My first Resin kit to be completed is the USS Phoenix an old Jim Shirley kit that was intended to represent the USS Honolulu after her 1943 rebuild. I decided to build this kit as the Phoenix, her closest sister as I still wanted to build a 1942 version of the Honolulu. Both ships were rebuilt at about the same time, receiving almost identical structural changes, so there was little major work to be done. The Jim Shirley kit was pretty accurate in proportions and matched the drawings I had obtained from the Floating Drydock, but the casting quality was less than desirable, and there was a lot of repairing to be done. These repairs were mainly replacing some of the splinter shields with new ones. I used thin pieces of resin cut from the over pour created in the casting process. My kit came without any secondary armament so I ordered some of Corsair Armada's 5"-25 cal guns that are available from Pacific Front Hobbies. The 20 mm guns came from the Skywave E-9 USN weapons set, as well as the catapults and crane. The masts were fabricated from brass rod and various parts from the spares box. Someday I plan to replace the catapults and crane with Photo etch ones, but after a year of working on this kit, I decided to take a few shortcuts and finish it. I did invest in Tom's Modelworks excellent light cruiser set for the searchlight platform and some of the other details. The railings along the outside were from Gold Medal Models cruiser destroyer set. I prefer the stainless steel rails along the outside as they seem to spring back when touched more than brass. Brass however is softer and easier to form the sharp bends, and small turns found on the superstructure. I painted this kit in the two color Ms. 32 pattern of Dull Black (BK) and Ocean Gray (5-O). I first painted the deck surface using weathered Deck Blue (20-B) and then spayed the Ocean Gray on the sides. I cut paper masks for spaying the Dull Black pattern over the Gray. Since the black was feathered over the gray, I let the mask stand off the surface a little to eliminate the sharp contrast created by masking.
I chose to display this ship underway and mounted it on a wood base with water modeled using techniques best described by the various articles that Rusty White has already done. Additional pictures of my model can be found in the ModelShipGallery.com site.
