An excessively ambitious 1/72 Revell Gato build...

[codythecatt]

Excellent, wonderful, and superb!

One question (since I am 'sub dumb') was that deck grating made of wood ... as the movies portray it with splintering wood going everywhere as the enemy fighters strafe the deck... or was it steel plate? I know: stupid question LOL

[Channell]

Superb Channell, as usual you did well to to resume your deck,the effect is screaming of truth
congrats
Nicolas

Thank you Nicholas!

[Channell]

Excellent, wonderful, and superb!

One question (since I am 'sub dumb') was that deck grating made of wood ... as the movies portray it with splintering wood going everywhere as the enemy fighters strafe the deck... or was it steel plate? I know: stupid question LOL

Thanks! It's NOT a dumb question... I didn't know either until I started researching for this build back in June/July. I'm a sub noob myself!

The planks are are teak on the real boat. Some Gatos had all teak decks and some had the teak replaced or substituted forward and aft with thin steel plates (as is the case with Cobia) where the crew wasn't likely to walk much while on patrol. I'm guessing it was to save money?

[Channell]

Finally, some pics with most of the hatches and cleanup done, plus a coat of primer:















I might put the Cobia away for a bit now... this was first intended to be a filler project to give me something to do until the new 1/200 Bismarck came out... but then I kinda went wild and crazy one it. I was expecting to be done by now, but you know how that goes.

Anyway, the Bismarck supposed to be delivered tomorrow. I'll try to keep this one going too, but my main focus is gonna switch to that build for a while.

[Gator52]

Jason,

Great work, I've enjoyed reading through your build here (as well as following your other projects). So far I've gathered the kit, the Big Ed PE, and a couple of CMK figure sets with the hope of building Cavalla.

If you could do it over again, would you still attempt to leave strips of the deck in place to support the PE deck, or would you cut out the entire deck and build your own support structure, as recommended in the Eduard directions?

Thanks

Jonah

[Channell]

Jason,

Great work, I've enjoyed reading through your build here (as well as following your other projects). So far I've gathered the kit, the Big Ed PE, and a couple of CMK figure sets with the hope of building Cavalla.

If you could do it over again, would you still attempt to leave strips of the deck in place to support the PE deck, or would you cut out the entire deck and build your own support structure, as recommended in the Eduard directions?

Thanks

Jonah

Thanks!

I actually did start to do it all over again; I began a future USS Cod but I've decided I'm better off focusing on 1 build at a time so both projects are on hiatus until I finish the Bismarck. I learned a lot from this build and want to improve on what I did here so I'll certainly be back to work on the 2 gatos eventually.

Anyway, for me it was far easier to cut the crossbeams out of the kit deck; it's easy to grind out the excess with a dremel and I'm fairly good with a knife (it was actually kinda relaxing for me, but I'm weird ) but I am not nearly as good at exact measurements...and seperate cross braces would need to be varying exact lengths to keep everything straight and sturdy.

Doing things that way meant I could stick where my talents were and keep everything straight and easier to assemble in the end.

One thing I did with the Cod that I didn't on the Cobia was to focus more on opening the perforated areas rather than trying to make perfectly neat crossbraces. They just aren't visible under the painted Eduard PE so they matter more for structural support than anything; Really, you can simply grind out the areas of the kit deck that have the molded-in "holes", making sure to leave enough plastic in between to keep the deck sturdy. If you do it that way however, lay the deck before putting the sideplates (the opposite of what I did with the Cobia) to keep everything looking right!

The planked section is another mater entirely though... I'm still mulling over better ways to accomplish that.

[Gator52]

Thanks for the info, I appreciate it. That gives me a better idea of how to incorporate the Eduard deck & hull parts.
Do you have any experience with either the G-Factor screws or the Nautilus Models wood deck section? I'm curious about both those products.

Thanks!
Jonah

[Channell]

Thanks for the info, I appreciate it. That gives me a better idea of how to incorporate the Eduard deck & hull parts.
Do you have any experience with either the G-Factor screws or the Nautilus Models wood deck section? I'm curious about both those products.

Thanks!
Jonah

I haven't bought from either, though I've heard good things about Nautilus and wouldn't be afraid to order from them.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think Nautilus has a 1/72 gato wood deck, unless it's a brand new product anyway. That would be a great solution to the problem though...

[Gator52]

I don't know if it's a new release or not, but the wood deck is listed as product 72-510 on the Nautilus website, though there's not a photo or description of it.

Jonah

[Channell]

I don't know if it's a new release or not, but the wood deck is listed as product 72-510 on the Nautilus website, though there's not a photo or description of it.

Jonah

I wonder what it looks like; I'd hope it it didn't have the planks butted up against each other like a normal ship deck; there real thing had spaced out planks so the air could get out of the space between the deck and pressure hull top at the sub dived. If you get one I'd LOVE to find out what it looks like; it would be a really slick job with an (accurate) wood deck and the Eduard PE.

