The Ship Model Forum

As I had the need to make a very special gift to a pair of friends of mine, I chose to build my couple of Tamiya O class destroyers. I needed a pair of simple but handsome ships that had to be almost identical; not willing to buy another E class, I started to work on those two, of which one should have become the HMS Offa in her late 1941 appearence, and the other the HMS Oribi during the same period. It has been a funny experiment as I wanted to see how far could I go building a decent model and keeping the cost as low as possible: I knew that there are some very good PE sets for those ships, but I was willing to keep my budget as low as possible. In other words, I sought for the lower edge of the cost-effectiveness balance
We all know that the old Tamiya Os have many faults, starting with the fact that the kit can be good only to represent the class leader HMS Onslow, and not her sisters. In fact I had to shorten the forecastle, rebuild the aft superstructure and reshape the bridge, based on drawings from the Profile Morskie book on HMS Oribi. Portholes had to be drilled as usual and I made a bi-adhesive tape template to have them identical and simmetrical on both sides of both ships. I also planned to make the hull plating with very thin strips of paper, but I finally chose to keep that experiment for a bigger ship worth of it. I rebuilt the 4.7" guns and their shields, they came out not really simmetrical but at least satisfactory. The AA and searchlight platforms had also to be rebuild, as they were a bit oversized. When I started painting, I did the first passage as usual, and then when it dried I blended the base colour with a clear matt medium and darker and brighter tones, brushed in vertical stripes to give to flat surfaces the contrast they needed. Photos barely show the result, and as my ships were to be brand new and I wasn't so sure about that new technique, I didn't insist too much.
The models aren't finished yet, but I will post more photos ASAP

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[Sorry if I posted in the wrong section Now I know ]

The most difficult is done once the superstructures are rebuilt; all the rest, is pure joy. Masts to be reproduced with copper wire, radars scratchbuilt with 1/400 railing bits (not as good as true PE radars, of course, but the result seems satisfactory). For the 20 mm Oerlikons, I used Tom's PE but keeping the original plastic pedestal, from which I severed off the guns that I spared for reconstructing the 40 mm pom-pom. Torpedo tubes seemed already good OOB, I just added a pair of small platforms that were missing. DC throwers were also missing. Going on painting, I think that my corticene brown is too bright: I had two references, the Profile Morskie colour drawing and my HMS Lance 1/400 paper model from JSC: one shows the corticene to be coffee-dark, the other is a sandy brown So I chose an intermediate tone that would probably be wrong in any case. But we have to consider that those ships will be given to someone who knows less than nothing about them
Coloured stripes on the stack were painted according to the infos I found on an article; Profile Morskie drawing showed the last stripe to be black, while the article, written by a most trusted naval historian, stated that the XVIIth Destroyer Flotilla had a red stripe instead.
I foreseen to place a pair of small cutters sailing behind my destroyers: I know that no private yacht was allowed to sail in wartime, but as usual, my friends don't, and I thought it would make a very nice detail. But mainly, I needed those boats so that I could write on the greeting card for my friends those words from Simon & Garfunkel's Bridge over troubled waters:

Sail on Silver Girl
Sail on by
Your time has come to shine
All your dreams are on their way
See how they shine
If you need a friend
I'm sailing right behind

So I took a pair of IJN 10 m boats and turned them into something similar to an English plank-on-edge, pulling hard in strong winds; masts are copper wire, sails are painted paper; not really perfect as they lack the rounded shape of the true sails, but the appearence is nice enough.

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Your post is in the right place, don't worry! Your build looks very sharp far, and the sailing ship is a nice addition. It's always good to see people tackling older kits and making them shine! Good work!

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If all else fails, a complete pig-headed refusal to see facts in the face will see us through. - General Melchett

Great kits very well done, the bases look good too. They give me inspiration for finishing mine, although I do not have much reference material, only one side view of 'OFFA'.
Well done on these kits

Thank you everybody It's your appreciation that keeps me running!
@ The Rayer: I didn't notice that we were building the same ship and I'm glad to inspire you as well! Carry on!

