The Ship Model Forum

The time has almost come to begin what I hope will be my ultimate build. I can't seem to do a ship without going wild and crazy (or finishing the previous one, for that matter ) so hopefully this will be an interesting and probably LOOONG term build log.

For those following my other 1/72 Gato build don't worry... I haven't given up. I originally intended to do that one as a "filler project" while waiting for the Bismarck but it morphed into quite the monster project in the interim. I can at least see the end of the tunnel on that one now and I'll try to keep both logs going.

Anway, I finished Trumpeter's 1/200 Arizona last summer and loved building it...



...It even won "Best of Show" at a local hobby shop contest last month but I fully intend to blow it out of the water with the Bismark.

Here's the basic plan which I am still developing:

I'm going to build the Bismarck just after commissioning with the light grey paint scheme. I'm doing this mostly because everyone does the later schemes and I like to be different, plus the idea of a brand new battleship appeals to me.

On the Arizona I didn't sweat the small stuff but this time around I want to go into intense detail and accuracy. I also want to do "glass" portholes and windows; something I haven't tried yet on a ship.


Finally, I like to pick a "gimmick" that gives my work some "wow factor" and makes my ship stand out from the crowd. On the gato submarine I did a scratchbuilt pressure hull and deck; this time I am seriously considering hand-planking the Bismarck deck with wood strips to get something special.

Anyway, my Bismarck is in the mail and I am waiting impatiently for it. The next update will be an assessment of the kit. Hopefully there will be others doing build logs on the same kit so we can compare notes!

Nice to see somebody jumping right in on this one. I'm sure you'll have a lot of company soon!

On the lighter side: if you want a "wow factor" that nobody else has I can think of a good option. What is the Bismark most famous for? Being sunk, of course. Anybody can bulid her as she appeared just out of dry dock, so why not do her with mortal battle damage? And then if you really want to get serious actually sink her in a 100 gallon aquarium or display case????

Sounds good to me ...

PS: I might get with you via PM's to discuss your Arizona build

codythecatt wrote:Nice to see somebody jumping right in on this one. I'm sure you'll have a lot of company soon!

On the lighter side: if you want a "wow factor" that nobody else has I can think of a good option. What is the Bismark most famous for? Being sunk, of course. Anybody can bulid her as she appeared just out of dry dock, so why not do her with mortal battle damage? And then if you really want to get serious actually sink her in a 100 gallon aquarium or display case????

Sounds good to me ...

PS: I might get with you via PM's to discuss your Arizona build

I am REALLY tempted to do the Bismarck as she is now

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPppKecj-aI

But I want a shiny new Bismarck more.

Here are some more pics of my Arizona too:

viewtopic.php?f=60&t=104054

I'm happy to answer any questions about it.

Yay! Been looking forward to see someone start a build of the new Bismarck and I'm even more excited now that you are doing it since judging from your previous work it's going to look awesome!

codythecatt wrote:Nice to see somebody jumping right in on this one. I'm sure you'll have a lot of company soon!

On the lighter side: if you want a "wow factor" that nobody else has I can think of a good option. What is the Bismark most famous for? Being sunk, of course. Anybody can bulid her as she appeared just out of dry dock, so why not do her with mortal battle damage? And then if you really want to get serious actually sink her in a 100 gallon aquarium or display case????
....

Well, what is she most famous for can also be answered with "making out of HMS Hood very fast fish food".
About making the "current Bismarck as wreck", this was well done as model several times with 1/700 and 1/350 kits.

However, scale 1/200 is fine and a shame that only so few kits, but German Navy is normally not my theme. But I will observe this build here too, because intresting without any doubts.

How about modelling her just after she disengaged from the PoW, with a holed bow? Wasn`t some of the boats on her deck damaged, too?

I am looking forward to this build.

Regards, Dave.

...still waiting for the big one to arrive... and I'm not even in California.

I should get it this weekend!

I'm digging into research and trying to learn something about this ship before I jump in... and there is a lot to learn.

I'm about 90% decided on hand-planking the deck with individual wood strips...it will be one hell of a job but huge monotonous projects which really add to the character of the boat don't scare me and are actually a bit stress releaving for me; I'm weird that way. It will also allow me to accurately recreate the gutters (what is the actual term for them?) along the deck edges which are absent from the kit as well as all the plank detail missing on the kit and give a better end result than a stick-on laser cut deck.

