NORMANDIE in 1/700 scale - a non-grey fleet ship !

[JIM BAUMANN]

Thansk you Jeff--

I have seen that -- its a concise compilation of the full 48 minute version...

screen-shots off the you-tube version which has supplied much desired detail!!

So I have now completed the install of the davits on the stb side
( it took quite a while tp align then all to my liking!! )
they await their bracing plates.

as a pleasant distraction ( and prevarication to start the davits on the port side...(!)

-- I painted and fiddled with the Lifeboat winching stations;

I was not satisfied with the simplified cast versions that I tried to improve back in February 2019 (!)





The real thing(s) looked like this:( slightly differing designs from fwd to aft)

I could make one from scratch quite well,

but -

I lack the ability of repeatability ...- making a dozen or more
completely identical...

hence....

The 3D printed versions ( done for me by Black Cat )

I attached them all to the sticky edge of a post it note , ladled some paint on the end of a brush
onto the ridged steps to try and self level the ( minute!) printing steps ...
and after drying painted them lightly .
'
Thereafter very carefully I painted the barrels ,
' edged' them with graphite dust on a brush and a blade sharpened pencil

I have since been going through all my PE

and I may remove the 3=D printed hand wheels
and substitute them with smaller 1/700 wheels

using gunsights ( WEM oerlikeon) or similar .


will report in on this soon.

In the meantime...

The ports side Davits are underway in the making,-- so now that I am practised...

Ha!

The 3-D printed life-raft stacks are being painted....

[SovereignHobbies]

Those winches look great Jim

[marijn van gils]

+1! A big improvement over the previous version.
Smaller handwheels would fit better to the real thing indeed, but the current items do look good too.

And congrats on the davits. Quite a job! That will be really spectacular with all the boats installed.

[JIM BAUMANN]

Marijinn wrote;

>>> Smaller handwheels would fit better to the real thing indeed, but the current items do look good too.<<<

Thank you Marijinn you for giving me the opportunity to shirk my obsessive nature guilt-free...

alas the hand wheels were way too large and bothered me!

interestingly the ones on the real thing are really quite small !

I did actually find some Oerlikon 1/700 gun-sights in my PE stahes that would have been about right...
BUT... installed to the tops they looked " wrong "
and to the casual observer would look wrong ( in my view )

so I compromised ...

The Lionroar 50 mm USN Bofor sights were the choice in the end

the slight ' cupping' of the etching in the corners of spokes-to rim-and centre boss radii bothered me
but I reckoned with a bit of careful dry-brush I may be able to disguise it

I offered up one of the Bofor PE sights to a spare winch to compare

It looked satisfactory

so I proceeded to paint them all and am now removing the existing hand-wheels
and replacing with the smaller PE items ( I reckon about 40% smaller )

result as below on the first couple--the second one is better
fortunately I have enough handwheels for 24 winches -- (!! )


so I shall keep on !!

[EJFoeth]

Excellent progress! 3D printing enhanced by 2D printing

[zs180]

Jim, it seems to me that this is your most demanding project so far (correct me if I am wrong).
It is a real test of your perseverance. You truly spare no effort and never cut corners, and it shows!
This is going to be something extraordinary, even from you!

[silvershadow]

Hi Jim, this looks amazing so far, love the progress on this beauty

[marijn van gils]

That was worth the effort I believe, Jim. Just the fact that the handwheels are now smaller than the boxes they sit on instead of bigger makes a big difference in appearance.

[JIM BAUMANN]

Hello all -- and many thanks for your words of encouragement !

--they are much needed as the fortitude required to carry on sometimes almost overwhelms me !!
======================================================================

in the meantime - all of the Port-side davits have now been completed and installed--more or less satisfactorily...

All the winches have been installed now to the empty winch platforms

the winches differed slightly in design ( and size) from aft to fwd --so they were cut and re-joined to suit

The three aftermost winches had a platform over the drums - which I will probably cut of paper.





Frustratingly-- the plans that ostensibly speaketh the truth.....--are in parts an amalgam of pre and post refit (!)

and have some notable omissions-- a few I only noticed later of course..!

herewith an example:

The real thing....

The plan....

The model...

as such--and after closer re-re examination of photos versus plans I added the pair of plates fwd as well!!!

All of this minute fiddling took its merry time; in the interim I started the dull past-time of painting
passengers -- wearing in the main overcoats and hats

( I had Agatha Christie 's POIROT on the TV at the same time (!_)
which gave a fair clue to the sombre and subdued colouring of 1930's clothing-
- the ladies overcoats were equally sombre

The officers are presented in dark navy uniforms-- and a few dark-red -clad bell-boys will be dotted about also

adding figures to the model has brought back in perspective the sheer size of this behemoth--even in 1/700!

Its now onwards and onwards still to try and bring this project to completion...


The major flaw with the model is that I shall have to keep the model heated -- for ever...


