1／350 日本海軍航空巡洋艦 最上 製作記錄 (三)

I've had a change of plan. I was gonna use the originally issued plastic base for my Mogami; however, decided to use a wooden base instead.

Here's the wood base which I'm gonna use for this model. I couldn't find a rectangular one in my local art store, and I really don't have time to look around. I'm just gonna suck it up and bear with this one...

The picture shows the board after stain and clear coat have been put on.

First, find the center and place the plastic base on the wood. Then drill the holes according to the plastic base. The plastic base already has holes on it, so just "trace" it.

Drill through the board from bottom and use two screws that are long enough to go though the board and the beads.
(I apologize for these bead. They are a bit simple and ugly, but as mentioned earlier, I didn't have time for scouting the materials.)

Finally, place the already assembled hull onto the base and tighten with bolt.

Next is to put on the decks. Starting from this lower deck of the rear of the ship. This deck is directly below the flight deck. As you can see, Tamiya's new design is to screw on the decks rather than old glue-on idea. This new design clearly makes decking a lot easier.

Then it's time for the detail. This here is the Degaussing Cable (消磁電路). There's a huge "magnet" inside the hull so the ship won't roll over because it is attracted by the earth's magnetic field; However, the magnet also attracts torpedos. the degaussing cable's job is to disturb the meagnetic force and minimize the chance of attrating the torpedoes.

Use the super glue to attach the cable to the side of the hull. Use the diagram provided with the kit as reference.

Next, put on the hand rail along the side of the lower deck, and add the Type 96 triple 25mm AA gun platforms on both side as shown above. I'm not gonna add details to this deck because after the flight deck is put on, 80% of the area cannot be seen anyway.

This is the PE set which I have long been waiting for. This set is an American brand, Yankee's Model Work. They have a 1/350 mogami, too, and this PE set is for that particular model. YMW claims that 99 percent of the parts will fit the Tamiya 1/350 Mogami. Let's find out!

Time for the flight deck modification. The rails on the flight deck are mold-on.

Use the combination of masking tape and design knife, sand paper, and crafting grinder to chip away the rails.

Here's the YMW flight deck rail. Frankly, I was disappointed. It's just not detail enough.... Unlike the Asian made PEs, the American model industry just don't really care for the realness that much. Since YMW is the only brand that carries PE parts for the Mogami so far, I had no choice, but having such low class quality PE parts is just a pain in the a*s.....

well, actually it's not that bad after the details have been put on. I'm still not satisfied with the quality, though, but at least it looks better than the mold-on rails.

Grinding and detailing took me 4 hrs to accomplish. When it's done, put the flight deck over the lower deck and secure with three tiny screws.