Merriman Assembles The I-53 ... Ugh!

Merriman · Sep 11, 2009, 11:07 PM

Part-1, The Lindberg 1/72 static scale IJN I-53 WW-2 Submarine Kit

Wow, what a horrible representation of that particular class.

So endeth my detailed critique of the kits faithfulness to prototype.

Now, onto construction:

First, I examined the kit.

A well packaged product, the kit arrived to me (it was sent straight from Lindberg) double-boxed, the outer box marked, indicating the contents ... don't know if I like that, what if my Mailman is into model kits? The inner kit box is well appointed. The packaging of the sprues and hull pieces was more than adequate.

And the Instructions were good enough -- this is a very simple kit to assemble, and the illustration heavy directions were easy to follow and presented a rational methodology that needed little variance to make the model r/c capable. If I'm not mistaken, the introduction of the supplied booklet, which droned on and on about weathering was authored by the same guy who built the trade-show model of this subject for Lindberg. This guy apparently applies his weathering mediums with fire-crackers and squirt-gun.

Anyway ...

... The Styrene parts are stout and not at all 'soft'. The four-piece hull is well engineered for assembly employing both mechanical fasteners and solvent (welding) cohesive cement.

All styrene parts were first scrubbed with scouring powder suspended in water and applied with a stiff brush, rubbed in with abrasive pads, and the parts then thoroughly rinsed and dried -- this to remove oil, grease, and to impart to the parts surface a scratch finish, suitable for optimal solvent action and primer adhesion.

Care was taken to snip the parts off the trees with a sharp set of dykes. Any sprue remnants remaining on the parts were filed and sanded back. All sub-assembly parts were test fit and worked with files as required to get the best possible fit before laying on the glue. Solvent cement was used throughout except for the none-styrene-to-styrene joining jobs (railing and other painted metal fittings) -- those items stuck together with CA adhesive.

Sub culture · Sep 12, 2009, 04:59 AM

I think you need more Dremels, Dave. Doesn't look like you have enough there.

herrmill · Sep 12, 2009, 08:22 AM

Very concise & to the point. Carry on, sailor.

redboat219 · Sep 12, 2009, 10:56 AM

Would be great if those Kaitens can be made operational.
Looks like they can readily accept a small electric motor, batteries and a reed switch. Make them slightly buoyant enough to float just barely below the surface. A simple servo operated release mechanism under their launch cardle.

aquadeep · Sep 12, 2009, 07:57 PM

Yup just a torpe ,almost 3/4 in in diamiter and plenty of space for components.

The important thing is to hover the mother sub for Kaiten launch,easy with a pump sub.

Dave Amur Sub Yard

herrmill · Sep 12, 2009, 08:41 PM

Could we please refrain from taking over this thread with adverts like we saw several weeks before. Thanks.

Merriman · Sep 12, 2009, 09:35 PM

... we resume our normal programming, now in progress ...

Part-2, The Lindberg 1/72 static scale IJN I-53 WW-2 Submarine Kit

Not many parts to stick together on this kit: the sail, the Kaiten torpedoes, a couple of mast shears, the hull, bilge keels, control surfaces, and a few other appendages.

Yesterday I stuck the first of the two I-53 kits I have here together. Today I stuck the second kit parts together -- a few lessons learned from the first applied to the second, and those improvements shared with you today:

kazzer · Sep 12, 2009, 10:08 PM

I see Mr M has his camera set to HUGE photos again. Good grief! Do we have to beat him with a stick to get it through his skull that these pictures are too BIG?

herrmill · Sep 12, 2009, 10:24 PM

Looking good, Dave.

Regarding the large photos, I prefer you keep them this way for added detail. Me thinks someone needs to buy himself a larger monitor to enjoy the picture show.

Roedj · Sep 12, 2009, 10:26 PM

Kazzer,

With all due respect, let DM post BIG pictures as they're much easier for older eyes to see (not that there's anything wrong with that or that I personally have that trouble - LOL)

Dan

Merriman · Sep 12, 2009, 11:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kazzer

I see Mr M has his camera set to HUGE photos again. Good grief! Do we have to beat him with a stick to get it through his skull that these pictures are too BIG?

