hahah! sweet indeed...
meanwhile...
I have been trying out various ideas to 'circumvent ( pun is intended!) ( on the spare practice hull ! _)
the wretched square-cast-should-be-round(!) portholes.... ( a lot of ... arghhh! )
such as ,...
1) spinning a 3B pencil in the aperture --this works REALLY well when the aperture is round...
2) drilling with a larger drill bit ( portholes end up too large ==> looks toy-like ..)
3) using a soft spring-loaded centre punch ( this did reform the resin very nicely and was totally repeatable
but the resulting dish was too large
==> Good for 1/350 though-- and for for future reference .
4) PE portholes--OK but on Normandie the portholes were flush
my findings are further down below
Truthfully-- Giving up was considered, but was a non-option--too much money and effort invested already
and I am not the the giving up-sort !
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Previously I had established the lower row of portholes had surrounding protrusive rings
but first I had to make them ............using fine copper tinned wire
I have been asked many time show to do this-- so here is how goes with pictures!
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1) select correct size rod/ tube that matches the INSIDE aperture of the porthole and insert into fine jaw pin-chuck
2) cut a short length 4 inches ( 100 mm) or so, insert a kink on the end --this will locate the wire in the pinchuck
3) pull wire gently and apply 1 x turn
4) rest the brass shaft on a finger to apply light pressure to wire and let finger act as an ' inclining' guide and turn the pinchuck slowly but firmly
5) when the end of the wire is reached stop turning and leave a small tail
6) slide off and admire your coil spring!
7) cut single turns off in the same place using a sharp blade on a hard surface
The resulting rings are flattened ( sandwich between metal blade on bladeand appl;y light pressure, tweaked to join in a ciurcular
==|> it is laborious, dull with a 50% plus waste rate (!! )
and so the protruding rings were applied to the row adjacent to the waterline-- these are of course over-scale-
- but when paint is applied they ' shrink in effect' an the effect is pleasing
( I did try thinner wire --but these rings proved very hard to keep round, to flatten or join -
-both stainless steel (
B)
and (
C ) copper wire were not a seffective as the tinned copper (
A)
and when painted --all but ' disappeared )
I made and added an overboard discharge(?) pipe vent
so this brings us full circle ( haha) back to the remaining portholes...
Using the afore mentioned spring loaded centre punch
the point of which created a shallow divot to make a repeatable and safe centre -
-as opposed to a catchy square edged hole..(!)
--into which I popped a 66Y drill bit
and then inserted my rings -- bedded on matt black paint-- so that they would sit flush
( using a sightly radiused end of tweezers handle ) so as to roll the eyes into the hole to sit dead flush
( the join in the circle sits at the top and will be disguised by the eyebrow above ( where applicable )
==> that's another brain-ache for later next week
the only drawback is that there are many hundreds of them to do...
(maybe I will see you in 2022)
when painted they left a nice sharp round hole
and look a long way superior to the original flawed offering...
brutally enlarged image alas...
Cutting along the axis is no sure solution either; I had to very gently 'tap' the knife to avoid rotating the wire...and that is using a template you do not need.
probably not! )