Well, personally I'm not really satisfied with the work I've done so far. Most of all, the building seems to lack precision, the overall impression is of a rather "dirt" model, as you may see in the next photo I plan to do better with my next projects

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One more photo; I was trying to represent all the standing and running rigging on my cutters, as they would draw lot of attention. Oribi's cutter is still missing one of his jibs and her own rigging is still in the making

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Your models are great, precision is absolutely not necessary and in this scale is sometimes not desired, as you are more trying to capture the "feel" of a ship as opposed to building a precise replica. I really like your little destroyers, they are quite nicely detailed and I love your little diorama idea. You should be proud!

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"It is best to remain silent and let others assume you are dumb than to speak up and remove all doubt"

http://nssavannah.wordpress.com/

Many thanks Avery That's it, I think that the overall precision is not as important as the feeling that the ship may give to the observer, as I consider the artistic side of modelling -the other being the "technical" side- to be the most important; but until now it was mostly a way to let me forgive my own lack of technical skill So, I still foresee to go on learning and progressing on that side
Now here's a photo taken from above; I've done another mistake while painting the sea, because I added too many ripples: there's one every few meters, that should make for a wind of more than 30 knots and with such a gale, my small cutter wouldn't have been able to set full sails as it actually does. Weaker winds may have the same effect on the sea surface, but only in shallower waters... You may also have noticed that the ships have a poor fit with their baseplates, but I should mask that with a little of drenched cotton.
(Let me say that I'm revealing all the mistakes that I've done not to prove that I don't deserve your compliments, but to make sure that others won't do the same mistakes )

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I'm nearly done Just missing a little drybrushing, the folks aboard and the White Ensign
I'm not pushing the detail to the limit as it's getting late and I'll have to deliver them soon

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Excellent work, very nicely done! The rigging is especially nice, and the sailboat is a nice touch.

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"It is best to remain silent and let others assume you are dumb than to speak up and remove all doubt"

http://nssavannah.wordpress.com/

Thanks again, Avery
I did the rigging with a 0.06 mm fishing line, previously painted black by passing it under the point of a permanent marker; at first I was willing to use my own hairs but that line is quite as thin and surely stronger and more reliable.
Not all the rigging is reproduced, I did omit some mainmast stays and halyards.
The two sailing boats, Lady Laure and Lady Chiara (as I invented them, I gave them the name of my friends that will receive the gifts), were very simple to build and I foresee to try something different in the future: I.E. a mediterranean latin-rigged boat with a prewar english or italian destroyer, or most likely a chinese junk (or any other kind of Pacific sailing boat, why not a malese "Praho") with a japanese ship... or a modern boat with a colourful spinnaker passing by a ship of our days... I would be happy if somebody would feel inspired by this idea, and have a try at it
Those two "cutters" got the hull of a surplus japanese 17 m pinnace, that just needed to be filed a bit and to have the cockpit carved out. Masts and booms are copper wire while the sails are in paper: this is what I should further improve, as paper can't be curved in 3 D and sails don't get the right shape.

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Dear Sirs,
I'm done.

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This thread has been moved to completed Models in the Picture Post section

Jim Baumann

Very nice model!!

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....I buy them at three times the speed I build 'em.... will I live long enough to empty my stash...?
http://www.modelshipgallery.com/gallery ... index.html

IPMS UK SIG (special interest group) www.finewaterline.com

Beautiful work, very nice and I'm sure your friends will be delighted by your original and very thoughtful gift! Very well done!

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"It is best to remain silent and let others assume you are dumb than to speak up and remove all doubt"

http://nssavannah.wordpress.com/

Ciao Secondo
Bello!!!
Mi era sfuggito!!
Luciano

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Best Regard from Italy
http://www.navymodeling.com/

They did Sunday I brought my models to a local hobby show to let my ships win the "gold" medal, and yesterday I presented them to my friends. We were all very happy and shared an unforgettable moment of friendship. All the hours I spent on those models finally paid off very well, but it has never been a tedious work, as I worked for love more than for the sake of accuracy. Now my little Os aren't mine no more, but I kept the medal for me ( ), and I know they're in good hands. I hope they will last our whole lifetime, keeping alive the memories of the moments, both sad and joyful, that we shared.
Before to revert on aseptic, merciless everyday modelling, let me thank all of you for the kind words and the support you gave me. It made my task even more pleasant

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