Kirov Class CGN in 1/350 scale

SteelBird said:

I've been feeling bad for both the Liaoning and her older sister should had been nuclear powered. Given such a large vessel and valuable space aboard, using conventional power on aircraft carrier is simply a waste. Since their 28,000 tons class cruiser have nuclear power, I just don't understand why the 60,000 class carriers use conventional power.

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Because Soviet Union didn't have marine reactors of sufficient size. Soviet Union from late 1950s to late 1970s regarded submarines as it's main naval asset, and carriers and cruisers as support assets. So they focused their marine nuclear reactor development primarily for submarines, and avoided the diversion and expense of developing separate larger reactors for surface ships as long as possible.

The Kirovs actually use submarine reactors which are not powerful enough to drive her to her full designed speed, so she also needed a unique separate conventional oil fired steam loop to boost her to maximum speed. The oil fired superheater is complicated and hard to maintain. On the pyotr veliky the system is mothballed to save maintenance requirements. So the mighty PV is in practice restricted to about 25 knots, pretty slow for a warship.

Only in late 1970s did soviet navy adjust its outlook, began to embrace an large independent surface power projection navy. One menifestation was development of dedicated surface ship reactors, first for the Ulyanovsk CVN. At the time of soviet union's collapse, the soviet navy had planned a new pure nuclear cruiser to succeed the Kirov, and nuclear powered AAW destroyers to escort the new nuclear cruisers and carriers.

Just as the USN was turning its back on nuclear power for surface ships other than carriers, the navy of USSR was beginning to embrace an all nuclear surface fleet.

...continuing on then.


Okay, in the last week I have worked on the main deck house (the forward deck house) and the main mast structure and all of their details. And there are a lot of them.

There are several levels to the main deck house and a lot of equipment, instrumentation, sensors, and viewing ports and windows on these decks. The main deck house rises five decks above the main deck on the Petr Velikiy, and the Main Mast structure rises another five decks higher still. Adding those decks, all of the equipment, including weapons, radars, fire control, life rafts, sensors, ranging instruments, and other sensors took a lot of time. Many of them were small, delicate assemblies of their own. Then their were numerous small windows and viewing ports , and the decks themselves that needed to be painted in their approriate colors as shown.

However, once that was done, this allowed the various parts of the main deck house and the main mast structure to come together very nicely as a whole:


Once the main deck house was assembled, that allowed me to complete all of the details of all of the dech house structures and then dry fit them together away from the ship, and then also dry fit them onto the ship itself. They are fitting together very nicely now and have completed the majpority of the structural build of the ship. They also have allowed the ship to come together and take on the real look of the Petr Velikiy as she appear in the russian Navy. But there is still much to do. As it is, here is how all of thos eparts look together now, both away from the ship, and together on her.


Now I have the fairly involved taks of putting together all of the photo etch work on this vessel. All of the main radars and sensors for the surperstructure are yet to be added, and they are quie involved. All of the railing throughout the vessel, and the webbing and netting for the helicopter landing pad too. Once that is completed, the decals will need to be added, before th final touch up painting will finish the vessel. All of that should take another two sessions.

Wow Jeff, I don't how you ever work on one of these models without ever missing a piece that either fail to the floor or the dog ate it?

Equation said:

Wow Jeff, I don't how you ever work on one of these models without ever missing a piece that either fail to the floor or the dog ate it?

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Hehehe.

I cannot tell you how many times that happens...and then I have to get down and look for them.

And the really small ones are sometimes very hard to find!

I have a very high intensity LED light right there to help me...and with my disabilities in my back since my cancer surgeries, it is not easy...and sometimes when it happens I simply glance heavenward and utter a little sort of prayer, actually more like, "Really? Heavenly Father, Seriously? Again?"

Then I get down on my hands and knees as best I can and start looking until I find it.

Beautiful and big ! in more elegant ship.

About 75 cm i think.

FORBIN said:

Beautiful and big ! in more elegant ship.

About 75 cm i think.

