markjay

Thanks, glad to be of help.

Did you check out his other videos?

HOF, take a look at the utube video. It took some practice on my part but using the right thread all looks in scale. He also has several other videos related to rigging.



 

It is strange, in that they all seem to sell well, but do so in phases. For example, one week it will be all Trial Cutters, another week Speedy's, then Sphinx, then a run on Indy's etc.

Good luck  on your journey. 

Great choice Rod! That is one classy kit. I'll be following along.

What's in the Box
A photo of the box is at the top of my first post. The box weighs a hefty 13.5 pounds (6.1 kg).  Here are a couple of composite photos of box contents.

A lot of the weight is paper - a beautiful 152-page manual and 23 sheets of plans. The cannons, figurehead, and stern decoration are 3-D printed. The hull is double planked with lime wood and pear wood. The masts and yards are walnut. Most of the blocks and rigging material will go into my leftover box if I stop with a hull-only model.

The kit includes 33 sheets of laser-cut MDF for the frames and pear wood for most everything else, 1 sheet of laser cut acetate for a stand, and 5 sheets of photo-etched parts.
 
 

I finished my Mississippi River Steamboat Robert E Lee in early October, and took a break from ships to build a TV console for my son and daughter-in-law. In the evenings I was looking for a new ship to build - something beautiful but challenging that would not need to go in a case.
 
I found a build log for HMS Fly (Amati) built by moderator @ccoyle. Chris built his model as a hull model, no masts, yards, or rigging. What a brilliant idea! He built all the fun bits without ending up with a dust catcher. I started searching for other ships that might look good as a hull model and found the Diana by Caldercraft. I asked Chris for advice, and he told me that my taste was consistent as both models had been designed by @chris watton, owner of Vanguard models. I ordered the Sphinx and had it within a week, but haven't been able to start it until now.
 
There are at least 18 build logs for the Sphinx on MSW, 7 finished, 3 in progress, and 8 stalled. Here are links to the finished logs for easy reference.
 
HMS Sphinx 1775 (prototype) by James H - Vanguard Models - 1:64 - FINISHED
12 pages, 5.5 months. This is the prototype build used for photos for the beautiful manual in the kit.
 
HMS Sphinx 1775 by Blue Ensign - FINISHED - Vanguard Models - 1:64 scale
29 pages, 16 months. Built as a hull-only model.
 
HMS Sphinx 1775 by Glenn Shelton (glennard2523) - Vanguard Models - 1:64
10 pages, 5 months. Glenn wasn't happy with his work (which looked great to me) and stopped with a hull only model.
 
HMS Sphinx 1775 by glennard2523 - FINISHED - Vanguard Models - 1:64 - V2 Kit by Glenn Shelton
16 pages, 11 months. Glenn started over and completed an even nicer model.
 
HMS Sphinx 1775 by mtaylor - FINISHED - Vanguard Models - 1:64
17 pages, 10 months. Mark also stopped with a hull-only model. A very nice build.
 
HMS Sphinx by ECK - FINISHED - Vanguard Models - 1:64
Only 3 pages, 5 months. A fast build with a short log, but the model is gorgeous.
 
HMS Sphinx 1775 by Hollowneck - FINISHED - Vanguard Models - 1:64
19 pages, 16 months. Amazing model with full sails mounted in a diorama.
 

After the last several months away from ship modeling, I started building Bluejackets Lightship #112 Nantucket from 1936. This was a kit that I purchased at Bluejacket several years ago while vacationing in Maine.  After reading through the manual and studying the plans I proceeded to shape the hull.  This solid hull was very close to plans and very little wood had to be removed, therefore, according to manual, the use of hull section templates was not needed.  At the bow, I drilled out the hole for the central anchor hawsepipe boss and glued it in place.  Marked out locations of all portholes and drilled them with an 1/8 drill bit.  After gluing in the propeller frame/sternpost casting I proceeded to the next step but I'm a little confused.  Unsure of the ship's forefoot construction, the kit gives you a 1/16" x 3" x 6" piece of basswood for this step.  My question:  Is this supposed to be just a continuation of the keel around the curve of the hull, or is it to simulate an additional plate of steel that was welded to the hull in this area? 

I once owned a rescue dog who needed a lot of behavioral work. So after some one-on-one sessions with a specialist we eventually graduated to attending obedience classes with others. I can’t say that we ever overcame all the issues (and I’m not sure who was training whom!) but I certainly learned the value of positive reinforcement. Consequently, since I have a tendency to be easily distracted and leave unfinished projects laying around, I wanted to reward myself for completing my first wooden ship model.
 
