Nice one Tim!! Great seeing you getting your feet wet in here!! Count me in for this one! LOL...that thing is still a good size even at 1/1200!! Looking forward to the build!!

Most recently released by Revell Germany, this small scale Yamato was originally produced the Italian company Casadio as one of their pre-assembled "Miniships" way back in the early 1970s. Over the years It has been reissued many times as an unassembled kit by Revell UK and Almark in England, Revell/West Germany, ESCI in Italy, Sablon in France, and by both Model Power and MPC in the United States. The same plastic has also been marketed as the Musashi. Apparently the only differences among the various releases have been in the instructions and box art.

This toy/model from the early 1970s is a very simplified, snap-together affair designed for quick building. When I built it as a kid back then I was among those for whom the kit was apparently designed: wargamers and young modelers (even though it was snap-together, the instructions recommended kid-friendly NOTOX plastic glue... I can still remember the weird lemon scent of that stuff!) At the time I liked the snap together design, but the poor fit of the parts was annoying. And the model is very basic: while the one piece hull is recognizably a Yamato, the shape is vague and toylike. The complex main guns and funnel are reduced to single parts, and the prominent mainmast is missing entirely. Aircraft are only generalized single float monoplane representations, in any case wrong; if they are meant to be Aichi E13A "Jakes", they should have twin floats, if Mitsubishi F1M "Petes" they should be biplanes. The 127mm type 89 guns are only vaguely correct, and the numerous 25mm triples are molded directly to the decks and turrets.

Still, the kit has its good points. First of all, at a mere 27 parts the ship goes together quickly, and although basic, I remember that the completed model does resemble the Yamato. The bridge windows are neatly represented as recessed squares, and two alternate main turrets are provided so you can depict the ship at an earlier point in her career before she got the extra antiaircraft guns on the turret tops, or perhaps as the Musashi.

This model is certainly no masterpiece of the kit maker's art, but it was superior to comparable Pyro and Lindberg offerings of the time, and it is still way less expensive than the various pre-assembled wargaming and collector models out there. I spent less than ten bucks for it, so taken for what it is, this little Yamato isn’t a bad kit at all.

Examining the parts this time around, I am struck by the crudeness of the molding with its chunky shapes, flash, goofy pits and bumps... but oh, well. Time to start cleaning!


At least the simplified kit won’t tempt me to go nuts superdetailing it. My goal is to finish her before the campaign ends!

Looking forward to seeing what you do with this kit, Tim!

If it's anything like what you did with the Enterprise, then we're in for a real treat!

Russ

Tim,

just had the same thought as Russ - your fantastic Enterprise-build you started with about the same ideas in mind, if I recall it right; a reasonable fast build - and than you got into detailing it. Now - time is running
No, seriously, looking forward to see how you approach this one

Cheers,
Jan

Russ and Jan, thank you both... but don't tempt me, Jan! I want to finish her in time for the campaign, though, so that will make it easier to keep myself disciplined and not make very many changes to the kit.

Sounds like a great plan Tim!! Bang it out and have some fun!!

Well fellows still working on fidely bits, I should have some pictures after this weekend. I met a rather interesting chap yesterday on my train ride home from work. He was a division gunnery officer on the USS New Jersey on her Viet Nam deployment. He was in charge of some of the 5 inch gun turrets. Had a nice but too short talk. He was also very curious about tanks.

Tom

Oh good, I've been following your Warspite build with interest!

Well after several hours working on fiddly bits, the 20mm were a royal pain I have some progress shots. Getting close, only some booms, plane, boats and railings to go.






Tom

Tom

She is looking ready to cast off. Great work, she is coming along nicely. On a side note, glad to see someone else with a clutter dockyard. I can never seem to Keep mine clean

Dave

OK, on with the tiny, mighty Yamato! I’m off to a late start and I want to make the May 1st deadline, so this is going to be a very basic build where I’ll only fix what I absolutely can’t live with.

I started by photocopying the overall general arrangement drawing from Janusz Skulski’s Anatomy of the Ship - The Battleship Yamato to 1/1200 scale. Comparing the model to Skulski’s rendering she rides a little high, so I sanded about 2mm from the hull bottom. The hull shape is mostly ok otherwise ...except the bow. After gluing the deck down I added a plastic shim and sanded things into a little better shape.


So far so good!

Your Warspite's looking great, Tom

Good start to mini/mighty Yamato Tim

Russ

Hi Tom,

Warspite is coming on fantastically, looking forward to seeing the old girl finished,

Hi Tim,

Nice wok on the mini mighty Yamato, an interesting little build.

