Friday, August 5, 2011

French Navy BB Strasbourg in 1/3000... construction complete

Finally (uhhh, almost!) done with all the items in the to-do list checked off. The model hasn't been glued altogether to help me with painting. The 2x quad 13" turrets, 3 quad 5" at the back, 2x dual 5", the front superstructure (bridge+conning tower), the rest of the superstructure, and finally the hull, are yet unglued (only blue-tac'd at the moment).


Yet unprimered, the dark-greenish parts are of the putty I used to fill the area (like the top of the 13" quads, middle of the superstructure, as well as the walls of the plane hangar...


The barrels on the 13" quads are made from a plastic bristle off a broom. Wasn't able to measure it's diameter, but I went ahead and installed them 2 pairs per turret as per the real-life layout. Unfortunately, having added the sights* and filling up made the turrets disproportionately taller...
*CMIIW, but I'm not sure what those "ears" on them turrets are called


Crazy enough for details: I felt adding those lifeboats and cranes/gantries mid-ship made the model more 'alive', it doesn't feel that 'cluttered' for me at all. I decided to abstractly represent them as 'nubs' for those that are too small when done in 1/3000, like searchlights and the 37mm AA stations. One last bit of detail left to do though would be the recon plane...


Guess next step would be painting and basing. Perhaps some would feel the model (or mini!) is overkill and inappropriate, or rather, too fragile for the tabletop. I have to admit that it may be the case; it'll all come down to me on reminding others to be careful when handling the model/mini...

Now off preparing for the next one: Richelieu! :D

Cheers!

4 comments:

  1. Looking good. But I think the detail will come out when painted. Its hard to pick in in white plastic.

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  2. The ears of the turrets are the ends of a long-base rangefinder.

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  3. I really like this! You clearly have a talent. I might have to pick your brains as I would like like to scratch build a Lexington BC

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  4. Cheers fellas!
    @Mal's:
    Agreed, my apologies (for now), just waiting for everything to properly cure (i.e. plastic cement evaporate completely) then it'll be greys and umbers/siennas :D

    @brooksindy
    Thanks! Just the correct term - rangfinder - I was looking for (so played safe and called it "sights") :)

    @Lane
    Thanks and best wishes on the BC Lexi ;)

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