Ian_Grant

I would try contacting Mamoli for parts.

5 hours ago, Canute said:

I'll follow along, too. RN battlecruisers are faves of mine.😄

Yes, the Lion class appealed to me even as a teen because of the unusual (to my eye) turret amidships.  If I had to start from scratch now, I'd probably make a model of the Neptune class with its two midship beam turrets.

Received my copy of "British Battleships of World War One" which is quite interesting. It lists the naval estimates for each year from 1905, has many drawings and photos of each class, and gives detailed information about armour belt spans and thicknesses, armament, and most usefully a chronological list of modifications made in the course of the war. So in fact, I'd like to add the 1916 searchlight towers to Lion, but I also want to keep the torpedo net booms which were removed by then. Thus I may not be historically accurate.

The book also has colour drawings of various dazzle patterns which were tried out on various ships. Many of them are pretty wild.

Still waiting for a second book I ordered.

What about carving a half-hull, then cross-cutting it at intervals to reveal the frame shapes? I did that for the bow and stern of my Roman Galley and it worked out quite well.

3 hours ago, Thukydides said:

Welcome Nick

 

You should still do one. It is the best way to get help as you go along. I also personally found the practice of documenting my build kept me motivated when I got bogged down in the middle. The help and feedback I got on my log made my first model way better than it ever  could have been had I just done it on my own.

Good luck.

Thukydides is right. You will get all kinds of help from other members if you log it.

Great kit, though formidable.  All the best for this kit, and hoping to see a build log!    (Go Habs Go!!!)  

Glen, you're doing a fine job on the rigging but (you can ignore me if you wish) your bowsprit bobstays look undersized to me. They're usually heftier rope than the martingales.

Just sayin'  🤫

Ian

Glen, I'm late to this party too. Thanks for the heads-up! You're doing a bang-up job so far and it's wonderful you are doing it for a family's memories.

Looking forward to seeing you decode more rigging jargon. Now you know how Bill97 felt trying to rig his Victory using Longridge's book. 😉

Glen, I'm a little late here, but I'm happy to see you off on another imaginative build. Looks great so far!

Nice to see the RR track put to use again. Must get some. They've been building light

rail lines in this town for years, creating many detours on the cycling paths.

1 hour ago, ddp said:

the Norman A. Ough's drawings shows the center funnel being round, correct? i think it should be oval like the aft funnel. you could cut a disk out of paper or whatever & place it where the center funnel is to see what the diameter dimensions do to the surrounding area.

No, Norman's drawings show it as oval. It's the Naval Encyclopedia's 3D render that has it round.

Thanks, I will omit the extra deck.

Hello ddp; thanks for commenting!

You're right, as a teen I missed the two 4" gun casements on the forward shelter deck for some reason. They're on my drawings.

After looking over the drawings I think I will be building complete new superstructures. According to a 3D rendering in the Naval Encyclopedia the aft shelter deck is supported by posts around its inner edges leaving what is beneath it as an opening. Difficult to pick out in  to tell in my drawing but now that I look again I see that it is so. The rendering also shows the aft  SL towers added after 1916 but oddly still with smaller twin SL's instead of larger singles as I have seen in other drawings. On the other hand, this same 3D rendering shows four 4" guns on the weather deck level on the forward superstructure and an open shelter deck, as well as the central funnel being round not oval, so how much can I trust it? On yet another hand, it shows another deck between the two forward funnels with some boats stowed on it. My drawings show no such thing but there is a photo in the Naval Encyclopedia entry "Loading Shells Aboard 1917" which does show a boat stowed above the weather deck on some kind of beam but no deck.

I'm hoping for clarity when my two book orders arrive.  ddp, it seems you may be familiar with this ship; can you comment on any of the above?

Yes the model is about 56" long.

As a teen I didn't worry too much about u/w details other than getting the hull lines correct. I think bilge keels would be too exposed and fragile for an R/C model which will be handled and carried around. The two props she does have are over-scale but again not visible when in water.

Rendering from the Naval Encyclopedia:

Loading shells 1917 - note the boat stowed high on beams. It's not stated which ship this is, Lion, Queen Mary, or Princess Royal, which all differed slightly.

Coal scuttle - what a job!  And no masks! I wondered what these actually looked like; they're exactly like manhole covers and are just small shaded circles on my drawing.

As I mentioned in the Naval History section I have decided to revamp this scratch model I made as a teenager in the 70's.  The model was built using Norman A. Ough's drawings, as purchased from David MacGregor Plans in the UK. Drawings consist of a sheet of "Lines" plus some cross-sections showing decks etc, and a second sheet showing overall profile and top view along with layouts of the various decks in the forward superstructure. There are zero details of the various ships' boats save for dotted outlines in the top view showing their stowage locations and their types/lengths.

I've been looking on the internet for photos of Lion and her near-sister ships Queen Mary and Princess Royal. They were all modified in the course of the war and it's quite confusing trying to reconcile all the photos. I've even seen one of Lion with that little walkway with a roof going around the stern, which I associate with Victorian warships for some reason.

Anyway pulling out the plans I see the teenage me omitted many details such as doorways, hull portholes, vent pipes at the funnels, beams reinforcing the blast screens, the foredeck windlass, the foredeck breakwater (or whatever it's called), all the weather deck hatches and skylights and coal scuttles etc. Plan is to add as much as possible without going too crazy; this is after all for RC not display.

