Now it looks like a ship!
Added 2022-12-14 22:00:38 +0000 UTCMy friends, the hull is slowly growing. It comes along pretty quickly when you're just snapping parts out of the sprue and gluing them together! However, when it comes to filling, sanding, texturing, and welding, things slow down significantly.
The most crucial part was gluing the hull together and getting rid of the visible gaps between parts. This is important because welds won't hide them. The real hull actually has corner welds, and I replicated them by slicing small grooves into the plastic, then softening them with glue. Don't ask me why there's a weld running along the edge of a plain steel plate (that area where you can see inside of the hull), but it's there on the real vehicle! :D
Those large supporting beams for the mortar needed a lot of work, mostly removing excess plastic (probably due to the manufacturing process), scribing weld lines, adding corner welds, texturing, etc.
Again, the kit is very nicely and accurately detailed. Trumpeter didn't forget to add a lot of these seemingly pointless welds on the lower part of the front plate. They're there, but I decided to improve them!
Also, I already have a solid plan on how to detail the inside of the hull and how to hide the visible gap between the lower and upper half. I'll just keep it for later when the mortar is assembled to make sure it will fit into the hull.
Now I'm gonna add all the details and stuff. Then I'll assemble the mortar, and I'm definitely leaving the walkways and railings for the very end!
PS: the tracks are slowly developing some natural sag. And that's just caused by lifting the model off the table!
