Titanic Trumpeter 1/200 by InkMot
Hello everyone,
I tried a few days ago to order a figurehead for a 1/200 Victory from Shapeways because the one that Caldercraft provides in their kit is not even to consider. But... just heard from Ben from MidwestModelShop that Shapeways went bankrupt. Now I'm looking where to find the stuff that was offered on their site. I also tried to order several items for my Trumpeter RMS Titanic. I build both models simultaneously. I have bought almost all of the parts that Woody's offers on his site, but still looking for more parts to enhance my models. Anyway the Figurehead for the HMS Victory is the most important for now because the thin one provided from Caldercraft really looks like a peace of cr... Sorry.
Thanks for any response. Daniel
I tried a few days ago to order a figurehead for a 1/200 Victory from Shapeways because the one that Caldercraft provides in their kit is not even to consider. But... just heard from Ben from MidwestModelShop that Shapeways went bankrupt. Now I'm looking where to find the stuff that was offered on their site. I also tried to order several items for my Trumpeter RMS Titanic. I build both models simultaneously. I have bought almost all of the parts that Woody's offers on his site, but still looking for more parts to enhance my models. Anyway the Figurehead for the HMS Victory is the most important for now because the thin one provided from Caldercraft really looks like a peace of cr... Sorry.
Thanks for any response. Daniel
- Joined
- Dec 26, 2021
- Messages
- 32
- Points
- 48
7. Correcting and installing the propeller wave wings
8. Bilge Keels:
I’m catching up on some progress since March, so stand by for several posts. ;-)
I did some minor modifications to the propeller wing busses. This was mostly etching the aft edges to shape them more into a taper. I also etched in the end of the plates. If you look at the photo below, you can see how the pates end and how the trailing edge of the propeller buss tapers.
I did not attempt to simulate how the plating curves to meet the hull, opting instead to just fill this with putty and move on. Another difference between the kit parts and the actual ship is the direction of the plating on the surface. The real plating ran parallel to the side of the hull, while the plating on the kit parts run parallel to the propeller shaft. I’ve come to accept that there are details that I notice but few others will care about and I’ve chosen to look past them in favor of finishing this project in a reasonable amount of time.
This image shows the etching work on the trailing edge of the propeller buss and the tapering on the trailing edge. You can also see where I’ve filled in and shaped the joint to simulate the curves on the real ship.
Here are two views of the completed and primered stern area. Note that I also added the pad eyes on the stern plates that were used for attaching block and tackle for propeller maintenance. These were PE parts that were incredibly tiny. Several have been knocked off during construction or lost during assembly.. I’ll need to come back later to repair these.
Another addition has been the bilge keels from Model Shapeways. I forgot to take photos of this process. If you’re planning to replace the kit bilge keels with the available 3D printed versions like I did, or if you’re just planning to make your own out of styrene, I’d suggest waiting until you’re about to paint the hull before putting them on. Otherwise, you’ll keep knocking them off. Ask me how I know. ;-)
Since I’m not sure if I mentioned this previously, note that the rudder is a replacement 3D-printed part from Shapeways.
Next Steps:
8. Bilge Keels:
I’m catching up on some progress since March, so stand by for several posts. ;-)
I did some minor modifications to the propeller wing busses. This was mostly etching the aft edges to shape them more into a taper. I also etched in the end of the plates. If you look at the photo below, you can see how the pates end and how the trailing edge of the propeller buss tapers.
I did not attempt to simulate how the plating curves to meet the hull, opting instead to just fill this with putty and move on. Another difference between the kit parts and the actual ship is the direction of the plating on the surface. The real plating ran parallel to the side of the hull, while the plating on the kit parts run parallel to the propeller shaft. I’ve come to accept that there are details that I notice but few others will care about and I’ve chosen to look past them in favor of finishing this project in a reasonable amount of time.
This image shows the etching work on the trailing edge of the propeller buss and the tapering on the trailing edge. You can also see where I’ve filled in and shaped the joint to simulate the curves on the real ship.
Here are two views of the completed and primered stern area. Note that I also added the pad eyes on the stern plates that were used for attaching block and tackle for propeller maintenance. These were PE parts that were incredibly tiny. Several have been knocked off during construction or lost during assembly.. I’ll need to come back later to repair these.
Another addition has been the bilge keels from Model Shapeways. I forgot to take photos of this process. If you’re planning to replace the kit bilge keels with the available 3D printed versions like I did, or if you’re just planning to make your own out of styrene, I’d suggest waiting until you’re about to paint the hull before putting them on. Otherwise, you’ll keep knocking them off. Ask me how I know. ;-)
Since I’m not sure if I mentioned this previously, note that the rudder is a replacement 3D-printed part from Shapeways.
