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Gents, I hope everybody had a Merry Christmas. Anybody get something cool in the modelling line? My complement of Oerlikons is installed and the deck is active with aircraft. I think my failure rate with the guns was about 25%. Those barrels will break off if you so much as look at them too...

I really had no idea how much care they took in painting these things. At the rate of production they had to put out I thought it was a far more rushed affair.

Not only is that a beautiful job, it really illustrates the US Navy's dictum, "Guns: Put them EVERYWHERE."

I was actually thinking about Revell's old 1/426 kit. Model Monkey makes some wonderful-looking 3D-printed pieces for it and I'm not a big fan of Trumpeter.

Honestly, this makes me think of one of those Pirates of the Caribbean movies when they deliberately capsized their ship 😂. I'm willing to give it a try on the next ship though, at least with sub-assemblies. That's a fine-looking Texas. I want to get to building the Arizona at some point.

I guess I'm not too hopeless with photoetch. My first attempt is the twisted mess at the pilothouse level of the bridge, the latest is the searchlight platform at the forward end of the stack. I used a tip from YouTube of using Tamiya masking tape to hold the rail in place instead of...

Buddy, you ain't kidding! I must be a masochist. I got these watchmaker's glasses to help out. They're ok. Also these dividers to measure sections for rails. The two pieces I've done so far are definitely better than my first ones. And, of course, it's just plain cool to have new tools.

I went to order the personnel and sort of stumbled across the Marblehead. As Yoda might say, "resist, I could not". One of my uncles was on the Marblehead, though after her epic escape from the Java Sea.

Just arrived today. I'll slot this in between my Saratoga and Enterprise builds so it doesn't feel like I'm just grinding through ships.

No sir. Can you tell me or would you have to kill me after?

Well, I figure they're about right if I want to model the IJN Kaga after Enterprise's dive bombers were done with her. I might get more but it takes so long to receive stuff over here I'm about willing to simply chalk it up as a lesson learned. After all this was a lot of the point of doing...

The medium AA battery and a bit of the photoetch is on. I did okay-ish with the radars and ladders, but I botched the railings and catwalks. Maybe I'll try doing the railing in smaller sections instead of bending long complicated shapes in one shot. The catwalks should have been easy but I...

Good point! Even so, I'll blend it in a bit better. Hey, if I mess up I can make another decal!

Comparing against this shot I think it's close enough. I went digging around on different sites and drew it up in Paint, then pasted it into Publisher to do the sizing and shading.

That's what I'm thinking. The number itself is still too dark and in some photos part of it is gone, worn through I guess.

Ok, I'm sold on homemade decals. Just knowing I can print more if I screw it up is a big comfort. The aft decal is a bit darker under the film, but maybe following clearcoats will fix that. I'll probably spot some aircraft back there anyways.

We don't need the negative ones, Moriarty.

I would have gone that route if I'd needed to, but I'm happy to say the new printhead did the trick. I'll coat the numbers tonight and let them dry until tomorrow. Probably the left one on the bow, right one on the fantail. I'm bashing the 5" guns together from the 3D print and the kit parts...

I was thinking dark gray, but it's no problem to try it a couple different ways. I've got a new printhead on order which should fix the magenta problem.

The weekend report: I decided to try painting the flight deck lines. It took a bit of minor masking work (sarcasm, it took a good chunk of Saturday) but it worked out pretty well. I goofed a little by continuing the centerline stripe all the way to the fantail, where the aft "3" is supposed to...