Flyhawk's 1/700 HMS Naiad

[TRM]

Hey fellas,

Not that I already have too much going on, adding one more won't make too much more of a difference at this point! Recently I banged out a review over on Model Shipwrights for Flyhawk Models' HMS Naiad 1940...

The Review - modelshipwrights.kitmaker.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=Reviews&file=index&req=showcontent&id=11340


I figure after reviewing along with seeing some other builds, I would head down the road to slapping this around the bench. So let's kick this off, shall we?


The Kit



As I mentioned, more or less, this lit is packed and packed well! For presentation of a kit form a manufacturer...Flyhawk get's a strong 100% with this one.



I won't go through the entire kit...well, wasn't that what my review was for? LOL! But to show a little more of how well I think they did with presentation and packing...



All of the superstructure parts and some miscellaneous items alone with the masts and yardarms were packed individually in their own clear plastic boxes for protection.



All of the superstructure parts do not require any cleanup...at least from what I can see. The masks and whatnot are attached to sprue trees and will need to be removed and cleaned.



The kits gives you the option of building a full hull or the waterline version. At the outset, I am thinking a little of both somewhat. I like the idea of working a diorama with this one. I could just use the waterline option, but the 1/700 scaling allows room to work the lower end of the hull into the diorama easily.

I began to sling the plastic around already. So far everything seems to be going just fine. I hope to have another update real soon!

Thanks for stopping in!!

[wbill76]

Nice subject! Looking forward to seeing what you do with this one Todd.

[Leon]

Count me in! Looks like a great kit.

[TRM]

Thanks Bill and Leon! Glad to have you along for the ride! I am hoping to work my way through this one...even before finishing some other things. We'll see how that plays out! I already started cleaning some parts and doing some dry fitting....seems to be going well so far!

[JimD]

Neat. Ships are foreign to me mostly, but I will enjoy it nonetheless. They sure do put together a pretty package though.

[Wes]

Looks like a fun one to folllow Todd. Im sure youll do one brilliant job.

[TRM]

Thanks Jimmy and Wes...glad to have you both along for the ride! 

Dig the heels in and go! LOL!! Well I managed to glue the lower hull to the upper. While the joint was fairly tight, there is an ever so small recess where the two meet. Filling and sanding was easy and took a short time to bang out so I am not even close to being upset. Still better than three-piece hull stuff if you ask me...





The deck is more or less a two-piece affair...a little dry fit seemed fun to have at!



You'll notice a small amount of filler on the forward deck. There is a small section that overlaps the lower deck and where it gets attached amidships there was a joint in the middle of the faux wood decking. This is mostly obscured when the model is together, I just chose to fill the joint and re-scribe the lines in case I am wrong...lol!!



The guns will be one of my next focuses. Should keep me busy while I plot my next move.





I toyed with the idea of replacing the barrels on this one, but I think these will work, and I kind of want to see how this thing looks OOB.

I know I might be jumping the gun here, but this brings me to my next dilemma...paint! I like to normally know what I am doing...or at least figure a plausible course with the painting before I am done building. With HMS Naiad,it looks like I have a couple options to choose from...I am going to have to mull that over some.

Thanks for dropping by!!

[TRM]

Just for fun...and fact I apparently have too much time on my hands...

I feel anyone has three basic options...Even though this is a 1940 configuration of the ship one could paint the Naiad in the dark blue-grey or dark grey solid coloring (depending on your feelings...LOL), or the disruptive Eastern or Western camouflage measure. Western being the colors below in the kit's instructions...browns, green and greys, the Eastern is Blue-Grey configurations. This is where #2 & #3 for the options comes into play...seems to be a split in the thinking of what the actual color of the scheme was...go figure...modelers not agreeing on color!! LOL!!

In both cases of the color fight, the pattern is to be one of the First Admiralty Disruptive Types. There was no standardized patterns to this measure. Early on there was a potluck of designs used. One typical thought is in line with the suggestion from the instructions in the kit where a 3 color scheme was used...



You would think it would be easy from there; however, there is a growing number of folks thinking the 3 color scheme was in grey-tones only. Now I would like to have two of Alan Raven's books in front of me, but after reading up a bit I found there is a back and forth belief on which colors the scheme actually was. Rather than spend the money at the moment on the two books (later...when I get more Royal stuff in the stash)....I will have a go at this myself...for two reasons; one, I don't have any allegiance to any of the color scheme...I will sleep well at night no matter the color! Second is something I notice in the pictures of the ship.





Now the basic design depicted in the instructions are similar in nature to what is seen in the pictures here...there is one issue I have. After having a long look at the picture...this is not a 3-tone paint job...there are 4 colors on this ship.



Whether it is brown, green and light grey of the Western approach or all blue-grey tones of the Eastern, there is distinctly 4 colors in the picture. If for argument sake, I go with the Western versus the Eastern, the darkest colors would be brown in the picture...seen on the face of the bridge and the side of the hull directly under the forward mast. The darker grey color going from the hull up onto the bridge, top of the forward funnel and in the middle of the aft funnel would be the green coloring. The medium grey straddles the brown swoosh of color below the forward mast...with a 3-tone coloring, that would be it...but there is a bright colored area not explained just forward the tug boat and up on the funnels. I am thinking light grey.



Even if the lighter color appear it could be either medium or light grey on the bow, I was just playing around to see what things looked like. In the world of greys...which appear to be bluer than anything else...form what I am reading...I might come up with this....



So while I continue to build this, I do need to make some sort of decision soon as I need to paint some things before things all come together! Looks like I need a little more coffee and i can mull over what I will do...leaning Western!

Thanks for stopping in....again!!

