1/350 scale NUMA oceanographic research/exploration ship "Neptune's Trident"

[Rick Lowe]

If you've put all that work into the LCAC, it's be a shame to bury it at the back of the hole.

Granted, there is a light source from the opening for the RHIBs, but it's still not going to be very visible.

The Wasp display idea is a valid one, or maybe you could have a small section of sea at the stern and have the LCAC being deployed off the rear ramp?

[seadude]

Until I can finally decide what I'm going to do for the well deck, I'm going to do a small side project and work on the main radar mast and get that all painted up.
One idea hit me for an area in front of the radar mast. Tell me what you think, folks. Like the idea or not?

[Rick Lowe]

Don't they still teach celestial navigation? An old-school, still-works-when-the-internet-is-down-and-the-power-is-out system would be a good fail-safe backup.

On the display side, I had an idea (yeah, watch out for those...)
In an old FineScale Modeller I saw where someone had a ship displayed; one side was pristine and on keel blocks, the other was dockside with people.
If you tweaked that to have the other side and the stern with a sea base, you could have the LCAC coming out of the well, and some things on cranes being deployed/recovered, and one or two other things heading to/away from the ship.

Just a thought. 

[scooter]

Don't they still teach celestial navigation? An old-school, still-works-when-the-internet-is-down-and-the-power-is-out system would be a good fail-safe backup.

Annapolis (the USNA) brought it back ten years ago.  The US Merchant Marine Academy never stopped.  More info at this >>HERE<<(article from 2015)

[Rick Lowe]

Good to hear.

[seadude]

In other news............
Although I have one hovercraft already built, I'm going to build a second. As I previously said in a past post, I have 2 Seaview subs, 2 hovercraft, and 2 DSRV subs. I'll put one of each in the well deck. And then another set on display in front of the main model.
As for the clear observation dome idea I had, it's hard to explain, but I was kind of basing my idea on this that I found and/or heard about:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archaeoastronomy
Not all shipwrecks, treasure, etc. are found with maps. What if Dirk Pitt and crew were were trying to find an ancient Egyptian sailing vessel that somehow made it to China and all they had to go on was stars and astronomy? And the thing is, the positions of stars and constellations was different centuries and millenia ago in the night sky than today due to continental drift, Earth axis, and a few other variables. I mean, remember what Indiana Jones said near the end of the movie Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny when the German plane and occupants wanted to go back in time and change history, but didn't factor in continental drift and ended up in a Greek/Roman battle instead?

But like I said, if the observation dome idea doesn't work out, I'll just paint over it and say there's an advanced radar system underneath instead.

[seadude]

This is going to sound crazy, but............

Oceanographic research ships not only use manned submersibles, but they also use unmanned remotely operated submersibles for exploration purposes. So where was I going to get some?  And then an idea hit!     I had a bunch of leftover Space:1999 Eagle transporter spaceships when the kit I had lost a bunch of other parts to it. Underwater ROV's are usually small to medium size. In the below pic, you can see how the Eagle transporter ships compare to the Seaview submersible and the DSRV submersible. The only thing that might not be needed is the aft engine assembly on the Eagles and could be cut off. I think it might look too weird with it being left on. The four leg "pods" would be left on in case the ROV ever needed to set down on the seabed floor or some other area. The nose of the Eagle transporter gets left on as that would be where most of the sensors and underwater lights are.
Thoughts, folks?

[Rick Lowe]

I can't see why that wouldn't work - without the engine nozzles, they'd be less immediately obvious as to what they were, and it's a good way to use leftovers/orphans.

[seadude]

Ok, so here's the checklist so far.