While I enjoyed the wood model, my situation is perhaps not the best for them. Simply put, sanding wood makes too much dust for me to do in our living spaces and I really don’t have an interior space to do it. With the arrival of Winter sanding outside isn’t much of an option. So I’m putting off the next wood model until Spring and the return of good weather. So returning to my interest in card models I read up on the models produced by Tomasz Weremko, aka, Seahorse. Card models are certainly more apartment friendly than wood models and they are much more budget friendly. Level of detail, of course, is entirely in the hands of the builder and designer. While I’ve tinkered with designing and building my own card models, I’ve never actually built a commercially available kit.
 
I still consider myself a novice builder and while I love the look of fully rigged ships I hesitate to commit to building one. I wanted something small, preferably in 1/72 scale to match my last model, and without too much rigging. I first decided that Searhorse’s Armed Virginia Sloop would fit the bill. However, its 1/100 scale means that some of the details are going to be quite challenging for my hand-eye coordination. I confirmed that by reading Clare Hess’ build log. (Mr. Hess’ log can be found here: https://shipmodeler.wordpress.com/2022/07/29/building-the-armed-virginia-sloop-paper-model-part-1/)
 
But Seahorse also offers a US Revenue Cutter in 1/72 scale. In addition, according to Mr. Weremko’s complexity scale the cutter ranks as a ‘2’ as opposed to the sloop’s level of ‘3’. It ticks all the boxes! Did I mention the budget friendlyness of card models? I ordered both as full kits complete with laser cut parts, sails, dowels and (almost) all the necessary bits and bobs provided. Both kits and shipping from Poland came in at $72.00 USD.
 
I ordered directly from the Seahorse web site on December 4th and eagerly awaited the arrival of the kits from Poland. After checking the tracking website daily (which stopped showing progress once the packages arrived in Los Angeles on the 9th) they arrived in my mailbox on December 16th. Mustering my dog-training discipline, I’ll save the sloop for later but I instantly opened the cutter package and reviewed the contents.
 
As expected, there’s nothing disappointing about this kit. The basic model is presented as a saddle-stitched (e.g., stapled) booklet with full color photos of a finished model on front and rear covers. Ah, something to aspire to! There is, of course, a minimum of written text in both Polish and English comprising of a short history of the ship and ‘Basic Rules and Tools’ for construction. There are four pages of pictorial instructions, two pages of parts printed in black on white paper and two pages of parts printed in color on card. Now, in my set there was a second set of the card-printed parts inserted into the fold. I’m not sure if this was an oversight or if the second loose set was included because the printing of the first set (which is bound into the booklet) is a bit weak. Or, perhaps Seahorse can sense a ‘newbie’ and kindly included spares. Whatever the reason, intentional or not, it gives me a sense of security and a makes me think that Seahorse is a quality operation. (It’s also a bit unsettling that I joyfully anticipate looking at a centerfold of a model… ship!)
 
There are a couple of hazards for neophytes. The first is that the required thickness of card for laminated parts is appended to the part number and is easily overlooked. The number is followed by ‘//’ or ‘*’ or ‘**’ to indicate 0.3, 0.5 or 1.0 mm card thickness. However, I think I’ve shielded myself from this potential error by purchasing the laser cut parts sheets. I’m also puzzled by this sentence in the instructions: “To avoid too many symbols, uncommon thickness of some parts should be matched to the width of the stripes covering its edges.” I can only assume that this refers to the keel which is considerably thicker than 1.0 mm and has a piece that runs along the bottom edge of the keel. That ‘edge’ piece appears to be about 4 mm wide so, therefore the keel should be laminated to that thickness. Now that I’ve typed that up it makes sense to me.
 
I also see a couple parts with ‘W’ numbers which are not part of the printed sheets. I believe these need to be created from wire (which is mentioned in the ‘Basic Rules’). The templates for these parts are on the fourth page of instructions along with the mast and spar diagrams. The most numerous of these appear to be the rail stanchions surrounding the deck to prevent crew from falling overboard.
 
My last observation is in regard to the copper sheathing below the waterline. It’s interesting that Seahorse has provided a simple solution and a detailed solution to the sheathing. On one side of the copper colored sheet the sheathing is designed as strips to cut and apply much like the hull planking. But if you flip the sheet over you find that it has been printed to represent the individual sheets of copper. So, depending up on your sense of fanaticism, er, level of detail, you have options. I like that.
 
