The Ship Model Forum

This is a kit that's been literally staring at me since I stumbled upon it on eBay about four months ago. I've been collecting PE, resin aftermarket, plastic aftermarket, and even bits from a failed Wee Vee build.

In total:

- IHP's kit, in its entirety.
- Brass 6" barrels
- 3DModelParts 1.1", 50 cal, 5"/38, cage masts, and other bits
- Tom's PE for the caage masts
- Various PE cranes, etc.
- Bits from the Trumpeter West Virginia kit

I haven't decided if I'm going to use the IHP superstructure, the WeeVee, or entirely scratch build something (or something in between.)

I'll hopefully begin building this thing tonight.

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

Good luck! Look forward to what you come up with.

If you scrap the IHP superstructure, send me a message, there is a part I'd like to take off your hands for my CC-3 rebuild.

_________________
Martin

"Tomorrow is the most important thing in life. Comes into us at midnight very clean. It's perfect when it arrives and it puts itself in our hands. It hopes we've learned something from yesterday." John Wayne

Ship Model Gallery

Ooh, interesting. Are you going to be sticking with the IHP turrets or using the WV ones?

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Vlad

//If you scrap the IHP superstructure, send me a message, there is a part I'd like to take off your hands for my CC-3 rebuild.//

I'll bug you over Facebook to see what part you need. I'm still sketching ideas on what, exactly, I need to change to add the '41 rangefinders, AA platforms, etc seen on the Colorado class. I figure that they would be the closest analog to a modern equivalent.

//Ooh, interesting. Are you going to be sticking with the IHP turrets or using the WV ones?//

Jury's still out. The IHP turrents aren't bad, though a little material heavy on one side of the current (necessitating careful sanding.)

I can say this much. PE involved, so far:

- GMM's fast BB
- Five Star Models hatches and some deck details
- Lion Roar's USN deck details
- Flyhawk's perforated gussets, supports, early USN radar, etc.

I think there's more, but I'll have to look in the pile.

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

I didn't mean from a quality point of view, I'm sure IHP's turrets are well cast. I meant more from a looks/preference point of view, if you are in the "curved roof" school or the "slanted roof" school.

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Vlad

After looking over all the resin and styrene parts, I'm leaning toward the WeeVee turrets. The IHP parts are decently cast, but pitted in spots where correction would result in a loss of what detail is there. Further, I sort of like how Martin's Saratoga looked with them.

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

Progress on the IHP Lexington.
I've been chopping and building the bridge structure, utilizing parts from a Maryland kit. Many portholes were too high, so I filled and replace them with Flyhawk PE. The other deck details are from a hard to find Lion Roar set.

I'm close to getting paint on the hull. Once that's done, I'll start adding 1.1" gun tubs, catapults, etc.

The funnels are going to be a beach, being that they're solid resin. I'm 50/50 on a total scratch job here. I'm going to TRY to hollow these guys, but well see.

I'm also planning to re-rig the Queen Mary in the near future, so that'll put this back a little farther.

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

Chris,

Looking good, you can get 3d printed stacks off of shapeways. They are hollow and easier to drill the cap out and detail.

Look forward to more updates,

Matt

_________________
In the yards right now:
USS Utah AG-16
On Hold
1/350 USS Portland CA-33 1942
1/350 Trumpeter Texas with a twist

Looking good, Chris!

_________________
Martin

"Tomorrow is the most important thing in life. Comes into us at midnight very clean. It's perfect when it arrives and it puts itself in our hands. It hopes we've learned something from yesterday." John Wayne

Ship Model Gallery

Progress on the USS Lexington. I've only had about an hour to build today, but I've largely finished the navigation level of the bridge.
Added: supports for the 5" rangefinders (behind navigation bridge) and support structures under the bridge.

I'll next do this to the lower 1.1" platforms and catwalks (which were built with styrene and CA-stiffened paper.