Oop's. Rose was messing with the camera. I'll set it for smaller files. Sorry about that.

David,

Akula971 · Sep 13, 2009, 04:35 AM

Mr Merriman, Please ignore the people with tiny monitors, and continue with the huge pictures. They look really good. I'm sure Rose knows what she is doing with the camera, and so far the photography is excellent. Please continue with the build!

Bill Harris · Sep 13, 2009, 07:57 AM

FWIW, at 1024x768 and under 100K in size, the photos are a good compromise.

kazzer · Sep 13, 2009, 09:22 PM

I guess my 17" Mac is actually too big for these blown-up photos?

Merriman · Sep 13, 2009, 10:20 PM

Part-3, The Lindberg 1/72 static scale IJN I-53 WW-2 Submarine Kit

Busy day. I got most of the re-contouring done on the bow on one of the two I-53 kits I'm assembling. The re-worked bow will serve as a temporary master off of which I'll pull a hard-shell tool, and from that I'll be able to produce production after-market bows for those wishing to get this kit (as best you can) to look a bit more like the actual boat.

I started by working off the excellent information unearthed my our own Chuck Miller: this guy know's his stuff and is relentless in his researches -- wish that he had been involved in the pre-production phase of this and the upcoming Lindberg-Hawk I-20 submarine kit. But, that's spilled milk, no need to beat our chests over that issue again.

Using the bow portion of the C3 class drawing Chuck posted at this site I enlarged it to the size that scales with the 1/72 kit. From the enlarged drawings I cut out a .125" thick ABS plastic sheet profile piece; which was glued into the hull; which had been prepared to receive the profile piece by cutting a slit in the deck, bow and keel. A portion of the forward lower hull was removed as if it remained that area of the bow would stand proud of the new section lines in that area -- other than that, the majority of the sides of the kits styrene hull was still good and was retained.

The objective was to get rid of the kits 'dip' at the deck near the stem, and to replace that with the distinctively graceful upward sweep of the bow as seen on the C3 boats, and the I-53 specifically. How could Lindberg-Hawk miss that!!!!!

Filler block of Renshape-20 (Pattern Maker's medium with a density of twenty-pounds per cubic foot) were cut to occupy the spaces above the deck and the removed lower hull section -- those blocs secured with five-minute epoxy.

The blocks were then filed and sanded to rough contour. The entire bow was then skinned with 'icing' -- a very thin formulation of two-part polyester filler which was sanded once well past the gel stage, but before it got too hard. I prefer the Evercoat brand of fillers -- there are several formulations available.

The Renshape, adhesives, abrasives, Evercoat filler, and other consumables are all available from, caswellplating.com.

Tomorrow I skin the work with a very light-weight layer of fiberglass cloth saturated with epoxy laminating resin (polyester would attack the underlying polystyrene plastic of the kit), sand and prim. By the end of the week I expect to have a set of bow production tools in hand, and will start in on making bow conversion kits for sale.

