1/350 Tamiya BB 63 Missouri

[adampolo13-Email Not Valid]

Hello everybody,
Just so you guys don't think I've totally fallen off the face of the planet, I wanted to share this with you guys.



This is Tamiya's 1/350 Missouri with Pontos "Battleship" kit, Pontos blue wood deck, and Eduard's PE set. My plan is to display this in 1944/45 configuration. I do have to warn you though, this build will be very slow for two reasons. 1. This is my first ship build. 2. My wife and I just had our first child a few weeks ago and I have very very little time to build.

With that being said, here are a few pictures of what I've done so far.




I sanded down the entire hull. There were a ton of little imperfections and a fine line representing the boot. I sanded that all down smooth. Then next thing I did was put the rudders on. As the hull is curved and the connections on the rudders were flat there was a gap. I used white glue to fill that gap. I also attached the shaft supports and dry fit the shafts. Finally I started working on the decking. I removed the molded on anchor chains and have started removing stairs.

Funny thing, now that I've written it down I've done a lot more than it appears. haha

Thanks for checking this out.

[Leon]

Fantastic start Adam.Count me in.

[TRM]

Ahhh, there it is!! Nice to see you get a few moments of "Adam Time"....won't be many of them for a while with the little one!! Worth every minute though...enjoy!! Nice job so far on the ship, she is a beauty!! Really tempting my friend....I can see mine on the shelf...must...be....strong!! LOL!!!

[wbill76]

Any time at the bench is good Adam, nice progress so far on the Mighty Mo!

[adampolo13-Email Not Valid]

Thanks for all the kind words guys!

My daughter decided to behave tonight so my wife and I got a little bit of a reprieve. I sat down on the couch and got a few minutes to read instruction manuals etc. One thing I did notice is that I need a bit of help on something. All along the deck where I will eventually end up putting the PE rail is this little lip:


My question is this:
Does this need to be removed? My best guess is, yes. But I wanted to double check before I went around cutting off more plastic then need by. Although, I did start hacking off all the stairs tonight. ;D

Thanks again!

[Thomas_M/]

The Iowa class battleships are among the few really beautiful ones for me. I will follow you on this simply because I like the lines of these ships and because the previous speakers praise your skills. I am also interested in how good ths Pontos set will fit this kit.

Nice and interesting start!

[Deleted]

Coooool! This is the kit that just came out?

[adampolo13-Email Not Valid]

Thanks everyone for the kind words and thank you for the advice regarding the coaming! Good thing I've got you guys on my side or I would have gone and cut it off.

The good news of the day is I got a good chunk of bench time this morning. The wife and daughter decided they wanted to sleep in until 9am. I am up everyday at 6am, so I had 3 hours at the bench, can't beat that! Whoo Hoo!

I spent a large amount of time meticulously cutting out the Pontos wood decking so that I could dry fit it to the deck. It comes with a self adhesive backing on it. It can be peeled off and stuck in place when ready but since I'm taking it nice and slow on this, double and triple checking all my fits, I needed to get this done. It actually gave me a good boost of enthusiasm for the build because the deck looks so sweet.

After that was done I went to addressing these stairs and the little gap circled in Red.


I circled that gap to show that there is also a portion of coaming there as well that has to be replaced. Ugh, was that some work. First I used sheet styrene to get gap level with the deck and then used some very thin pieces to reproduce the coaming. Then I moved on to taking out the stairs which again left another two gaps to be filled. Again, plastic card was used.

The picture below shows the results of filling the gap on the right hand side, replacing the coaming and then attaching the Eduard Photo etch sheet to it. I circled the area where the gap was where the coaming was. I did end hitting it with some primer to test sanding etc. Just as a note, there is a piece of PE that attached to the side of the structure which will cover up that nasty fill job.




This picture shows how crisp the Eduard set is. My question, should I drill out the port holes, paint them black or what?


Lastly, I decided to start doing a ton of dry fitting of the supper structure. Here are a couple pictures of the dry fit. Please excuse the base, I'm still trying to work out what I'm doing there. I know it may be a little contrary to popular thinking but I like having a base that is smaller than the ship.





Thanks for checking this out!

[doogsatx/]

Nice! I built the New Jersey (modernized with helipad, Tomahawk boxes...) years ago and loved it. I've been drooling over that upcoming Trumpeter 1:200 Missouri, but it's just flat-out too big, so I've been eying the venerable Tamiya kit myself. Will be watching to see how it goes!

Congrats on the little one! Our youngest is four months...never fear, bench time is possible once the initial few weeks pass.

[adampolo13-Email Not Valid]

Thanks doogsatx! This really has been a lot of fun. It's my first real attempt at a ship model. Other than some funky gaps this really doesn't seem like it's too much of a hassle. You can pick up the Tamiya 1991 version and get the Pontos "Battleship" kit and depict the Mo' as she sailed in the movie, or you can get the Tamiya 1944 version and the Eduard set and build it like I am. I did get the "Battleship" kit and blue deck from Pontos as the "battleship" kit has ton of brass that can be used.

[wbill76]

Jul 13, 2013 15:50:56 GMT -5 @dickyf said:

Big Mo is a beautiful floaty thing and was my first build on my return to the hobby - it was very enjoyable and I would love to build another now I'm a little better at the bench...

So does this mean you'll be picking up the Trumpeter 1/200 offer that's slated for September?

