atic: 1:35 Bronco XXIII with interior

[DrSchmidt]

On with the forward ballast tank...printed some big structural parts and placed them. Then the primer.





Then the base coat and as the ballast tank is constantly exposed to sea water, one can weather quite a bit ( still I don't overdo it to keep the technical stuff visible)...



Then the forward compresser air tanks....



And the torpedo tubes ...



And eveyrthing with the starboard half of the hull....

[redboat219]

Will you be printing the ballast tank vent mechanism?

[DrSchmidt]

I did....in the second photo you can see a hatch in the upper left part of the picture. That is the vent valve. I didn't find any details about it, but usually the German boats had valves that veer actuated via thread rods that drove push rods that opened and closed the valves. That's wat I designed an printed. But actually there isn't much visible in the upper part of the ballast tank.

Here are the valve mechanisms implemented on VIIc u-boats:

https://www.uboatarchive.net/U-570/U-570Plate28.htm

[redboat219]

I did....in the second photo you can see a hatch in the upper left part of the picture. That is the vent valve. I didn't find any details about it, but usually the German boats had valves that veer actuated via thread rods that drove push rods that opened and closed the valves. That's wat I designed an printed. But actually there isn't much visible in the upper part of the ballast tank.

Didn't notice.

[DrSchmidt]

Good news: Halves have been joined and everything is looking O.K.. The styrene parts of the kit were glued together using classic plastic kit glue, and the printed parts were additionally secured using high strength epoxy resin. Rock solid. There will be plenty of cleaning seams and straightening up things, but that should be easy compared to the rest. NExt is the conning tower, snorkel and induction masts and the Diesel exhaust muffler with the respective valve.

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Epic!.......

[DrSchmidt]

Thank you David.

[trout]

Ditto what HWSNBN said!

[goshawk823]

Museum level everything. Just an awesome project on one of my favorite boats.

[CC Clarke]

If this model doesn't have internal, micro-LED lighting to show off the myriad of details you so thoughtfully included, it certainly rates it. Thorough subject matter research and and attention to 3D modeling detail.
(Your work inspired me to dive deep into resin printing a couple of years ago, as it showcased just how much consumer-grade technology has improved when someone knows what they're doing.)

Awesome job and I look forward to seeing the next phase!

-Or more appropriately: BZ!

CC

[redboat219]

A full complement of crew figure (14-18) would be great to show how cramped the conditions were inside these boats but it would obscure all those beautiful detail.

[DrSchmidt]

Thanks so much folks....still a long way to go and plenty things that can go wrong. So it's stays an exciting game.

Yes, the model has LEDs. Unfortunately I lost some in the bow section, I guess due to a short in a current driver unit, and it took the connected LEDs with it. As the LEDs had been installed at that point and everything including the leads were secured under glue, there was no way to repair it. But I was lucky being unlucky....as I have divided the LEDs in the torpedo room and the storage/battery room below in two separate circuits, I only lost the light in the battery and storage compartment. That's kinda O.K., as those would be switched off during normal operation of the boat anyway. Nevertheless, I was quite angry when it happened...

And yes, I have some figures. But I won't block everything by putting a whole crew in there. I want primarily a technical display.

[DrSchmidt]

What's still missing is the conning tower with its masts and the pressure hull. The difficulty here is the alignment of the pressure hull and the sail. I'll use the periscope as reference and work from there. The pressure hull floor is printed and partially painted. Fits quite well....



Next difficulty is that the pressure hull partially punctures though the bridge deck in the Type XXIII boats. So the first thing I did was to remove the pressure hull part of the kit where the printed hull is going to take its place.



The other parts of the pressure hull are printed as well and already got their base color. Fit looks promising....

[rwtdiver]

You are certainly inspiration to watch, and it makes me go back and take a look at my work and say I could certainly do better! Thank you again Andreas for sharing your beautiful work!

Rob
"Firemen can stand the heat."

[DrSchmidt]

While I paint all the bits and pieces for the interior of the conning tower I work on the fine tuning of the snorkel, direction finder and induction mas assembly. An engineering piece of art in itself....