Model Monkey News

[maurice de saxe]

Speaking of 'coming soon', when is the Saratoga 1928-1930 island arriving?

[Mark McKinnis]

Hi Steve,

Nice work on the Essex Class. That is a lot of stuff!!!!

Well done............

[ModelMonkey]

Impressive!...
Looking forward to see what you come up with for the Oklahoma!

I'll do my best! Thanks to you, there may be enough references on hand now for Nevada 1941, too. I was very surprised to find out just how very different the superstructures of the two sisters were.

Speaking of 'coming soon', when is the Saratoga 1928-1930 island arriving?

Today's the day!

As with all Model Monkey pre-war Sara and Lex island designs, the 1928-1930 island includes a matching fighting top for your kit's funnel.

Hi Steve,

Nice work on the Essex Class. That is a lot of stuff!!!!

Well done............

Thanks so much, Mark! I just added the 1943-1944 island design for USS Wasp CV-18 to the catalog and updated the post above. More coming.

Which ever holidays you all* are celebrating this season, I hope they will be filled with joy for you and yours!

Steve


* In Carolina, we pronounce that "y'all".

[maurice de saxe]

Thank you!!!

[ModelMonkey]

Both, kinda. College at The Citadel in Charleston, SC, and now living in NC.

[Frank Fowler]

Steve, I am glade Martin has provided information on the Nevada 1941 superstructure. Hope you can do a superstructure for it like the Oklahoma 1941 you have planned. When I sent you plans for the Oklahoma I think I recall noting there were a number of differences, but I did not have any plans for Nevada. I do have the Ironshipwright 1/350 Nevada 1941 and it has the different superstructure decks. You can see these differences in photos of Nevada after the PH attack. Looking forward to the 1/700 Oklahoma in the near future and hopefully a 1/700 1941 Nevada superstructure someday. The current, now out of production, 1/700 resin kits for Nevada 1941 are incorrect in depicting the superstructure for December 1941. Have a great Christmas and New Year and I will be ordering some of the Essex islands in a couple of weeks.

[ModelMonkey]

Thank you so much Frank! I'll do my best.

Your post, David, made me smile.

In other news, a customer asked for a special nameplate be made for a model he named in honor his late father. This nameplate is 3D-printed in acrylic and hand-painted by the customer in colors of his choosing.

3D-printed nameplates are available in acrylic and real metal, too (brass, silver, bronze, gold-plated and rhodium-plated).

Requests for custom names or other text are welcome.

[anj4de]

Hallo Steve

Merry Christmas first of all...and thanks a million for those WWII Essex islands! They look absolutely phantastic! Am I right assuming they are meant for the Dragon kits? TheTrumpeter ones I think are a touch under scale.
Having mentioned Dragon Essex class ships, their details under the overhanging flight deck sections are completely missing! Also, on the long hull version the bow 40mm pits look absolutely toyish! Room for new products...
I am in the market for a Hancock island to start with!
And last but not least, do you know how much a 1/350 island would probaly cost if you did one?

thanks a lot
Uwe

[ModelMonkey]

Hallo Uwe!

Thanks so much!

I can resize any island to better fit the Trumpeter kits. Please advise how best to get a perfect match. (I have an old Hasegawa kit. Oh that old island, oy!)

I'll rescale some of the islands to 1/350. Once I get one uploaded we'll have a much better idea what it will cost. Is there an existing design you would like to see in 1/350 (Hancock)? I'll start with that one.

Merry Christmas!

[anj4de]

Hello Steve

Hancock would be great in 1/350...

thanks
Uwe

[ModelMonkey]

Thanks, Uwe, I'll have the existing Hancock design optimized for 1/350. It should be ready tomorrow pending any "life happens" events.

In other news, a set of 60 US Navy life raft canisters is now available in 1/700 scale and a very slightly smaller set in 1/720 scale. The canisters are very tiny.

[gtbred]

Your spoiling the carrier guys Steve!

[Miguel]

Miguel, I hope this gives you some better options in case the ISW kit is a bit small: Happy to announce a set of Colorado class 16"/45 cal. turrets and barrels designed specifically to fit the 1/350 scale Blue Water Navy and Yankee Modelworks USS West Virginia BB-48 kits. These turrets will also fit the Model Monkey 1/350 scale USS West Virginia 1941 Superstructure.

Turrets: http://shpws.me/PknV
Barrels: http://shpws.me/Pko6
Superstructure: http://shpws.me/P7mI


Happy Holidays!

Again many thanks Steve,but after thinking and planning ,I found for me the best solution is to go with the ISW West Virginia,but wish to ask You a big favor , your BWN Superstructure is simply gorgeous ,how about to make the upper levels only,then will be a perfect replacement for the ISW kit(and cheaper than BWN piece) and is no need to resort in big surgery to the model,then I can use your other pieces like the mast tops, turrets and directors.

[ModelMonkey]

Again many thanks Steve,but after thinking and planning ,I found for me the best solution is to go with the ISW West Virginia,but wish to ask You a big favor , your BWN Superstructure is simply gorgeous ,how about to make the upper levels only,then will be a perfect replacement for the ISW kit(and cheaper than BWN piece) and is no need to resort in big surgery to the model,the I can use your other pieces like the mast tops, turrets and directors.