All said and done, I’m quite happy with my purchase. I’m not certain when I’ll get started on the cutter and the Virginia sloop is certainly farther down the line. (Maybe the sloop will be next Winter’s project.) At this point I’m still mustering my canine-induced self-discipline and working on resizing my skipjack design. But once I’ve hit the ‘proof-of-concept’ stage in that project it’s ‘game on!’ on the cutter.
 
Pictures (or it didn't happen!):

Took awhile for my eyes to uncross but the ratlines on the lower shrouds are done.

Go for it.

Go for it.

Look up Enterprise in whatever tables of masting and rigging are closest to its year and list them by spar and line.
Look up Surprise and do the same. 
If they are the same:
Mic the spars in the kit and tightly coil each type the rigging line around a dowel and count the number of coils in a 1 inch distance. The number of coils divided into 1 yields the diameter.  The tables are probably line circumference, so the table numbers divided by pi are your values for comparison.   If the kit numbers match the chart you made up for Enterprise then -- well the spar and line stock has to come from somewhere, so why not.  But the research of Enterprise masting and rigging scatlings needs  to be done first.
 
I forgot the blocks - do the same with them.
Block size is determined by the size of its line.
On an actual ship there is a variety of line diameter.  In scale a lot of that diameter is too close to differentiate. It simplifies things a bit.
Unless a ship is one of the rare ones with individual masting and rigging data,  A kit mfg would or should have done the same lookup.
It is then a matter of you being able to accept the compromises made for the material in the kit.

Shipyard makes a 1/96 HMS Enterprise card kit that runs about $38 at Ages Of Sail.
 
It will have the exact masting and rigging plans for the Enterprise.
 
Shipyard’s kits are amazingly detailed and designed.
 
Then you could cann materials from your Surprise kit to use on your Enterprise.

Hello all.
I have this crazy idea.
The idea is build the CAF 1/48 HMS Enterprise and then complete it by building the masting and rigging using the HMS Surprise in 1/48 parts and plans (which I abandoned)
A monster project!!!
Do you think is possible to do, and what difficulties I may encounter? Would you encourage or discourage this project?
 
Thank you all.

Rigging progresses. Earlier in the log, I mentioned that Grecian is not much trickier than Erycina. That’s true of making the hull, mast and spars. The rigging, however, is more complex. 

I’m quite used to fore and aft rigging now, but finding the yards on the foremast trickier. As a beginner to this, each of the yards seems to have seven lines attached to it to keep it in position. To start with I didn’t dare tie off and glue any of them for fear I need to change the tension on them later. So for the topgallant and topsail yards I had 10 lines dangling down weighted by crocodile clips getting tangled up…. So I took the plunge and tied off and glued some. Hope I won’t regret it. 

Fore course yard is yet to be fitted, although the sling for the yard can be seen loosely tied on for now and floating around. 

I’ve just noticed that in these photos that the forward two cannons are not in place. They’re not glued yet as they may be in the way, the downside of this is that I keep having to rescue them from my little son’s Lego fortress. 

I’m finding the rigging a little confusing despite Vanguard’s excellent plans. The Vanguard plans  superbly layout exactly where each line runs from and too and how it should be attached, they couldn’t be clearer. What I’m finding harder is where each line should run relative to all the other lines without touching them - it would be almost impossible to show this on a plan without it becoming incredibly confusing and furthermore the neutral lines are hard to see against a white background in the photos on Jim’s incredibly helpful build log. The Petersson rigging book doesn’t help in this regard either as it breaks out each line individually too.  I’m sure with experience it will become clearer where they should run, for me it’s a learning curve. I think they’re roughly right so far. 
 
The other thing I find hard is looping the line around the belaying pins and tying it off, is there a good technique for this? 
 
Grecian visiting Alert. 

Thanks again for all the likes encouragement and advice. 
 
 

Conclusion
for someone venturing into the RC world with a wooden hulled boat this will fit the job very nice, however as a static build it will be lacking in detail, having said that for the price it it is very well priced and will make a great build 

Yes, I think it's a strange decision by Artesania to do that. Surely it would make more sense to double plank it. 
 
Also, I don't think that a model released in 2023 should be making you cut out your own gunports. Yes, the template makes it easier. I had to cut out 80 gunports (maybe more?) on my Royal William, and that was an anxiety filled experience given that you don't know whether parts that have not yet been fitted (like wales, fenders, channels) will fit later on. It turned out that I made a dozen mistakes and had to go back and reposition gunports, which I was able to do because the model was double planked. But companies like Caldercraft and Vanguard mean that expectations are different these days. I shudder at the thought of having to cut out 200 gunports. 

