mtdoramike

That is the one thing above the rest that I love about Constructo models, the choices of wood they use is above most other kits and if you want a natural finished model, Constructo is the way to go.

Oh and b y the way, you are doing a wonderful job of her.

If I can add something here, the wire doesn't look parallel to the other side of the hammocks. Please don't build a model the way it looks on the box or the look that the manufacture shows. Build the model or at least fit and finish the model THE WAY YOU WANT IT TO BE! Now, if you like that look, then by all means go with it. But to me, the Constitution is a model of a relevent ship that is still around today and the black and white finish is really expected on her. This is a model that will take you year(s) to finish, so why not try and make it as accurate to the real thing as you can. It would be a shame to spend all that time building her, only to regret not finishing her in her traditional colors. My first model was of the Constructo HMS Bounty, I finished it just like on the box, in natural wood look, which looks nice, but every time someone see's the Bounty they ask, why didn't you finish her like the replica Bounty, which recently sank or like the movie Bounty. So now, I do regret not thinking out of the box and finish her with the replica Bounty paint scheme rather than what the box had shown.  

I would have to agree with Cap'n'Bob, as well as Nigel.
 
Best Regards,
Pete

Looking at the workmanship of the rest of the boat, I'd say this builder knows exactly what he is doing.
 
Bob

May be a closer reflection of actual practice. The ends were the challenge - the mid-body was more or less a straight run. Take each strake as he has done and extend to fill the rest.

Just for fun

Bow Reinforcement added

I just received the piece of HMS Victory wood from England that came off the Victory during one of her recent refits. I will use some of the wood to make various pieces of the model and then will include what ever is left of the wood in the display case which will be included in the donation to the library along with the model.

Absolutely gorgeous. I LOVE Constructo models and even though I have built two Constitutions in the past, I would love to build a Constructo Connie.

I just received the piece of HMS Victory wood from England that came off the Victory during one of her recent refits. I will use some of the wood to make various pieces of the model and then will include what ever is left of the wood in the display case which will be included in the donation to the library along with the model.

I just received the piece of HMS Victory wood from England that came off the Victory during one of her recent refits. I will use some of the wood to make various pieces of the model and then will include what ever is left of the wood in the display case which will be included in the donation to the library along with the model.

I just received the piece of HMS Victory wood from England that came off the Victory during one of her recent refits. I will use some of the wood to make various pieces of the model and then will include what ever is left of the wood in the display case which will be included in the donation to the library along with the model.

I recently ordered the Artesiana Latina HMS Victory 1:84 scale from Plastic-Model-kits.com for the price of $567.00 with free shipping. They basicallt only sold Latina kits. They are a sub of Oakridge Hobbies, who actually shipped my kit. It took 10 days from the date of order to receive this massive kit. The invoice claimed 21 pounds shipping weight and I believe every bit of it. Upon receiving the kit, I opened the box and did an inspection of the contents. I was quite pleased with the woods chosen for the model and the fit and finish materials supplied. But they included an adendum to the instructions due to a sheet of the laser cut bulkheads were mislabeled and giving the correct sequence in the adendum. 
 
Observations so far:
 
LIKES: The building materials are outstanding, the instruction book is quite thick and very detailed with color pictures to follow as well as written instructions.
 
Definitely the price point for a kit of this magnitude.
 
The false keel and bulkheads are cut from some thick plywood, so no worries about breaking anything.
 
As usual with Latina, they include some very nice containers with actual lids to keep all the parts in one bin. They are a lot nicer than those egg carton still containers that are shrink wrapped but the small pieces still find their way into other bins.
 
Dislikes: A major dislike for me is NO PRINTED PLANS, What???, no, you heard right, I can't believe AL cheaped out on a kit this expensive and sent a CD with plans on it rather than printed plans. This is a problem for me, because I build by plans, not by instructions or a CD. So now, I have to locate someplace to get the plans printed off of the CD and bare that added expense and living in my neck of the woods, it's not that easy. We don't have a Kinko's/Fedex or anything like that. The best I can do is Office Depot, so I'll have to check them out. Now, can the model be built with the CD plans? YES, it can and has been and there's a build log on it. But, I'm old school I guess.
 
I could be wrong, but I didn't see a second layer of hull planking, which was Always supplied with AL kits in the past just in case you messed up on the first layer.
 
