The Ship Model Forum

I've put most most of this out in bits and pieces but I thought it would be nice to put everything together for those curious about the kit. I'll skip the history of the real ship; If you don't know the saga of the Bismarck by now you might as well stop reading.





The first thing you hear about this kit is how freaking huge it is. It's big, true... but it's not too wild and crazy, all things considered:

for size comparison:



1/72 Revell Gato

1/200 Trumpeter Bismark

1/200 Trumpeter USS Arizona

1/350 Revell Tirpitz

Here are some general kit pictures:






















The model compares favorably with Trumpeter's other 1/200 offering, the Arizona. Detail is crisp and fit is excellent. I am normally not a fan of molded-on stuff as it usually looks bad but most of it actually works here! The only molded detail that I don't like and want to replace so far are the porthole shields and porthole "eyebrows" as well as the bar steps on the stern and gun turrets/superstructure.

The hull itself is very "In the rough" compared to most plastic ships; the connection points for the interior braces show through to the outside and need to be sanded down, plus there are heavy mold lines to sand as well. The hull is nearly devoid of detail too... but at least hard core rivet counters will have a clean slate to add exactly the right number of rivets onto it.

Unlike other ships I've built, the kit engineerings makes assembling the superstructure almost too easy; the pieces are molded together and stack up like lego blocks. This saves a lot of seam work; in fact the only major real seams on the whole ship that need work to hide are from the the weird cutout on the bow ... I suppose it was a necessary evil to get the hull to come out of the mold.

Don't think building this ship is gonna be any easier though... the box says there there are 1800+ parts. I didn't count but I don't doubt it! This is a HUGE job which will keep the average builder busy for months... if not years !!

Monolithic molding creates other problems too... all the portholes on angled parts are likewise angled so they could come out of the molds and aren't straight. Some are misshappen, especially on the curved parts like the bow or in the superstructure around the secondary guns. It's probably gonna be more work to fix the portholes than it would be to assemble the superstructure in pieces!

Speaking of guns... they are plastic. I also bought the detail-up kit from Trumpeter even though it makes me mad that it's an obvious money grab; there is no good reason those parts couldn't have been part of the standard kit. Trumpeter did the same thing on the Arizona They are almost necessary for a good looking ship as the plastic ones leave a lot to be desired. At least Trumpeter gave us PE instead of plastic "Aztec steps" in the standard kit like the Arizona had.

My other big gripe about the model is the deck. The plank pattern is wrong, nothing on the deck is "boxed out" in the planks like the real boat and the area under the anchor chains is just plain plastic when it should at least be scribed with plank lines. Perhaps Trumpeter figured we'd all slap wooden decks on our Bismarcks so they didn't bother? It's a bit frustrating because I prefer to paint decks to look like wood but the deck here is just too subpar to accept as-is.

All and all, it's what I'm starting to expect from this company... brilliance and blatant stupidity all rolled up into one. But if you are patient enough to fix the errors and follow through to the end, you will have a jaw dropping piece. I couldn't help but notice one company online is selling completed handbuilt 1/200 Bismarck models for over $12,000... this kit has the potential to outshine that offering for only a few hundred bucks... and a few hundred hours!

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-Jason Channell

Current Project: 1/200 Bismarck

Hi Channell,

I have read your review with interest. I fully agree with you at almost every point. I would add two serious points to be corrected at least in my opinion:

1. The hull has not a straight keel. Bow and stern rise up a little bit creating fittings problems between deck and hull. It does not make a perfect fit, I would say just a good one. I think the distorted keel is the reason. Getting the bow and stern down will give the deck the clearence needed to match the hull al least in the longitudinal axis. Concerning the transversal axis, making the keel stright would compress the deck, but the hull would keep it in position without a problem.

2. In the 7th picture you've posted we can see that the shape of the central propeller bossing is not in scale. I have decided to cut it off and replace it by a new one that I have to make in resine. May be it is not necessary to cut, may be only to add some putty and give it the correct shape. We will see...I am studiying this point in deep.

As I've said in other threads, this model is the best Bismarck comercial model and I am sure it will be magnificent out of the box but with aftermarket accesories and proper paints, it would be outstanding.

Rafael

Thanks Rafael...

I didn't have the same problem with my Bismarck; the keel is straight and my deck fits perfectly without any warping. I guess there is some variation in Trumpeter's quality control. The central prop bossing is another issue but I'm not sure yet if I want to replace it entirely. It doesn't look too far off to my eyes, just a little bit undersized.

_________________
-Jason Channell

Current Project: 1/200 Bismarck

On the other hand, I think the propellers in brass ist a must. In 1/350 scale may be we could try to paint them but to match the proper color would be a real challenge. In 1/200 scale, despite of the fact that Trumpeter has made a very nice plastic propellers, the color would be unrealistic.

I am thinking to use RABOESCH propellers type D 162-07 and 08 (see here http://www.raboesch.com/CATALOGUS_2-2010_WEB.pdf page 6.) The propellers have a diameter of 25 mm, but as usually in practice it can be reduced to 23.5 mm using a lathe, or carefully done by hand. The original shaft of 2 mm in diameter can be used unless you go to RC version. In this case it is necessary to check the balancing of the propellers after modification in order to avoid high vibrations on the shaft.

Did you see the amazing accessories to be released on January by the famous Korean manufacture ? It would be a nice adition to the model but the cost is too high. (About 400 dollars) We have to wait and see what pontos can offer.

Merry christmass.

