ccoyle

Welcome back! I just made the move in the opposite direction a few years ago.

Welcome aboard! I built the Midwest flattie kit as my second venture into wooden models. Your scratch-build looks very well done. I for one enjoy seeing something a little different being modeled, and your personal connection to the subject makes it that much more interesting. Cheers!

GERMAN DESTROYERS Robert Brown Seaforth Publishing, 2019 64 pages, 21 cm x 29.5 cm format MSRP: $24.95 (GBP14.99) Verdict: Wow! (Apologies in advance for the perhaps odd-looking cropping of the photos that accompany this review -- it is really hard for this old guy to take photos using a digital camera with one hand while holding a stiff paperback open with the other hand!) Call me ignorant, but I had not previously heard of the ShipCraft series published by Seaforth. But after reviewing the most recent addition to this series, German Destroyers by author Robert Brown, suffice it to say that I will be alert for further titles. There is a lot of information packed into 64 glossy pages here, along with plenty of illustrations. Forty destroyers were built for the Kriegsmarine beginning in 1934 (of which 25 were lost), and they were essentially all built to the same design, naturally with some modifications to newer units. The book starts off with a discussion of the design elements incorporated into both the class as a whole and to individual vessels or groups of vessels within the class. This section includes a discussion of the inherent weaknesses of the basic design, these being the result of a lack of German shipyard experience due to limitations imposed by the Treaty of Versailles coupled with a lack of time for testing and improving the type -- a mere five years between the time the building program began in 1934 and commencement of hostilities in 1939. This portion of the book is accompanied by many B&W period photos. The next portion of the book was something quite unexpected: a survey of the various kits available for the subject, in everything from 1/1250 scale on up to 1/250. The described kits included both newer offerings from well-known manufacturers such as Revell, Trumpeter, and Dragon, along with 'classic' kits such as those from Eaglewall, Heller, and Matchbox. I was pleasantly surprised to see that two card kits (those from Wilhelmshavener and JSC) were included in this section. Along with the basic kits, this section also reviews the various aftermarket upgrades that are available. The next section is a gallery of some really well done models. It made me want to whip out my credit card and buy some kits and PE detail sets -- but I know my limits (both to my skills and to my line of credit). The gallery is followed by three pages of paint schemes, shown in black and white but including a key for the various shades of paint. Don't worry -- English translations are provided for the German color names. The last section of the book is a lengthy treatment of the appearance of the type. This includes both a discussion of general appearance and a section on variations and modifications made to the different classes within the type. Attention is even given to such variations and modifications made to individual vessels, so that the modeler is really very well prepared to attempt a portrayal of just about any of the 40 ships. This section is accompanied by four pages of crisp drawings consisting of side profiles and deck arrangements. Finally, a list of additional references is given, along with a list of the 27 other titles in the ShipCraft lineup. Might have to get me some of those other works! I can't say enough nice things about this book. The writing, photography, line drawings, and printing are all first-rate, making the book worth every penny of its US$24.95 price tag in this reviewer's opinion. CDC

Looks great from here, Danny! I have the Halinski Spitfire Mk V in my stash.

Agree! That looks fabulous, especially considering the age and scale of the kit. Very nice work!

Good luck on your project!

Stunning work, as usual! 👍👍👍

Looks suspiciously like a rendition of HMS Beagle. Google "HMS Beagle" and you'll find many similar images and models.

Moin moin aus South Carolina! My college degree is in the closely allied field of fisheries science, and I also have a keen interest in a certain Bavarian professional soccer club. Hope to see your work here soon! Tchuess!

You WILL make mistakes! All of us have. Fortunately, wood is more forgiving of such mistakes than some other media. In the end, you will find satisfaction in your completed model, warts and all.

Welcome, Wayne! I wish you every success with your Victory project. That is quite an undertaking, but it sounds like you have the requisite experience. In case you have not seen it yet, please have a look at the pinned post in the kit build logs section on the subject of Chinese kits. In a nutshell, the Chinese wooden kit industry in general plays pretty fast and loose with intellectual property rights and has earned themselves a place of dishonor here at MSW. The pinned topic will explain in more detail and includes a list of banned manufacturers. Cheers! Chris

Well, then, that means that their skills are far, FAR superior to mine! I love the effect of the weathered and flaking paint -- it looks very realistic indeed. Cheers!

Doh! Now I feel silly. Well, that description down at the bottom certainly isn't part of the NRG's official tagline, and a model can be historically accurate with regard to construction without including a historically accurate paint job. Don't lose too much sleep over it. 😉

Where are you seeing that??

Outstanding! Let us know when it gets published.

Great-looking kit and subject! I'll be interested to see how this comes together.