Adam, making good progress! On the porthole question I suppose it comes down to how visible they will be and to what degree you want to represent them as being 'true' portholes? I recall when I toured the Mo in Pearl that the porthole glass was very thick and from the outside when closed appears very dark...so at 1/350 scale I'm guessing if you went black and/or used something like Tamiya Clear Smoke to represent them you'd be fine?

[adampolo13-Email Not Valid]

Hey guys, luckily I was able to get some more work done today. In fact i got about 6 hours bench time. ;D

I set out the day to work on something a little different as I was a little tired of stairs etc. I've noticed that there is plenty of things to be done when working on ships. ;D

Well, I set out to work on these:


First thing to do was addressing these:

The are just AWFUL!

The Pontos kit came with these thank goodness:


Unfortunately the Pontos kit did not come with resin replacements for the base of the big guns. Sorry I don't know the name of them. So, I cut the barrel away from them and I ended up with these:


I drilled out them out and put the brass barrels in and then used white glue to fill the gaps. I'm sorry to say I was so entrenched in building that I forgot to take pictures. Well, after many hours of cutting sanding, gluing etc I ended up with the first turret being almost done. I have one more piece of railing to put on and then the life rafts. After that I will put it under a coat of primer and move on to the next project.






Thanks for checking out my build!

[wbill76]

Definite improvement with those brass barrels Adam.

[TRM]

Lovely work so far Adam! Those Big Gun look fantastic! Not sure what Eduard set you have...could it have port holes included? I know one of the sets has the entire side panels in one shot! Glad to see you got a chance to sneak into the cave brotha'!!

[406 Silverado]

wow this is one to follow. Very nice work so far Adam.

Congrats on the new addition to the family bud.....papa

[adampolo13-Email Not Valid]

Thanks guys! I really am having a ton of fun with this kit, lots of work, but lots of fun.

[deafpanzer]

Mighty Mo!!! Count me in!!! One of my fav ships... that 1/200 kit is so tempting but 4 feet long and more... not too sure!

[Leon]

Adam,those barrels look fantastic buddy .Looking forward to more updates.

[bbrowniii]

WOW! Those guns look GREAT!

You look like you are really doing a number on this one. Keep up the good work!

[TRM]

Nice reference one for you!! BTW, stick with "blastbags" like Dicky suggested...sounds more manly!!




A little bit different perspective now?!!   LOL!!  Nothing like lobbing a VB bug at someone from 26 miles away!!!  

[adampolo13-Email Not Valid]

Whatever they are, they're big! Thanks for the ref pic T, and Dicky thanks for the correct name. I've been fiddling around with the base this week. My plan for the weekend is to get the base done and hopefully finish off that turret.

[TRM]

Sounds like a solid weekend plan my friend!!! The little one can ride around in it in the tub when you're done too!!!

[`Boots`]

Lovely work on this one Adam and congrats on juniors arrival

[pt109]

Very nice Adam...good detail work, those barrels make a big difference.

Paul 

[bbd468]

Hello Adam, This kit is one of my dream builds. Im not sure ill ever get it bought and built, but for now ill live vicariously live through you to get my battleship fix!

Your off to a great start and those barrels or sweeet!!

[Thomas_M/]

Getting the 1/200 Mo wouldn´t be impossible, only the aftermarket stuff would ruin me...

Like your progress so far, Adam. the turned brass barrels are cool!

[modelfreak72]

Hey Adam! Oh this is a sweet build! Those gun barrels looking good! Looking forward to more!

[robbo]

Oh wow a big boat with loads of extras, front row seat for Robbo please

[adampolo13-Email Not Valid]

Hey guys thanks for the complements. This really is a fun build. Unfortunately I didn't get too much bench time today, just enough to fiddle with some more PE on the first turret. I'm hoping on getting some more bench time tomorrow morning and I'll have an update ready then.

[adampolo13-Email Not Valid]

Hey guys, unfortunately my huge build plans for the weekend fell through. First, I finally got the courage to start surfing again. I had hung up my wetsuit 2 years ago after my last knee surgery. Then I spent a ton of time with the family. Well, with the few hours I got at the bench this weekend, here's what I did.

First off, I got the last of the PE on turret no. 1. After that I decided to lay down some primer to check all the gaps and seems. I attached all the guardrails with white glue and filled the seams around the blast bags. I would have had much more time to build if I hadn't of decided to lay down the primer. I have never had a problem with my Badger Krome but with the crazy heat the tip dried up bad and got wicked clogged. I had to put the thing in my sonic cleaner and then very carefully pick the paint out of the tip. I spent almost 2 hours cleaning the brush. Thankfully I got it clean without damaging it. Also, I have a Badger Patriot as a back-up which doesn't have such a fine tip which I used to prime. Anyways, here are the pics of the turret.






After that I got the bug to get the little planes built. I wasn't expecting it to take me as long as it did, there were seam lines on every part. But here they are.

Nicely engraved panel lines.


Lastly I turned my attention to the super structure. Getting to this point took almost 3 hours. There was a major seam/gap running down the middle of the two sides. I used super glue to fill and sand smooth. There's also a gap which runs along the seam where the deck fits. I still have some work to do there but again I've used white glue to fix it. Then I started getting some of the Eduard PE attached.




A quick dryfit of the super structure.


Thanks for checking out my build!