Digital Navy - USS Arizona - 1/100

Casemates complete

Just finished the bulkheads for the casemate guns. They came out great and good fit up. Once the guns are placed, the deck above will be placed down over the top to form the shelter deck.

I ran into my first real bump in the road today. I began building two of the 5"-51 casemate guns and things were going well until the barrel. I rolled the first gun barrel and placed it on the mount. Something didn't look right. The taper was way too exaggerated. The breach end was way too big. Once I placed the barrel on the mount and put it in its spot on the deck, I found that the overall profile was way too tall due to the larger breach end. :eek:

When I rolled the barrel, I rolled it to the seam line printed on the paper. I doesn't appear that this is right. I don't know if this is a scale up issue, or a printing issue, but the barrel needs to be rolled a good bit tighter than the seam line to get the correct barrel diameter. The barrel needs to rest further down in the mount to get the correct overall height.

So, I have a beautiful picture of a 5"-51 mount with barrel, but it's a beta build at this point. I'll have to go back and redo this one. The second one I'm working on will end up being a test build as well, to get the correct barrel diameter. Future DN ARIZONA builders need to take note of this, as it could be an issue at regular scale as well.

arizona52jy8.jpg


arizona53ve6.jpg


arizona54gh3.jpg


arizona55ox6.jpg
 

David H

Member
Gosh they are a fine looking gun barrel (!) but looks like a pig to do in a single piece of card.

h46317.jpg

My recent experience with the "itsy bitsy" cannon on HMS Alert has shown me that using really thin paper to make a solid barrel is one way. You can create the swell by wrapping the muzzle with a thin strip of paper and then soaking the lot in PVA means you can sand or turn the whole barrel before painting, perfection!

There are only 10 to do after all!

I got wise to this technique from building masts and adopting / copying other modeller's!

Your mounts are a fantastic bit of modelling. It seems a shame to hide them in a casemate!

D

PS funny how 5' sounds much bigger than 125mm
 
Thanks David. I've done both methods and really like the one you describe for small gun barrels. This printing and size for the 5"/51 isn't too bad to handle. It's a little slow to roll, but the detail on the barrel is great.

Hank... I use Prismacolor markers. They have all kinds of colors, but particularly they have several shades of gray from 10% up to 80% I believe. You have to be careful with them when they are new, because they are very wet and will bleed into your card. You have to use them lightly until they are "broken in". I get them at Hobby Lobby in the markers/colored pens section.

I've built the second 5"/51 deck gun this afternoon with tremendously better results. I'll post a side-by-side photo tomorrow.

Happy New Year!
 

airbob

Member
Wow!....what a monster!!!....and a great job that you are doing!...Happy New Years! from Western Tennessee!!!
 

CJTK1701

Banned
Wow! Just stumbled across this and whew, I don't know what to say..... Truly a fine piece of work. I Love the scale of it, it really looks....... awesome.:thumb:
 

SgtSki in MI

New Member
Wow!

I followed this whole thread. I found it especially interesting because I plan on Digital Navy's USS Arizona to be the first card model that I actually purchase once I develop my skills some more. I'm going for this particular model because it comes on a CD so I still have the ability to print more parts if I screw up. I'm sticking with the scale I buy it in though. 1/100 is a little much at this stage for me but this resized build effort is amazing! I look forward to seeing the finished model.

-SgtSki
 
5"/51 Deck Guns Perfected

Thanks for the kind comments guys...

Bob and CJTK1701... Thanks, it sure is a monster. It can be overwhelming at times.

SgtSki in MI... The DN Arizona is a good model once you feel comfortable with your skills. The fit up is great, and I've only found a couple of quirks to this point. These 5" deck guns for instance... Ignore the seam line on the barrel part. You have to roll it to a diameter based on the mount size.

Well, that took a little patience, but I've got the deck gun issue resolved. I went to the good ole Hobby Lobby and purchased some 3/32" diameter brass tube. I've used this in the past to make primary guns on smaller scale ships. This approach worked great for the 5" guns. The tube essentially becomes a former for rolling the barrel, and then I let it taper out towards the breach. The end result gives you a nice rifled muzzle for extra realism. The only down side is the added weight to the assembly. I like to use aluminum tube for this trick, but they were fresh out of 3/32" in aluminum. :curse:

These gun assemblies are quite involved even at this large scale, so I'm going to be busy building these for a few days. Two down, mid-way into two more and six to go.

Here is a side-by-side shot of my first two 5" deck guns. Top one is correct diameter and the lower one is rolled based on the seam.
arizona56my0.jpg


I went back and fixed the first one and have mounted the pair on the shelter deck. Looking similar and fierce. :thumb:
arizona57an5.jpg
 

barry

Active Member
Now that is what I would call a proper gun and equal to the polish sites a great build I think you ought to build an extra one so people can see it properly on it's own little diorama deck.
 

191pedram

New Member
hello
i'm bahram najedy (191pedram) from iran
please guide me how can i take the battleship map as same as uss arizona ?
waiting for your answers
best regards
 
Thanks for the kind comments guys. I've made eight of the ten 5"/51 casemate guns to this point. Only two to go.

On an unrelated topic, I've run into some deck de-lamination around my forcastle area. There are some ridges and bubbles that have popped up. I must have not used enough 3M spray mount in that area. Do any of you have ideas for re-laminating the deck to the 1mm card without taking it completely back up? Any ideas would be very helpful. I'm contemplating solutions as I write this.

191pedram... Thanks for your interest in my build. I've taken the electronic files from the CD ROM of Digital Navy's ARIZONA and reproduced them at 250% magnification. That gets me to 1/100 scale. The original parts are created at 1/250 scale. I had to use a commercial print shop to do the printing because the size was much larger than my home printer could handle, and I didn't want to segment the parts.

Here is a link to Digital Navy's website where you can purchase all of Roman Detyna's fine models.

Home
 

Hank45

New Member
I have been using Aleene's fast grab tacky glue and a wooden brayer to roll the two pieces flat and tight. This might be a help with your problem. Hank
 
Dan, now that sounds like a great idea.

I've not placed the barbettes on the deck or other deck elements in the forcastle area. I could make enough of an incision with a syringe that I could disguise the entry mark and put enough droplets of glue in to do the trick.

It would probably need to be a very thin adhesive though. Something that would flow well and not build up too much when I'm placing it...

Any ideas???

Thanks!
 

dansls1

Member
Well, I was thinking good old 'Elmer's' type white glue thinned with water, but perhaps somebody else out there might have some other better ideas...
 
Not a bad idea Dan. I'll have to be careful with Elmers. I'm not real experienced with water-based glues. I use gels.

As I'm writing this, I'm noticing that the bubbles are lying down more in the last 24 hours. I may have experienced a humidity effect. We've had some recent swings of extreme temperture (extreme cold to unseasonably warm)and moisture here in East Tennessee the last few days. This problem may have resolved itself.
 
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