Next Steps:
- Drilling portholes
- Painting the Hull
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Great job that I will follow sinds I also started up a Trumpeter Titanic. Already ordered some Maritime model, AK and MiniBrass stuff. The only problem seems to be finding a hawse pipe. ShapeWays does not exist any longer… If somebody has a idea where to find it!
I also received stuff from Andrew 3D to strengthen the hull and in the meantime offers a base for the light kit from Magic Scale Modeling. Great enhancements.
Kind regards to all,
Daniel
I also received stuff from Andrew 3D to strengthen the hull and in the meantime offers a base for the light kit from Magic Scale Modeling. Great enhancements.
Kind regards to all,
Daniel
Have you seen the aftermarket stuff for Titanic from the midwest model shop ?
Thanks for your reply Bryian. Yes I did and already received a few of their parts. But they don’t sell the hawse pipe either. Daniel
- Joined
- Dec 26, 2021
- Messages
- 32
- Points
- 48
Drilling Portholes:
I had ambitions to add the MiniBrass plating sections for B and C Decks. I purchased it…and then decided that I didn’t want to do major surgery again on the hull for what would be a subtle change. For any project to get done, scope must be managed. Here’s what that kit looked like before I sold it:
I opted instead to purchase the Scale Warship PE porthole inserts and to not worry if some portholes were in the wrong place or non existent on the real ship. Nobody is going to notice.
Here are the Scale Warship porthole frames. The kit comes with replacement gangway doors (you can do open or closed) and it includes porthole glass.
Before you drill your portholes, ask yourself this question: Why?
Seriously. it’s a ton of work. There’s around a thousand portholes on this hull, give or take. It’s going to take you a long time. If you’re planning on lighting the kit then go ahead and drill. If not, may I suggest that you just fill each porthole with either a drop of clear gloss or Kristal Klear after you’re done painting?
Anyway, about drilling portholes…
To drill the portholes, I purchased a number of excellent drill bits from Drillbits Unlimited. (https://drillbitsunlimited.com). These guys are great! They were prompt with answering questions, quick in shipping and their pricing is reasonable.
Here is the set of drills I purchased for my project. I suggest that you decide how you plan to glaze your portholes BEFORE you purchase your drills. If you’re planning to use fiber optic, as demonstrated by the Midwest Model Shop, make sure you buy drills to accommodate the limited selection of fiber optic diameters. I made the mistake of measuring each molded porthole size with a micrometer and then ordering my drills for each measured size. The result was that the fiber optic sizes used by the Midwest Model Shop would not fit all of the holes I drilled. I ended up going with a mix of fiber optic and Kristal Klear (more on this in a later post). I was not going to re-drill a ton of holes.
To drill the holes, I purchased the Tamaya Drill. This is an actual kit that you have to assemble. It cost about $35, but it does an excellent job drilling portholes. You could also use a pin vice, but I don’t think you could fit drills like the ones I purchased in a pin vise. Also, your hand is going to hurt a lot. Do not attempt to use a Dremel tool for this, unless you like big burn holes in your hull.
Here’s a shot of the hull in mid-hole drill. Note that my aftermarket bilge keels are mounted on the hull. If I’m ever stupid enough to build this kit again, I’ll mount those bilge keels just before I paint the hull. They’re fragile and they break easily. BTW, you can make realistic bilge keels with strips of thin styrene and save yourself a bit of money.
I’ll cover the mounting of the Scale Warship porthole frames in a later post, since they get installed after you paint the hull.
I had ambitions to add the MiniBrass plating sections for B and C Decks. I purchased it…and then decided that I didn’t want to do major surgery again on the hull for what would be a subtle change. For any project to get done, scope must be managed. Here’s what that kit looked like before I sold it:
I opted instead to purchase the Scale Warship PE porthole inserts and to not worry if some portholes were in the wrong place or non existent on the real ship. Nobody is going to notice.
Here are the Scale Warship porthole frames. The kit comes with replacement gangway doors (you can do open or closed) and it includes porthole glass.
Before you drill your portholes, ask yourself this question: Why?
Seriously. it’s a ton of work. There’s around a thousand portholes on this hull, give or take. It’s going to take you a long time. If you’re planning on lighting the kit then go ahead and drill. If not, may I suggest that you just fill each porthole with either a drop of clear gloss or Kristal Klear after you’re done painting?
