WHY DID YOU BUILD THAT

                           I am often asked why I built particular models. Now what I don't do is design a set of stats and then build a model to suit. I tend to start with a desire to make a ship type and a box of bits . I then tinker till I get to where I think I wanted to be. To demonstrate allow me to lead you throught the thought process that led me to my latest model.   

                           The Retribution prow section had been in the bits box for a few days. The rest of it had been built into a dedicated fleet carrier and the prow was surplus to requirements. I toyed with cutting off the prow and throwing the rest away but couldn't bring myself to do it . Then by sheer co-incidence one of the people on the BFG list , James Symmons mentioned an idea for combining a retribution and plastic cruiser to make a sleek fast looking pocket battleship. Now I had my own ideas about what a pocket battleship should look like but the basic idea stuck.

                             The prow section had two weapons bays as did the cruiser but they were bigger and heavier looking and the prow is awesome. I have for a long while disliked the process of adding a couple of guns to a plastic cruiser and calling it a battlecruiser and always made my BCs more imposing. The idea hardened and I determined to combine the whole prow section with a cruiser to make a very imposing battlecruiser. What type and what armament I had no idea.

                           Step one was to cut the rear flange from the retribution prow and generally clean it up and straighten the mould warp.  Next I took the two cruiser halves and glued them together, left them to dry thoroughly and thought about what I could do. Once dry I set about demolishing the cruiser . I cut off the prow and sent it to the bits box (never throw anything away ) I then sliced off the whole of the weapons bays directly under the top superstructure decking decking leaving the rear hull and the superstructure. I carefully cut off the points and spires in front of the superstructure and saved it for later use. Now was the time to offer the hull to the prow section. It looked ok but too small. I had two choices , to widen the hull or increase its depth. The width looked nice and sleek so i decided to deepen it. I made a horizontal cut just under that central bulge above the supports. I then cut a piece of 2mm thick plastic card a little smaller than the bulge and glued it below the bulge . When dry I glued the lower hull below it. I offered the hull to the prow once more and it looked fine.   Happy with the way it looked I drilled a 0.9 mm hole down through the two gun mounts into the retribution hull and pinned and glued the plastic hull to the retribution prow with 0.9 mm brass rod pins.    

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                            I had given little consideration to weapons as yet but there was still plenty of time. It was time for the engines. I made a vertical cut just behind the pipework supports in front of the engine position and reproduced this cut in the hull directly below it. This is where the engine bulkhead would sit. I had already decided to use plastic cruiser engines but enlarged from 7 to ten tubes. Using two sets, I cut the inner pair of tubes from each engine so that I had two sets each with 3 vertical tubes and each with one outer pair of tubes, one left , one right. From 1mm plastic sheet I made a small blast shield that would be glued vertically between the engines. I then assembled the engines and the blast shield. I made a plastic bulkhead from 1mm styrene sheet. The bulkhead is roughly octagonal in shape cut to match the engines and the shape of the hull. Again from 1mm sheet I cut two blast shields to sit on the bulkhead outside the engines. I decorated these with 0.4 plastic strip to represent framing and then assembled engines, bulkhead and blast shields. The assembly was then put aside to dry.

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                          There remained the hole where wings go (now 2mm higher than previously). I took a set of wings and cut the wings off completely, leaving the block that slides into the hull. I then shortened this to match the hull and glued it into the bottom of the slot. The resultant gap was filled with 2mm rod.  Once dry the engines were glued to the rear section. The sides looked a little bare so I took some sword ventral mounts and cut them in half . I glued a mount on each side of the hull just  behind the struts that "support" the hull bulge.

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                         The time to decide was rapidly approaching. In order to avoid making the decision I worked on the detail. I fitted a standard plastic bridge which looks just fine. The spikes and "spiers" section was a little narrow and too short when mounted on the top of the Retribution prow section so I glued it to a piece of 0.4 mm card cut slightly wider . I glued this in contact with the prow and filled the resultant gap between it and the superstructure with a short piece of 1.00mm thick styrene "decking. I added two anti ordnance turrets to the decking and a blast shield. Finally I glued two chaos lance turrets to the gun mounts on the super structure. The moment had come. 

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                         A careful check of my collection showed I had covered most combinations of weapons. I had WB & lance combines , all lance & all WBs. However, to my amazement I didn't  have a Mars. Trouble was this had torps . TOUGH. Thus was borne the torpedo variant of the Mars class "I.M.S Shifting Sands". Only the paintwork remained. Yes folks the basis of the Noah Ben Shalek ship design system is a momentary whim and whether it looks pretty or not. Cool Eh??? heheh  

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                       I do hope this has been of interest and inspires you to equal endeavours. I have spent many satisfying hours in converting and scratchbuilding and encourage others to do the same. It will greatly enlarge the hobby for you.  Finally here are some shots of the finished & painted model.