After my exhaustive cruiser build I wanted to do something "easier" and smaller just for relaxation. Therefore I decided for the Kaiwo Maru. I bought the kit cheaply at a vendor´s discount sale and the Artwox wooden deck also for just a few bucks from Ebay.

Some facts about the real ship: The Kaiwo Maru was, together with her sister ship Nippon Maru, built and commissioned in 1930 at Kawasaki´s shipyard in Kobe. It was intended to be used as a training vessel for the japanese merchant-marine students. During her service live she sailed over a Million nautical miles and has trained 11.000 young sailors. During WWII the IJN requisitioned the ship, removed the sails, installed 2 x 1.500 HP diesel engines and used it for postal duties between its Islands and as a resupply ship for the lighthouses - here she earned its nickname "the angel of the lighthouses" when she brought awaited provisions, spareparts and food to the lonely lighthouse keepers.

Luckily she survived the world war and was backdated again as a sailing vessel and served therefore until 1989 when she was after 59 years of service decomissioned because of the completion of the Kaiwo Maru II. The ship is moored until today in Kaiwo-Maru Park near Toyama Bay and can be visited as a museum ship.

I would like to build her at her wartime livery as a resupply ship anchoring at a rocky shore near a lighthouse. I didn´t found any lighthouse kits in 1:350 so I will be forced to scratchbuild one; lets see how it works...

The kit itself is small with a manageable amount of parts. Despite its roots lay back as far as 1977 when IMAI released her first as a sailing ship it is still a very nice kit to tackle with. Sure there is some small amount of flash but nothing serious. The extra wooden deck from ARTWOX will surely upgrade the overall impression in the end. The kit have extra photoetched parts for the railings and the shrouds but arguably both are too less for the kit so I have to improvise here, too.



If I did have aroused your attention and interest for this small but special ship I would be glad if you look inside my build from time to time and tell me what you think.

So there is just one more word to say: "let go!"

Thomas,

Nice choice, a interesting subject. She will be a smaller build and I hope an easy one. Looking forward to the next post.

Mark

And here it is, and here I am

What a fascinating topic! Certainly I am surprised at learning Japan has built such beautiful ships and has continued the tradition with modern replacements.

It's also good to learn that they cherish their maritime history and have preserved her and her sister as museum ships.

Watching with interest

Always liked the look of this Kit. Watching with interest.....Cheers mark

Moin Thomas!

Of course I'm in and will be watching your build!

As was said before, really interesting topic and completely 'out of the beaten path' build, very nice choice!

Easy build - well, as far as the kit is concerned. But seeing your plans of doing a diorama and scratch building a lighthouse - well, at least ambitious enough I would say.

I'm looking forward to your build log!

Cheers,
Jan

Thomas: I have noticed quite a few of the 20th century vintage sailing ships as I shop on Hobby Link Japan. I have never seen any in person. Are they waterline only or do you have a full hull option?

There is a German Navy sail training ship among those offered. I forget the name but the sailing ship is boxed with an S Boat and a U Boat, and the box cover art suggests interesting diorama possibilities, using all three.

I am going to follow this thread closely as I have never built a sailing ship, and really would like to, but think it wise to draw on your experience first.

That Zara of yours was the finest ship model I have seen for a very long time, and you have some serious rivals from the members of this board. As for me, your Zara has cured my personal delusions of adequacy.

Hey Chuck,

thank you very much for your comment about my ZARA build - appreciated

As for the Kaiwo Maru: You have the option here for both full hull or waterline. I prefer to build her with full hull and just show her in the water as there is always a bit of the lower hull visible until the ship is in dead calm water and fully loaded.

Here is my first update - the kit itself have not that exceeding number of parts so progress is fast here. I started the kit with drilling out all the portholes and installing the upper decks and the ship´s lower hull. Sure there is a bit of cleanup but compared to the age of the kit it is absolutely ok.

The Connections between the parts had to be improved with putty and sanding








I did opened all the funnel exhaust pipes


All the masts were quickly finished, too.


I complemented some small spreaders which are missing


Now I can load my spraygun to hide that ugly red color. More to follow soon

nice progress Thomas

Agreed with Russell, nice progress. What brand of putty is the yellow/green color you used?

Mark

Thank you Russell, yes progress here is very fast due to the comparative few parts. Something relaxing after my ZARA

Hi Mark,

the yellowish putty is Milliput´s Standart Yellow-Grey putty

Something of a treat, for us ship modellers, to have a kit with just a few parts

Indeed, hehe!

Continued with this epic build and painted the upper hull and all the small parts with GUNZE Sasebo Grey, the lower hull in battleship hull red and the wooden parts in IJA propeller brown. The lady looks more nicer now to me without ist eyehurting red Color lower hull.

I glued on ARTWOX´s real wooden deck; the bow worked flawlessly


The Stern part was not so easy as it was a tight fit because of my preinstalled superstructures and in the middle the deck lifted up. I had to use cyanoacrylate to glue it onto the plastic surface which worked well


ARTWOX did indeed "forgot" to supply the wooden decks for all superstructures which are also wooden planking. So I had to improvise and did cut appropriate parts out of the left wooden parts from the set. It´s not perfect but it looks much more like the real thing:





Started with the lifeboats and some railings for the superstructures which are missing from the kit supplied etched set. Gladly I have quite some spare railings left from my ZARA build



Cheers

Lovely work so far. Surprised at the amount of Putty for her.....Cheers Mark

Making really nice progress. The wooden deck really enhances the ship features.

Mark

looks beautiful with the wood deck on!

Thomas,

Those decks look stunning, and the superstructure planking doesn't look improvised at all. First rate work!

@Mark, Mark, Russell and Tim: Thank you for comments. Yes some putty is needed here but nothing too seriously for a kit with such age.

I do have holidays for this and next week and therefor are able to continue my build a bit. Today I finished the (missing) railings for all of the upper superstructures with spares railings. I think the ship looks more "complete" now:










Will continue now with the rest of the railings

Thomas,

very nice progress on this very special model. And even it's supposed to be an 'easier' to build ship as you pointed out, you're approaching it with your usual attention to detail and wonderful crisp and clean work! Once again, your build log is fun to watch and follow!

Cheers,
Jan

Vielen Dank Jan Glad when you are having fun watching my blog

Thomas,

Can't agree more about your statement on the railings, very nice work.

Mark

The railings look great now they've been "shipped" Thomas!

Thank you Mark and Russell

Now there are even more railings installed. I fitted all of the kit itself´s parts and added some more railings from spares for the mars platforms because there were/are railings at the real ship. Aoshima show them at their boxart but strangely omitted them inside their etched set. Same with the ratlines - there should also be some more ratlines from the first to the second mars platforms - I need them to do out of an in stock etched ratlines set from Alliance.

All the lifeboats were painted in Sasebo Grey as the ship and their canvas in IJN canvas color:













The stainless steel railings and ratlines from Aoshima have been no fun to me - I found them too sturdy to bend and the color don´t really stick good with them. A IJN flag is also missing from the kit; have to look where I can "borrow" one from another kit.

Will now continue with the top ratlines, the rear ship´s name decal, a flag and all the ship´s necessary rigging - and I thought this would be an small and easy build

Cheers