What the hull?

Here's my first actual work in progress post. I've started to work on the hull and it might even be a few weeks before I can glue the two halves together because of all the work I need to do.

So far only worked on one half of the hull. Here's what I've done so far:

- drilled out all the portholes (nearly 500 per side) The Dremel rotary tool wasn't very accurate so I ended up using a pin vise and doing them by hand.

- opened up the windows on the main deck near the stern (tourist class promenade)

- cut off the railings molded onto the hull

- sanded off all the molded on rivets (these were way out of scale)

- removed the propeller shaft assemblies and filled the gaps with styrene and putty (these were totally wrong and will be rebuilt from styrene)

- filled all the windows on the promenade deck (I was thinking of just opening these up, but they are two part windows with a smaller upper section and there was no way to model that in an open position. I will make decals to simulate windows)

- smoothed out some dimples in the bottom of the hull with putty

My next steps will be to scratchbuild propeller shafts and make promenade deck decals. Of course I haven't even started to modify the other half of the hull yet.

Also on the to do list is how I'm going to mount the model. I have a nice mahogany base and need to find some brass stands or finials.