--Originally Submitted 4/1/12 (Sorry for the Delay, Gus. -Ed.)--

SEP Orzel
Polish coastal Submarine


Click on Image for FULL RES
Accura 1:200
by Gus Hager

This is (my build of) the Accura kit of the Polish "Orzel" in 1/200 scale:


Click on Image to Enlarge("...at Gus's this afternoon, trying to figure out how his system sends emails with attachments. Like the story of the monkeys and the typewriters, we managed to hit enough of the right combinations of key strokes to get one off to you." - Phil Fuss [LOL, Phil! -Ed.])

...(This model is) fairly typical of Eastern European short-run kits...not a lot of detail and suffers from loss of several smaller parts due to "short shot" low-pressure injection molding with many sprue stubs with just little blobs of plastic attached.

I added deck detail with two sizes of Evergreen siding stock and popped them out with a wash. Drilled out the conning tower windows and filled them with Krystal Kleer. Added exhausts with shaped and drilled Evergreen half-round stock. Relaced 105mm deck gun barrel with hypo tubing. All uprights and triple-mount AA gun are from spares box. Antennae are nylon fishing line terminated at Evergreen stock stubs. The deck panels are Evergreen stock while the bollards, hatch covers and capstans are all kit parts. The props are kit-issue but the shafts are Evergreen...

("Unfortunately, the pictures of [Gus'] Sub do not do justice to the actual model...The rivet detail is amazing - typical of the great work Gus does..." -Phil Fuss):


Click on Image for FULL RES...about the rivets. I did them first as an experiment just to see how they worked and think they did a lot for the sub. They are from the "O" scale sheet from Micro-Mark and, I think, are pretty amazing. They are actually raised dots (resin?) bonded to regulation decal carrier film. I trimmed them close to reduce the amount of film showing around then applied just like regular decals. They respond very well to setting solvent and residual carrier film virtually disappears. The only details on the kit hull are some faint raised lines so everywhere you see rivet detail on the hull and tower it is courtest of Micro-Mark.

...It's a good time to be a sub modeler!