¹⁄350

HMS Westminster

Both the Center and Aft superstructures went together as per the instructions. The kit provides stanchions to support the deck extensions. I glued these to the deck extensions initially, but didn’t glue them to the deck, as it would have caused some problems with the painting, especially as I wanted to have a modular paint and build. WEM have etch stanchions in their set which looked so much better and as such I removed the kit parts, filed down the attachment points. Once everything was painted I was able to add these parts without too many problems.

With the hangar I had considered detailing the interior, but on reflection I realized that not a great deal would be seen. Rather than just having the hangar door closed, I was able to use the WEM set to show it partly opened with some of the crew inside. It was given a few light coats of light coloured paint and then a light wash just to bring out the details.

At this point all the superstructures were test fitted prior to painting. With everything in place and the correct colours now in my possession I got the hull completed with the anti-fouling red paint, the bootstripe and the light grey main hull colour. All the superstructures were removed and a darker grey colour was added to both the deck and superstructure roofs. Rather than attempt to paint the etch once it was glued on, I painted all of it on the tree. Once attached I was able to brush paint any parts that required touching up.

I had already scraped off the kits folded anchor chains, and added some 1mm chain that I had in the spares box. I painted this in Mr Hobby Dark Iron, which is a colour that allows you to buff it up. A small amount of buffing once dry, and it was out with the tweezers and superglue. The kits chain does not include a small amount of chain that branches off at the fore of the ship. This was easily added, as was the painting of the rope guides in red. The area around the chains will be heavily rusted, which is something that shows in all my reference photos.