Next? I'll give the main hull a once over and decide if it's ready for the first primer level. I also need to finish the 1.1" gun tubs that are on deck.

....lots to do. I need to fill space between the gussets and the navigation bridge, for example. There's still a LOT of work to do on, well, everything.

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

I'm trying to drill out the funnel out now. I've spent a LOT of accessories for Lexington, so another fourteen bucks isn't much.

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

I've continued building, rebuilding, and just throwing PE at the bridge. I keep some level of sanity by doing quick dry fits (like this) to remind myself that there is a warship under all this work. I'm mostly satisfied, sans the railing on the catwalk under the bridge. Thankfully, this is resin and I can sand it lightly down to match the PE. I got impatient.

I am noticing that the IHP superstructure is longer on one side. I'm hiding it as best as I can, but I'm sort of wishing I simply went with the Colorado class bridge entirely.

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

I've finally dug this one out again. Updates with be rather sparse due to the evolution of my skills and time obligations from work, life, and modeling promises (read: commission work.)

Setting:
I'm still planning to do Lexington as imagined on December 7th, having been dispatched to escort carriers currently ferrying aircraft to Wake. The battlecruiser will be sailing at high speed back to Pearl Harbor, actively searching for the elusive Kido Butai. She'll be without her float planes, having launched them to search for the fleet.

Status:
I've hollowed out much of the IHP funnels and plan to build new grills using copper and/or stretched sprue. I'm also currently building gun tubs to protect exposed AA gun positions using plastic stock. I'll add ribbing and other detail as I go on, likely with sprue. The following pictures show the detail of two of the (incomplete) gun tubs and overall show of the Lexington dry fit. Note: I haven't yet started work on either catapult or the 1.1" gun tubs I plan to add. I also am still debating how I'll place her launches, though they'll likely go midships as per her design. I'm seriously considering adding to platforms adjacent to launches for additional AA. With the Lexingtons likely acting as escorts for the scouting fleet, I imagine they'd have priority for the new .50 cal and 1.1" AA guns.

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

Looking good! I have often wondered about the 1.1/ 3-inch aa guns on this class. Being mounted on the lower aft deck, I wonder if this would have been good or bad considering that at high speed I imagine this deck to be pretty wet.

Looking forward to seeing this one resurrected.

_________________
In the yards right now:
USS Utah AG-16
On Hold
1/350 USS Portland CA-33 1942
1/350 Trumpeter Texas with a twist

With Invincible done, I'm back at this. I had planned on making serious headway this weekend....

...then the wife decided our kitchen cabinets needed new paint. Sigh.

Still, I -did- managed to prime the main hull after finished the AA gun tubs and begin work on the wood deck.

Process is as follows:

1) Paint the deck in your desired base coat. In my case, I used Tamiya's light deck tan.

2) Use very sharp colored pencils in a variety of colors. I used two shades of yellow, a few dashes of orange, and two shades of brown. Make your deck look like a damn Thanksgiving decoration. Like this:



3) Resume with base color or a shade off of the base. I added some Tamiya flat white to my deck tan mixture and diluted it to 80-90% thinner. Over several layers, mute the lines until they're just visible. All lines should blend into the base paint and only bear a little hint of their existence. This was, well, mostly successful. A few darker lines are still visible on the starboard side of the second turret. I'll lighten it up after work.





4) Future then use a darker oil wash to pick out the hull planks. This should be light unless your vessel has seen a lot of action, JMO. This has not been done.

I'm not sure if I'm going to mask the deck off and airbrush 5D on the hull or stick to hand painting. I've had paint ripped off by tape in 4/5 ships I've done in resin, regardless of how hard I've scrubbed them or how much I've primed the ships. My one exception was after a Future treatment on the ENTIRE ship, but I'm still admittedly paranoid. I may mask off the entire upperworks and spray the hull, relying on the brush for her upperworks. I'm still not sure.