Sep 11, 2009, 11:07 PM	#1
Merriman on a vacation Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Virginia Beach, VA Posts: 499	Merriman Assembles The I-53 ... Ugh! Part-1, The Lindberg 1/72 static scale IJN I-53 WW-2 Submarine Kit Wow, what a horrible representation of that particular class. So endeth my detailed critique of the kits faithfulness to prototype. Now, onto construction: First, I examined the kit. A well packaged product, the kit arrived to me (it was sent straight from Lindberg) double-boxed, the outer box marked, indicating the contents ... don't know if I like that, what if my Mailman is into model kits? The inner kit box is well appointed. The packaging of the sprues and hull pieces was more than adequate. And the Instructions were good enough -- this is a very simple kit to assemble, and the illustration heavy directions were easy to follow and presented a rational methodology that needed little variance to make the model r/c capable. If I'm not mistaken, the introduction of the supplied booklet, which droned on and on about weathering was authored by the same guy who built the trade-show model of this subject for Lindberg. This guy apparently applies his weathering mediums with fire-crackers and squirt-gun. Anyway ... ... The Styrene parts are stout and not at all 'soft'. The four-piece hull is well engineered for assembly employing both mechanical fasteners and solvent (welding) cohesive cement. All styrene parts were first scrubbed with scouring powder suspended in water and applied with a stiff brush, rubbed in with abrasive pads, and the parts then thoroughly rinsed and dried -- this to remove oil, grease, and to impart to the parts surface a scratch finish, suitable for optimal solvent action and primer adhesion. Care was taken to snip the parts off the trees with a sharp set of dykes. Any sprue remnants remaining on the parts were filed and sanded back. All sub-assembly parts were test fit and worked with files as required to get the best possible fit before laying on the glue. Solvent cement was used throughout except for the none-styrene-to-styrene joining jobs (railing and other painted metal fittings) -- those items stuck together with CA adhesive. Attached Thumbnails Assembled hull halves. This is a BIG boat! 109.3 KB · Views: 468 Love the doubler idea. 69.6 KB · Views: 236 Rose showing off the big hull with the GATO SubDriver inside. 121.8 KB · Views: 624 The union between the forward and aft hull quarters is very good -- simple and strong. Good engineering here. However, the holes that pass the screws had to be enlarged a bit. No biggie. 79.9 KB · Views: 189 Yikes! The 1/72 GATO in foreground is the same scale as the I-53 in background, not the size of the I-53 hatch and that on the GATO. 61.8 KB · Views: 329 I thought Japanese were short little critters? So ... why is the I-53 hatch about five times bigger than the GATO's? 59.8 KB · Views: 204 The Kaiten torpedo in foreground has received the scratch-finish treatment, the one in background is still slick out of the mold. 98.3 KB · Views: 306 The 1/72 GATO and I-53. The same SubDriver (WTC) used for the GATO will be used aboard the I-53. 126.8 KB · Views: 413 Working out the methodology for conversion of this POS kit to r/c operation. 104.3 KB · Views: 263 The I-53's SubDriver. 125.2 KB · Views: 257 Some of the consumables used on this kit assembly job: Abrasive, filler, putty, and adhesive and cohesive glues. 85.2 KB · Views: 94 Using an abrasive to impart a 'scratch-finish' to the styrene parts. Variouse type brushes were used to dig the abrasive into all areas of the plastic parts 123.6 KB · Views: 159 Care was taken to snip off and dress out the plastic pieces of the kit. 56.7 KB · Views: 117 Mechanical fasteners and cohesive cement were used to assemble the hull quarters. 56.3 KB · Views: 177 Pouring on the liquid cement along the keel union between left and right hull halves. Note the use of clamps to hold things together till the weld is fast. 87.8 KB · Views: 235 plate sections fit into one side of the assembled hull to cover over the screw fastener wells. Good design here -- the plates acted as union doublers and also hid the fastener holes. Neat. 44.4 KB · Views: 182 Outer and inner box. Very professional looking. 107.8 KB · Views: 289 On the side of the inner box is this photo of the kit parts. Useful. 96.8 KB · Views: 280 Things on the inside are bagged and well protected against handeling damage. 88.8 KB · Views: 178 Last edited by Merriman; Sep 13, 2009 at 08:52 PM.