( I removed the heaters from under the base to enable me to hold the model on its side for installing the winches etc )

after a 6 hour session of fiddling about ( and no ' under-boat-heating ' ) the model had contracted....

with the shocking sight as below-- fortunately I am not ( that! ) much annoyed any more

==> as after I 'plugged the power back into the ship' ....

it expanded back to its 'correct size' and the promenade windows were tight and flat again...

Ha !!

more soon

JB

[LE BOSCO]

hello Jim

The NORMANDIE the most detailed we can see at this scale titanic work for the greatest pleasure of the eyes
cheers
Nicolas

[Goodwood]

Ah, if only you could make some expansion joints in the PE sides that wouldn't be noticeable, the model wouldn't have to be permanently baked...

...happy 4/20!

[Pieter]

Ah! Reefer madness!

...happy 4/20!

[marijn van gils]

Fantastic work Jim!

The figures look excellent, and they are already bringing the model alive.

But aaargh, that bending PE would drive me crazy!
Glad you found a way to deal with it (physically and mentally... )

[JIM BAUMANN]

Thank you all == and great to see Le Bosco -Nicolas back at MW.com !

Slowly but steadily it is heading in the right direction it seems

Normandie had 3 x liferaft stacks each side of the funnel bases
each stack consisted of three life-rafts ergo 18 in total

The kit life-raft castings were not much to my liking,....
the separation lines being a bit curved and uneven.

I could have rescued them with filler and a sharp blade for new straight lines...
BUT... the bigger issue is that they were not solid
they had a ' hole' in the centre !

the real thing looked like this

I had new one 3-D printed by Black Cat models

They are 'pretty' good--
They have a central aperture , tie downs and are straight and sharp

not A1 perfect alas
==> but only on 5 x magnification--
the ( very faint! ) 3-D print lines were a bit tricky to clean up
without damage to the tie down lines ( which are quiet neat really! )

Once painted I picked out the separations and the tie-downs with a pencil
sharpened to a blade on 2000 grit sandpaper

I have experimented successfully with brush applied matt varnish
so as to homogenise the paint levels

In the early pre-fit version that I am building-the life-rafts were white

this evidently offended the 'FRENCH LINES ' sense of style
--as post refit the life-rafts were red--
I guess so as to blend in with the funnel bases
and be less intrusive to the eye when viewed in side elevation...!


Picking out the divides in pencil was a tedious an d slow task..
especially as as to ensure that I could pick out the best 18 to use on my model

I made just over 30 sets ... (!! ) now that really was tedious
( there are two of these blocks.... ! )

For a bit more gratifying fun, I started work on the funnels again

as they had to be completed sooner or later!

The Funnel tops were a rather nice piece of PE ( from the kit !)

The aft funnel was a dummy--( no smoke uptakes ) used fro ventilation uptakes and exhaust--
as well as dog kennels...

You will have noted that I have not yet fitted the PE top...

that is because it all looked a bit empty....

I reckoned there had to be more--not much though it seems

The plans suggest this rather large array of skylights and a ( access I guess) hatch...





Lets see how this will turn out... as I have to make this

more soon!

[LE BOSCO]

hi Jim
thank you .... always a pleasure to see so many wonders here, including yours: thumbs_up_1:
I see that the work in number does not scare you
well done
cheers
Nicolas

[hypno7]

that's a big ship... The temperature difference situation is unfortunate, but If it stays indoors, it should not be a problem right?

The funnels look extremely nice. The funnel tops really look intricate.

[JIM BAUMANN]

so the empty aft funnel bothered me rather--and ever I went and obsessed about it !!

all photos of the aft funnel are ;

either at shallow angles or a long way off or at too oblique an angle

a few of the poor photos from which I sort of garnered the conclusion I reached.

This image " clearly " shows the fwd portion of the aft dummy funnel deck to be a dark colour- probably dark grey/ black

another 'confirmatory' image thereof--

this angled view ( I guess confirm ?!) what on the plans...(?!! ) but darker fwd-

(though the image had been lightened and colourised)
which also shows the need to add the diagonal bracing inside the funnel

so the fwd skylights--based on the plans dimensions

made from generic perforated beam PE I had from another model..)( Northstar )

I used thinned matt varnish on a sliver of black paper to
practise aligning the bits of PE- I had quite a few attempts-- tricky!

Once painted and inside the funnel ( a few short hours later....!!! )

It all started to look a bit better--

interesting to note how different t looks with differing light levels

meanwhile the other two funnels had the small gaps
( in scale --quite huge actually !! )
' twixt uptake and PE filled with white glue


ah well !

more soon

JIM B

[Joe Simon]

All I can say is wow!

[Willie]

Hi there Master Baumann and all,

Candy. These stacks can only be defined as candy. I am speechless.

Thanks for sharing this with us, and best regards,

Willie.

[marijn van gils]

Those stacks look georgeous Jim!
I think it adds interest that the aft stack is different from the others. Luckily now it also looks suitably busy.

btw, did you paint the red with an airbrush?