Anyway, about drilling portholes…
To drill the portholes, I purchased a number of excellent drill bits from Drillbits Unlimited. (https://drillbitsunlimited.com). These guys are great! They were prompt with answering questions, quick in shipping and their pricing is reasonable.
Here is the set of drills I purchased for my project. I suggest that you decide how you plan to glaze your portholes BEFORE you purchase your drills. If you’re planning to use fiber optic, as demonstrated by the Midwest Model Shop, make sure you buy drills to accommodate the limited selection of fiber optic diameters. I made the mistake of measuring each molded porthole size with a micrometer and then ordering my drills for each measured size. The result was that the fiber optic sizes used by the Midwest Model Shop would not fit all of the holes I drilled. I ended up going with a mix of fiber optic and Kristal Klear (more on this in a later post). I was not going to re-drill a ton of holes.
To drill the holes, I purchased the Tamaya Drill. This is an actual kit that you have to assemble. It cost about $35, but it does an excellent job drilling portholes. You could also use a pin vice, but I don’t think you could fit drills like the ones I purchased in a pin vise. Also, your hand is going to hurt a lot. Do not attempt to use a Dremel tool for this, unless you like big burn holes in your hull.
Here’s a shot of the hull in mid-hole drill. Note that my aftermarket bilge keels are mounted on the hull. If I’m ever stupid enough to build this kit again, I’ll mount those bilge keels just before I paint the hull. They’re fragile and they break easily. BTW, you can make realistic bilge keels with strips of thin styrene and save yourself a bit of money.
I’ll cover the mounting of the Scale Warship porthole frames in a later post, since they get installed after you paint the hull.
- Joined
- Dec 26, 2021
- Messages
- 32
- Points
- 48
Painting The Hull:
After drilling portholes, I spent a lot of time prepping the hull. This included filling a lot of gaps in the MiniBrass hull plates on the bow, bottom of the hull and also the stern plating. I spot-primered critical areas to reveal any issues and went back and forth with putty, sanding and priming. I won’t bore you with all of the details, suffice to say that there were many iterations as I looked to minimize blemishes.
The hull was given an overall coating of grey primer to prepare for color.
I was originally going to use an airbrush to paint the base layer but opted for the ‘ol trusty “rattle can”. I like to soak spray cans in warm water for a while and give them several rounds of shaking. This helps with a smooth coat.
I went with a semi-gloss. This gives a nice sheen. I know some prefer everything to be flat, claiming that gloss paint looks flat at a distance and that this creates a sense of scale. I don’t disagree, however, I feel that 100% flat is unrealistic for a commercial ocean liner as well. I’ve had success with semi-gloss on LARGE models.
Using an airbrush, I added variations and weathering to the black hull paint, using Floquil Engine Black (Flat) and Tester’s Semi-Gloss Black. The Floquil Engine Black has an interesting bluish-black look that I liked. I worked mostly in virtual motions to simulate the effect of many days of rain, etc. draining down the sides of the hull.
After painting the hull black, I needed to mark the line for the anti-fouling. It’s not a straight line for the Olympic Class ships. It curves up a bit on the bow and stern. I did start with a straight pencil line using a jig and a large, flat surface (kitchen island counter).
The Midwest Model Shop has a great YouTube video describing this process. I highly recommend it.
Here’s a shot of the hull painted with a base layer of Krylon Matte Red Pepper. I then used an airbrush to add some accents of Floquil Tuscan Red to knock down the color and provide a bit of weathering.
This picture will give you an idea of the weathering effects. Note the darker vertical streaks on the anti-fouling and the variation in the hull black.
Here is the hull, with the hull black and anti-fouling and initial weathering.
The next step was to add the zinc yellow accent stripe. Vallejo sells a Titanic paint kit that has this. I didn’t have it at the time, so I mixed my own using drops of green added to yellow:
Painting the yellow stripe before I painted the white worked out well.
(Oh look! The rudder got knocked off…again.)
The last step was to paint the white upper part of the hull. I used Tamaya Flat White with a semi-gloss clear coating. Having the yellow stripe already painted made it easy to mask over top of it to create the needed white areas. I’ve seen the yellow stripe added last before and I watched the modeler struggle to keep things neat.
A view of the starboard bow, showing the name decals in place. I like how all of the work I put into the haws pipe upgrade and surrounding plating came out. I skipped a step here and didn’t spray that area with gloss before applying the decal, so I’ll end up re-doing that later.
Another lesson-learned is to paint the inside of the haws pipe before painting the hull. It won’t be a big deal to squeeze some red in there later, but it would’ve ended up looking better had I sprayed that area first and then masked it off. Also, note the PE railings just at the bow. These tend to get knocked off, as well as some of the other PE items such as the shackles on the stern (used for servicing the propellers). It might be best to add these last, if you’re planning on using such PE parts.
