1:700 scale

In 1971, Japanese manufactures started to produce a series of 1/700 scale water line ship kits.

Between 1977 and 1979, Matchbox released a small number of British, German and US waterline ship kits,[3] they were designed to be made of different colors of plastic so that painting was not required.

The Water Line Series was created by the Shizuoka Plastic Model Manufacturers Association in May 1971.

It is a collaborative effort by three manufacturers to produce constant scale models of most of the ships of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II,[5] in their first series, and then an ongoing collection of 1/700-scale kits of warships of the world.

As the series name suggests, the models are produced only with the portion visible above the water, that enable them to be displayed as though they were at sea.