Sep 12, 2009, 09:35 PM	#7
Merriman on a vacation Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Virginia Beach, VA Posts: 499	... we resume our normal programming, now in progress ... Part-2, The Lindberg 1/72 static scale IJN I-53 WW-2 Submarine Kit Not many parts to stick together on this kit: the sail, the Kaiten torpedoes, a couple of mast shears, the hull, bilge keels, control surfaces, and a few other appendages. Yesterday I stuck the first of the two I-53 kits I have here together. Today I stuck the second kit parts together -- a few lessons learned from the first applied to the second, and those improvements shared with you today: Attached Thumbnails Most of the attachement chores was done with solvent type cement, tube and liquid. 52.8 KB · Views: 122 Lots of flash around the base of the two bilge keel pieces, this was knocked off with a sanding block. 27.9 KB · Views: 92 Kaiten torpedoes, sail and shears glued together. Extremely good fit -- very little shaving, filling, and putty work needed later. 45.3 KB · Views: 165 An alternative to gluing the keel section of the two hull halves together from the outside, you can do it from the inside like I'm doing here, before installing the two deck pieces. 111.6 KB · Views: 231 Before you can slip the two deck pieces into the hull capture lips you have to loosen the upper screws that pull the two hull halves together. 126.4 KB · Views: 164 The two deck pieces are installed by flexing the hull halves out enough to clear the upper flange of the hull capture lip, no problem at all. 120.9 KB · Views: 150 You can lay a bead of tube glue to the capture lip before installing the deck piece, like I'm doing here. Or, you can install the deck pieces dry and brush on liquid cement into the hull-deck union crack, letting capillary action work the cement to a 107.0 KB · Views: 136 The hull and deck pieces all glued together (takes no time at all -- a very well engineered kit) and held together with tape, I prepared the doubler plates --, that hide the screw holes and strengthen the bond between the hull quarters -- for attachement. 104.6 KB · Views: 161 The alignment pins on the doublers only get in the way of these self-indexing pieces. Snip 'em off! 63.0 KB · Views: 153 Tube glue is slathered onto the hull and the doublers installed and held in place with tape. 74.4 KB · Views: 183 Last edited by Merriman; Sep 12, 2009 at 09:47 PM.

Sep 12, 2009, 10:26 PM	#10
Roedj Registered User Join Date: Apr 2008 Posts: 23	DM's big pix Kazzer, With all due respect, let DM post BIG pictures as they're much easier for older eyes to see (not that there's anything wrong with that or that I personally have that trouble - LOL) Dan

Sep 13, 2009, 09:22 PM	#14
kazzer www.caswellplating.com/models Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Fairport NY Posts: 47	I guess my 17" Mac is actually too big for these blown-up photos? Attached Thumbnails This file is only 18.7 kb 18.7 KB · Views: 169

Sep 13, 2009, 10:20 PM	#15
Merriman on a vacation Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Virginia Beach, VA Posts: 499	Part-3, The Lindberg 1/72 static scale IJN I-53 WW-2 Submarine Kit Busy day. I got most of the re-contouring done on the bow on one of the two I-53 kits I'm assembling. The re-worked bow will serve as a temporary master off of which I'll pull a hard-shell tool, and from that I'll be able to produce production after-market bows for those wishing to get this kit (as best you can) to look a bit more like the actual boat. I started by working off the excellent information unearthed my our own Chuck Miller: this guy know's his stuff and is relentless in his researches -- wish that he had been involved in the pre-production phase of this and the upcoming Lindberg-Hawk I-20 submarine kit. But, that's spilled milk, no need to beat our chests over that issue again. Using the bow portion of the C3 class drawing Chuck posted at this site I enlarged it to the size that scales with the 1/72 kit. From the enlarged drawings I cut out a .125" thick ABS plastic sheet profile piece; which was glued into the hull; which had been prepared to receive the profile piece by cutting a slit in the deck, bow and keel. A portion of the forward lower hull was removed as if it remained that area of the bow would stand proud of the new section lines in that area -- other than that, the majority of the sides of the kits styrene hull was still good and was retained. The objective was to get rid of the kits 'dip' at the deck near the stem, and to replace that with the distinctively graceful upward sweep of the bow as seen on the C3 boats, and the I-53 specifically. How could Lindberg-Hawk miss that!!!!! Filler block of Renshape-20 (Pattern Maker's medium with a density of twenty-pounds per cubic foot) were cut to occupy the spaces above the deck and the removed lower hull section -- those blocs secured with five-minute epoxy. The blocks were then filed and sanded to rough contour. The entire bow was then skinned with 'icing' -- a very thin formulation of two-part polyester filler which was sanded once well past the gel stage, but before it got too hard. I prefer the Evercoat brand of fillers -- there are several formulations available. The Renshape, adhesives, abrasives, Evercoat filler, and other consumables are all available from, caswellplating.com. Tomorrow I skin the work with a very light-weight layer of fiberglass cloth saturated with epoxy laminating resin (polyester would attack the underlying polystyrene plastic of the kit), sand and prim. By the end of the week I expect to have a set of bow production tools in hand, and will start in on making bow conversion kits for sale. Attached Thumbnails Inserting the profile piece into the slit cut into the bow. I enlarged the drawing Chuck found for us to the scale of the kit and used that to mark-out the profile piece 76.5 KB · Views: 230 Ah! ... the smell of polyurethane in the morning! Cutting some Renshape-20. The much denser Renshape-40 is that purple stuff in foreground 98.8 KB · Views: 329 The bow area around the shutter doors was removed as this area, if left, would project past the new lines of the re-contoured bow 42.0 KB · Views: 166 The profile pieces was tack-glued with CA. Note the radically new shape of the bow! 39.2 KB · Views: 175 Securing the Renshape-20 filler blocks to the bow with five-minute epoxy 91.4 KB · Views: 201 Wow! 53.1 KB · Views: 272 After a rouch contouring of the Renshape-20 I skinned the entire bow area with Evercoat filler 91.8 KB · Views: 209 Starting to skin the bow of the modified I-53 bow 72.4 KB · Views: 222 64.0 KB · Views: 306 Last edited by Merriman; Sep 13, 2009 at 10:39 PM.

