*COMPLETED* 1/350 USS Benson (DD-421), 1940

[Devin]

Hand rails and doors are pretty much done. There's an electrical conduit or two that needs to be put on the forward deck house with some fine wire, but I'll wait until I get a coat of primer applied before I do that.

Hand rails are done with .010" (.3mm) round styrene rod from Plastruct. That's as small as it goes that I've been able to find; normally I use Evergreen styrene as I find their shapes more consistent, but they don't make anything this small, and the Plastruct looks good when applied.

I also applied the first photo etch, some ladders on the aft deck house (leftovers from a Blue Water Navy Benson/Gleaves set I've used in the past) and a fire station from the GMM doors and accessories sets.

The styrene watertight doors went on really well. There's a trick to cutting them off the sprue so they don't get damaged and so you don't have to sand the tiny things too much, but otherwise they snap right into place. In the photos they stick out a bit too far, but in person they look just fine.

I picked up paint on Friday, so I'm ready to move on. I hope to get primer on the hull and these superstructure bits today or tomorrow, then start spraying some color.

[Dan K]

Nice work. I like this configuration, prewar.

[Devin]

The pre-war color scheme, coupled with the parts break down, is going to make painting very simple. The limited AA fit also cuts down on the complications. The only issue I forsee is going to be the rigging. I need to come up with a decent brass replacement for the mast; I'm thinking a large sewing or a small knitting needle?

The guns and directors are going together well, although with 5" closed mounts pretty much require you to use the blast bag versions of the barrels, as the non-bagged versions are wide open and look nothing like the real thing.

[marijn van gils]

Hello Devin,

Most decent hobby shops sell a nice selection of brass wire in a range of diameters. Many hardware stores do so too, but their range usually starts with larger diameters. That should be easier to purchase than finding the right knitting needle, and maybe even cheaper too.

Cheers,

Marijn

[Devin]

Marijn, thanks for the suggestion. I've used brass rod in the past for my resin kit builds, but it doesn't have the taper I like. I've tried to taper rods by putting them in my drill press or Dremel and sanding, but I haven't been able to get a satisfactory result as of yet.

[marijn van gils]

Ok, I understand now Devin.
I had succes with that method (the horizontal spar at the top rear edge of the funnel of my Lexington is for example tapered on both sides like that). But I can imagine that it wouldn't be so easy for larger items in 1/350th as the brass rod tends to flex away and the result might be too irregular. So sewing needles might be a great idea indeed!

Cheers,

Marijn

[Devin]

Finishing up the major assemblies so I can start spraying some primer. Honestly I'd hoped to have it to that point well before now -- the NATS are fast approaching -- but social obligations during evenings weekends have curtailed my modeling time.

The bridge and the director base (is that the conning tower?) have open portholes. An odd choice since all of the bridge and deck house portholes aren't open, and none of them in the hull. To get uniformity, I cut styrene scraps and glued behind them to close them off.

The torpedo tubes and the gun mounts are nifty little pieces that needed little clean-up. I haven't assembled the two open 5" mounts yet as their base is deck gray with the rest being the standard lighter gray; it'll be easier to paint the pieces individually then assemble afterwards.

[Gordon Bjorklund]

I like your progress pictures and wish you had more at this time but I'm glad you got some time to work on this kit and post your progress.

Now to change the subject.
Do you have any new Civil War articles coming out in the future? It's been about a year since the last one that I know of.

[Devin]

Gordon,

Thanks. I do have some free evenings and as of right now this coming weekend is free and clear, so I plan on at the bare minimum getting the thing primed and getting the paint started.

Yes, my last piece on the Civil War Navy was last December (the one on the western river ironclads HERE). As with most things that have to do with the world of words, the Times had their budget slashed for that project, so instead of posting an article a day, this year it's been only two or three times a week, max. I did, however, just receive my edit notes this past weekend for my next piece on the conflict's submarines. That one will go up in January and unless I can squeak something else in, it may be my last Times contribution. I've been dedicating more time to my fiction recently (editing my first screenplay, looking for representation for my latest novel, started a new novel), so the drop-off on the Civil War requirements is a mixed blessing.

-Devin

[Devin]

Two quick questions for those following along, based off of the photos that Rick Davis posted on May 29th (page 1 of this thread):

1. I've studied the overhead view several times, and zoomed-in on a very high resolution copy of that photo, and I can not make out any non-skid on the decks. Did they use it pre-war?

2. The hull sides, especially forward at the bow, there are three distinct runs of "plating". Does it appear that the center run is raised, or are they all on the same "level". Was the skin on these DD's welded, resulting in a raised weld bead, or were they butted up next to each other, leaving little seam at all?

[taskforce48]

Devin,

I could find no images of a Benson/Gleaves with the anti skid, mostly due to not having any clear overhead shots of this class. I find several images of other prewar classes using them. I found a photo of the Farragut, Dale, Downes and Preston all dated in the late 30's where you can see the anti skid. It doesn't look as prevalent as it did during the war, but you can still make it out. It was real heavy around the open gun mounts.

