HMS Warspite arguably has the most illustrious battle record of any warship in history. Her battle honors include Jutland 1916, Narvik 1940, Calabria 1940 (where she set the record for longest range hit against another warship), Malta convoys 1941, Matapan 1941, Crete 1941, Sicily 1943, Salerno 1943, Normandy 1944, Walcheren 1944. Unfortunately she has not been well covered in injected plastic. The only kit out there, except for the resin White Ensign Model that is MUCH more expensive, is the decades old Airfix 1/600 scale kit.
The first thing you notice when opening the box is it’s not your typical box. Instead of the “normal” two-piece box where the lid is removed from the bottom this is a one-piece box where you have to open either end to slip the pieces out. The first thing I did was transfer the contents to a plastic tote to protect them while constructing the kit. I’m pretty sure that I’ve lost at least one part, the cradle for one of the seaplanes, through the open end of this box.
The kit contains two sprues of a light gray plastic, plus the two halves of the hull and the deck piece. There is some flash, but not much.
The Warspite was an “all big gun” battleship. This makes it even more disappointing that her guns aren’t well made. The main battery 15” guns have a large flange at their ends making them look like a blunderbuss. The smaller 6” medium caliber, and 4.7” anti-aircraft guns are so small and fragile I can’t see how they could ever be made properly as is. My plan was to immediately replace these guns. I chose 1/16th inch brass tubing for the main guns.
I don’t have any experience with scales as small as 1/600 but I noticed that this ship has very little deck details, planking, hatch doors, and such. On my copy the deck planking has some scratches and I’m not sure how they will look after painting. There are few ladders and those that are there are of the “Aztec temple” type. The ship will surely do with some P.E. set like the one made by Tom’s Modelworks. Since this is my first small scale ship I’ll forgo the P.E. set until I have more experience.
The hull and deck has both pros and cons. The hull is full hull split lengthwise. Anybody wishing to make this in a waterline display get out the saw. The deck, on the other hand, is one piece, with two small sections molded separately to represent the medium caliber gun batteries. After gluing the hull pieces together I have test fit the deck and it seems to fit well, though on my kit the deck is warped. You will need to be careful with clamps or rubber bands to make sure enough pressure is applied at certain critical points while gluing. One caution, do NOT shave away what appears to be some flash at the very stern of the deck. This represents the roof of the stern gallery.
One issue I’ve had is the bridge and secondary control position. Joining the two sides then adding a roof makes both of these structures. On my kit when you put the two sides together the roof won’t attach properly. I joined the three pieces together as best I could leaving a gap in the seam between the sides. If I had it all to do over again I’d cut the locating tabs off the roofs of both of these structures so that I can put the sides together without seams then place the roofs on where needed.
The painting guide in the instructions give two paint schemes, one for 1940, which is the one I chose, and one for 1944. The only paints suggested are Humbrol, and the instructions only give Humbrol numbers, not the actual colors. I planned all along to paint this kit using inexpensive craft acrylic paints. I chose a light gray color for the upper hull, a wine colored red for the lower hull, and a light wood color for the deck. The Humbrol number for the anti slip decking is a “cockpit green.” This seemed to be a bit of a strange color to me so I chose Tamiya XF22, which is a medium gray green.
