Progress! And lessons Learned.

I have finally something to show for my 3d printing efforts. I have made a number of prints but these are the first that I have gotten assembled and painted. I have learned quite a bit while doing this. I will not be adding masts and sails until after painting the components. Anyway, I have three built and painted if not rigged vessels.

Unlike my previous efforts, these are all in 1/700th scale. They come from 3 different places. The one on the left is not a print. It is a schooner from Warlord Games' Black Seas. I really like the vessel and have 6 more to do. I have painted the decks of two others.

The middle one is a model from Ash and Stone on Wargaming3d.com. The original was a 28mm model and absolutely huge. I rescaled it and built the masts and sails. The rigging was an attempt. The foresail was not put on correctly but I just let it go. It is tiny and fragile. I really need to consider basing my 1/700th models. Especially this one. I like how it turned out. I want to print a few more. Ultimately I think I want at least five of these.

Lastly we have a ship sloop. I am not 100% sure whose model it is. It might be one of Henry Turners or Saturnalia studios. It was one of the first vessels that I got a good print on the sails for. I made the mistake of gluing the sails in place before painting. In the process of painting, I broke off the main mast right below the sails. It is glued back but will need the rigging to hold it together firmly. I am not confident on how that will go.

IN printing smaller vessels (schooners, brigs and even small ship sloops) from Henry Turner, I am struggling with the sails. The masts tend to be bigger than the holes for them end up. I have a pin vise to drill them back out. But the dry fitting of the parts have led to multiple sails breaking. The detail of the Henry Turner figures is fantastic. But they are much more fiddly. The Saturnalia ones are good but the masts are chunkier which makes them great for gaming but less so as scale models. I have successfully printed a couple of bomb ketches from Saturnalia now. What I have found helpful is using warm or hot water to rinse the models. I am using a water washable resin. This helps in removing the supports. I am also letting the model air dry after that before putting them under UV lights. This has prevented some odd looking blobs showing up on the model.

This is how I spent my Memorial day. I am putting off further rigging. I will go ahead and prime some of the Saturnalia models that I have and paint them this week to get a good comparison point. I have 3 hulls printed for the HSM Pickle from Henry Turner. The sails that I have printed haven't worked yet. I have not been able to get the bowspirit to fit at all.

As such, I am concentrating on the Saturnalia figures. After printing, the mast holes are still too small. I am drilling them out to get them to fit properly. I have painted up a pair of bomb ketches so far. I have to glue the masts in place still. Should finish that tonight.

I did finish a second Black Seas Schooner as well. I used a painting guide I found online and painted it in more French like colors. I'm not sure I like it. I will get pictures tonight.

I also have an update on my AWI scenario book for To Covet Glory. I have finished with the ship list for brigs of the Royal Navy. I have also added another scenario to the book. I am working on the Brigs of captured French, Spanish and Dutch navies now. This leaves Cutters and schooners left to stat out. This puts the book in at 115 pages thus far. Of which, 45 pages are scenarios and campaigns. The ship list will be over 100 pages detailing Royal Navy vessels under the rate from Ship Sloops (3 masted ships smaller than frigates), to Brig sloops (two masted vessels with a square rig), to Schooners (two masted fore and aft rigged vessels) and cutters (single masted vessels). I will have partial lists of US Navy and State navy vessels. Some data changes the ship types from the To Covet Glory rulebook. Lastly, there is a single page of some gunnery changes that are optional. This was a thought I had to further differentiate between the smaller cannons. This section might get dropped.

3d Printing & Black Seas

One thing I am having issues with in 3d Printing ships are the holes for the masts being too small for the masts. I am not sure what I am doing wrong there. Sanding down the mast bases seems to help.

I have started to actually paint some 1/700th scale miniatures. I printed a small bermuda sloop that I scaled down from 28mm of all things.I also have a shop sloop of 18 guns that I have printed up. Both of these are on the painting bench. I need to do some rigging on the small bermuda sloop to get the rest of the sails on. The ship sloop has its deck painted. I am still deciding on a scheme.

I ended up buying the Black Seas Schooner Squadron. The ships are really nicely detailed. I have them primed and have painted one of them. The one thing I noticed is that some work with plyers is needed to get the sails lined up with the bowspirit. I have one that is painted and I am waiting on the glue to dry on the thread to being rigging it. Will see how it goes.

I am very interested in picking up the Black Seas Cutter Squadron. the problem is, I can't find any retailer in the US that carries it. Shipping for it from Warlord directly is $20. No one seems to be selling it on eBay at the moment. I would like to experiment with some different sail plans for them to give them different looks. I think it would be worth it.

The problem with both the Warlord Games models and the ones I am 3D printing is that they are light and tend toward being top heavy. I had not based any of my 1/300th ships. That wasn't an issue with them. With these, I think I will need to base them to have them stay upright on the table. Once I have some more of Henry Turner's models printed and painted up, I should be in good shape to complete the scenario book. That is something I am looking forward to.