One of the bulkheads was quite warped, so I had to wet it down and then took a hot air paint remover gun and with enough heat and a bit of cursing, it flattened out fairly well enough for government work anyway.
 
The fit of the bulkheads to the false keel is quite sloppy and some with gaps up to 1/16". This makes plumbing up and squaring the bulkheads quite difficult. Also, you MUST lay the first false layer of decking BEFORE gluing the bulkheads to the keel or you will have a devil of a time getting the deck to fit properly. They floppy bulkheads do help in this instance though. So it may have been planned. 
 
They also included a cheap cradle style display board for this grade of s ship model, something besides plywood will be in order to compliment her beauty.
 
With all this being said, so far I like the kit and I have always like Artesiana Latina kits for fit and finish and it's nice to see they are still kicking. Will this kit make into a fine model? the answer is yes, with a little hard work and determination. I know there are doubters about Latina kits, but as long as you remember, kits are not Museum quality models, they make into fine ship models but they aren't unique. If someone is looking for museum quality then they should scratch build, which would be unique. I'm not a scratch builder, I'm a kit basher. I have a lot of respect for scratch builders willing to devote the time, patience and money into a single project. I know a few near me and applaud their efforts, but I was more into building and selling my models at the time. So build time was a premium.
 
But this particular project will be my last model. This model (the HMS Victory) will be donated upon it's completion. So no hurries mates as long as my health holds out and my eye site holds on. 
 
I will continue to add to this review as I go along. I was also able to obtain a small piece of wood from the actual Victory ship, which I will incorporate into the Victory model such as anchor collars or something like that.             

Here is the Constructo Mayflower that I built several years ago. I sold it to a guy up in Canada

Thanks Peter, get to building that Danmark, you will not be disappointed. It was a really fun project to build. To me, the Hull was one of the easiest hulls I have ever planked. The plans and drawing included in the kit are some of the best I have used.

I bought the Billings Danish Training ship Danmark kit off of Ebay for $99.00 a while back. I built the Danmark, which took me about 1200 hours give or take an hour or three. It was a wonderful kit and I would not hesitate to buy it and build it again even at a higher price. The fittings package came with the kit and quite extensive. I can't recall a single issue with the build. The plans are quite good and left little to the imagination. I can't really speak for the directions, because I don't usually use them. The kit came with pre-printed sail material as well.
 
Here are a few photos of the kit as it arrived to me. 
 
All in all, it was a pleasure to build, yes, they do use quite a few plastic parts, but if you like to kit bash, that isn't an issue. Now, this kit is an advanced level kit, but with a little help, a novice shouldn't have any real issue with it. 
 
The finished model is currently sitting in the lobby of a Danish West Indies trading company in Ft. Lauderdale Florida.

I bought the Billings Danish Training ship Danmark kit off of Ebay for $99.00 a while back. I built the Danmark, which took me about 1200 hours give or take an hour or three. It was a wonderful kit and I would not hesitate to buy it and build it again even at a higher price. The fittings package came with the kit and quite extensive. I can't recall a single issue with the build. The plans are quite good and left little to the imagination. I can't really speak for the directions, because I don't usually use them. The kit came with pre-printed sail material as well.
 
Here are a few photos of the kit as it arrived to me. 
 
All in all, it was a pleasure to build, yes, they do use quite a few plastic parts, but if you like to kit bash, that isn't an issue. Now, this kit is an advanced level kit, but with a little help, a novice shouldn't have any real issue with it. 
 
The finished model is currently sitting in the lobby of a Danish West Indies trading company in Ft. Lauderdale Florida.

I bought the Billings Danish Training ship Danmark kit off of Ebay for $99.00 a while back. I built the Danmark, which took me about 1200 hours give or take an hour or three. It was a wonderful kit and I would not hesitate to buy it and build it again even at a higher price. The fittings package came with the kit and quite extensive. I can't recall a single issue with the build. The plans are quite good and left little to the imagination. I can't really speak for the directions, because I don't usually use them. The kit came with pre-printed sail material as well.
 
Here are a few photos of the kit as it arrived to me. 
 
All in all, it was a pleasure to build, yes, they do use quite a few plastic parts, but if you like to kit bash, that isn't an issue. Now, this kit is an advanced level kit, but with a little help, a novice shouldn't have any real issue with it. 
 
The finished model is currently sitting in the lobby of a Danish West Indies trading company in Ft. Lauderdale Florida.