Learned another new thing today -- had never heard of Operation Meridian. Thanks for sharing!

I wonder if I can anneal card stock before rolling it? 🤔

Hey, Steven. This process, called "bending", varied by type of sail and era. It's very helpful to have a reference work on hand that illustrates the various practices, such as zu Mondfeld. Cheers, Chris

Hey guys and gals, In recent months we've been having a lot of folks share images to our galleries, for which we are all grateful, but many of those images have not been placed into folders. In that sense, they're kind of like loose photos in a box -- once they get bumped off the first page of unsorted pictures, they'll be somewhere near the bottom of the box, where they'll become increasingly less likely to ever be seen again. Folders help people find your images when they search for specific models. So, create a folder, and remember to put the name of the ship in the folder's title! Thanks!

Nice! Golden Age of Flight subjects are my favorites whenever I take on a card model airplane.

I haven't heard of any further developments.

The two escorts in the photo both have four 5" mounts, single funnels, and round bridges, which are all characteristics of Sims-class destroyers. There were five Sims-class vessels in Destroyer Squadron 2 constituting Task Force 17's (Hornet) screen at the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands on 26 Oct 1942, Morris (DD-417), Anderson (DD-411), Hughes (DD-410), Mustin (DD-413), and Russell (DD-414). Perhaps the ships in the photo are two of these?

I was just commenting to a coworker last week about how Titanic's sisters are largely forgotten -- even though they both had longer and far more successful careers! Good luck on your project!

DESTINATION DUNKIRK: The Story of Gort's Army Gregory Blaxland Pen & Sword Books, 2018 436 pages, 16 cm x 24 cm format Verdict: Not all great historians are great storytellers. Destination Dunkirk is a reprint of a book first published in 1973. It is essentially a history of the BEF in France, starting with pre-war planning for a response to a German invasion in the west right up to the evacuation at Dunkirk that ended in June 1940. There's a certain kind of person who will enjoy reading this book, and I am not that type of person. Allow me to explain. The evacuation of Allied forces from Dunkirk was a remarkable accomplishment. Like any monumental struggle on the battlefield, it consisted of thousands of heroic actions carried out by thousands of individuals. These represent a trove of potentially gripping stories for any historian to mine (although you may not have gathered that from the, IMO, horrible Christopher Nolan movie that hit the theaters in 2017). Good historians who are also great writers, such as Barbara Tuchman, Stephen Ambrose, Nathaniel Philbrick, or Stephen Bungay, manage to paint an engaging and thorough big picture while also weaving in some of the fascinating individuals and actions that played their parts in the larger narrative. This, however, is not Gregory Blaxland's style. Mr. Blaxland, who passed away in 1986, was a meticulous researcher, and this is obvious in his descriptions of events. The problem with this volume is that it is entirely too meticulous about the wrong kinds of details. Blaxland spends page after page telling the reader that the nth Division moved here or there, with the X regiment on the left and the Y regiment on the right where it linked up with such-and-such division along the left bank of the (insert name here) River, where it took fire from the German XYZ Division, losing x number of (Bren gun) carriers and y number of casualties. In the meantime, the reader learns precious little about the men in those units. Who were they? Why did they fight? What was their experience in France like? The author himself provides clues about why the experience of the everyman in the Battle of France is largely ignored within the pages of his book. In his introduction, Blaxland describes The History of the Second World War, the official history of the British armed forces in that conflict, published by Her Majesty's Stationery Office, as "the framework round which I have built," and I'm guessing that there are precious few accounts of individual British enlisted men in the Official History. In the sources section, the reader also discovers that Blaxland availed himself of little additional material other than the official war diaries, notes, and minutes published by various units and officers (much of which first became public in the late 1960s) -- and not very much of it, either. So it should not be too surprising that Destination Dunkirk reads very much like an official history since it is, in effect, a repackaging of various official histories. The people who do tend to garner ink in this volume are the various officers within the combatant armies. This fact is evident not only within the narrative but is also seen in the selection of illustrations. There are 53 black-and-white photographs, which is actually a pretty good number, but of those 53 photos, 37 are of officers. Only one (!) shows any units actually engaged in combat operations Sadly, for me at least, Blaxland tosses out so many names and numbers and dates, and in such a matter-of-fact delivery, that it becomes impossible to keep track of all the dramatis personae. And since so little is divulged of their back stories, it is rather hard to form much of an attachment to them either. It's a style that is fine for anyone who might be primarily interested in who did what and when, but it's not exactly compelling storytelling. There's no hook, and very little in the way of page-turning suspense. Through dogged perseverance, I made it to page 104. Your mileage may vary.