Narrow Seas [26]

 

I'm now off work for 48 hours on doctors orders, with plenty of painkillers to keep me happy. Rather than waste the time, I've been fiddling around with the Tumbling Dice Graf von Gotzen and have had a go at converting it into a Sperrbrecher. These were merchant ships used to set off any mines laid in the path of  convoys or warships leaving port. As such they were heavily adapted with anti-mine equipment and additional bouyancy aids, together with a shedload of flak.

As you can see, I've swapped the original bridge and funnel for ones from a Skytrex Vorpostenboot, added flak mountings using some extra sprues from a Tamiya Narvik class destroyer kit, used the radar antenna from the same kit as magnetic mine gear on either side of fore deck and fnished off by adding a barrage cable cutter at the bows. I think it looks a bit like the real thing, which varied in appearance from ship to ship, so I'm quite pleased with the overall end result.