WOW, the planking on this Vic, looks sooooo smooth it looks like plastic. What a beautiful job indeed.

Slow progress with the mizzen fife rails. My fat thumbs don't help, but the sticky tape does. Drilling the holes caused the wood to split, so I had to glue the underside for reinforcement.

WOW, the planking on this Vic, looks sooooo smooth it looks like plastic. What a beautiful job indeed.

I recently ordered the Artesiana Latina HMS Victory 1:84 scale from Plastic-Model-kits.com for the price of $567.00 with free shipping. They basicallt only sold Latina kits. They are a sub of Oakridge Hobbies, who actually shipped my kit. It took 10 days from the date of order to receive this massive kit. The invoice claimed 21 pounds shipping weight and I believe every bit of it. Upon receiving the kit, I opened the box and did an inspection of the contents. I was quite pleased with the woods chosen for the model and the fit and finish materials supplied. But they included an adendum to the instructions due to a sheet of the laser cut bulkheads were mislabeled and giving the correct sequence in the adendum. 
 
Observations so far:
 
LIKES: The building materials are outstanding, the instruction book is quite thick and very detailed with color pictures to follow as well as written instructions.
 
Definitely the price point for a kit of this magnitude.
 
The false keel and bulkheads are cut from some thick plywood, so no worries about breaking anything.
 
As usual with Latina, they include some very nice containers with actual lids to keep all the parts in one bin. They are a lot nicer than those egg carton still containers that are shrink wrapped but the small pieces still find their way into other bins.
 
Dislikes: A major dislike for me is NO PRINTED PLANS, What???, no, you heard right, I can't believe AL cheaped out on a kit this expensive and sent a CD with plans on it rather than printed plans. This is a problem for me, because I build by plans, not by instructions or a CD. So now, I have to locate someplace to get the plans printed off of the CD and bare that added expense and living in my neck of the woods, it's not that easy. We don't have a Kinko's/Fedex or anything like that. The best I can do is Office Depot, so I'll have to check them out. Now, can the model be built with the CD plans? YES, it can and has been and there's a build log on it. But, I'm old school I guess.
 
I could be wrong, but I didn't see a second layer of hull planking, which was Always supplied with AL kits in the past just in case you messed up on the first layer.
 
One of the bulkheads was quite warped, so I had to wet it down and then took a hot air paint remover gun and with enough heat and a bit of cursing, it flattened out fairly well enough for government work anyway.
 
The fit of the bulkheads to the false keel is quite sloppy and some with gaps up to 1/16". This makes plumbing up and squaring the bulkheads quite difficult. Also, you MUST lay the first false layer of decking BEFORE gluing the bulkheads to the keel or you will have a devil of a time getting the deck to fit properly. They floppy bulkheads do help in this instance though. So it may have been planned. 
 
They also included a cheap cradle style display board for this grade of s ship model, something besides plywood will be in order to compliment her beauty.
 
With all this being said, so far I like the kit and I have always like Artesiana Latina kits for fit and finish and it's nice to see they are still kicking. Will this kit make into a fine model? the answer is yes, with a little hard work and determination. I know there are doubters about Latina kits, but as long as you remember, kits are not Museum quality models, they make into fine ship models but they aren't unique. If someone is looking for museum quality then they should scratch build, which would be unique. I'm not a scratch builder, I'm a kit basher. I have a lot of respect for scratch builders willing to devote the time, patience and money into a single project. I know a few near me and applaud their efforts, but I was more into building and selling my models at the time. So build time was a premium.
 
But this particular project will be my last model. This model (the HMS Victory) will be donated upon it's completion. So no hurries mates as long as my health holds out and my eye site holds on. 
 
I will continue to add to this review as I go along. I was also able to obtain a small piece of wood from the actual Victory ship, which I will incorporate into the Victory model such as anchor collars or something like that.             

Should be a lot of places to get it done that are close to you. Almost any engineering or surveying office could do it, how about the engineering department of your local power company then there are all the government agencies getting into GIS Mapping that would have the ability. Heck, I would be happy to do it for you,' and even supply the paper, Mylar you would need to buy', max size up to "D" size. The offer stands only if you hand deliver the CD to me only as a favor. I bet you can find someone very close to you to do it.
jud

I love the planking process when I'm not cursing up a blue streak hahahahahaha.