I first saw pictures of the New Orleans class U.S.S. Kyushu in the Star Trek Chronology and thought it would make an interesting build, though I wasn't sure what kit had been used, let alone how they had built it. Since it looked quite similar to the Galaxy class I assumed that the model builders had used that kit, so I went to my local hobby shop and bought the ERTL Galaxy class model. Not long after I discovered the Ex Astris Scientia web site and saw there breakdown of exactly what the ship looked like and how it was built. I also found that another guy on the web, Erick Munoz had already built a New Orleans model and so I went over to his site to figure how he had done it and get some tips for myself. Soon after I ditched the large Enterprise model (except for the bridge) and bough myself a couple of the 1/2500 scale Enterprise models. Now I was ready to begin!

To start I cut off the small bridge from the top of the saucer and added the larger one supplied with the 1/1400 scale kit. Next I cut away all of the connecting dorsal from the bottom of the lower saucer section and then sandwiched a piece of plasticard between the two halves to create the right deck height for a 1/1400 scale model. I then cut away the existing impulse engines, cut back a little on the saucer section and added the engines from the large Enterprise kit.

The next stage was the engineering section. I cut away the engine pylons since these would not be needed for this model and sanded this area smooth. Again I added a thick piece of plasticard between the two halves and then filled in the small gap between the lower engineering section and the deflector dish with some putty.

Once these pieces were in place I cut the engineering section across its thickest section and placed a piece of plasticard in between the two parts to give the engineering section the right length. I then built up this section with more plasticard and sanded it to shape.

I then cut out a V shape from plasticard for the engine pylons and glued it to the top of the engineering hull, I figured using one piece for the engine pylons would be sturdier than using two separate pieces and should prevent sagging. I then glued both the saucer and the engineering section together and filled this area with modelling clay to build up the ship's dorsal or "neck" with this part smoothed out and set I moved onto the engines

Much like all other parts of this ship the engines may look like Galaxy class types but they also have been modified. This is where more than one 1/2500 scale Galaxy kit was needed. The last centimetre or so had to be cut away from one set of engines and then the last inch or so from the second set was cut off and added to the end of the first set to give the engines their right length.

The last part of construction were the three pods, two of which sat on the upper saucer, on either side of the shuttlebay and the third on the under side of the engineering hull. The original model makers had used highlighter markers for these parts but I needed something a lot smaller, so I used several caps from a set of smaller markers, glued end to end. Although not exactly the same as on the original model, they fitted the job adequately.

Now that construction was complete I moved onto the painting. I used the same colours as on my Galaxy class kit, mixes of duck egg and sky blue with other details such as the warp engines and deflector dish with metallic blue, copper and gloss red. The decals are from JT Graphics who as usual have done an excellent job.

I'm quite pleased with how this model turned out although I think I could have done a better job of connecting the saucer and engineering parts, plus something I never noticed until I began the painting process was that one of the engines sags down a little at the front! oh well there's always next time!

Image: Bow on ventral

Image: Bow on dorsal

Image: Closeup