Building the Dragon Z-39 in 1/350 scale

[GazzaS]

Hi Jenny! Thank you for your kind comment. A lot of modellers here use brass or other materials for the masts because they tend to bend after having rigging attached. I haven't even finished my masts, yet. They're still in pieces waiting for me to get more of the superstructure completed. Unfortunately I'm struggling with railings for the superstructure pieces that don't have the vertical struts where I need them(historically), so have had to make them on my own.

I'm new to the whole shipbuilding thing and am learning by mistake, trial, and error. Shipbuilding has given me a greater appreciation for the happy time spent building Tamiya 1/35 scale armor.

[GazzaS]

Success of a sort but ultimately a failure. I figure I'll share so maybe someone can offer some better solution.

I was having a heck of a time with PE railing. I just don't have steady hands, but was resolved to keep trying. I came to the after gun deck and realized that my generic German PE railing would not have vertical supports where there were bends at the lower level of the deck house (which is shaped like some wonky figure . This couldn't be right. So, I spent a lot of hours finding a close-up photo of that area. I discovered I was right. The railing I had purchased wouldn't work without irritating me. Then I noticed that the upper level of the deck house railing was only 2 squares (or whatever the correct term is) high. Obviously that had to go, as well. And, in my clumsiness, I'd trashed the railing for the forward vierling.

So, I built an experimental model on a piece of flat styrene and decided it was strong enough and fine enough to be tested in real conditions. Below is the result.



After painting, you'll notice that my horizontals are very fine, and hard to see in some places. Just like in pictures! Score one for me. I used my wife's hair. Collected from a hairbrush, washed, Ironed, and held in place by PVA.

My verticals are ugly. Coated with too much PVA, and some leaning at crazy angles. Score one for team "F". My verticals are the bristles from the brush behind my work, held in place by Tamiya model cement.

Here's what went wrong: My test model was done with some very old nylon bristles from a battered pool table brush. I bought a new brush with much finer bristles to use. I assumed that the same glue would work. I Only discovered I was wrong whilst putting the horizontals on.

The hair didn't stick to the PVA once it had dried uniformly. Although this helped ruin my overall finish, it did allow me to tighten areas up by pulling on the hair. I used PVA because web surfing took me to a doll site where PVA was used to glue a real-hair wig to a hard plastic doll.

So, this is like 3-4 days of work for a result which shows I should have tried different cements. Plastic to nylon, it seems neither CA nor Tamiya gives rock solid performance every time. Hair to nylon, the PVA has good tack, but is hard not to blobulate when you're clumsy like me.

The only thing I really like is how fine the railing looks after painting. When working with the hair, it's almost invisible, and easily lost to sight.

As usual, I'd love to hear your thoughts whilst I return to the drawing board.

[PetrolGator]

I've seen similar techniques used for railing. Perhaps purchasing some VERY fine copper fire from a local hobby shop for the verticals would be better?

Also: Try using stretched sprue. You can attach the sprue to the verticals with matte varnish with relative ease. You can tighten railings with a little heat.

[GazzaS]

Well, since my last post I haven't glued together two pieces of styrene despite being on vacation. This all because I have been fighting the battle of custom railing. At this scale I'm finding some things just too difficult for my hands and eyes to manage. I may have to either lower my expectations, or hope that practice will make things better, or move on to larger scale scratch-building.

I devoted an entire day (well, almost) to stretched sprue. It's just too fragile for my hands or my glues. And heat shrinking...massive failure.

I tried various glues to get plastic, vinyl, and human hair to work together. I found a glue that would work for all, but it bubbled when drying, so every time I walked away from two joined pieces, I'd return to find shifting. I wanted vinyl because of it's flexibility, fineness, stiffness, and strength. An additional problem with vinyl was that it was nigh impossible to get enough hold on one end of line to make the next piece of line straight. After much searching I went with natural fibers. Coco fibre bristles and hair. The result is better than the last three attempts but still in need of improvement. But, I need to move on. I've never spent a week on 7-linear inches of model before.



On many of the pictures of this class of ship, there is a railing that is out of sync with the 3-bar system around the aft deck house guns. I never could really tell what it was, where it started and began, or what purpose it served. No picture was close enough until I found the one below. I finally figured it was a stub-railing placed there to keep the ready-use ammo from falling off the deck house. You'll see in my pic that I've modeled it, but very poorly. Trying to work in a space smaller than 2mm wide is too dang hard.

[rtwpsom2]

Are you referring to the ready ammo troughs that surround the gun in a semicircle? When the guns are in use they mate up with the two doors in the ammo room wall just ahead of them. Then gunpowder and ammo is set on the tracks and rolled into place. It goes to either side so the troughs can feed the gun in any position. Also, I am not sure if the ammo is caseless like most bigger guns or not. I assume it is because why use two troughs if not? In the photo they are stowed out of the major path of travel.

[GazzaS]

I'm referring to the stub rails which form a fourth bar around the ready ammo troughs. For these cannon, the powder and shell were separate...because they were really cruiser size guns. Lightened versions of those on all of the German capitals. I imagine there are two rails so that the ready use ammo can be placed so that it's easy to get to no-matter which way the cannon are pointing.

On most places on most German ships you can find three-bar railing. However on this vessel there is 4-bar railing around the ready use ammo, and two bar railing around the vierling at the upper level of the deck house.

[GazzaS]

I've finally got the bones of Z-39 cum z-32 painted. I've learned something about detail. The more detail you have, the harder it is to get a pristine finish when masking and spraying. However, I hate the thought of removing all of the factory applied detail and then trying to replace it. What is a man to do?



