Hood Build - Week 9

Issue 9 comes with parts for the stern area (rear end) of the Hood, still no new pictures on the front cover (no more of that), but what we have now is parts to add to the length of this monster, total size after completion of this issue is 1108mm (46 & quarter inches), that's 5 inches short of the 1314mm of the finished model.
At the end of this issue I've again showed the comparison to the plans I have, and they look superb, I was unsure if the plans were showing the true scale of this model..I was wrong, I think it maybe a mill or two bigger than the model but that's not a problem. There are a few steps in the magazine you need to be aware of, so read before you glue or even take any parts from the ply fret. Issue 10 shows the stern area beams and side panels, to strengthen the stern.

Hood Build - Week 8

Issue 8 continues adding more parts to the main structure of the bow section, but to start with I want a moan, hopefully Hachette listens to customer complaints/suggestions, I'll add this as a suggestion. I'm sure a company as big as Hachette can afford to add a new front cover picture to the magazine each week as opposed to recycling the same old one every 4 issues. Issues 8 front cover was used on the front cover of Issue 4, nice thought they are maybe a customer suggestions is to do as DeAgostini have done to the HMS Victory magazine and show various angles of the model itself, or at least buy some more. Issue 9 front cover has also been Issues 1 & 5.
Another complaint regarding the instruction, good as they are but steps 1 to 6 are repeated in steps 7 to 12, the same procedure just the other side of the ship, surely it would be much simpler if you put 'repeat on other-side' My opinions are not casting any shadow over this build, in fact I'm enjoying it, the articles, small as they are, are very good, so don't misunderstand my moaning.

Hood Build - Week 7

Onto Issue 7 and what seems like a simple procedure turns out to be a little more work than I thought, it's always worth double checking to make sure your fret/parts are flat and no warping has occurred, especially since we are moving towards the bow (front) of the ship. I've seen many ways of getting the slight or even severe warps out of ply, one being soaking in warm water then placing the part under a flat surface for at least 24hours. It really depends on how bad they are, as mine is not that bad I have another workaround.

New Books

It was only be accident that I found out a new book was published by author Ian Johnston called 'Clydebank Battlecruiser - Forgotten Photographs from John Brown's Shipyard'

In a word a stunning book, it takes you on a journey in photographs and some informative text of the life of 5 great ships, they are as follows - Ship No 374 Inflexible, Ship No 402 Australia, Ship No 418 Tiger, Ship No 443 Repulse and Ship No 460 Hood.

The whole book is well worth the £20 I paid from Amazon.co.uk, loads of wonderful construction shots dating back to 1908, I bought this solely for the Hood, but  seeing all the other ship it really is a great early Christmas pressie for any historian or modeler.
The Hood section is just outstanding on its own, I'm really impressed with the quality of the photographs shown here, considering the size of the ship and the early life of photography at the time. The sheer size of Hood just needs to be seen in these pictures to be fully understood.

For example on page 167 there is an awesome shot showing the arrangements of the plating strakes at the bow and the thickness of the plates. A view I've never seen before and in such clarity and so close.

Hood Build - Adding the Hull Frames.

Onto part 2 of my build, adding the hull frames from issue 1 to issue 6, after having laid the 'keel' parts down on the build board and making sure it is 100% flat and following the centre line I can now start the frames that have already been made up since Issue 1. All the beams in each frame are not glued and as such will need to be removed at some point, but as I progress by adding the frames I've kept them in to make sure the hull frames stay square.

I've started to mark the lower tabs (for use of a better description) that need gluing to the main keel, again its worth having a good look to see what areas do need gluing before attempting to attached the parts to the keel.

Hood Build - Fixing the Keel parts.

The next few post's will concentrate on all Issue from 1 through to 6, and the gluing of the keel parts, hull frames and the side parts. Showing how I went about doing this, not the only way, maybe not the best way, but my way..and it works for me, loads of pictures in detail, most of which don't really need me blabbing on, the pictures do the talking. A point to note is I use Aliphatic wood glue, from my experience it's just brilliant, I've used this on my HMS Victory model and it dries so hard you will probably break the wood to part them. If your doing the R/C bit then other glue maybe worth looking at, have a look over at the partworksmodels forum and see what they use for R/C.

I started with the Keel parts, you need to keep them flat when joining these parts so the build-board your going to use is a good base, BUT if your not careful you could end up gluing the keel to the board, so I got some double-sided tape, as it has a waxy finish to it so the glue will not adhere, making it easier to join you keel parts.

Hood Build - Week 6

An early diary entry this week as I have 9 days off work, I got Issue 6 this morning and the first thing I notice on the front cover is HMS Renown firing a salvo..nice. Not a great deal to glue away from the model this week as it adding to what we already have, so if your like me only dry fitting then this will be quite quick, I was hoping this week I could get a better idea of where the stern would end but it still needs more adding to it and I don't want to jump ahead and fix it down on the build board just yet.

Forums, Blogs & Models

As I progress slowly through this massive build of nearly 3 years I seem to be searching the net for other fellow builders doing the same model (scale), what I plan to do in this post is to link what I consider to be the most helpful, informative and just plain brilliant.
I think this will be updated over time, so if your site, blog or forum is not here that’s probably because I’ve not found you yet. Just to mention these are my personally favourites and in no particular order, and not the be all and end all.

Apart from being THE best Hood reference's web site it also has a forum and a facebook page, not the most busiest forum I've seen but maybe folk are not aware of it, hopefully they are now, they have 4 sub forums, General Discussion, Technical &Specifications, Crew-Related Matters and Scale Models and Miniatures.  A welcoming bunch of people.  HMS Hood Forum 

Hood Build - Week 5

Moving right into Issue 5, a great long shot on the front cover of the Hood taken around the mid 30's, see the plane at the stern of ship. Onto to the build a few problems encountered here but after a little bashing (adjusting what we have) the possible problems have been sorted out. Hopefully this will help you decide what you want to do on your build. R/C or not to R/C!!!

NOTE: Anything you read here is my personal thought's NOT an official build diary and as such you don't have to copy what I'm doing or even agree with me, just use this along with the many other Hood build's and make your own mind up. ta!