[bluedot0]

Fair comment on the Endeavour, that's how you see it. The quality of the kit has been questioned since day one and the comments here may turn some away, but encourage others, but in the end it is the individual who has to decide if he wants to partake.

The guys on this forum are a hardy bunch and have helped each other a lot with their experience, ideas, rebuilt parts, general discussion and thoughts. I'm positive the "silent guests" who read what is written have been helped as well.

But in the end it doesn't matter if you are a forum member or not, to be "influenced or not" the information gleaned from a site like this is still subject to the way each person interprets it and how they use it.

I see your point and I nearly followed you out the door, but I'm past half way, and I've decided to complete it, but I won't do this kind of kit again....Phil

[lthump]

I have to agree with both of you ,Phil and Dave, its not the kit I thought it was going to be. It's going to be a lot more work than it should have been. I dont mind some scratch building, but it is starting to get outa hand. You would think they could have got the anchor right, I mean we actually have the real one, so how hard could it have been.The point at which I most recently had some doubts was only two nights back when I was thinking of getting new planking for the outer hull.I shouldnt have to be thinking that at all , it should be good enough. Apparantly the Endeavour hull was made of white oak and you can get white oak model ship planking....... so why couldnt they have sourced some of that .?? The thing is if you want this model to look really good , you will have to scratch build heaps of it and buy some replacement timber. You will also need to have a reference like the AOTS book and more if you can get it.Thats because there are some obvious discrepencies but only if you are interested in historical accurracy ( the stern rudder is looking wrong ) You made a point that if you didnt know you would build this thing the way they have given it to you and probably be happy......... until you looked at another model and started to notice the differences. I am too far into this boat building thing now to stop building this one, but I wont start another part work in a hurry without seeing someone else has been there first and worked out the bugs.
Still after all this ranting I know I will be happy with this boat because I will make it the way I want it to be and be happy with that.I just wont be impressed with all the extra work I'll need to make a descent job of it. Not to mention -extra money- needed to be spent.
Oh and you lucky dogs, both of you have the 1/72nd U-boat.......I really want to do one of them........ one day. ;D

[berth44]

I reckon that we as modellers see things mostly the same, but in completely different ways, no two modellers are alike, no two models of the same kit are alike, some like to super detail, others do not, some may say, well it looks like the Endeavour, others will say "sorry, I say otherwise, it's not"..but the one thing that no two people differ on, "it's a kit!!", and we all have but one 'goal', and that is to build it, put it together, paint it, display it, as long as it looks like what it's supposed to portray, and that my friend (s) is fair comment!!
How each and everyone of us perceive this, or any other thing for that matter, well, we are, each one of us 'an individual' and that is whether as you say, on the forum, not on the forum, the 'goals' are the same but achieved in many ways, some need only the 'basics' and the rest will be made from scratch, but then, like this kit costing the earth, why do we keep forking out to put it right??
OK Phil, you know what I do, I know what you do, we have skills,many skills that we can adapt to whatever we are building, it might be super detailing a 'oo'gauge locomotive, but wait, we've known the pitfalls of this loco before we bought it and we are prepaired to fix these 'pitfalls', even if it cost us the same again, but I personally think that the Endeavour falls into a completely different catagory, we were lead to believe this was a model of great distinction, a museum piece even, but it has turned out to be something else, more of a 'le-mon', but as you say Phil, the builders here are a 'hardy bunch' of modellers who have stuck with it, helping each other out, I know, I was a part of that for a while, and incidentally, as you and others know, I loved every minute of it, and I admit that I was very influenced by certain individuals, that's for sure, I do not deny the fact, that's why the 'forum' was so good, it just was a tryingly bad model !!.....Dave

[lthump]

I was asked by Shipaholic where to get the Admiralty paints and I have posted on his build log, but I thought I would post it here as well along with the other site for white oak planking for the outer hull.
www.miniaturesteammodels.com/category89_1.htm

cgi.ebay.com/MODEL-SHIP-DECK-PLANKING-CHOOSE-15-TYPES-WOOD-/270568268104?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3eff202148

Hope this helps some of you.

[lthump]

Here ,here Dave . You got that right , we were led to believe this was a better than it turned out to be kit. In the end I will ( others too) turn this Le-mon into a swan, but with more blood ,sweat and tears than we bargained on.