Stern view. I have since touched up the yellow stripe and added the “TITANIC LIVERPOOL” lettering on the stern. The anti-fouling appears very red here. It’s since been knocked down with Floquil Tuscan Red and highlights have been dry brushed on using the Anti-Fouling Red (Pink) that is included in the Vallejo Titanic Paint Kit. BTW, that Shapeways rudder has been re-attached about a dozen times so far.
Here’s the overall view of the painted hull.
After drilling portholes, I spent a lot of time prepping the hull. This included filling a lot of gaps in the MiniBrass hull plates on the bow, bottom of the hull and also the stern plating. I spot-primered critical areas to reveal any issues and went back and forth with putty, sanding and priming. I won’t bore you with all of the details, suffice to say that there were many iterations as I looked to minimize blemishes.
The hull was given an overall coating of grey primer to prepare for color.
I was originally going to use an airbrush to paint the base layer but opted for the ‘ol trusty “rattle can”. I like to soak spray cans in warm water for a while and give them several rounds of shaking. This helps with a smooth coat.
I went with a semi-gloss. This gives a nice sheen. I know some prefer everything to be flat, claiming that gloss paint looks flat at a distance and that this creates a sense of scale. I don’t disagree, however, I feel that 100% flat is unrealistic for a commercial ocean liner as well. I’ve had success with semi-gloss on LARGE models.
Using an airbrush, I added variations and weathering to the black hull paint, using Floquil Engine Black (Flat) and Tester’s Semi-Gloss Black. The Floquil Engine Black has an interesting bluish-black look that I liked. I worked mostly in virtual motions to simulate the effect of many days of rain, etc. draining down the sides of the hull.
After painting the hull black, I needed to mark the line for the anti-fouling. It’s not a straight line for the Olympic Class ships. It curves up a bit on the bow and stern. I did start with a straight pencil line using a jig and a large, flat surface (kitchen island counter).
The Midwest Model Shop has a great YouTube video describing this process. I highly recommend it.
Here’s a shot of the hull painted with a base layer of Krylon Matte Red Pepper. I then used an airbrush to add some accents of Floquil Tuscan Red to knock down the color and provide a bit of weathering.
This picture will give you an idea of the weathering effects. Note the darker vertical streaks on the anti-fouling and the variation in the hull black.
Here is the hull, with the hull black and anti-fouling and initial weathering.
The next step was to add the zinc yellow accent stripe. Vallejo sells a Titanic paint kit that has this. I didn’t have it at the time, so I mixed my own using drops of green added to yellow:
Painting the yellow stripe before I painted the white worked out well.
(Oh look! The rudder got knocked off…again.)
The last step was to paint the white upper part of the hull. I used Tamaya Flat White with a semi-gloss clear coating. Having the yellow stripe already painted made it easy to mask over top of it to create the needed white areas. I’ve seen the yellow stripe added last before and I watched the modeler struggle to keep things neat.
A view of the starboard bow, showing the name decals in place. I like how all of the work I put into the haws pipe upgrade and surrounding plating came out. I skipped a step here and didn’t spray that area with gloss before applying the decal, so I’ll end up re-doing that later.
Another lesson-learned is to paint the inside of the haws pipe before painting the hull. It won’t be a big deal to squeeze some red in there later, but it would’ve ended up looking better had I sprayed that area first and then masked it off. Also, note the PE railings just at the bow. These tend to get knocked off, as well as some of the other PE items such as the shackles on the stern (used for servicing the propellers). It might be best to add these last, if you’re planning on using such PE parts.
Stern view. I have since touched up the yellow stripe and added the “TITANIC LIVERPOOL” lettering on the stern. The anti-fouling appears very red here. It’s since been knocked down with Floquil Tuscan Red and highlights have been dry brushed on using the Anti-Fouling Red (Pink) that is included in the Vallejo Titanic Paint Kit. BTW, that Shapeways rudder has been re-attached about a dozen times so far.
Here’s the overall view of the painted hull.
Last edited:
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- Oct 28, 2018
- Messages
- 742
- Points
- 403
The hull looks nice
Well done
On to Phase 2, which gives nice challenges
Regards
Henk
Well done
On to Phase 2, which gives nice challenges
Regards
Henk
- Joined
- Dec 26, 2021
- Messages
- 32
- Points
- 48
Thanks! I just need to finish glazing portholes and installing porthole frames. Sheesh.
