The Ship Model Forum

As far as printing, back on line finally. The Phrozen folks went really cheap on the replacement LCD (not a cheap item) by not having a real connecter on the flexible wire strip, you have to push this flexible item into a tiny tight slot with no finger room. Aside from the item that they don't tell which ways it goes in leads to experimentation and excitement. Finally success was obtained with a short pair (one) of tweezers with really broad flat tips. Perhaps the Asian women who assemble these with tiny fingers can get in there.

So first test item was an 120:1 inclined ladder for the APA. Seemed to come out OK.

Cheers: Tom

Bravo Tom On the road again !

Thanks Pascal!

This reminds me of the early days of home computers with upper memory areas, having to set jumpers to assign locations for "peripherals" and whatnot. Still a degree of "Geekatude" required.

The vertically printed LCVP came out OK, but with some jaggies caused by what looks like a slight shifting every few cm. Attempt one at fixing this was lubricating the X screw shaft with some fine gun oil. We shall see! In some ways overall the horizontal LCVP I printed earlier may have printed better, so will try that again. The vertical one took about 7 1/2 hours to print. The very small 3 bladed prop printed nicely on the shaft but of course I knocked the rudder off in handling.

The adventure continues!

Tom

LCVP first try, printed vertically. There were some issues in printing this and trying one horizontally at the moment. Currently in grey auto primer. If I add 50 cal's, they will be separate items.

Cheers: Tom

Tom,

I can't imagine why 3D printing would not be scratch building if you have researched and designed the parts yourself! Ditto with photo etch. Whether you print/etch the parts yourself or have it done commercially seems to me to be irrelevant.

I don't see why it would matter if you are working in wood, plastic or metal. I have seen some beautiful scratch built ship models made from brass and polystyrene.

Phil

Phil:

It's a philosophical question, there are no right or wrong answers intrinsically. In photography I am grounded in the traditional methods, I used to work with sheet film with a cumbersome 4x5 view camera. I still use my Hasselblad I have had for almost 50 years. But I did get a digital back for it. Actually I was an early adopter of "digichromes". All my life i have built things with my hands and enjoy building furniture, I built my house myself. But I am not afraid of technology, but it is a different way of working.

I enjoy creating making my hands, one way or another, the brain directs the hands, it is satisfying to imagine and then realize.

Best wishes to all, whatever their creative and imaginative pursuits.

Tom/Phil,

I think both of you make good points and I'm in agreement with your shared modeling philosophy. While I tend to be "old school" in my approach to ship modeling, I also employ the newer mediums of PE and 3D printed parts in my modeling efforts.

While I'm still "way behind" in the learning curve on designing scaled 3D parts (I'm working on it ) and know that it will take time to learn to use the design program - I do see progress and this will in turn give me part results much more accurate than I could make from hand.

This thread makes me think back to the U.S. Navy Museum's model requirements page and the fact that they are so inherently archaic in their acceptance of anything other than wood, metal, paper, etc. - I doubt their requirements have been updated by their curator staff for ages now. They need to do so. Times change, methods change, and modeling mediums change.

Anyhow, I'm with you guys on "new tricks for old dogs" etc.!!!

Hank

Anyone have any bloody (substantiated) idea how the 36' LCVP's were stacked in the LCM's?

As the technological adventure continues: The LCVP printing overnight finished as the last part of the ramp needed printing. The Z axis screw firmly refusing to budge. I was able to extract the model and remove the platen and vat. Took the unit upstairs and was eventually able to free the screw and clean and lubricate the shaft and sliding guides. There was some grey crap surrounding the bottom of the screw collar.

So I have 6 1/2 LCVP's (the last one needs a handmade ramp extension) and have been printing some 5" twin mounts for Alaska and Missouri. A little development issues with printing the barrels, but solvable. A big advantage of printing these is the numerous grab irons can be printed right on the mount.

Cheers: Tom

5" twin Mk 38 Mod 3 (I think) as used on Alaska. If suitable for Missouri will add blast hoods and capn's sights as appropriate.