Sep 12, 2009, 04:59 AM	#2
Sub culture Man from Atlantis Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: London Posts: 589	I think you need more Dremels, Dave. Doesn't look like you have enough there.

Sep 12, 2009, 08:22 AM	#3
herrmill Shanghai'd Expat Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Xiaoshan, China Posts: 2,425	Very concise & to the point. Carry on, sailor.

Sep 12, 2009, 10:56 AM	#4
redboat219 Registered User Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Republika ng Pilipinas Posts: 299	Would be great if those Kaitens can be made operational. Looks like they can readily accept a small electric motor, batteries and a reed switch. Make them slightly buoyant enough to float just barely below the surface. A simple servo operated release mechanism under their launch cardle.

Sep 12, 2009, 07:57 PM	#5
aquadeep Permanently Banned Join Date: Oct 2007 Posts: 534	Yup just a torpe ,almost 3/4 in in diamiter and plenty of space for components. The important thing is to hover the mother sub for Kaiten launch,easy with a pump sub. Dave Amur Sub Yard

Sep 12, 2009, 08:41 PM	#6
herrmill Shanghai'd Expat Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Xiaoshan, China Posts: 2,425	Could we please refrain from taking over this thread with adverts like we saw several weeks before. Thanks.

Sep 12, 2009, 10:08 PM	#8
kazzer www.caswellplating.com/models Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Fairport NY Posts: 47	I see Mr M has his camera set to HUGE photos again. Good grief! Do we have to beat him with a stick to get it through his skull that these pictures are too BIG?

Sep 12, 2009, 10:24 PM	#9
herrmill Shanghai'd Expat Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Xiaoshan, China Posts: 2,425	Looking good, Dave. Regarding the large photos, I prefer you keep them this way for added detail. Me thinks someone needs to buy himself a larger monitor to enjoy the picture show.

Sep 13, 2009, 04:35 AM	#12
Akula971 Is it me? Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Perfidious Albion Posts: 70	Mr Merriman, Please ignore the people with tiny monitors, and continue with the huge pictures. They look really good. I'm sure Rose knows what she is doing with the camera, and so far the photography is excellent. Please continue with the build!

Sep 13, 2009, 07:57 AM	#13
Bill Harris Shrug... Join Date: May 2000 Location: Backwoods Alabama Posts: 2,928	FWIW, at 1024x768 and under 100K in size, the photos are a good compromise.