Single plank model with 2mm thick planks is a recipe for disaster. You have to become very very good at bevelling planks and use a lot of filler. Given my modelling skills, it would probably be the latter! Good thing that the entire hull will be painted! 

My first kit was an Artesania as well. I never finished it. 

I think that's it. These kits aren't aimed at those who have little experience. I would be able to plank that hull, no problems, even in 2mm, but that's because I've some experience. For those who have little experience, it would be a nightmare, and buckets of filler would be needed.

Thanks for the review.   Coming from you, I can put total faith in your comments.   I am currently building AL's Soleil Royal and the two kits are so very similar.     Although I do question why AL chose to make the ST a single plank model whereas the SR is double planking.    For me with my modeling skills a single plank model almost puts it off my list of kits to do. 

Great review James!

Thanks for the review James.  I like the novel approach to their current kits, I recently picked up their Victory cross section (also just released) and they take a new approach with built-up frames (whole and part) threaded onto dowels with pre-formed spacers to construct the hull.  Definitely some original thought being applied by AL.
 
Gary

1:84 Santisima Trinidad – Trafalgar 1805
Artesania Latina
Catalogue #22901
Available from Artesania Latina for €749.99
 

 
The Santisima Trinidad (full name: Nuestra Señora de la Santísima Trinidad), was a Spanish first-rate ship of the line with 112 guns. This was increased in 1795–96 to 130 guns by closing in the spar deck between the quarterdeck and forecastle, and to 136 guns around 1802 (plus 4 small guns on the poop), thus creating what was in effect a continuous fourth gundeck although the extra guns added were actually relatively small. She was the heaviest-armed ship in the world when rebuilt and bore the most guns of any ship of the line outfitted in the Age of Sail. She was built at Havana, Cuba, to a design by Irish naval architect Matthew Mullan (domiciled in Spain under the name Mateo Mullán), originally intended as a ship of 112 guns. He died on 25 November 1767, and the construction of the ship was continued by his son, Ignacio Mullán. and the ship was launched in March 1769 and completed in August 1769 as a 116-gun three-decker. She was considerably larger than her British contemporary Victory and somewhat bigger than the French Bretagne.
 
Commanded by Francisco Javier Uriarte and the flagship of Rear Admiral Baltasar Hidalgo de Cisneros, she took part in the Battle of Trafalgar on October 21, 1805, as part of the combined Franco-Spanish fleet. Due to her great bulk, her helm was unresponsive in the light winds on the day, contributing to her ineffective service in the combined fleet's cause. Her great size and position immediately ahead of the fleet flagship Bucentaure made her a target for the British fleet, and she came under concentrated attack by several ships. She lost her mast and eventually surrendered to the Neptune; a 98-gun second rate commanded by Captain Thomas Fremantle. She was taken in tow by the 98-gun second rate Prince but was eventually scuttled by her British captors northwest of Cádiz.
History abridged from Wikipedia.
 
The kit
 

 
Before I post my own information on this new release, I’ll give you the details of the kit, as per Artesania Latina’s own blurb.
 
“In addition, the naval modeling kit of the Spanish vessel comes with several paper templates to make the building process of the model easier. Among other functions, they are used to arrange the elements on the decks and to place the embrasures and other objects on the sides of the hull. Speaking of the hull, its structure can be assembled as if it were a 3D puzzle. With this faithful 1:84 scale replica, you can represent correctly the appearance and artillery of the Santísima Trinidad in the battle of Trafalgar since it brings the howitzers that the ship carried in great detail -144 cannons-. Likewise, modelers who wish to line the hull of the magnificent model of the Spanish ship are in luck because the kit includes copper tape to be able to do it below the waterline.
 
Once it is assembled, the model of Santísima Trinidad (22901), measures 46.88'' (1191 mm) length, 35.63'' (905 mm) height and 18.26'' (464 mm) width. Its design using a false keel and frames brings its assembly closer to the real ship. As a bonus, the kit of Santísima Trinidad comes with 5 die-cast figures.”
 
This new generation of large Artesania kits certainly pack a whole load of contents for your money, and of course, the boxes are very large…and heavy. Definitely another kit where you need to try hard to fit everything back under the lid if you intend to repack for a later date. 
 