Missouri rather than Randall progress, replaced all six 5" twin mounts with the new printed ones. As with the original ones I made, these are attached magnetically. The handling room contains a strong thick coin type magnet and a screw protruded from the bottom of the mount, both locating and securing the mounts on the ship. As you approach the location with the mount it gets sucked into position. Shuuuup!

Don't know if I have enough resin to print four more mounts to complete six for Alaska, and certainly not enough to print any more LCVP's till more resin arrives. The current six units onboard Alaska are Model Monkey units in 1:192, perhaps someone would want to purchase them? I could include my printed blast hoods should your application need them.

Cheers: Tom

Printed a few 50 cal BMG's for the LCVP's, will see if they need further modification. Also only need two more twin 5" mounts for Alaska as Mo is fully equipped now. One is printing and if I have enough resin for the enroute one and one more I will be happy. The first 50's I printed are really cute, but hadn't added the somewhat unique shields. They have four rounds corners, to reduce injury I would guess in a small boat crowded with crew and "passengers". I'll see if I can cough up (covid symptom). a few photos tomorrow.

Of course in cleaning up such small items as the 50 BMG's accidents happen, I snipped the barrel off of one.... Possibly repairable with sprue?

Cheers: Tom

Just one more twin 5" to print for Alaska. Here just a light coat of auto primer. Looks a lot like a mount on a battleship in the reserve fleet in the 60's before being towed away. 1:192 The Alaska's used no mount blast hoods, because of their size and design of the Alaska's there was sufficient spacing to dispense with these items and take full advantage of the open sky arcs and improved visibility.

Alongside the twin mounts am printing 50 BMG's for the LCVP's and the mount captains sights, Mo rails and whatnot.

Cheers: Tom

Hi,Tom!
It' really nice your 5" /38 twin gun.
Best regards; Song.

Thank you Song!

Here is what a print looks like coming "out of the oven". I often raft a number of items together. Here we have a mount with barrels forAlaska, a rail for Missouri and some 50 cal BMG's in 1:120 for Randall.
As a note, I use photo stacking to get "in focus" images of these very small items. Photoshop combines a number of images of differing focal plane to extend the depth of field.

Very nice Tom!

Tom,

The mount, 50 cals, and LCVP look really good - you've got "the knack". Really nice work!!

Hank

Thank you gentlemen!

Making all this new stuff will require some lengthy airbrush sessions, which also means I'll have to mix new batches of paint. The single biggest ingredient is "Golden" titanium white fluid acrylics. Various blues, purples and carbon black go into the formulation. I originally matched to the Shorts and Snider USN Paint chips. As they are hiding somewhere I match to my existing models. I am waiting till I have some of the major efforts such as all the 5" mounts and LCVP's done till I paint. Since they are on three different ships, the fun multiplies.

Cheers! Tom

Today's effort, for Missouri. Printed some more superstructure rail and designed a few more. Getting toward the end of rails, progressing up the fire control tower. I ordered some more FEP for the bottom of the vat. Amazon is nearly as incompetent as the government. They decline to reveal how they are going to ship something, for example FEDUP or PO. So you guess since it's free shipping it will be PO (cheapest) and they send it FEDUP, who reject it because it's PO. Sometimes not till it's been here and back. The notes to some human to read about deliver to one or the other, not read. Call someone? no one cares.

I think the search engines are in cahoots, maybe you could find other sources on page 192.

Be glad to get some more resin and do additional work on Randall, LCVP's etc.

Enjoy life! Tom

The resin which I ordered over a week ago from Amazon finally shipped, at least this time they are sending it to my PO. I ordered FEP sheet from McMaster Carr, an industrial supplier who in the past has been very reliable. A good excuse to pick up some 14 mm crush washers which I needed for my 1:1 BMW. Successfully printed almost the last rails needed for Missouri and have those installed.

So, a pause in printing so I need to get out the airbrush and paint the LCVP's and some of the items I have done for Missouri and Alaska. May require some more paint mixing!

Cheers: Tom