I'm studying old pictures of the Bismarck and it looks to me like the deck ISN'T random plank lengths but that the ends of the planks line up every fourth plank. Can anyone confirm or deny that? If so/not, what is the pattern of the planks?

I'm also thinking I might want to hold off on the more detailed parts of the ship until some PE is released. The more I think about it, the more I want to go "all out" on this one.

with a model of that size I would definately take the time to hand plank the deck!

ps: gutters ... and every 4th is pretty standard so that is probably correct. (I think that comes from older habits of using 16' teak planks over the 4' spaced iron stringers (?) on the wood-hulled iron-framed sailing ships of the 1860's - 90's ... if thats what you call them??? )

If I'm not mistaken the butt ends line up every sixth plank and each plank overlaps the next one by one third. Two thirds?

I need to dig a bit deeper for this...

Happy staring (at photos) ~ Olaf!

I should correct myself; what I should have said is 4 planks in between the butted ends...

Channell wrote:I should correct myself; what I should have said is 4 planks in between the butted ends...

I knew what you meant ... just double checked my Cutty and that's the configuration I used. it doesn't mean the Bismark used that of course ...

My ship has come in, so to speak:























The detail is crisp and the quality otherwise very good, minus a couple of issues.

The first problem that struck me are the slightly cattywompus portholes on the angled pieces of the superstructure This is probably because Trumpeter molded the main deck pieces as 1-piece units and had to do them at an angle to to get them out of the molds. I plan on drilling them out and hopefully adding "glass" but it probably would have been better to mold them in pieces like most normal models.

Second, the 1 piece hull doesn't mean no seams; Trumpeter molded the deck lines slightly off center on the mold seams right in the middle. The deck plank pattern is wrong too.

The hull itself is a bit rough too, and the portholes on the bow and stern suffer the same porthole problem as the superstructure.

I hate molded on detail because it usually looks toy-like and, well... molded on, but most of the detail actually looks pretty good otherwise. Only the circular steel window shields and molded horizontal lines meant to represent steel bar steps really look bad but I can't expect a model company to actually replicate them at this scale.

So my first goals for this build are:

replank the decks with wood strips

rework the portholes/windows and add "glass"

replace all the metal bar step moldings with metal wire steps

I foresee the superdetail market going crazy with this one and it would be a shame to forge ahead without some juicy PE additions so for now I'm gonna just aim to clean up the hull itself and get the deck laid. That should take a few months, me thinks.

Dang! I hate it when thing are kiddy-whampus!

Yeah, the decking is all wrong ... but not much one can do about it except sand it flat and put a real wood deck over it. ( oh boy oh boy!)

But the deck detail is fantastic!!! Good thing I am poor or I'd be whipping out the Visa card!

Being poor didn't stop me... though maybe it should have!

I have a question for the Bismark Experts. What in the world is this U-shaped set of holes?



It's on both sides toward the bow. Is it right?

Poor I yam and thats all that I yam.... but I can live vicariously through your build!

Channell wrote:Being poor didn't stop me... though maybe it should have!

I have a question for the Bismark Experts. What in the world is this U-shaped set of holes?



It's on both sides toward the bow. Is it right?

I believe those are for a typre of sonar (passive?)that Bismarck carried. Check out some Bismarck websites on the web to get a better answer than I can give you.

Channell wrote:Being poor didn't stop me... though maybe it should have!

I have a question for the Bismark Experts. What in the world is this U-shaped set of holes?



It's on both sides toward the bow. Is it right?

I was wondering about these myself so I started doing research for my build. These are the GHG Sound Locator microphones.
And, Trumpeter appears to have them correct.
http://www.bismarck-class.dk/technicall ... g/ghg.html

HI Channell

I found a way to miss the "big mounting"
good luck for the rest of mounting
best regard
Nicolas

I will get mine for Christmas!
but since I still have a complete fleet to finish I will be following your build before I will start my own.
good luck!

See here what the "U" means:



http://www.bismarck-class.dk/technicall ... g/ghg.html