[Gator52]

Ok I went ahead and ordered one; details posted here when I get it.
Jonah

[blacman]

I'm following this thread with hight interest. This build is just fantastic! I'm not a fan of submarines but looking at this what you are doing here.... Just marvelous. Looking for more

[Gator52]

I don't know if it's a new release or not, but the wood deck is listed as product 72-510 on the Nautilus website, though there's not a photo or description of it.

Jonah

I wonder what it looks like; I'd hope it it didn't have the planks butted up against each other like a normal ship deck; there real thing had spaced out planks so the air could get out of the space between the deck and pressure hull top at the sub dived. If you get one I'd LOVE to find out what it looks like; it would be a really slick job with an (accurate) wood deck and the Eduard PE.

The Nautilus deck came in the mail today; the engraving quality is good, but it has a couple of accuracy drawbacks. As you feared Jason, the planks do butt right up to each other, so it is essentially a solid piece as the engraved 'spacing' between the planks does not penetrate all the way through the wood. Second, there is no engraving to identify individual 8' or 10' planks, the planking is represented as single long planks that run the entire length of the wood deck, which is about 110 scale feet. In other words, it's as though the deck is made of planks 110 scale feet long. This could be mitigated by scribing your own marks to delineate the proper plank length.

Overall, I think it's usable, but it may be difficult to achieve the desired realism effect many modelers would want to achieve.

Jonah

Jonah

[Channell]

The Nautilus deck came in the mail today; the engraving quality is good, but it has a couple of accuracy drawbacks. As you feared Jason, the planks do butt right up to each other, so it is essentially a solid piece as the engraved 'spacing' between the planks does not penetrate all the way through the wood. Second, there is no engraving to identify individual 8' or 10' planks, the planking is represented as single long planks that run the entire length of the wood deck, which is about 110 scale feet. In other words, it's as though the deck is made of planks 110 scale feet long. This could be mitigated by scribing your own marks to delineate the proper plank length.

Overall, I think it's usable, but it may be difficult to achieve the desired realism effect many modelers would want to achieve.

Jonah

Jonah

Hmm.... If it's a self-adhesive deck you could paint the kit deck secton black, stain and cut out the individual planks then space them out evenly on the kit deck using .010 thick styrene strips between them (then pulling the styrene strips out of course). You would want to figure out something to represent the crossbeams underneath though. Lots of work but not any more work than trying to lay them out entirely in styrene.

It's really too bad no aftermarket guys did a PE deck for the center like the Eduard set's fairwater deck. That would really have been the best solution, but I doubt it will ever happen as I believe the 1/72 Gato kit has been discontinued. Best of luck anyway, please share what you come up with!

BTW, any chance you could post pics of the Nautilus deck? I'd like to see it too as I might wanna try the above on my second gato.

[Gator52]

Jason,

Here are some photos of the Nautilus deck (fore to aft), sorry it took me a month to get around to posting them!









I'm on the fence about it, the engraved detail is nice, but the fact you can't see through it may be a deal-breaker for me...

Jonah

[Channell]

That's too bad... it's pretty on it's own but too inaccurate for the likes of me.

Thank you for the pics Gator!

[Steve.Wilson]

Sorry to dredge this thread up from the murky depths....but I want to see more, Jason! I joined up here just so I could post and maybe even share.

You're not insane -- you're already committed. I do hope your Cobia finally found her paint and weathering, and would love to see this thread continued/concluded.

The fine folks at Revell are re-releasing the Gato in a few weeks, and I already have mine on pre-order at Tower Hobbies. A Big ED kit already awaits. Yours is the best build log for the Revell Gato I've found online, and would love to see more, especially your references. This is a truly one-of-a-kind build, and I hope my own effort is at least half as good as the beautiful boat in these five pages. Thanks for sharing...lots to learn about this build!

[Channell]

Oh the shame...

Cobia still exists... she's sitting on my "boneyard" shelf with a broken propshaft and a medium-sized chunk of broken deck planking (a victim of moving house a couple years back)... I never got further than the thread shows. I even started a second one (USS Cod) but that one's back in the box for now too. At the moment I'm dedicated to a 1/200 Nelson so it will be a while before I return to Gato-land... but I will someday.

I have noticed that since those days this: http://www.rcsubs.cz/index.php/80-uvod/113-gato-172 has been put on the market and is now available... I would very much like do a full "wood" plank deck out of one or both of my defunct Gato projects someday. If nothing else it easily resolves the problem of recreating the central plank section of the kit.

[steinerman]

Hi Jason,
I didn't know you were into subs as well as battlewagons. I don't know if you are aware or not, but back in October I took a drive to Muskegon to see the USS Silversides, a GATO class sub permanently moored there. I took a whole bunch (approx 275) photos of all sorts of details of the sub and have posted them on Flickr. If you're interested, here's the link:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/steiners_pics/albums

Do you ever plan on doing any more with your Missouri? Just wondering......

[Goodwood]

I once visited the Silversides as well, but that was when she used to make occasional excursions (or else I heard the tour guide incorrectly). It would be nice if some of the smaller museum ships out there were still used in such a way...I'd totally want to go for a cruise on one of the surviving tin cans!