In the 70's this ran with rheostatic speed controllers which wasted a LOT of battery power. She had two speed controls for her two 6V Decaperm motors. I think this time I will just use a single 60A brushed ESC to drive both motors. Also, she has movable forward turrets, servo-controlled, but they don't maintain the same angle as they rotate - what was I thinking? This time I want to have all four turrets rotate to the same side of the ship; probably will mean two or even three servos; trying to figure out how to get 180 degrees for the turrets. A rack and pinion system occurred to me but a cheap system for hobby use eludes my search. There are gear sets available for laser cutting; maybe I could cut a rack too?

Here are a few shots of a dusty Lion as she is now. Those men on the compass platform are wildly too large, at about 1/72 scale. Following  these is a shot of an experimental six-piece 3D-print of a stack. It looks pretty good to me but I fear the vertical seams are exaggerated. They're 1/32" square in this print; not sure how they would print at 1/64" thick but will try it.  I will get some micro brass rod and try to make the cages atop the stacks, which supported canvas covers when boilers were drawn.

Hello again. While looking through the Naval Encyclopedia entry on the "Lion" class, I noticed the bibliography list. I've ordered "British Battleships of World War One" by one R.A. Burt, 2nd edition, 2012.

This heavy tome covers the dreadnoughts through to battlecruisers and others, and purports to have many photos added compared to the 1st edition.

I've found quite a few undated photos of Lion and her sister and near-sister ships, which raise questions as they were all modified from time to time. I did find one of Princess Royal with the searchlight towers added in 1916, and a few deck shots revealing some details. There is even a colour diagram of Lion in dazzle paint, which I did not think was used in WWI. Apparently they experimented with different schemes on different ships but the brass must not have liked the nontraditional look since without exception they were all repainted to grey after a few months. Apparently this book has detail on this, and diagrams of the different dazzle schemes tried.

Just closed the pool so without a test tank progress on my other RC models is stalled, so I will start work on Lion soon. Good winter project.

John, noticed (again) your build which I must have forgotten to "follow" at the time. Looking great! Winch is excellent.

Those interior photos on upper deck and wheelhouse are very interesting. When I was there only the main deck was open to be wandered through, due to ongoing renovations.

Looking forward to seeing more of your build!

Ian

3 hours ago, Keith Black said:

 Valeriy, there are folks that can do that for you. Your work is good enough for a coffee table style book of photos including a description of what ship the part was made for and date that you made the part. Over the years I watched you produce little works of art that are included in your builds. I for one would certainly be pleased to have a hard copy of your work. 

Me too!

Back in the 70's I made an RC model of this ship which has been on a shelf for decades. With retirement I have the notion of overhauling her to add detail the teenage me omitted (and modernizing the speed control from rheostatic to ESC).

I have two sheets of plans from David MacGregor, "lines" and overall views. Details on hatches etc are hard to make out, plus there are some dotted additions of searchlight platforms that were added in 1916 which are illegible to me. Also I have read she had several Lewis guns and something like 8 or 9 rangefinders (some in the turrets) which are not evident in the drawings.

Does anyone know of a book which might have on-board photos of Lion? I see plenty of photos of Lion steaming along but very few on board.

Thanks everyone.

Ian

Very sleek...nice planking job!

George, your water dioramas are always superb - totally convincing! And Ares is another exceptional model.

Good idea to use a french curve as a bending jig!  Must keep that in mind.

3 minutes ago, wefalck said:

A couple of weeks ago I had, during a business visit to Athens, the opportunity to visit the Hellenic Maritime Museum in Piraeus. They have a 1/50 scale model of the ARES on display:

 

I think your small model compares quite favourably with this model, which is three times the size!

Is that the museum which has "Olympias" on display?

Bill, you are as prolific with wood as with plastic now. Congrats!

Quick report on trial:

Went to my first RC boat club Wednesday sail at "Brown's Inlet" in Ottawa. They said they'd be there at 4:30 but no one showed up. A little after the 5pm the fitful  breeze died completely. As I was dismantling the rig, two ladies walking past asked, "Why don't you sail with those other guys?".  Turns out I was at the wrong end of Brown's Inlet and the two ends are cut off by trees etc. Next time I know where to go.

Anyway, as soon as I put her in the water I saw she was sitting stern-down with the forefoot barely touching the water. Even in the light breeze her bow kept wanting to veer off the wind. I'll need to rethink the weight distribution. Might even come down to completely tearing her down again and rebuilding much more lightly eg see those beams in first post first photo, and build the cabin with thinner pieces in pine not maple. Also get rid of the metal frame holding the pulley for the winch loop.

That's strike two for this summer in my RC revival; first the Roman galley and now this.

I'm also now getting enthused about restoring my HMS LION from WW I. Thinking of adding detail, correcting some errors and of course buy a modern brushed ESC for her decaperm motors. Will stay with gel-cell battery as that was most of her ballast, back in the 70's.

Looks great Jim.  So the Duchess didn't have Jarvis brace winches?

"........I’ve started on the mechanism to make the captain go below on diving".   

??!!!!!  Wow that would be something to see. Great model!

Somewhere on this site exists Chuck Passaro's tutorial on edge-bending strip planking. Might help you with your walnut!

Ready for trials!  If not detailed yet.  Didn't have time today as I was repairing some stuff at a client's house. Tomorrow is the plan, wind permitting. Will be naming her after my wife when I find some adhesive vinyl lettering.

I need to make a better-designed stand.