1/350 scale USS Solace LHD Amphibious Hospital Ship

[seadude]

Put several stacks of 20 foot containers back there and a small crane. Stack 2 high, around 10 accross.   Many components of field hospitals and other Humanitarian Assistance/Disaster relief (HADR) gear is now going containerized.  With a crane they could be lowered to LCU's/Landing craft, or be lifted to the the flight deck to become underslung loads on a CH-53.

Yeah, that has been on my mind as well. I do want to get, or make, some 20ft. ISO medical containers. But I don't want to put them anywhere on the flight deck as I want to keep the flight deck for mostly aircraft operations. So I don't want to have ISO's stacked where aircraft are going to be parking/landing. If there's enough space to stack containers there, then I will. But if not for any reason, then I'll go back to my original idea of a boat deck.

[zenrat]

Regarding Post # 144 further above.........I've asked around on a few other forums and the answers I've gotten back have been..........hilarious, to say the least. 
Things like: Sun deck, Solarium, Mini pool, Jacuzzi, Deck chairs & picnic tables, Mini game courts (Soccer, basketball, etc.)

WTF?  I'm not building a Carnival Cruise Lines passenger ship here.  Hospital ships just don't have those sorts of things...

Sure they do.  They're crewed by human beings who need to unwind (medical personnel particularly).  You not seen MASH?

[seadude]

Regarding Post # 144 further above.........I've asked around on a few other forums and the answers I've gotten back have been..........hilarious, to say the least. 
Things like: Sun deck, Solarium, Mini pool, Jacuzzi, Deck chairs & picnic tables, Mini game courts (Soccer, basketball, etc.)

WTF?  I'm not building a Carnival Cruise Lines passenger ship here.  Hospital ships just don't have those sorts of things...

Sure they do.  They're crewed by human beings who need to unwind (medical personnel particularly).  You not seen MASH?

If hospital ships had the things mentioned above in the quote, they'd be in the "interior" of the ship, not on the exterior. There's none of that stuff on the exterior of the US Navy MERCY or COMFORT hospital ships. Yes, I'm building a What If ship. But it's going to be "realistically plausible". Not "fanciful" with an exterior jacuzzi, beach chairs, tennis court, etc.  And Yes, I have seen MASH. Great comedy series BTW.

[seadude]

Just glued in the lighting to the ceiling of the well deck for my hospital ship. I'm a bit nervous about this cause I'm not sure how everything will look at the end once I get the well deck in place, the ceiling in place, more painting to be done, etc.  Hopefully, I'll have pics later this week, maybe in time for Christmas.    Wouldn't that be cool? A green lit well deck for Christmas.         

[seadude]

SUCCESS!       

Main hull painted red and white - Check. 
Hangar bay floor (Clear acrylic sheet) in place - Check. 
Well deck lighting in place and functional. - Check! 

Well, that's three more hurdles done. So what's holding up the clear hangar bay floor you might ask? From what I've heard and read, the Wasp class LHD's had (But were removed? ) a cargo monorail type system that transferred cargo from the upper vehicle bay and/or other points in the ship, to the well deck. This monorail system kinda looks like a bunch of I-beams on the ceiling of the well deck in various pics found on the Net. I decided to scratchbuild a few pieces of monorail I-beams from Evergreen plastic strip (Painted yellowish color) which you can see in one of the pics.

Lighting the well deck with EL wire is complete. I'll have to show and/or explain how I did this a bit later since I'll be off to bed soon. Sorry for the blurriness of the pics further below. My digital camera ain't the best nor do I have any photography skills. You'll just have to deal with it. When compared to these pics, I think I nailed the green lighting pretty damn good.  The blue lights I decided not to add. Don't need the added stress. The green lights you see in these pics are at an angle, appear rectangular, and are overhead the catwalk railing, which is exactly the same effect I was trying to go for.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ship/images/lhd-1_well-deck_050620-n-7869m-055.jpg
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/USS_Wasp_%28LHD-1%29_welldeck_2.jpg
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/83/US_Navy_051017-N-1189B-017_A_Landing_Craft_Air_Cushion_%28LCAC%29_awaits_the_loading_of_vehicles_in_the_well_deck_of_the_amphibious_assault_ship_USS_Wasp_%28LHD_1%29.jpg
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a2/USS_Wasp_%28LHD-1%29_welldeck.jpg
http://www.supermotors.net/getfile/553630/fullsize/well-deck.jpg

And now for my model pics........










LET THERE BE LIGHT! It's not the greatest, but it's the best I could do. Not too bad for my very first time putting lighting inside a model kit.