As for the hull, can't claim being and expert there, but in reviewing a lot of photos of this class, it would appear that the center strake was recessed, but varied from ship to ship on how much. Photos of the Bailey and the Mackenzie show a noticeable recess in the center strake. The Wells, Kalk and Carmick show it to almost be flush across all three. Either way, even the more pronounced recesses would be mighty fine in 1/350.

Keep up the great work!

Matt

[Devin]

Matt,

Thanks for the feedback. I thought the central strake was a bit recessed myself, but wanted to see if anyone else got that. I plan on depicting it very finely by masking off that area then shooting the rest of the hull with a further coat of primer to give a little build-up.

For the non-skid I'll think on it some more. The kit comes with the decals, so no trouble adding them. In the photo I mentioned on page 1 of this log I looked again at the overhead photo, and it looks like there could be something there, but not as pronounced as the decals and wartime fit would have been.

Thanks,

-Devin

[taskforce48]

Devin,

Found something of use. The USS Monssen was probably the best documented prewar Benson/Gleaves as far as close up detail that I have found.
http://www.navsource.org/archives/05/0543605.jpg

Navsource has a few more of use for you if you decide to go that way. I think the anti skid plates just blend better with the deck gray for some reason and stand out on the deck blue?
http://www.navsource.org/archives/05/436.htm

HTH

Matt

[Devin]

My first free weekend in some time, so I'm knocking out as much as I can. I'd HOPED to have the major sub assemblies and the hull fully primed by the end of today. I'm not going to make it, but I'm damned close!

Not pictured below, I've also gotten the stack assemblies initial assembly finished. The kit includes duplicates of the trunks, one with molded in ladder, one without. A nice touch. There are pretty significant sink marks along the sides of the stacks where they attach to the sprue, however, so several passes of Mr. Surfacer 500 applied with a brush and sanding are in-progress.

Now that painting is imminent, I'm still going back and forth if I should do a dark base first. The pre-war gray is so close in shade to the Mr. Surfacer primer that it's difficult to judge coverage, and I've become a fan of doing an overall black coat first on armor and sci-fi aircraft, to help with shading. Of course one option is to shoot everything the darker deck gray first, which may be what I do.

[MartinJQuinn]

Nice! I'd better get cracking on my DD.

[Devin]

Single photo today of the two stacks. I was skeptical of the fine pipe work they include, as I didn't think it's survive being cut from the sprue, and then I didn't see how it could be glued together (the short run of pipe is molded separate from the longer run). But they came off the sprue without an issue, and the sprue casting points are on the pipe mount brackets inner side, which is a nice touch, as you don't want to have to sand something this fine. They glued up fine, snapped right into place. The stack caps went on with no problems, as did he PE ladders and the platform for the forward stack.

The only issue I've had is with the stack opening framing/grate piece included in brass. It's very fine, in two pieces per stack, and there's no mounting points in the stack cap. I usually say that if a bit of PE is smaller than a grain of rice and I drop it more than 10 times trying to apply it, then it isn't worth the effort. These aren't worth the effort. I'm trying to come up with something else -- maybe scratch it from styrene or paper.

Otherwise, I'm happy with how these turned out. Once they're primed I can start painting.

[Devin]

A little free time today before I start prepping to grill for some friends, and I'm using it to do the rest of the small assemblies. I've often read people complaining about these Dragon kits for the lack of detail to the instructions, and the occasional call-out for incorrect part numbers. The open 5" guns are the first time I've run into blatant examples of both. Each is made up of 10 or so parts, and the instructions basically show an exploded view and say "apply glue", and the part numbers are all completely wrong. Fortunately they got the sprue letter right, it's a small sprue, and it's easy to tell which parts you need. To figure out placement I did a lot of internet research, and pulled out a set of L'Arsenal resin 5" 38's, and came THIS CLOSE to using them, but I don't want to use after market resin on this kit if I can avoid it (and I'm saving them for my USS Essex build).

[Devin]

Once I figured out where that first piece went on the 5" mount, it all fell into place. Well, if something can "fall into place" over the course of an hours worth of off-and-on work, that is. I'm particularly proud of how the open mount turned out, and now that I'm building the second one and know how it goes together, it's much smoother.

One thing that Dragon doesn't mention in the instructions at all, or maybe they do and I just can't read it in Chinese, is that the locator holes for the K Gun racks and mounts on the main deck need to be filled in, as they aren't used. I'm in the process of jumping back and forth now between doing that and finishing the second open 5" mount

[sgtryan13]

Looking great Devin! I really do need to get around to building one of the newer Dragon kits, it has been on my list since the first one came out. So many models, so little time...

[PetrolGator]

K-Gun holes shouldn't be a big problem. I filled these on my Laffey without losing anything I was aware of. The boat is looking good. What shade of grey are you using, or are you going to blend up something that approximates the pre-war grey?