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Yes, as I say in the description, it is just under 30" and at 2.54 cm to ths inch, that does work out.

Now. my USS Enterprise was the biggest so far. She is just over 3 ft long and is just a hair under 93 cm long. Big model in 1/350 scale...with a fully lit hanger deck I might add.

Lots of intricate photo etch work this last week. The most intricate were the various radars and their mounts. There are numerous radars on the Kirov class cruisers and they vary from vessel to vessel, with the Petr Velikiy (this vessel) as the latest ship having the most modern fit. In this session I worked on the following larger radars:

The Russian Voskhod MR-800 (Top Pair) 3-D Search Radar:
This higher-band 3-D volume search radar concisits of modernized Russian Voshkof MR-600 (Top Sail) and MR-500 Kliver (Big Net) radars arranged back to back and located on top of the main foremast on the Petr Velikiy guided missile cruiser. It is the principle 3-D air search radar for the cruiser and has a range of approximately 500 kilometers.

Russiat Fregate MR-7600 (Top Plate) 3-D Search Radar:
The Top Plate S-Band 3D search radar is a complimentary 3-D search radar that is mounted on top of the second, more aft mast. It is the same radar used on all of the larger, modern Russian surface combatants including on the Kuznetzov aircraft carrier, the Slava class guided-missile cruisers, the Udlaoy class guided missile destroyers, andthe Sovremenny class guided missile destroyers. It has a range of 300 kilometers.

Russian Topaz-V MR-302M (Strut Pair) 2-D Search Radar:
The Topaz MR-302M Strut Pair 2D is an air and surface search radar. Each installation concsists of two dishes arranged back to back for high rates communication throughput. On the Petr Velikiy, there are two installations of this radar, one on either side of the main mast between the mid point and upper level of that mast on each side with the dishes facing fore and aft.

Russuan Topaz MR-320 (Palm Frond) Surface/Low-flying aircraft/missile Search Radar:
These are pairs of surface/Low Flying aircraft/missile search radars located on forward navigation deck house (one) and on the upper level (two) of the main foremast on the Petr Velikiy guided missile cruiser.

Getting these radars added properly in photo etch parts adds significantly to the authentic look of the vessel in scale as opposed to the plastic parts that come with the kit. There are a few of the radar dishes that the Trumpeter kit includes in photo etch, and I did use a couple of them, but I prefer the Gold Medal Models Kirov Class 1/350 scale photo etch kit that is made specifically for the Kirov class and includes the varuious radars and their mounting hardware that are used on each of the four vessels. These parts are much more detailed...and also much more difficult to assemble.

I started with the landing netting for the helo deck. This is included in both the Trumpeter kit and the Gold Medal Models kit, but the Gold Medal Models part is much more detailed and outlines the actual landing markings on deck, so I used that one.


Then it was on to the main 3-D Volume search radar, the Top Pair radar...and also the 2-D air and surface search radars mounted on the main mast, the Strut Pair radars.. I carefully cut out each of their mounting brackets, bent them appropriately to shape, then cut out their dishes, antennae, wave guides, etc., assemnbled them, and then used the Epoxy/Super glue to put them together and then onto the main mast. I also assembled and added the Palm Frond radars on either side of the upper main mast during this step.


Once these were complete, it was time to move to the second mast and add the 3-D Top Plate radar, replace the plastic yard arm, and add the four ECM/Sensor platforms to that mast.


I also was able to add the four inclined ladders to the various levels of the main deck fore and aft, and the safety netting around the helicopeter landing deck aft. Once this was done I added three antennae masts (one forward and two amidships) and then took a few pictures of the various photo etch details with the three major deck assemblies once again dry fitted to the main deck:


That is really starting to look good!

I hope in the next week to get all of the final plastic parts (ships launches and their davits and a few more details), all of the photo etch railing, and a few final details added to the vessel, along with the decals. If I can do all of that, I can finish the vessel this week. If I can, I will end up four weeks start to finish on her, and that will be pretty good time.