[bluedot0]

You are dead right Dave, this is a LE-MON.....there is nothing "museum piece" about it. My desire to build it has waned considerably, I've put it away and at some later stage I'll give it a go again.......I will complete her but I don't know when.

So I'm leaving the Endeavour party for a while, I'll be like Dave and watch from afar, heap praise on you guys, and throw in my 2 bobs worth, but I won't be progressing my build in the foreseeable future .......I'm going to other parts of this forum to work on my railway for a while.........and my Bismarck......Phil

[shipaholic]

Hey guys I wouldn't get too hung up on some of the things wrong with this kit. Most kits have lots of faults, and suffer from being approximations instead of faithful replicas. For example the Artesania Latina Endeavour is as bad in many ways, with pretty ordinary looking metal fittings ind many incorrect details. Corel make an Endeavour model that looks nothing like the Endeavour. The Caldercraft Endeavour looks good in the photos but I bet it also has faults.
Bottom line is if you build it as instructed you will end up with a fine looking model that is a good representation of how the Endeavour looked, and it will look like the model in the magazine photos.
I knew right from the start when I looked at the photos of the model in issue 1 that I would be scratch building a lot of stuff and doing a lot of things differently, so my model wont look like the photos. That's my choice. I just wish some of the parts were a bit better so I don't have to scratch build too much. Steve

[bluedot0]

I know what you're saying Steve, but the creators of this kit are asking you to spend a lot of money on it, however the return for that investment is way below par, and that shouldn't be the case.....Phil

[shipaholic]

Yes I agree its a crappy kit for 1500 bucks, way below par for the price and theres no way I would buy a kit that cost that much in one hit even if it were a top class kit, but we're paying for the magazine as well. What got me into it was the 1:48 scale, all the Endeavour kits I was aware of are 1:60 and I really wanted to do a 1:48 one. Plus I dont mind paying $15 a week, I dont even notice it, about the cost of a couple of drinks at the pub. I just see it as spending that money amusing myself. Its much cheaper than some other amusements I can think of. Plus I gave up smoking in March, that was costing me $300 per month, so this is nothing. And one of the best things is it has sparked these forums and I am really enjoying comparing builds with you guys, as well as that its fun bagging the dirt out of the faults with the partwork.....Steve

[lthump]

All good points Steve.Particularly about the forum. It's seeing you blokes progress that inspires me to get off my bum and do some more too.It does make it easier to make the kit.People like steve, who improve on the kit with scratch building, are an inspiration, although I recognise that it also leaves some feeling that the kit has let them down badly. The thing is ,Steve, shares what he does (as do we all)and is happy to say how he improved this or that. That is what makes the forum great and keeps it a fun excercise.Myself and Anthony have added lights, definately not part of the original kit, but a fun thing to do and shared with all. The forum is an important part of this partwork for me, I enjoy all of your company and thankyou to all of you. What a great bunch of humans. ;D

[lthump]

I have had one side of my endeavour sanded for a while and have had it sitting on a table in front of me near the tellie. I have noticed that the shape of the hull near the bow on the sharp lengthways bend looks a little flat. This is nothing I have done wrong but the way the kit has the shape turn out. Today I took a piece of planking and curved it while holding it against the hull in that spot. Seemed to me that it could use a bit extra meat on it.Today I finally added some thick filler to it and even before I sand it back it has taken on a more evenly rounded shape. I will do the other side differently tho, using an added layer of short planks and sand and shape them . I will post a pic when I'm done to help explain.

[lthump]

As promised... a few pics showing the improvement to the flat spot on my hull.

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[lthump]

I also tried bog on this side ,it works too, but I recommend the layer of planks for this cure. Less mess.

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[lthump]

After looking at the AOTS drawings I have made changes to my rudder post hole. The rudder keel (if thats its name) goes up into the rudder hole flush against the boat keel and is more substantial than the model kit allows for, pushing the rudder out a bit further and higher where it goes into the hull.The circled area may have to be bigger yet.If you have a dremel this modification is one of the easier ones.

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[lthump]

Here is a spare piece of ply simulating the rudder keel. It now goes flush up the stern and into the rudder hole the way it should

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