 
This new release comes with FOURTEEN sheets of laser cut and engraved ply sheet in a varying number of sizes and thicknesses. The material, in my sample kit, is perfectly flat, without warp or defect, and all of the cutting and engraving is clean with no laser blow-back. All parts are also laser numbered too. Included with the timber sheets is a set of three A4 parts plans which you can use to quickly locate the part you want without fumbling through the actual sheets. All of the timber parts in this kit are cellophane wrapped and not too tightly as to cause deformation. 
 




 
As you look through these sheets, you’ll see the unusual manner in which the parts are supplied. You won’t find a single-piece hull, or even a two-part solution. The hull is built up from three parts, and the bulkheads are multi-part creations that use dovetail joints to hold the parts under glue. The hull itself is built up in sections and expanded as you progress from bow to stern. This is a lot like the system used in the monthly magazine partwork builds. The various elements of construction should mean that the build proceeds with minimal risk of the keel being twisted (although I would always ensure this is the case, as you build). 
 





 
You will find a number of parts on these sheets that relate to things which aren’t frames or bulkheads etc. such as the deck grates. I’m not absolutely sure I like this aspect, as these aren’t engraved. To fix this, you would need to varnish, then score along the grates to show the main batons running bow to stern, and then apply a dark ‘wash’ to make the grate look like it’s made from individual parts. You also won’t see any deck sections in the parts sheets. There aren’t any. All decking is single planked, directly onto the top of the various frames/bulkheads. You will need to ensure that your plank joints are very tight together, and I would also think along each edge too, or the deck wouldn’t be solid.
 

 
Another point that’s important to mention here is that the hull is single-planked. You will need to tread carefully here if you are used to double layer planking. You will need to ensure that your timber doesn’t sag anywhere as you won’t have the fallback of another layer. The good news is that the planking timber is superb quality and it’s 2mm x 5mm (300mm long). You also won’t see any bare timber in the finished build, so you have a little extra leeway too. The lower hull is coppered (5mm wide tape) and above the waterline, the colours are black, red, and white.
 
Multiple packs of high quality strip timber are supplied in cellophaned bundles, and clearly labelled for size. I very much do like the quality of the timber elements in this kit. They are a world away from my first build…ironically, an Artesania kit!
 


 
Another pack of timber is included. This time its dowel of various diameters. The material used is birch, with the small quantity of 2mm being bamboo. Thankfully, the latter does look fine, but I don’t go a bundle on bamboo for mast/yard material. 
 

 
There are FOUR fittings boxes with this kit. Here are the photographs to see for yourself. The rigging blocks are deadeyes are perfectly good as far as quality goes, with the metal parts being cast in a zinc alloy. This includes the cannon. Some seams are present on some of these parts, and you’ll need a rotary tool to remove these. Other zinc alloy metal parts include buckets, anchors, stern décor, ship’s wheels, lower quarter gallery sections, belaying pins, belfry roof, etc. The figurehead is also far nicer than many of those supplied in other contemporary releases, with this one being cast in multiple pieces to eliminate the problems with single-part casting techniques. There are some brass parts too, such as the lantern tops, bell, anchor rings etc. 
 












 
The fittings boxes also include brass wire, netting, eyelets, glass parral beads, brass nails, turned metal stanchion, capstan, brass chain, metal cannon balls etc. You will note that the lower decks have stub barrels and not whole guns. You won’t see them down there anyway, especially in 1:84.
 

 
Love them or loathe them, Artesania has supplied a full set of sails. The material is quite thin, and the stitching is good, apart from that which edges the material. This is way too much and not nicely done. If you want to use these sails, I suggest picking out that stitching and redoing in yourself. However, I would simply leave the sails OFF a model of this type. 
 

 
A number of other items are packed within another clear sleeve. These include some very nice silk screen printed flags, a roll of 5mm copper tape, acetate sheets for glazing, and various paper templates that you lay onto the planked hull, in order to position gun ports, fenders etc. 
 

 
If you like photo-etch, then this kit has in in abundance. All of the SIX sheets of this is produced in brass, using multi-layer etching processes, and cellophaned to a thick card backing to protect it. You will see that a lot of the parts, certainly the larger ones, concern the stern fascias. While these are very nice, I would use them in conjunction with timber to enliven them further and produce something which looks more 3D. The same applies to the quarter galleries, but if you install the supplied materials properly, then you will still have a very nice result.
 