Si

Superb work on the Grand Old Lady Tom!! She's a real beauty!!

Great job on the Bow work Tim!! Looks to be smoothing out nicely! Wow that thing is small!!

Moving along to the Yamato’s superstructure, I noticed that the second deck was incorrectly shown planked – it was actually steel. I sanded the area smooth.

A bigger problem was the configuration of the antiaircraft guns. The model is pretty accurate for Yamato (or Musashi) in October, 1944 (Battle of Leyte Gulf) with all those 25mm singles on the main deck. Unfortunately, it also has the six additional 25mm triples along the deck edge amidships which were added later when the single mounts were removed. The simplest fix would have been to remove the center six 25mm triple mounts and go for a Leyte Gulf Yamato, but I liked the powerful look of those triples all lined up on the deck edge. Keeping these meant going for a Yamato in her final 1945 configuration.



The 1945 Yamato would require eight more 25mm triple mounts, so I bought a second kit to raid for parts.

After trimming off all those 25mm singles (24 of them!), I added the eight 25mm triples from the spare kit in the appropriate places to make an April, 1945 Yamato.


It was a bit more alteration than I had originally intended, but the micro battlewagon is now ready for paint!

Clever solution Tim,

You are producing a real little Gem.

Si

Late start! Zvezda 1/350 Battleship "Knyaz Suvorov"

Well, In THOUGHT she was ready for paint, but a second look at the18 inch guns revealed that they were too long compared with my references. Cutting the ends down was the obvious solution, but then the steps in the barrels would have ended up too far forward. Doh!

To solve this I removed the barrels, drilled holes in the turret faces and reinstalled the rifles with much of their length inside the turrets. This left guns of the correct exterior length with the steps where they should be.


After that I drilled out the tips of the 18 inch barrels with my X-acto and added Milliput blast bags.


Also, I improved the aft fire control station (part #12) by combining it with the forward fire control optic array (part
#13 with the radars removed) from the spare kit.


NOW she’s ready for paint!

Hi Lap man,

Good luck, I have just started work on her sister Borodino.

Hi Tim,

Looking good, turning into a right little gem.

Si

Good luck on the Knyaz Suvorov Lap Man!

Nice bit of work there Tim! Hyper-detail the Hyper-scale!! Smart move cannibalizing the slave kit for guns!! Not to mention Rockin' the big guns!! Well done!!

Tim, clever solution with the guns.

I'm having issues with the small yards and booms. Every time I cut one off a sprue and true to sand the cuts smooth they break. I've been replacing them with stretched sprue.

Plane, boats and rails left.

Tom

Well gents I'm working on the Warspite tonight into the early hours. I work nights so this is my usual schedule. Well the walrus will be airborne since the kit planes are horrible. So I have to finish paining the boats and add them and the rails and anchors and I should be done. I won't count the stand in that.

Has the link to the gallery been set up yet?

Tom

Here you go Tom! http://gallery.kitmaker.net/showgallery.php/cat/29134

As I prepare to paint the Yamato, I did a quick application on my test mule of the Kure Arsenal Grey (Tamiya Dark Sea Gray XF-54) with the black deck (Tamiya Dark Grey XF-24) just to see how it might look.

The black painted wood is correct for the ship's last sortie, but photos also show her in the usual bright holystoned natural wood in the days immediately before the operation, so I could accurately paint her up either way. Is it just me, or does that dark deck just look strange on a Yamato?

Greetings!

This site never ceases to amaze me. There are so many incredibly talented modelers here! Great work to all of you!

Tom - Beautiful work! I have HMS Warspite in my stash. If I can only do HALF as well as your build, I'll be thrilled!

Tim - Surgery on a 1/1200 model?? Wow!

My original entry was the USS Texas (1898) by ISW. The parts are a total mess and will have to be scratch-built. I don't mind doing that and, in fact, kind of look forward to trying. But, I know I can't finish her in time thanks to my late entry. (My bad!)

However...

My 7 year old just asked me (Easter Break) if I would help him build some ships. WOW!! And I thought he only loved video games, movies, soundtracks, and Little League!! He said ships look, "Really neat".

Hmmm...I only build 1/350 scale. I don't think he's "quite ready" for those.

So, I picked up a 1/1200 Revell Bismarck for us to have a go at. (Props to Tim for the inspiration!)

Would you guys be ok if my son and I did a "co-build" for this Campaign?

Thanks,

Daniel