[seadude]

Oh, one other thing I found while recently doing research for my hospital ship model. Remember the debate we all had either in this thread (or somewhere else) about if hospital ships could have/carry weapons for self defense? These two pics prove it. Look closely and you'll see .50 cal mounts in various places.
http://www.navsource.org/archives/09/12/09121965.jpg
http://www.navsource.org/archives/09/12/09122084.jpg
This doesn't necessarily mean I'm going to put weapons on my model. It's just something I found interesting.

[Captain Canada]

Oh my this is unbelievably good ! The lighting just makes it look so real.

[seadude]

Oh my this is unbelievably good ! The lighting just makes it look so real.

Glad you like it. I'm just glad I was able to successfully pull it off. I wasn't sure how close I could make it look compared to the Wikipedia links you see further above in a post. I think what I've done is much more realistic compared to the regular grain of wheat/rice size LED bulbs that you normally see other modelers use. There's probably more room for future improvement. But for now, I think I nailed it! 

[kerick]

Oh my this is unbelievably good ! The lighting just makes it look so real.

Glad you like it. I'm just glad I was able to successfully pull it off. I wasn't sure how close I could make it look compared to the Wikipedia links you see further above in a post. I think what I've done is much more realistic compared to the regular grain of wheat/rice size LED bulbs that you normally see other modelers use. There's probably more room for future improvement. But for now, I think I nailed it! 

That looks very good. Another trick I will file away for future use!   

[seadude]

Ok, I need suggestions. I need a good way to hide all the extra EL wiring, plus control switch, in the model display base. The base is the big black thing you see in the pics upside down with a square cut in the middle of it to snake the wiring and control unit through. So I'm wondering what I can do to the underside/inside of the black display base to hold all the wiring and control unit. Clips? Tape? Velcro? Or something else? The top of the display base is completely flat. Also, I have no plans to use those brass lamp pedestal things that most other modelers use. Oh, and one other thing: Cutting the EL wire to shorter length isn't an option. You'll just have to trust me on this.
Pics:
https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1642/23940438392_a3c29038eb_h.jpg
https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1484/23940524512_5733ad6750_h.jpg

[seadude]

Not much is going on with this project. Progress has been very slow due to painting a lot of parts white. Sometimes as much as 3 coats. 



Haha! Not that kind of coat. LOL!        It's going to be quite a while before I'll have new in-progress pics to show. Maybe not till February. Sorry.
Otherwise, I have painted the main flight deck, but still have to paint/add smaller details to it. I may add .50 cal machine gun armament to the hospital ship as I briefly mentioned in a post further above. No work has been done on the Bridge island superstructure yet nor any of the aircraft/vehicles. That will probably be done in late Spring or during the Summer.

[proditor]

Ok, I need suggestions. I need a good way to hide all the extra EL wiring, plus control switch, in the model display base. The base is the big black thing you see in the pics upside down with a square cut in the middle of it to snake the wiring and control unit through. So I'm wondering what I can do to the underside/inside of the black display base to hold all the wiring and control unit. Clips? Tape? Velcro? Or something else? The top of the display base is completely flat. Also, I have no plans to use those brass lamp pedestal things that most other modelers use. Oh, and one other thing: Cutting the EL wire to shorter length isn't an option. You'll just have to trust me on this.
Pics:
https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1642/23940438392_a3c29038eb_h.jpg
https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1484/23940524512_5733ad6750_h.jpg

Hmmmm. Twist ties to clean up the wiring (loops) and then maybe a stock styrene cover with a slot for the switch? Basically, turn the base upside down, then coil the wire and secure with twist ties, then tape that to the new "bottom", then have a styrene slab with a cut out for the switch that goes on top of that and hits the walls of the base. Secure as desired, but removability would suggest something like clips, tabs, or really strong velcro.

[seadude]

Been a while since I posted here. Work is still proceeding slowly sadly. I won't have any pics ready yet until maybe end of June or around July 4th sometime. Currently at work on decaling the flight deck. -> Then work on putting lighting under the flight deck to light the interior vehicle storage deck. -> Then attach flight deck to ship hull......maybe with magnets? That way, the flight deck can be easily removeable if need be. -> Then work on building bridge island superstructure. -> Then last thing to work on for this huge project is all the aircraft, vehicles, and other small accessories.

[kerick]

We'll be looking forward to it! This had been quite a project to build so if it takes a little extra time it will be worth it.

[seadude]

Yeah, it's taking time. That's for sure. White is an awful color to paint. Plus, I've got a lot of long and/or large flight deck decals to cut down into smaller segments to put on which is taking time. This project will be as bad, if not worse, than the Habakkuk model I previously did.  I had hoped to finish this project in time for a late October contest or an early November contest. But I have my doubts on both.