[wbill76]

Interesting! A bona fide paint scheme mystery on your hands Todd. Either one would make for a great finish. I'm kind of partial to the Eastern scheme myself as it isn't something you seen done a lot...but both schemes are eye-catchers no matter which you choose in the end.

[TRM]

Thanks Bill! I was leaning Western but after I keep looking at the 'drees blues' I am still hanging onto the top of the fence!

[wbill76]

Jun 4, 2015 15:08:57 GMT -5 TRM said:

Thanks Bill! I was leaning Western but after I keep looking at the 'drees blues' I am still hanging onto the top of the fence!

For what it's worth I meant the Western with the green and brown as something not seen often. Get down off the fence already!

[TRM]

LOL...well now that makes me want to flip flop a bit more...LOL!! Grabbing a coin right now to give it a flip.............okay...2 out of 3.........LOL!!

Side note...great to hear the Mrs. will be home and on the mend!! Best wishes to the both of you my friend! She might have to take up modelling o keep her hands busy during the recovery!!

[deafpanzer]

WHOA! Another ship... this time I really have fallen in love with the camo scheme!

[4bogreen]

A boat!!! (oh no! grandpa is going to hang me, its a ship boy! its a ship, he always said...) eh ship!!

I normaly only do 1/350 ships, but this looks pretty good Todd!! I love the camouflage pattern. Detail also looks very good for a 1/700 ship. Seeing all this, wants me also build a ship (got a nice 1/350 Russian Sovremenny!!).

Regards,

Remco

[TRM]

Thanks Andy! The camo is certainly colorful!!

Thanks Remco! Nice how a tiny piece of plastic can conjure up fond past memories! 1/350 is nice, but similar in that there are still a bunch of parts in that scale that are hard to see...LOL!!



Well not the biggest of updates, but there is progress! My oldest daughter graduated yesterday form High School, so things have been a bit crazy the past couple weeks to say the least. I did manage to get some things moving forward though! The Sovremenny is a fine looking vessel! You should have a go at some point...it'll be fun!!

I assembled the 5.25's...





Various other small surface details have been cleaned up and assembled; ready for paint.



A quick dry-fitting starts to reveal a little ship...







Finishing up some cleanup of the larger of these tiny pieces.



I also began masking some items in preparation to slinging the primer.



Time to get back to the bench and see how things turn out! As always, thanks for tuning in!!

[Leon]

Making good progress Todd!

[dierk]

I was going to ignore this as it's a ship and they generally don't float my boat groan, sorry couldn't help myself. But then I saw who's building it and there's also that interesting camo scheme - so count me in!

[TRM]

Thank you Leon!!

Thanks Dierk! LOL...glad you are deciding to tag along! Now lets hope I don't mess things up too badly!

[JimD]

Nice stuff. I can't help but to get a chuckle from those guns. I'm seeing a couple of portly bald dudes waving their arms in the air like they just don't care.

[TRM]

LOL!! Thanks Jimmy!

[wbill76]

Maybe that's where the Brits got their inspiration from! The US Navy also had some AA-cruisers but I think they saw duty mostly in the Pacific if memory serves.

[deafpanzer]

Your ship definitely will have the approval from this well known ship captain...

[TRM]

Thanks Andy! Blast form the past! Used to watch that show all the time! LOL!

[deafpanzer]

Jun 9, 2015 12:26:41 GMT -5 TRM said:

Thanks Andy! Blast form the past! Used to watch that show all the time! LOL!

Not surprised at all because I did too!

[wing_nut]

NIIIIIICE! Wow the color scheme in on the sheet is too cool. can't wait to see that.

Seeing this... I feel like I need to take a ship.

[TRM]

Thanks Marc! Sorry for missing you a few days back! Like a mad house around here still...LOL!! You doing a ship? Sound like some FUN!!


Well, I stole some time and went to work on a couple things. First off, I primed the hull.



After a quick, extremely light primer coat on the decks, I added some color using Camo Black Brown...this is my form of shading this time around.



I added some highlighting in an attempt to bring out some color on the decking.



I started getting some primer down on the itty-bitty pieces as well. These sprues are nice in that for the parts that had connection points on the outside, I snipped and cleaned leaving the part still secured to the inner circle.



To make things even better and to add another pat on the back to Flyhawk, the mini sprue are designed to stack! :-)--< Anything to help my failing attempts at a clean workspace are greatly appreciated!





And you can see the spue labels...LOL!! I know, "small things..."



I added some primer to the main guns as well.



Okay...looks like I need to get back to some chores here. With any luck I will get back to the bench tonight and see what I can bang out! Thanks from dropping by!

[Leon]

Nice to see some primer and color going down Todd!

[Biskup.]

Not sure how I missed this. It looks great Can't wait to see more

[wbill76]

Always neat when a kit maker takes little things (literally in this case!) into account with the sprue and attachment design!

[TRM]

Thanks Leon!! Always a good feeling to get the painting underway!

Thanks Lucas! No problem my friend! Its a small ship an easily missed!!

Bill, sure is! I have been thinking Flyhawk is #1 already with the design, what they toss in the box and of course the molding...but these little details make it all the more impressive if you ask me. Just shows more of the quality.


I have been sneaking in a few minutes here and there over the past week or so and worked though some paint. First up was a base of white/grey.



I also lightened up the decking a little



Here I have been using the masking fluid again to help out with the camo. Here I have the white/grey and then a creme shade added...



Then more masking...then some green....



Then after a little more masking and an application of brown....I ended up here!





I am thinking things seem to be heading in the right direction. Once things set up, I will give her a clear coat and start working on superstructure. Should get some time tomorrow hopefully....woo hoo!!