8 Jolly Rogers … whats not to love … 
Thrown some paint on the Enterprise. I am not doing this in my normal way. Usually I would paint the entire hull and be done.
But with this ship there are so many fragile PE installations still to come I decided to half paint the hull so I wouldn’t have to worry about breaking things off when I faffed around with masking off boot lines etc.
So much work still to be done. I have now reached the stage where I am having to work with 2 sets of PE since they all go in the same area.
11 Likes
I noticed something quite annoying. Something I wish I had noticed sooner as it would have made my life easier.
You have to use 2 sets of dome headed screws and nuts to hold the bow onto the main hull. On the port side the screw head gets hidden by a sponson so isn’t a big deal.
I just assumed the same was true on the starboard side but I was wrong. I looked online at other built versions and noticed they didn’t seem to have the screw. You can see that here in the Eduard PE build pictures
I wanted to keep the screw in place for structural reasons so I ended up grinding the screw head down with my dremel. Once inserted it sat almost perfectly recessed into the hull.
Some putty and sanding later and it is now covered. Looks like its still sticking out but when you run your finger over, its smooth 
9 Likes
Nice save, but annoying you had to do it in the first place …
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Great progress here on your USS Enterprise! What a beast of a model…
Yep, that screw definitely is annoying, but yours truly looks like a good save!
Looking at the Eduard pic and zooming in - might the screw be ‘photoshopped out’ there?
Cheers
Jan
Could be? When looking at other completed builds, it’s definitely not visible and no one mentions it. I really thought I had missed something in the build instructions but nope.
Don’t you realize? You just destroyed the AN/13 OCRAP ESM antenna, the KEY electronic defense system of that period. The demise of the only manufacturer forced the Navy to develop Stealth technology as an alternative. The Enterprise was the only vessel so equipped. 
Its been slow going. Started work on the elevators and they have been a pain in the butt. Most of the time has been spent on the support girders which were not fun or easy. Having to wrap PE around another flat piece of PE at a vertical angle induced many a swear.
The fact that these will be pretty hidden will hide a plethora of sins.
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Shame its hidden from view but you have done a great job with it.
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Great save with the Screw. Would look very strange if left alone…Cheers mark
Finally got to a point where it was time to put the deck on. There is a ton of PE that I need to add which attaches to both the deck and hull so it was time to bite the bullet.
Of course the deck sections didn’t match up perfectly so I had to get to work with some putty.
After a bunch of sanding, re-puttying etc I ended up with a fairly smooth deck. Its by no means perfect and there is a transition between sections still but that just isn’t in my skillset to remove. Will do my best to hide it with parked aircraft and such.
Having the deck on makes it a tad bit harder to manhandle around now 
But it looks good.
And finally, they were a pain in the butt but the elevators look pretty good.
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I’m glad you included that picture. Made me realize a little ramp thingie that sits between the nets had fallen off. I was able to locate it on my desk and it’s now firmly reattached.
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Now the deck is on … double wow … that is big old bit of plastic … going to look even better with those tomcats on top … The lifts are little pieces of magic as well. … beautiful details
I am annoyed. All those girders and nice side walls on the elevators means I am FORCED to have 2 of them attached in the lowered position. Which is not what I wanted. I only wanted to have 1 lowered and the rest raised. What’s worse, I tend to have my ships sailing to the left when on display, which means all that detail will be hidden.
I know, first world problem but its frustrating.
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That’s a bummer…
Which are raised, which are lowered.
Which did you want lowered ?
Is it a case of the PE is making it an issue ?
And I take it sailing left, shows off the most detail along the entire length ?
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Brilliant work!
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Right the 2 rear starboard side will be lowered, the rest raised.
I wanted the rear most starboard side lowered. My AM Decals come with a lovely “Homuz Highway” decal which will add some nice flair.
Not my build but that’s the decal.
Yip, elevators arent quite tall enough so the top of the beams hit the underside of the deck
It does on carriers since if the ship was sailing to the right, the island would obscure a lot of the flight deck.
It honestly started with me because the first ship I built just looked better on the port side, think I messed up some decals on the starboard so I chose to display with like that. Now I just do it to maintain uniformity in my ships. An odd quirk is that I have all my subs sailing to the right
2 Likes
Those dang Submariners… a strange lot. …
—mike 