It is very simple for me to provide that for you. But I am concerned that it may not fit the ISW kit well giving you a very expensive unusable part and making for a very unhappy customer.

Let's assume the reason the sample BWN kit provided to me wasn't precisely to scale was because of shrinkage during curing. The BWN master was probably built very accurately, but resin shrinks as it cures, and it does not shrink uniformly. Resin can shrink differently in different directions, how much depends an many factors and conditions.* In other words, the smallness of the BWN kit isn't a simple percentage reduction in size. The sample BWN kit loaned to me was narrow as well as short, but not by the same % fore-aft and side-to-side and vertically, and the shrinkage was not uniform from tip of the bow to extreme stern. Frankly, it was a scale mess most likely due to shrinkage, a common problem for large-scale resin kits. Generally, the larger the resin model, the more it can be affected by shrinkage. Although shrinkage is probably not noticeable to the modeler, it presents considerable problems for vendors trying to design accurately scaled products to fit inaccurately shrunken resin kits.

So the 3D-printed design for every deck and feature had to be adjusted to a different size in all three dimensions, each dimension differently one at a time. The adjustments were extremely complex because of the number of features and the geometry of the sloped vent trunking.

If you lay the 3D-printed design over scale plans, you will see that the upper-most deck and pilot house are essentially 1/350 scale in all dimensions. But as you go down, each deck below gets reduced proportionally until the lowest level is short enough and narrow enough to fit the sample BWN hull loaned to me. The uppermost level had to be to-scale or the BWN photo-etch cage mast wouldn't fit, the cage mast would be too big in diameter because photo-etch doesn't shrink. Which brings up another consideration:

When creating the 3D design, the adjustments not only had to fit the hull, they had to be done in such a way that when the resin BWN model with 3D parts placed on it was complete, the fighting tops would be level on top of the BWN photo-etch cage masts. The 3D superstructure was deliberately designed so that its height would ensure the top of the photo-etch brass cage foremast would match the height of of the BWN photo-etch mainmast (which sits on the hull) so that the fighting tops would be level.

Not knowing anything about the ISW kit, I have no idea if the 3D design intended to fit the BWN kit will provide level fighting tops if used on an ISW kit.

I am happy to offer the 3D superstructure to you without the 01 level if you like. But IMHO, the product might not fit the ISW kit well, noticeably so, and be a waste of your money and time.

Thoughts?


* Even the same two resin model parts pulled from the same mold on different days (different conditions like temperature, etc.) can be differently sized due to the factors affecting shrinkage.

[Miguel]

Steve ... I really admire your professionalism , Yes , you are totally right ,then lets wait till I have the ISW kit in my hands ,then can have some measurements and figure the best possible path,I still think that my request part has almost non regrettable effects on the kit ,maybe if the ISW has a better proportion vs the BWN ,then You can increase the size a 5% to be more on scale, but after your thoughts ,I better wait for the kit.

Thanks a lot Steve ...Happy New Year and my best wishes


Miguel

[ModelMonkey]

Thank you, Miguel!

David, yes, easy to imagine you having to do that, and not an easy task!

I usually find that scans of BoGP drawings are distorted differentially, surely some of that is due to shrinkage over time of the original drawings and sometimes simply scanning errors. One might be inclined to believe a set of BoGP drawings can be scanned into a 3D program and the software will pop out a 3D object instantly. It just ain't so.

Due to distortion, even the best, most authoritative 2D drawings have to be adjusted for differential distortion and redrawn using the 3D software one line at a time to ensure everything will fit. This is why it takes a month or so working full time to design a single 3D-printed superstructure.

Next superstructure in the queue: USS Pennsylvania 1944.

[Miguel]

Miguel, what is the actual(not scale) length, width & height of the model from the bottom of the hull to the top of the 01 deck?

Steve, that shrink & expansion caused me to redo a drawing I finished doing the previous day back in the early 1980's when I worked as a mechanical draftsman doing full size drawings for the torches to cutout of metal plates for a metal service company. drawing was about 84" wide & over 100" long done on 2 sheets of paper taped together width wise. drawing shrank & expanded by at least an 1/8" all over whereas the tolerance was 1/16". redid that drawing on the lunchroom floor instead of doing it on the drafting table as drawing was too big unless done 1 panel at a time.

Sorry David ,I don't have the WeeVee ISW kit , was my plan buying one for a future build ,but really want to take advantage of Steve fantastic designs,with the superstructure,top masts ,turrets and directors, also getting the new printed cage mast from Blue Ridge, I am sure that can improve greatly the ISW kit .

Thanks ,getting a better picture,never thought the BWN was a bit under scaled cause of the shrinkage ,to be honest not too picky about a 5% shrinkage , as commented with Steve ,better to have the kit in hands before making any further request

[Miguel]

I saw in your above post after I posted that you didn't have the model yet. when you do, post the dimensions to see what can be done.

Excellent David ,thanks man

[ModelMonkey]

Thanks, everyone!

[MAJOR-B]

Steve
Any chance doing a Lexington CV-16 island 44-45 ?