The Ship Model Forum

Thank you, gentlemen. I appreciate it.

Next came another series of steps. First, I glued the quarterdeck to the hull. Frankly, the fit was terrible, and uneven, with sizable gaps much of the way around the deck. Proper fit required scraping away aspects of an internal lip molded just below deck level on the inside of the hull that�s meant to support the edge of the deck all away around. That, and actually shortening the length of the deck to fit properly into the lip. Serious gaps still remained all around the edge of the deck. These were filled with lengths of 0.01� styrene rod and then covered with putty and sanded smooth. I was really surprised by how badly it fit.

At the stern, I glued on a small hatch and yet another small set of skylights. The position of these will differ slightly for Kyokuto Maru. I also installed upright supports for the raised bulkhead that wraps around the front of the quarterdeck. Finally, I added brass vent covers to the top of the raised boxes that surround access ladders to the oil holds below deck.

Maybe less glamour than your previous cruiser and destroyer models, yet these ships do look very nice and you render it very weel, thank you for sharing!

Nice work, Dan. I wasn't aware you'd started a build log for these.

Yes, much less glamarous but certainly interesting, and challenging, to me.

I chose to tackle the pillar supports for the boat deck next. This was a premature step but, I felt compelled to see how well I could manage them. Thinking back to past projects (Maya comes to mind), I�ve always custom fit each pillar individually, which usually leads to uneven results and a lot of extra time spent to ensure a uniform appearance. Given the large number of pillars per side (9), I felt another approach was needed to insure uniformity of appearance as well as fundamentally straight uprights. Otherwise, the likely disarray would be very distracting.

After some thought, I decided to experiment with a simple jig. I cut long lengths of 0.01� styrene square rod and glued them at 2mm intervals to a larger, more rigid styrene beam. I spent a lot of time reviewing photos to determine the proper width of the pillars, which remains open to interpretation. I felt that something closer to 0.15� was probably more correct, but not readily available in square rod. Meanwhile, 0.02� rod seems far too wide to my eye. So, 0.01� it is.

Held rigid, the supports were trimmed evenly at their bottoms. Glued simultaneously at the bottom to the deck, the set of eight acted together in mutual support until dry. I then trimmed the pillars to their proper length on top. It only took a couple of dry, albeit careful, fittings with the boat deck to ensure a good fit. I do not intend to glue the boat deck down, nor glue the tops of the pillars to the boat deck, until the quarterdeck underneath has been painted, along with some of the vertical surfaces. Admittedly, this does leave the pillars very susceptible to inadvertent damage in the interim. If need be, I�ll cut them off and re-glue another set on once the necessary painting is done. I certainly won�t glue on those for Kyokuto Maru until I reach that point with her.

Outstanding work!

Very clever jig!

Devin wrote:Very clever jig!

Yep !I missed this Advanced,indeed this is a good method thanks for the sharing
cheers
nicolas

That jig was a cleaver idea. Good work

Hope to see these in VB. You should have quite a fleet there!

Thx, guys. Yeah, the jig turned out to be a simple but effective method.

Joe, I can only hope that one of these is done by then. You know I'll jinx it if I commit.

There were a few more steps to finishing off the stern. I added a small rear hatch and additional skylights for Kyokuto Maru. Each ship also gained a paired set of three smaller bollards placed to either side of the stern. Each set is composed of three bollards made of styrene rod glued upright to a short styrene strip. I again used a jig set-up similar to that used for boat deck pillars.

More significant was the addition of a sponson extension on the stern port side used to guide & clear oil hoses for refueling astern. (It�s worth noting that these platforms were not fit to these ships as built. They were added only after a ship had been allocated for UNREP duty and refit accordingly, from late 1941 on.) Surprisingly, or perhaps, thankfully, the kit part #49 actually fits properly to the stern, level with the deck. Perforated PE supports were added underneath, along with styrene sidewalls, and a rounded edge to the platform itself.

At this juncture, I chose to set aside the rear superstructure assemblies, aside from adding the upright supports for the raised bulkhead at the front of the quarterdeck for Kyokuto Maru, as well as the brass vent covers to access hatches. The next step would be painting the quarterdeck, but I plan to wait until all the main decks are ready for painting.

Very nice build so far. Looking forward to seeing how you build the bridge of these vessels. The bridge is the main reason my Kenyo Maru is still in the stash.

Well, it turns out that the bridge is the next section that I tackle, Pieter.

Before I go there, this photo (courtesy of Berend van der Wal), of Kyokuto Maru herself shows off the aft refueling sponson to nice effect.