1. Well deck inside the ship is done except for adding acrylic gel medium to create some water in the well deck. And also need to add at least 1 LCAC hovercraft, 1 Seaview sub, and 1 DSRV sub inside the well deck.
2. Helicopter hangar is done and installed inside the upper superstructure hull portion of the ship.
3. All aircraft are built and painted.
4. All watercraft are built and painted: 2 Seaview type subs, 2 LCAC hovercraft, 2 small remote operated sub vehicles, and at least 9-10 RHIB boats. I did not paint the Seaview type subs exactly like those seen on the Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea tv series. There's a silver colored access hatch on top, and the main windows at the front of the sub were painted with TAMIYA Metallic Blue paint. All subs are in bright colors so as to be highly visible below the surface of the water. This is normal in the real world. Two small Space:1999 Eagle transporter spacecraft were painted to represent small underwater remotely operated vehicles. The nozzle engines at the back were cut off. The 4 squareish leg pods on each were painted a different metallic color to represent where the maneuvering thrusters would be on the ROV's.
5. Three large cranes built and painted. Used a fine tip black ink pen to color the control cabin windows.
6. One large A-frame and one small A-frame cranes painted. These "cranes" can usually be found on the port or starboard sides of oceanographic ships for raising and lowering of divers and/or scientific instruments.
7. Main radar mast built and painted. It is a spare mast from an Arleigh Burke destroyer model kit. I didn't want a lot of white all over the ship, so the mast was painted black. And some oceanographic ships do actually have black colored masts. So it won't look that weird.
8. There's at least 1 forklift in the well deck. One forklift and 1 flight deck tractor are in the aviation hangar. What's left in the picture below will be put on the aft flight deck of the ship.
9. One UH-60 Black Hawk and one UH-1 Huey are in the aviation hangar. All other aircraft seen in the picture below will be placed on the aft flight deck.
10. Currently working on painting all the radar/sensor domes. There's at least 10-13 of them in different sizes and all will be painted white.
11. Hoping to glue the upper superstructure hull piece and the lower ship hull piece together later this week. Then "maybe" next weekend I can spray paint white the upper superstructure ship hull.

[Weaver]

Every picture on this thread is coming up as a purple rectangle with "CONTENT NOT VIEWABLE IN YOUR REGION" written inside it.

[PR19_Kit]

But they didn't earlier.....................

Perhaps Trump is demanding a tariff for them?

[seadude]

Every picture on this thread is coming up as a purple rectangle with "CONTENT NOT VIEWABLE IN YOUR REGION" written inside it.

Try clearing your cookies, cache, and browsing history. Sometimes, things on the Internet may or may not be viewable depending on what device and software a person is using such as desktop computer, cellphone, various operating systems, etc. If one thing doesn't work, then try switching to something else.

[seadude]

Pictures and more pictures. If anybody has questions on anything, then just ask.

[seadude]

I'm screwed and I need help. 
Look at the red circled areas in the picture below. You can see that the hull attachment areas do not line up/meet. The reason for this is that the hull, especially the upper superstructure hull piece was warped (Particuarly on the starboard side) when I got the kit long ago. I tried everything I could long ago to fix that warpage, but nothing worked. Anybody have any suggestions before I go and glue the two hull halves together in the next few days?

[Weaver]

Every picture on this thread is coming up as a purple rectangle with "CONTENT NOT VIEWABLE IN YOUR REGION" written inside it.

Try clearing your cookies, cache, and browsing history. Sometimes, things on the Internet may or may not be viewable depending on what device and software a person is using such as desktop computer, cellphone, various operating systems, etc. If one thing doesn't work, then try switching to something else.

Done all that and restarted my PC too. Doesn't make any difference: I'm still seeing purple rectangles instead of pictures. I've never seen a regional restriction as a result of cache/cookie issues before. I could see all the pictures before, on this device (I have no other) so this is new thing that's changed, not a device problem. It strikes me that this is something new that Imgur has done.

EDIT: it's definitely Imgur blocking the whole of the UK, probably in response to the UK's Online Safety Act, although they havn't put out a statement.

Article here: https://piunikaweb.com/2025/09/30/imgur-uk-blocked/

Guess we all need VPNs now...