1:700 USN Kearsarge Crane Ship, by LionRoar

[D-Boy]

I stopped by my office after a day out at meetings and saw that the new US Kearsarge arrived from Hong Kong, where I had ordered from Lucky Model - about two weeks shipping time to get it to the US East Coast. I'm off to DC for meetings early tomorrow, so no time for photos, but wanted to offer some quick first impressions.

Smaller than expected box, packed well, but tightly with resin hull, seperate resin castings, and four sheets of PE, plus instructions.

Hull is flawlessly cast, sits flat, and I notice only one WL edge that will need a light sanding touch to clean. No mold pour removal or sanding required on any of the five other resin pieces - base of crane and various crane housings. All ready for washing and subsequent assembly.

Assembly instructions are contained in a 24-page 3x5 inch stapled booklet, and very straightforward - in my limited experience with PE, I would suggest these are the clearest instructions I have ever seen for the assembly sequence for PE. They remind me of the clarity and sequencing of Lego instructions - that good. Of course, given the predominance of PE in this model, they better be good.

20 of those pages are dedicated to crane assembly, the final 4 to the crane support and deck/bridge features.

Very impressive kit of a totally unique subject. Will post pictures by the weekend.

[D-Boy]

With apologies for a long delay in posting further comments and photos.

I remain extremely impressed with this kit.

Neat and tidy box, chock full of bubble-wrap and resin and PE:



WL hull, with prominent side bulges added for stability during the 1920 crane refit. About 7 inches in length:



Bow and stern, close-ups:





Crane base, two angles. Note large resin pour stub:





Resin details for crane:



Weights and housing for the crane:



Front of bridge:



Rear of bridge. Note resin pour stub at bottom. A thin piece slices out, leaving two mounting pins to located bridge to deck in proper orientation:



Five frets of PE for this kit - the smallest fret is duplicative of PE on one of the larger frets. Not sure why LionRoar would give an option of material for these select parts... perhaps steel (?) stronger than brass for rigging purposes?



Instructions for PE are 20 pages in length and the crane builds in a very clearly laid out sequence:











Very impressed with all components of this kit!

[Dan K]

Agreed, impressive

[djohannsen]

Any updates on this one? Please... This kit looks simply stunning to me (so much so that I would be tempted to leave it unpainted). I would love to hear whether it goes together well. I am also curious whether this could this be built using CA or if soldering is required. I don't think that my skills are yet up to this kit, but am sorely tempted to buy it and put it in the pile to "get to later."


Dave

Edit: Just ordered the YD-33... We'll see how it goes.

[D-Boy]

Dave, I am still at the "look-in-the-box-and-drool" stage for this kit, but do expect to bring it on vacation with me in July with intention of making some progress.

(But every time I butcher a PE fold on another model, I think about putting this kit at risk.)

Do agree this would be very interesting unpainted.

[djohannsen]

Dave, I am still at the "look-in-the-box-and-drool" stage for this kit, but do expect to bring it on vacation with me in July with intention of making some progress.

(But every time I butcher a PE fold on another model, I think about putting this kit at risk.)

Do agree this would be very interesting unpainted.

If I get my gumption up sooner and jump in on my YD-33, I'll try to post some comments (especially regarding CA, as soldering is more than I want to master right now). Fear of destroying the PE is why I went with the YD-33 - still a very involved crane, but the kit is about $20 less. Good luck to you when you do give it a go.


Dave

[Guido]

Hi, guys!
The kit is generally nice, but it lacks a couple of things. It does not have a rigging instruction. There are no parts for the main or secondary jig. There are no pulleys present whatsoever. Some details are missing such as life boat davits. A few dimsional errors will be spotted by the rivet counters.
Overal the kit is pretty good, but not perfect. The slap-on-the-forhead part is that the omissions could very easily be avoided by close study of the pics available in the net.
I still recommend it to the dedicated modeller and commend LR to trod off the beaten track!
Cheers,
Guido


PS.:It's kind of funny that I get to see a lot of their stuff for checking, but the first time they put out a ship, I don't get to see anything before release.