Looking good Dan! Also looking forward to your bridge work.




Bob Pink.

The forward bridge structure is worthy of a little time spent in the way of comparing the kits to the real thing. I�ll work backwards as Kenyo Maru is part of the last, and largest, batch of sister ships.

The latter two groups of sisters (11 ships) had nearly identical bridges of four decks, all with a slightly curved facing and noticeable deck camber. Their bridges were full width and sat over the main deck, with a narrow, central compartment running fore and aft underneath. In most cases, that ventral compartment was flanked by wide apertures in the bridge face to either side, forming the openings of what were essentially short, deck through tunnels to either side. The first raised deck of the structure (01 or Bridge deck) was supported by pillars placed along the forward edge of the apertures. Not every ship had this arrangement; at the very least, Itsukushima Maru had a fully enclosed facing. (More on this shortly.) The upper two decks were slightly recessed in beam. Fortunately, there are a handful of excellent reference photographs and plans. Additionally, the Model Art Ship Modeling Special #27 has a detailed plan layout of Nippon Maru that shows placement of portholes and hatches to good effect.

The initial group of sisters, Kyokuto & Toa Maru, had main bridge structures that were almost identical in size and layout to the later sisters, though with a deeper, more pronounced curve to their facing, and narrower but longer bridge compartments on the upper levels. Unlike the later sisters, the wings of the bridge facing was not plated in between the Upper Bridge deck and the Navigation Bridge Deck above it, but left it open. (Interestingly, upon her salvage and resurrection postwar, California (Kyokuto) Maru did have this area plated in like the later groupings.) Nor were the Navigation Bridge deck or the uppermost Compass Bridge Deck recessed slightly on each wing. These bridges structures also sat full width above the main deck with compartmentation underneath, but those were placed to either side, with the central area left open and utilizing pillars to support the central portion of the 01/Bridge deck. Fortunately, we have enough photos to provide a good sense of their arrangements as well, even if we don�t have one quite as good as that of Kokuyo Maru.

The kits come with a vastly simplified bridge structure composed of three sections, plus the bridge facing. As I mentioned at the outset of this build, Fujimi has included three different bridge facings with some its kits; mostly the later releases, I believe. So, if you want more detail or accuracy, you can either rework the kit parts, or scratch build. I suppose it depends on your preferred level of detail, and pain. I chose to scratch build the bridge.

However, I do have some observations about the facings for those who want to use the kit parts as much as possible:

You can remove the recesses for windows and replace them with styrene struts and/or PE brass but, the openings are displayed with gentle arcs, rather than strictly horizontal, as befits the cambered decks that were actually installed. So, you�d have to construct the rest of the bridge behind the open facings with cambered decks. It�s more complicated, but it can be done. The Nippon Maru model in MASMS #27 was done to that spec.

From overhead, the concavity of the kit facings is not pronounced enough, particularly for Kyokuto/Toa Maru. The real ships had more curve to their bridge fronts.

Among the facings provided by the kit are a version for Kyokuto/Toa Maru (on left in the image below), and two versions for the later sisters. The Kyokuto/Toa Maru facing on the left is correct for the apertures above the main deck. So is the enclosed version on the right, for Itsukushima Maru.

I�m uncertain as to whether the middle version, with an aperture only on the one side, is entirely correct. Ships� plans show openings to either side. Virtually all the available photography that I have access to displays onIy the starboard side with an aperture. The few views of the port side that I have are at the wrong angle to make a determination. The area in question is either obscured by the angle of the shot, or entirely out of view.

My personal belief is biased towards symmetry so, I think both sides are open.

Mindful of the pluses and minuses of using the kit parts, as well as the experience gained on modifying the aft superstructure, I chose to scratch build the forward bridges. My first steps were to cut decks from Evergreen V-Groove styrene sheet, like those at the stern. 1/700 scale deck plans can be found in the aforementioned MASMS # 27, and in Motoyuki-san�s �Visual Guide of Japanese Wartime Merchant Marine� vol. 1 (VGJWMM) for Kyokuto and Shinkoku Maru. More styrene was used for the supporting bulkheads. Additional v-groove was used to correctly position the decks atop one another.

In the side by side comparison, I�ve erroneously place the kit�s Group I bridge facing next to that of Kenyo Maru for comparison.

Next was the transforming of the v-groove into wood decking with applications of Tamiya Deck Tan paint, Future sealer, and a burnt umber wash.

Very nice. Bringing them for show and tell tomorrow?

Maybe. Is there a display area?