All for now. Ideally, I'll post a pretty picture of her hull fully base-painted in the next few days. While that dried, I'll continue work on the forward superstructure and funnels.

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

I've had the same issue with tape pulling up acrylics. But never when I've used Tamiya primer underneath. I don't know what is different with their primer but it's always been foolproof for me.

After a few days off masking in my "free time," I managed to get the vertical surfaces and superstructure painted 5D. Thankfully, a preparatory layer of thin Future avoided all but one big chunk of paint that came off right where the superstructure sits. Win.



Here's the vessel with what bits I've started work on. I hadn't touched anything up to the point.

I've added two 1.1" gun tubs from my donor kit above the quarterdeck. I figured that the latter would likely be utilized almost entirely for aircraft handling and likely wet.



I'm not focusing on adding additional details to the hull. I have a number of brass muchroom vents, donor kit vents, hatch covers, boat cradles, etc that will be added to the ship's main hull to not only increase detail but to make the kit more realistic.

Note this midships aft superstructure where funnel #2 sits:

I've cut and removed the knob-things and placed two ventilators from the Maryland kit after drilling out their holes to a major in-scale size. Note one is painted:



Sadly, I've only been able to do a few little things after painting due to a massive home improvement task that is now thankfully complete. I'm hoping to get the hull mostly done this week. I'll then focus on the boat deck, funnels, and work myself out (with occasional work on the scratch and detail-heavy bridge.)

Note that the plastic catapult is for placement only. I have the excellent GMM PE set for USN battleships. I'll be using catapults off of that.

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

Made some progress in what little modeling time I've found. Most of my focus has been on the ship's two funnels. I first focused on the forward funnel base by adding some ventilators, grills, and bits from my Maryland donor to add some visual interest to this area. Ribbing on the funnel was also restored.

Note on the grill: This is a prototype. I was hoping to get away with, erm PROTOTYPING a funnel grill design. Being that it's rather bare, I'll either:

* Pull it off and add two more beams running port/starboard.
* Add styrene to either side of the stem/stern member, glue, add pressure to properly curve, then glue to funnel. Repeat successfully four times. Sand. Hopefully profit.
* Solder an entirely new funnel grill from scratch.
* Cheat by making a 3D design and having it printed.

I'm still not sure where I'll go.



I decided to move on to the aft funnel and work on the searchlight platforms. The original IHP resin bits were cast rather thick (and the port/starboard examples weren't entirely even) so I decided to utilize one platform as a pattern and cut new ones from sheet styrene. Here's where it stands with reinforcement and some support girders. I'll add the second, higher platform to each side tonight.



Overall, here's Lexington as of 09/28. Once I finish with the aft funnel, I'll eat my fear and resume work on the bridge. Once that's done, I plan to get the boat deck (between funnels) planned out, designed, and installed.



Step by step....

_________________
- Chris

1/700 Saratoga w/Pontos (Needs paint)
1/700 Potato w/Kurama (On hold)
1/700 Murdertorpedoboat Ooi

Next to the Enterprise, the Lexingtons are my favorite carriers. Cool seeing a model of what they would have looked like had they been continued as planned.

Great progress!

Nice work so far! I think the funnel grill is acceptable, very similar to what I did on mine. Battleships don't see much in the way of cowlings, cruisers however do by the time frame you are building so maybe on the forward stack if you wanted a small cowling? I also agree that 1.1's or any other aa gun(seen a couple of drawings with something on that aft deck) would have not worked out so well there. I had them in a similar place as yours but after looking at the big 5 and some other BB's, felt blast damage would be cause to not leave them out in the open. I haven't decided whether I should mount them over the top of the aft most case mate gun or on the main deck a little aft of it abreast turret #3

Loving the build so far, possibly my favorite class of never builts

Matt

_________________
In the yards right now:
USS Utah AG-16
On Hold
1/350 USS Portland CA-33 1942
1/350 Trumpeter Texas with a twist