 
Now…rigging cord. There is quite a lot of this, as you would imagine, and generally the quality is ‘ok’. There is a small degree of fuzz on the spools I looked at, although not as bad as that of a number of other manufacturers. I would consider either replacing the rig or using one of a number of techniques to reduce the fuzz. 
 

 
This kit supplies a few printed sheets, and what looks like a full-size colour side profile photo which will be very useful for reference. A full colour parts list and fittings sheet is also included. At this point, I have to tell you that there isn’t a printed manual. All of the instructions are available for download from the product page on Artesania’s website. There over FIFTEEN downloads too, so you’ll see why this isn’t included in print. Ideally, you could do with a laptop or tablet in the workshop and access the instructions from there. The instructions are graphically driven, and the sheer number of photos is astounding. Around 8000 photos are included, over 800 pages. I know Chris would kill me if I submitted that number for his kits! Everything looks extremely easy to understand with just about every angle of the build covered, multiple times. I’ve included a few photos from the various instruction downloads. If you head to Artesania’s YouTube page, you will also find a number of tutorial videos for this specific kit.
 


















 
Conclusion
While I’ve seen numerous unboxings of some of Artesania’s recent large kit releases, this is the first time I’ve seen one for myself. Construction is generally quite different to what you’d expect with regards to bulkheads and hull skeleton construction. I’m not at all averse to this methodology at all. In some respects, it seems almost modular, and highly unconventional. It does appear to work well for the builder, having researched a number of online builds. I still have to get my head around a single-planked hull. It’s something I need to try and align with as I do intend to build this in the future. The hull is fully painted/coppered, so there is a lot of flexibility with the underlying timber if you need to fill and cut back…albeit carefully. You most certainly will need to be more careful than you perhaps would normally be on your lime planking. I know I’ve certainly improved in that area over the years, and you’re best employing a good method of tapering, such as the one that many use here…Chuck’s method. 
 
Another unusual element here is that ‘missing’ manual I mentioned. There is a QR code that you can scan which will take you to the product page on the AL website. Here you can download the manual directly. If you like a printed manual, you’re going to need some serious ink to print this. I know this aspect can be difficult for those that like a manual supplied, as is traditional.
 
In all, this is a kit I actually quite like, and I know Artesania are proud of their products. I’ve been discussing their products with them over the years, and this is one they are excited about. As far as price point is concerned, I think this is pitched correctly, considering the size of the overall model and the quality of materials supplied. Another contemporary manufacturer has released a limited-edition kit which is twice this price, and around the same scale, and slightly smaller. In comparison to that, minus the other kit’s gimmicks, this kit still stands head and shoulders above that with regards to quality and value for money. I’ve often said that I have a fondness for AL kits as that is how I started in the hobby, but I wouldn’t steer you wrong. This is a very nice kit; with the caveats and things I’ve mentioned. If you have the skills to build an intermediate to advanced kit, this is definitely one to consider.
 
My sincere thanks to Artesania Latina for the kit you see reviewed here on Model Ship World. To buy directly, click the link at the top of the article. 







 
 
Related Products
Before I mention these, Artesania have also designed this model so that the grand cabin can be illuminated. Installation of the specific AL set is shown within the many photographs for this kit. The lighting set can be bought from AL for €24.99, here.
 
Ok, I have been sent two additional sets that are designed to be used with this kit. These are a figure set (to add to the small number included within the kit) and a paint set. 

 
The paint set, which is available here for €31.99, includes TWELVE 20ml bottles of acrylic paint. These paints can be applied with a brush or thinned for use in an airbrush. The website says they can be thinned with alcohol or thinner. From this, I presume you can use either isopropyl (rubbing) alcohol, or possibly something like Tamiya X20A. For the latter, do a small test to make sure the paint doesn’t congeal. The paints in this set are:
 
·      Off White x 2
·      Off Black x 2
·      Bright Red x 1
·      Red x 2
·      Ice Yellow x 1
·      Buff x 1
·      Cocoa Brown x 1
·      Dark Red Leather x 1
·      Gold x 1
 

The Figure set I have for this release, can be bought here for €29.99. This set consists of SIXTEEN figures and accessories which are period-correct. The figures appear to be cast in zinc alloy and look quite nice for this scale. Included in this kit are:
 
·      Captain x 1
·      Officers x 4
·      Surgeon x 1
·      Marines x 2
·      Grenadiers x 2
·      Gun Crew x 5
·      Sailor x 1
 
Also included are accessories, such as sabres, gun crew tools, ammunition etc.