aerials:

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To be continued
_Bruno

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PostPosted: Thu May 24, 2012 8:53 pm 
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Hey guys. What is the best way to fill in the gaps of space between the hull halves when working on a 1/350 scale? What would be the best putty to use? Thanks. By the way nive victor class!!!


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PostPosted: Fri May 25, 2012 10:56 am 
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That depends on the color of the plastic and the size of the gap. Squadron green or white putty works so does tamiya. Thin it with some acetone like nail polish remover and spread it then light sand. Another alternative for smaller ships is superglue. A few drops of superglue followed by a zap kicker works great.

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PostPosted: Fri May 25, 2012 5:09 pm 
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Thanks drdoom1337 ! Never heard about thining it down before I know the white putty always seems to be to thick! Thanks for the tip! :)


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PostPosted: Fri May 25, 2012 11:27 pm 
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How good ans acurate are the yankee modelworks 1/350 akula, searra,and alfa , and last victor kits ? Thanks


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PostPosted: Sat May 26, 2012 11:10 am 
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redoctober27 wrote:
How good ans acurate are the yankee modelworks 1/350 akula, searra,and alfa , and last victor kits ? Thanks


Well, I have their Victor and I have seen the Akula plans and pics of the Alfa.
You have to take into account that these models were released when info on (former) Soviet subs was still sketchy and contraddictory...as such they are quite inaccurate!
My personal advice would be to look elsewhere.
OKB 1/350 VictorIII is a great looking sub (though missing some of the latest boats features like SOKS).
MikroMir has made a decent 1/350 Alfa with the added benefit of being in styrene.
Then HobbyBoss is coming out with a VictorIII and an Alfa in a couple of months...and then maybe somebody will make a decent Sierra!
:wave_1:

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PostPosted: Mon May 28, 2012 4:31 pm 
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Dan,

Thanks for the info. You must have some good references for the Yasen! All I have are the great stuff that Atma has posted in the russky subs sections. I will take into account what you mentioned but I guess the modificatins are currently out of reach for my skills :scratch:
But there is always the polar bear option! If it only they weren't that expensive!

Bruno: beautiful job on that Victor! I have Georgi's 1/350: too bad I ended up screwing things up when joining hulls and now the kit is a total loss...

DrDoom: thanks for letting me in!

Let's see if I will make the deadline!
:wave_1:

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PostPosted: Wed May 30, 2012 12:52 pm 
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Well, I've been mostly absent from the site for a while, graduate school demanding most of my waking life lately, but I recently had some time to look at my Kirov... and, *sigh* what a bloody mess this kit is. Frankly, for a recent Combrig release, I'm wildly disappointed. no detail at all on the super structure, not even portholes. It's like those old, old Fujimi kits where you had to drill all your own. Not that I can't do it, I was just hoping for something a little less time consuming. Plus, in my start of the kit, I managed to botch something.

Anyway, I have a few other Russian kits hiding around, including some other WW2 stuff, so I'm going to dig around the stash and see what I can pull out, because Kirov is going to be a labor of love/hate. (I'm thinking of ordering the Lenin Gunboat)

Bravo on the great builds already going here!!!


~Chris

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PostPosted: Wed May 30, 2012 1:34 pm 
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I have finally begun my Steregushchy. I have to take photos tonight. This build seems really straight forward as Orange Hobby has eliminated all guess work. Instructions are clear and the detail is great. I really screwed up the funnel and had to rebuild the whole thing with plastic stock and 1/8th" plastic tube and top it off with the funnel grille. It's not as perfect as the original piece but once painted nobody's gonna know anyway. I'm thinking of buying the Bronco Akula and putting them both on a base together. The heavily weathered Akula would make a great contrast to the Steregushchy.

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PostPosted: Tue Jun 05, 2012 1:33 pm 
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_viper_,

I only use the photos availabe here and a couple Russian forums as reference. Along with a so-so use of google translate.

drdoom,

Thats a nice looking corvette. I'm looking forward to pictures of your progress.

Dan.


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