I just finished putting together both the battleship and carrier. I have to say I was surprised with the models. I expected the carrier to be a hard build and it was in fact really easy. The battleship on the other hand gave me a lot of trouble. Getting the end pieces to line up correctly was a problem, I think I need a better long thin object to keep them in place while they dry.

One thing I was unhappy about was the instructions for the rail gun. It was a bit unclear to me where you mount it. I mounted mine on one of the back wings but it does not seem right. Can anyone share a good picture of where it suppose to go.

Overall both models where fun to build and the instructions were well done. I'm still a cardstock newb so my issues might just be due to lack of experience.

Yea, I had a lot of fun building the carrier. I've printed off the hammerhead, but haven't started cutting/building yet.

The railgun is, indeed, supposed to go on the outside of one of the "back wings". If you look, there's a "track" on the outside of the wings, and the Railgun supposedly moves along that track.

Just to give further clarity here, these two shots might help you out:

Okay cool so I put it in the right place. thanks guys

Honestly, where you put the railgun doesn't matter as much as making sure it's facing forward.

I know we all want our models to look "right" but honestly, I expect to start seeing alterations or slight differences in builds soon.

Very true, but I wanted my first set of ships to be the standard build. Once I get those built then I am going to play around. Maybe work with some textures and color schemes. Maybe make some beat up looking ships for a house ruled pirate faction.

I actually have a group of ships that I took a pinkish marker and traced over the blue outlines of the Royalist faction and use those for "other" Sathrican faction ships (such as pirates or say ... civilian transports).

I also have a bunch of my first builds that I took a knife to and basically shredded them to make my own debris markers ...

This is actually a conversation for the user-mod boards.

I've just built my first Hammerhead, and it's a really nice model.

The only observation I have is that while building the main body section, the ends of the main sections have tabs that require tucking in. I usually prefer the last piece of an enclosed volume to glue straight down onto tabs on the main section, so no tucking in or awkward squeezing of the main shape is required to get it to hold.

It may seem like a minor point, but it makes a large difference in ease of build for me - so such so that for my next build I would go to the trouble of kit bashing different tab locations.

Is it just me?

Steve

Steve is right, this is a bit fiddly. But I guess "sinking" the end pieces, tabs first, into the "tube" of the hull will make the whole thing look better than glueing it "atop" tabs. The reason is that the printed version makes the tabs practically invisible once you glued them inside, hiding all the white if done properly.

Steve's suggested version is indeed easier to build, but less sturdy and needs a bit more careful edging. I tried both, and the original version looks better in the end, at least to me.


EDIT: Anyway, different thing: Did you all glue a railgun to all your BCs? I built two versions, with and without the railgun attached.