Midships shelter deck
This area is more or less accurate and again only required some simply applied “tweaks”. The armoured doors kit parts D-18, 16, and D35, 37 are sliding doors that can be slid open to allow firing of torpedoes from their launchers – kit parts F-46. The kit parts are a little thick and were thinned down by sanding the rear face of the parts. They were then glued into place over the adjacent parts. If you want to show the doors closed simply follow kit instructions. Next up the boat davits kit parts D-11 and F53 depending on whether you want the boats run out or stowed. For stowed I simply glued into place and removed the pin projecting down from part (in reality this is the davit pulley block and tackle used to raise or lower the boat. If you want to show the boats run out simply attach the parts far enough out from ship’s side to allow boats to be lowered.
The upper side of this assembly was very straightforward and for the most part the kit instructions were followed. The ready-use lockers, kit parts G-4 and 13 were mounted into place, parts G-6 were slightly relocated due to the additional 20mm Oerlikon gun mounts.
The Twin 4” gun mounts – six of them, were assembled as per instructions but were not attached until later. I added some extra detail to the guns in the form of photo etch relief detailed panels that fitted inside the shields against the gun mounts, these parts came from the WEM detailing set used. I added covers to the gun apertures made from PVA glue. This was simply applied by brush into the aperture to form a skin; any waste was carefully removed before drying. Once dry another coat was applied until the canvas cover was formed. PICs
The remaining structure was assembled, funnel bases and boat stowage and Pom Pom platform as per instructions with only photo etch railings and ladders added.
The funnels were straightforward and I added a few short lengths of round plastic strip to inside of funnels for missing uptake pipes etc as seen on actual vessel.