HMCS St. Laurent 1/350 (Resin Shipyard)

The Canadian Navy’s HMCS St. Laurent was the first warship entirely designed and built in Canada.

This is my buildlog of Resin Shipyard’s model of this beautiful ship.





shafts from aluminum rod

replacing limbo mortar tubes with aluminum hollow rod


attaching sonar and fin keels, mounting holes drilled

props: shaped from two flat peices of pe. blades cupped and bent with proper rotation (port blade counterclockwise; right blade, clockwise)

aerial lookouts

rolled and folded

paint


binoculars with seat

actual size: :slight_smile:

cable reels:





starting painting for plimsoll line

adding 1/8" tape to form the line (this strip stays on until the end of hull painting)

painting red for lower hull coverage

maskied off lower hull (and plimsoll line) and sprayed upper hull and superstructure gray. after gray dried, removed all tape

3" 50’s

shaping the gun’s small radar dish

using piece of spare sprue and round end of paint brush to form dish from flat







upgrading the nav lights, used some spare clear spru left over from Nagato

dab of paint on back flat sides and then a quick dunk in Future


small radar

making fuel hoses for attachment to funnel

painted and attached

SPS-12 radar



brass barrels to be cut to length

starting masking gun deck

3 ready for paint




Been spending a fair amount of time doing the deck paint; St. Laurent’s deck scheme is one of the most attractive aspects of the ship I think.

masking off (all vertical and some deck) surfaces that are supposed to remain light gray

shooting the dark gray

removing masking tape (and holding my breath, praying…)





I have the platform that the radars are situated on mostly done… here’s how the radar platform is shaping up so far:

most of the parts cut and filed

clamping parts to facilitate assembly

folded

first level assembled and glued

adding cross-members and supports

second level deck

adding resin posts between levels and brass rear support

almost done

radars and platform ready for paint (I am painting the platform and radars separately as I want to apply a semi-gloss to the radars while leaving the platform flat)

Thanks for looking and as always, comments and suggestions are welcome. Cheers! Tim

nameplates painted to be attached onto ship’s upper hull, near stern, both sides

radar tower: painted and radars attached

(still need to add 3 sets of railings to complete platform)

Have added more detail to St. Laurent, just have the utility boats, antennas, cable reels and railings left to do.











Starting the railings and antennas:


Do the black and white antennas appear slightly thick to you? They did to me so I tore them out and thought I would try a guitar string.

So I cut a few pieces off of one I had on hand… and in the pic they are alongside a few of my original stalks. Paint is on and they appear to be about half the thickness of the other to my eye. sorry for fuzziness of pics…its hard to get sharp ones of small things that are thin and grey



I have the antennas painted so while waiting for them to cure a little, I added the util boats, rear gun deck antenna and bow railings.





Thanks for viewing :slight_smile:

All antennas and railings finished…










Thanks for viewing my build log. Comments, suggestions and questions most welcomed. Cheers! -Tim

Wow, simply amazing. so fiddly.

Excellent build

Outstanding work and well done on the masking and paint job.

Let me add my congratulations to a fine job. What companies did you get the kit and the pe from?

Great build! Also a very nice group of photos.

I believe my brother-in-law’s dad was the first commanding Officer of this ship.

I’ll check on that. Perhaps he has some photos he can scan.

Below is an interesting link.

http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/canada/postwar/stlauren/

Fun fact: When first commissioned folks from other countries would ask about the exaggerated tumblehome from hull to deck. In actuality it was supposedly to aid decontamination wash down of atomic “fallout”

but the standard answer was - “Oh that? That is so that it is very difficult for polar bears to climb aboard during operations in arctic waters.” This would be followed by much sage nodding by the questioner and comments such as “Jolly good idea old chap!”