Posted by Loren Perry on August 28, 1998 at 14:01:15 in nts86.rockisland.com:
In Reply to: Well Deck Question posted by Kevin F on August 26, 1998 at 19:39:09:
First of all, I assume we're all talking about
the well deck side bulwarks (part of the hull
moldings), and not the deck itself. On my model,
I also noticed the problem. It was clear that
unless I made some modifications to the hull
halves, I wouldn't be able to properly located
the gold stripe as it ran along the well deck
bulwarks. The bulwarks are too low at their
foward ends and the gold stripe couldn't be placed
correctly. (Oddly enough, the little Revell kit
got this detail right!)
So I cut two pieces of styrene with the
forward end about 1/16" tall, tapering down to
zero at the aft end, and their lengths equal to
the lengths of the well deck bulwarks.
After cementing them on top of the bulwarks
molded onto the hull halves, I faired them in with
modeler's putty and sanded them smooth. The model
was now ready to paint.
This modification took me about an hour to
complete and is the easiest solution I could come
up with. The well deck itself still has a noticeable
slant up toward the bow, but correcting this would
have taken too much time and I had a deadline to
make.
This slant is really only noticeable when
one looks at the cargo cranes mounted thereon. You
can minimize this slant by shimming the bases of
the cranes until they are vertical. Otherwise,
you'll have to make some enormous surgical changes
to the entire bow area to level out the well deck.
This is the point where building the kit ceases to
be pleasurable and turns into drudgery. So I took
the easy way out described here.