--Originally Posted 12/30/09--

This is the old Viking kit, long ago out of production (and out of business!) The guy who made the master/pattern over sanded it leaving a lot of the edges that should be "hard" a rounded, soft look (like the casemate areas. There is a large lip (almost 1.5' x 1' in scale) around the deck edge where the railings attach. The brass set was provided by Viking via Flagship Models, and has some relief or double etching. The kits "detail" parts are mostly white metal (arrgh! I junked and scratch built a lot of replacements!), and many were dead ripoffs of other's work (Tamiya, Revell, Tom's Modelworks, Iron Shipwrights) This explains some of the "softness" of detail. The quad 40mm's (I junked the Viking/Revell ripoffs) are by L'Arsenal - I'll get a closeup of one for you - they are really little kits by themselves and are really nice. I have Seahawks from L'Arsenal that I will perch on the catapault (this build is supposed to be 1945 era and the switch to Seahawks from Kingfishers had been made by then. I have a bunch of photos with the Seahawks sitting on the cradles and cat. Much work to be done yet -

Kevin