Answer: Touch up, touch up, and more touch up.

But I can understand why some guys don't want splinter...lol

[Plastic Habit]

Enjoying watching your build. Really like the paint job you have done.

Makes me want to start working on my Zerstorers.

[GazzaS]

Thanks Plastichabit. I'm probably going to have to get zvezda's z-17. I'm hoping that Dragon will release the type 34 and 34a. The more time I spend with this kit the more I'm impressed with it's detail, parts fit, and overall quality.

[Plastic Habit]

I agree. Dragon ships are very nice to work with and are forgiving too.

In the stash I have their Z-31 and 38 kits that I have started getting after-market parts for when I'm ready to build them.

Keep up the great work. Looking forward to seeing more of your progress.

FYI, I might have to steal some ideas for when I do my Zs.

[GazzaS]

I have been working on it, honestly. Even though I'm on vacation I can rarely make myself sit in one place for very long. There's always something else that has to be done. On the brighter side I bought a 1/72 aircraft model for when I want to slap some plastic together.



I've finally got both masts soldered and glued together. Soldering is a very new skill for me. So much so that I always need to file and sand some solder away when I'm done. This poor ship model has been little else but experimentation and learning. The four main superstructure parts are glued into place. A light blackwash has been applied with Tamiya flat black acrylic thinned with water and quickly dabbed off in hopes that faint dark shadows show around all of the detail. Hopefully any extra blackwash that stayed on got touch-up painted over so I can avoid das "Verlinden Effekt". Then I drybrushed with Tamiya flat white enamel to lightly bring out any raised details. Finally I've started adding the smaller detail pieces which will get some kind of treatment later.

I like these digital photos cause they can show just how crappy something can look.

As always, your insight is very much appreciated.

For the curious, or the Hipper class builder, the black and white photo shows where the ejected cartridge cases from the superfiring turrets land. I snapped a screenshot from a youtube video because I thought it a useful detail.

[MartinJQuinn]

Coming along nicely. Love the camo!

[GazzaS]

Thanks Martin! Once I get to the place where I don't have to touch everything I'll start toning her hull colors down a bit. I like the scheme, but it seems a little too stark.

[mick]

great camo job

[GazzaS]

Thanks! I've had to put it away for the night. I just about had a Godzilla moment. After repeatedly stuffing up whilst bending PE, then stuffing up the in-box mast supports I was ready to cast the offending warship into the Sea of Japan.

[Dan K]

Smart. Best to sleep on it. I've been there too many times.

[GazzaS]

More wasted effort. Stuck waiting on railing and figurines, I've been trying to put ready-use-ammo into the ready-use-ammo rails that flank most of the type's main batteries. I also am bagging the ends of my paravanes with simulated canvas. It seemed like a common practice on the type. I'm just using layers of white glue since I have a big blob of it on my blotter.
Their using the kit-supplied and now damaged ammo rails as rests while they dry.

I worked on those rails for so long that they became unusable and I had to make new rails with resin after making molds from the surviving two ammo rails. All to no avail, because I'm massively out-of-scale in relation to my sailors which arrived today. My Sailor might as well be standing next to Yamato ammo. My wife's sewing machine kit supplied the shells which are just the tips of steel pins.
Man! Are they small. Like ants.
I bought three sets of figurines. Two German sets, and the boxing tournament set. It's the only set my supplier had that had seated ppl. Some of the cheering sailors look well posed to man the range-finders and other optical gear.
Anyway, I've learned a few things.

[GazzaS]

Been a while since my last post. I've been in figurine hell. My best calculations for how many men that should be on deck at visible action stations counts for 81 of the crew of 220.

When you look at those Northstar figures online, they sure look big. But when you paint them, they sure are tiny. I've broken countless due to their fragility and my lack of grace. However, I finally got them done. I used two German sets, and the US Boxing Tournament set to give me some guys who are sitting down. Really, they are so tiny and so blobbed with paint, that you can't tell which is which. I was gonna try to helmet some. But once I realized how easily their heads came off, I gave that idea up.



The enlisted men are all wearing dark blues with the German equivalent of the Kapok vest. It's a decent looking piece of gear. Looks like you could wear it and fight. The officers aren't wearing theirs. I wanted to have a stab at painting the shiny bits that show off their status.

Once I'd applied them, they looked too bright. So, I gave them a heavy wash in the uniform color. I tried to use various shades on all of the cloth bits, but I didn't differentiate enough for it to show once they were all put together.

The photo itself ain't so hot. My phone seems to have trouble focusing when I try to take a picture.

[Goodwood]

"When you look at those Northstar figures online, they sure look big. But when you paint them, they sure are tiny."

The story of my life, man. Oh sure, building the latest superkit looks awesome when following someone else's build with all those juicy photographs of intricate detail all blown up on the computer screen. Then you get that selfsame kit in your own hands and...is that a hose reel, or did I drop a bit of sprue from that tank model I was working on last week?

Anyway, they look great for what they are, and personally I can't imagine how anyone could've gotten better results.

[GazzaS]

Thanks Goodwood. I think it's gotten easier to paint them better as I went along. I experimented a lot with different tools, even using wire or stretched sprue when I couldn't get a result I wanted with a brush. When I first started, it seemed I'd have no hope. Eventually I returned to the brush and got better results than when I started.

But that doesn't mean I'll ever do another Dio in this scale again. It crosses the fun/difficult boundary too often for me.

Highest praise to you guys who build small.