Rafael

I got my MK1 Design set for just 119GBP. That one for $399 on Ebay is just price gouging. The deck is not a worry for me as I always use self-adhesive wooden decks now. You just can't beat the look of real wood.

Cheers guys
Warren

I concur that my hull had a straight keel and outstanding deck fit: In fact the center bottom of the keel is a bit higher than the bow and stern. Not a big deal...

The curvature of the bow's sides did warp slightly the porthole openings, but getting these bow concave curves accurate outweight this problem imho...

Here are a few other observations I posted elsewhere on this site:

"I also think the rear hull of the Trumpeteer kit has a much more prominent error (but simpler to fix) than those shown fixed in the thread: Notably that the rear area of the hull, which is sloping upward above the propellers, is actually a flatter surface than it seems towards the edges, and as a result has sharper "corners" where the sides of this area transition to the vertical, including to some extent all around the stern's bottom. This is actually away from the complicated propeller stems and rudder bases, and so is somewhat easier to "improve" than what is shown in the thread, if not quite a path to a "full" fix...:"



"I did find out something real interesting about the 1/200 Trumpeteer deck plan shape, after much effort: The final rounded end curve (in plan) at the tip of the stern is too narrow in radius: In effect, the deck plan view is slightly too "pointy" at the stern end...

Although this might bring the overall length a bit under scale length, I found it is quite easy to remove/carve out about 4 mm of the stern's deck radius extremity, and change the radius to a significantly broader-looking "rear end" (I did go through the plastic, but not so large a hole resulted when I felt it had gone far enough): This will require cutting a wood deck's extremity to match, and rebuilding in my case the hull's "lip" edge (I scrapped the entire plastic deck sitting surface, so that the deck is slightly "countersunk" by 0.7 mm all around, allowing, in theory, a flush wood deck without too much trouble: It was a major ordeal, but fairly easy to do)

I did not need to remove/alter the nearby deck detail while carving out the rear end's radiused tip, and I don't care if this deck detail now sits too close to the stern extremity. The only other issue I saw with doing this is that the left rear anchor hole is affected, and the sit of the rear anchor will have to be modified to look "untampered with"

To determine this stern radius (or at least its relationship proportional to the whole ship), I used aerial photos of the Tirpiz, seriously enlarged to overlay this enormous kit to it... (Other photos caused problems when repeatedly enlarged):



In profile, correcting this "pointy" stern "squares up" the stern when viewed from the side, and I think that is a good thing as well. The stern profile's lower radius will need squaring up anyways, as I outlined here below (I hope the builder of this particular model will not mind my use of his photo, with my added lines, to make the point):



I have started on the building up the hull's rear lower side edges "squarer", and though easy to do, it requires truly vast amounts of putty... Info on the actual appearance of the docking keels (not drawings) would be greatly appreciated...

Gaston

Did Tirpitz' slightly different hull affect the "pointiness" of both bow and stern?

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De quoi s'agit-il?

For the outline of the deck in plan view? I assumed it didn't...

The bow in the above Tirpiz picture definitely looks identical in outline to the Trumpeteer kit. (The undernourished anchor bulges don't affect this angle: I hope they are easier to fix than they look!)

I do recall that in less favourably angled aerial shots of the actual Bismarck, the deck's stern end also looked just a touch blunter, and thus slightly broader-radiused at the end, than the kit. This suggest the two ships were similar in this area. 3-4 mm of take-in isn't much on a kit this big... I did go through the plastic near the deck, but the hole is barely 2 mm across...

Gaston

[Edit]: On further examination, it seems the problems with this kit go way beyond minor corrections.... The hull simply appears to have no relationship to reality in its entire rear two-thirds cross-section... I really hope I can be proven wrong about this...

Here is what dawned on me as I looked at this overturned Tirpiz photo: I was puzzled because I could not understand what I was looking at, and relate it to any part of the kit... Yet this photo covers a large part of the hull...



Then I suddenly realized the photo does not show, facing the lens, the bottom of the hull, but its side.

Incredibly enough, the Trumpeteer kit is so far out that it does not allow you to recognize what you are looking at... This is because the bottom "corners" of the kit's hull are so "rounded", they make the kit's hull look too shallow, at this angle, to match the image in any recognizable way...

In red I outlined where the Trumpeteer's hull upper "limit" would be if the kit was in roughly the same attitude as the Tirpiz: The canoe-like "roundedness" of the hull is what accounts for most of the missing material...

I fear the red line does not really exaggerate the lack of "squareness" of the hull, as I held my kit at the exact same attitude based on the center prop shaft. The difference is simply astonishing...

The true shape of the Tirpiz's hull is confirmed by this overexposed image, which does still display the shadows of the sharp bottom corners throughout its less-worked-on "high side":



The orientation of the props shafts confirms we are looking at the side in the previous picture: You can see again the repeated round holes done to the hull, and you can see the corner "strake" followed beyond its length by sharp shadows which indicate quite a sharp transition from the vertical of the hull to its horizontal bottom (not caused by the corner "strake", "keel", or whatever it is called).

The Trumpeteer Bismarck hull really is actually closer to the shape of a canoe than to the intended subject... The fact that the orientation of the Tirpiz photo is completely impossible to determine from the kit itself speaks volumes about this...

I would be glad to be proven wrong, but it doesn't look good...

Gaston

Just curious if anyone knows that if Trumpeter is planing a 1/200 Tirpitz? And any after market add ons?

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Building
1/72 Admiral Kuznetsov
1/72 Frunze Russian Battle cruiser
1/72 Steregushchy-class corvette

Mick
Tumut Australia