But not good enough. I am going to have to revise my overall schedule and add and additional 3-4 weeks because the Kuznetsov alone will probably take a good six weeks to build and that will be ambitious, and I still have another DDG and CG to build for the intial part of the Russian CSG!

Damn, it takes me a year or more to finish a ship model. But I ususally have 7-8 projects going on at the same time.

chuck731 said:

Damn, it takes me a year or more to finish a ship model. But I ususally have 7-8 projects going on at the same time.

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Hehehe...everybody has the same 24 hours in a day, no matter who they are. It' is ours to choose (usually) and schedule how we spend them.

I have a full time job, I teach a Sunday School Class at Church, I try to work with our local Boy Scout troop, I have nine grandkids (eight of them nearby) who I try and rotate time with each week (three grandsons who enjoy model building as well), a wonderful wife who I try and take out once a week, five kids who we try and help in their life wherever we can...including babysitting with the grandkids when necessary...etc., etc.

Anyhow, all of us (hopefully) to one extent or another keep busy with our likes, our work, our ambitions, our hobbies and skills, as we so choose etc. We just each choose the priority is all. Believe me...at times, when I place too much priority on the model building and some honey do's end up slipping...I am pretty quickly reminded of it. LOL!

But that's okay too. All a part of life.,

Finally...completed the Petr Velikiy!


Well, a lot of time has passed. More than I usually like to see. But I got really side tracked with the Sochi Olympics, and then the situation in the Ukraine with the Maidan Protests and the entire Crimea situation, and finally the loss of Malaysian Airline Flight MH-370, all took my attention. But finally now, I have gotten back to the Petr Velikiy.

There was quite a bit to do.

First, there was the massive amaount of photo etch railing required for the vessel. Kirov class nuclear cruisers have a lot of main deck railing over their massive length, and then a lot of secondary and auxilliary decks throughout the vessel. I am using the Gold Metal Model's Kirov class PE set specifically for the 1/350 scale Trumpeter Kirov class cruisers, and I highly recommend this set. It has the various railings for the main deck and all of the other decks. You just have to careffully cut it to fit and then either using a PE bending tool, or your tweezers or other tools to bend the railing to fit.

It toook me several days of work, in the evenings and on the weekends to accomplish this, but the look is very good indeed.

I also assem;led and painted the various launces fot the vessel. This consists of two larger launches and a smaller launch under each crane on either side. The crane assamblies were put together too at this tage and you can see how the cranes and the launches, look together with the railing in the following pictures.


I also needed to do the props on the vessel. The vessel comes with four bladed propos which are not correct for the Kirov class cruiser. They have five blade props. Luckily, the PE set from Gold Metal Models includes two five bladed propos. You have to bend these to the appropriate angles (and I recommend doing that while they are still attached to the Sprue), and then cut the plastic blades off of the Trumpeter part and glue these new props to the resulting prop housing. This results in a very decent set of five-bladed props for the ship.


Once all of this was completed it was just a matter pof putting the decals on. Not too many decals necessary for the vessel, partuclarly since I painted the helo landing markings on the aft helo pad by hand. Pretty much the vessel name, it's pennant number, and a few other identifying decals.

Once the decals were completed, it was time to give the vessel it's two coats of dull coat and then get the overall pics and a few detail pics.


She is looking very good. I intend to build and detail a cople of Ka-25 ASW helos later. One for the landing pad and another in the hanger.

I will also do some pics comparing the Kiov Class to the modenized Iowa Class. Though the Iwoa class are now (gain) in reserve status and all laid up as museum (and will probably never sail again, despite US law maintiaining them), there has always been a lot of interest in the two classes and how they might have faired if ever pitted against one another. I will compare this Petr Velikiy and my USS New Jersey when that time comes.

Now, I will take another break from the Russian group and build the new PLAN Type 052D destroyer I got, the DDG-172, Changsha, which I will add to my PLAN Carrier Group. Then it will be back to the russian Group with a UDaloy II DDG and then the Carrier, the Kuznetsov.