Welcome to my Web site

Welcome to my website. This site is for folks who build or would like to build plastic model ships. I’ve been building ship models for many years and I still get as much enjoyment from the hobby as I did when I started. If you are an occasional modeler, serious modeler or if you’ve been away from the hobby for awhile and are coming back, I think you will enjoy this site.

I chose Revells’ Cutty Sark as the launch project because there are a large number of these kits out there in closets, attics and modelers collections, waiting to be built. Also, this kit builds into a pretty impressive ship model, no matter where the modelers’ skill level is.

The plan is for this site to grow over time, featuring a different model about every month. Previous models will be archived for reference and new visitors to the site. As you may have already noticed, this site is written in a blog foremat with the latest post on top and previous posts in decending order. I hope that modelers will find this website enjoyable and useful and will visit often……………..John

The Island

 The island really needs a lot of modification. I started by cutting the funnel opening out so I can use a pe grill. Since the inside of the island will be visible through the opening the inside of the island was painted flat black. Molded detail on the fwd side of the island were also cut off. I removed the splinter shields from the walkways since they looked like railings and some detail was just wrong for the period the ship will be modeled in. The bridge and flag bridge were particularly wrong. After cementing the walkways on I cut .005" sheet styrene into strips for the new splinter shields. Antenna mounts were made from sheet styrene and styrene rod. Sections of 1/350 scale pe ladders work well for bridge windows and windows on the pri-fly.The safety nets around the SPS30 antenna platform came from a 1/720 scale pe fret. The stanchion for the lights was made from sheet styrene and rod. The lights themselves are from the 1/540 pe sheet. A bomb nose from a 1/48 scale airplane kit was commandeered for use as a radar dome on the rear of the island. It still looks a little too pointy to me though.The number decal came from a GMM decal sheet. 5 minute epoxy was used to attach the island to the flight deck. I've had islands come un-stuck before and this attachment does not look strong, so epoxy it is.





Painting the Hull and Flight Deck

 After looking over some drawings and photos I discovered that I had omitted the 5" gun mount on the aft starboard side. This is also omitted in the kit. So I used some more styrene sheet and angle to make the gun tub and mount for the gun director. Glad this happened before the paint was on! For paint I used Tamya Dark Ghost Gray from a spray can. Model Master Dark Ghost Gray is a pretty good match of Haze Gray. Not so with Tamya. It dried to a very pretty light blue color. Not acceptable. So I repainted the hull and flight deck MM Light Sea Gray (spray can). On CVS carriers the flight deck appears to be the same color as the hull except for the angle deck. I've looked at photos of CVA carriers and they show a more uniform dark gray color over the entire flight deck. I don't know the reason for this difference. After the paint dried I masked off the angle deck landing area with Tamya tape and painted it MM Euro 1 Gray. Which is a nice dark gray that will also take weathering well. Also brushed on the same dark gray on the cat walks. Masked off the waterline and painted the boot topping Testors Flat Black.
The stripes for the angled section of the flight deck are incorrect for the period I'm modeling so I opted not to use them. Also I prefer to paint long straight lines when I can since decals are really difficult to keep straight. Using the drawing I have I measured the angled deck off and masked the striping with tamya masking tape and painted the lines with MM Light Gray. I use this rather then white because white looks too bright in scale. Painted the catapults the same way with MM Euro 1Gray.  After the paint dried weathering was applied using pastels, mostly black. A little brown was added in some places. The elevators get dirtier then the rest of the deck so I weathered them heavier. Decals were applied after a coat of clear gloss was sprayed on. I had to use numbers from my spares box and a few other non-kit decals. Sprayed the whole thing with clear flat.