once cut to the necessary shape, they are painted with matt white - as the sanding sealer makes them look like masking tape in colour!

About now, I start on the rail capping...

when fully set, the black styrene is cut away with a sharp craft knife and the sides sanded smooth. I also sand the edges to a rounded shape which hopefully will make it look less thick, as it is still somewhat thicker than scale.
The holes where the bridge supports pass through must be opened out carefully and the ends trimmed to the required length (I made it too long)
It's a good idea to test fit it on the railings and see how it looks.
If all is OK it can be painted, I use 'Tamiya red brown matt acrylic' followed by 'Wilkinsons' dark oak wood varnish..

Now the railings must be painted before going any further. What I did was, using Araldite precision or Wilko repositionable two-part epoxy resin, apply a little to each joint in the railing where it will be seen ie. only on the inside where the canvas covering will be, to simulate the ball joins on a real ship. When fully set, the railings are spray painted with (in this case) simoniz acrylic white gloss. the effect can be seen on this pic of the completed starbd side rail that didn't yet have the canvas attached... 

an excelant detailed writeup.  great looking railings 

"It's a good idea to test fit it on the railings and see how it looks.
If all is OK it can be painted"
I forgot a bit..... first I had to glue short pieces of 0.8mm brass wire into the tops of the stanchions and the furthest aft piece of the gate. Then a scrap of the black styrene is drilled and put on the brass wire which is cut as close as possible to the styrene, then it's filed flat. When the styrene is removed the piece of wire should be the correct length to locate in the underside of the rail capping. This is done to all the stanchions.

...and then....

I've already removed a thin ring of paint from the bridge supports where they pass through the rail capping, araldite is applied to it. Also to the top 'folded over' edge of the canvas sheet and to the holes in the underside of the rail capping. Then the rail capping is fitted onto the railings and held lightly in place until set.

No doubt I've just made it all sound like everything went like clockwork, well, it didn't!
When I did 'test fit' the rail capping it turned out to be about 1.5mm too long (no idea how that happened) most of the holes lined up OK but the distance between the first and second bridge support was too long so I had to cut a piece out and re-join the two halves. That was successful and you can't even see the join 
Then I found that no matter how much I tried to fold the top edge of the canvas, it would straighten, pushing up the rail capping. I put the ply template on top of it to hold it down and fitted clamps to the bridge supports to push it down. This worked but the clamps damaged the paint and I got some araldite on the top of the rail capping so it stuck to the ply! Got it off eventually but also some of the paint/varnish - which then had to be re-applied. It looks fine now though 
Finally, some araldite ran down the canvas and set - but it came away when pried off with the tip of a knife, didn't even need repainting... 

bits and pieces I've done since last time.....
sanded down a couple of LEDs as much as I dare without going through the cover glass and 'superglued' two pieces of wire on the tip to represent how they look on photos... soldered wires on and tried them on 3 volts... looked a bit blue so I tried lightly painting with the same yellow transparent laquer used to simulate brass... they look much more like white now but didn,t show very well in the photo. I then fitted them into the plates above the doors and painted the backs black so light only shows from the front.

also noticed the stairways (passenger ones, anyhow) are not open ladders as supplied from the model shop so spent some time painstakingly blocking them all in with bits of styrene sheet cut to size, the back will need sanding level when set... 

Quote from: mjt60a on February 13, 2011, 11:02:51 PM
also noticed the stairways (passenger ones, anyhow) are not open ladders...

I'm not too sure about that statement now, on some pictures they are open while on others they look like they're filled in - but may be just the light/camera angle, or may have been changed at various times during the ships 'working life'
anyhow, I'm using the filled in ones but after painting they didn't look very good in my opinion, just couldn't get the right colour so I've added strips of wood to the steps, coloured the same as the deck planking and with a thin (very thin!) strip of foil tape on the front edge to represent the brass reinforcement seen on waverleys' steps - but without the grooved texture, I can't build that at this scale!
pictures as soon as the camera battery has recharged...

camera's about half-charged so enough for a picture 
I've fitted them into place but still need to fit all the railings yet...

I didn't realise until now but I haven't posted on this since my birthday!
not much to report, been putting the wirimg for lighting in and details for the aft saloon which is a bit visible through the windows (only from close-up though so I don't know if it was worth the bother and time it's taking...)

Hi Mick,
Coming along very nicely. The thought of wether or not its worth it shouldn't enter the equation. Enjoy the build knowing you have done it your way, and be surprised when people comment, re the detail you have included and how much better it looks with the interior done.
Keep up the good work
kiwi