shipman

Support your sponsor. Who would argue with that here.

Backer is making a damn good job with his Bounty and doing his best to make it convincing. I agree with your historical comments on rigging practices, wefalk. With all due respect to Backer, he's got limited resources available and it seems to me he's happy with the overall 'impression' he's getting. And why not? He's doing fine and building his confidence. Sometimes the right thing can get in the way. Tomorrow is always a new day; to be welcomed, so we can go forward with what we learned yesterday.

Mmm, drilling and shaping 1mm long blocks? I'm sure it can be done only by you. You'll be doing the same with poppy seeds next. Wait...I was joking.

A few deft strokes with a pointed needle file or a scalpel tip would help 'fair' the hole in the block; much as should be done to advantage with deadeye holes.

Patrick, so sorry to hear your unfortunate news. No idea how old you are, as age seems to be a significant component of Covid infection outcomes. Take care of yourself, like many others here, I wish you a quick and full recovery. Keep us posted please.

Patrick, thanks for the sail tutorial; excellent results. The 'tissue'....is that a single ply kitchen type?

CA de-bonder (basically acetone, which is the main component of nail varnish remover) does the job of releasing CA joints. I'm not a big fan of noxious substances, but common sense goes a long way. Good ventilation and avoiding skin contact should do.

Last year I made an offer on one that didn't sell. Got it for £4.50+p&p! Saw the empty box, that was a larf! AND it's still awaiting a new owner.

The Tilley Revell is as good as it gets. After seeing your excellent work on the Victory, I know you could get to that level with the Airfix kit, the larger scale would be a lot more convenient too. To my knowledge, no one has done justice to the Airfix Bounty. You can.

The Airfix Bounty is so much better than the Revell one (which can be well detailed with a lot of work: look up the late John Tilley's build on the net-see attachment). Plus, the larger scale is a bonus. Don't you have ebay where you are? Lovely rudder pendants. The finest chain I have is 54 lpi. Already blackened; it's so fine you'd never guess it's chain at first glance. I got it off a retired chap in the Isle of man. I'm sad to say I think he's passed away, he was ill the last time we spoke, a couple of years ago. The email address is closed. He also supplied some superb 1:98 brass belay pins and stanchions. I haven't discovered the original source of the chain; if anyone knows.....

Always a n educational pleasure to read your posts and comments, Eberard. 'modelships.de.' was and is the only source I found models by the guy's mentioned. I'm not interested in the buying and selling thing either, but often sites such as these can surprise with often well photographed subjects. I'll be looking into details of the Bremerhaven museum. Thanks again.

G'day, Roger. The aircraft museum was not far from Duluth, but I can't remember what it was called. I did get vivid descriptions of ice storms and deep snow winters. The 'State Bird' stories made me laugh! It's a shame the model rooms at the NMM and Science museum have closed. It would appear Chatham Historic Dockyard is the place to go now, though I haven't visited. Glasgow seems to have the biggest public model display now. Portsmouth has the Victory, Warrior and Mary Rose. If You're ever in London, the Cutty Sark is a must, though my last visit was before the fire and restoration. Lucky to have most of the woodwork removed before the conflagration, so that aspect is authentic. I have several copies of the book “The Boats of Men of War”; it's a shame most of the illustrations are so small/indifferent, but it's a tome worth having. I'm always amused The Republic of USA, remains the last place to insist on the 'Imperial' measurement system. Us older Brits are able to work comfortably with Imperial and Metric. Take care on those slippery surfaces.

My stash includes the 1:200 Nichimo kit. Now that's a big one! Looking forward to your progress.

Roger, thank you for your kind and generous reply. I looked up your 2 photo 'album' of your longboat, which looks rather splendid. That's the sort of model I admire; no ostentatious superfluous decoration there! I'm curious about a couple of details. What did you use to make the sails? They look so natural. The capping rail appears quite wide; no doubt your research confirmed that. Did you base it on drawings from the NMM? I noticed you are in the Duluth area, which reminds me of my only visit to the USA, over 25 years ago. I was in Owatonna, for three weeks. I drove up to your neck of the woods to visit an aircraft museum, which impressed me. Got to see a baseball match on Independence Day, the technicalities were lost on me, but I was impressed with the stadium. I'm not sure what i was doing on a visit to the 'Mall of America'. I was struck by how friendly most people were (as long as I didn't mention politics. It seems Americans are aggressively polarised). Don't know why, but I was constantly being asked if I was Australian? On my return to the UK, I realised what a hole the UK can be. By contrast, later that year I had my last holiday; in Goa (India). Now there's a place of contrasts. I didn't expect that part of India to be dense jungle. Though the average Goan lives in abject poverty, you wouldn't find such delightful and friendly folk anywhere. I cried when I left. Anyway, less of my adventures. I'll be looking out for your posts. Stay well and safe.

Hi guy's, my reason for this topic was to try and find information about Rainer Wedel and Jan van den Haivel and any other scratch builders of small open boats. I'm not interested in the merits or otherwise of the marketing of models, whatever their merits. So from my point of view, things have rapidly drifted off topic. 'Finemodelships,de' is the only place that included the above mentioned scratch builders work, which is why I focussed on that site and on these two craftsmen specifically. The variable quality of some of the other stuff and prices have no interest to me.

Bob, I agree, a good proportion of their models are kit builds. However, the ones I'm interested in are definitely scratch builds. I hadn't bothered to look up the prices. You suggest an on-line co-operative......now there's a good idea?

Hello, I hope this is the correct area for my enquiry. Surfing the net I came across an interesting German (?) company that trades in model ships, many of which are of exceptional quality. 'Fine modelships,de'. Generously they post comprehensive albums of photographs of models past and present in their inventory. Two modellmakers who feature prominently are:- Rainer Wedel who specialised in lovely 1:10 small open boats. The other, Jan van den Haivel, who specialised in open working boats and other vessels. Both these chaps apparently made very high quality models for European museums. I haven't come across either anywhere else. Does anyone know more about them? I'd also like to find other features by/of such subjects. I suspect 'Wefalck' may be well versed on the subject. Thanks guy's.

Wefalck, I respect your opinion. As far as I know, it's many decades since a 'worthwhile' plastic sailing ship was released. Back in the day, none of the kit manufacturers would have seen how ship modelling would develop. 99% of their intended market was young teenagers, who's imagination compensated for any defects. Looking at today's market, who would have thought we'd get 1:200 scale Hoods' etc (at a price)? I suggested a new tool 1:48 kit of a cutter to Airfix. The modern moulding techniques are superb. Yet the box would contain no more plastic than the old 'Bounty' kit. At that scale there would be no excuse to compromise on any aspect of the vessel. Alas, the price of plastic kits is now beyond my pocket-money. Still waiting a reply from Airfix..................

Wefalck. Dafi. Some sanity at last. A lot of work to get the best out of a plastic kit. It depends what resources a modeller has; not everyone has everything. Dafi's Victory and the ongoing Solial Reale on this forum show the best of the best with plastic. Smoke and mirrors can be the best tool any of us can muster. Dafi's comment for split deck replacement is a fine example; quick and a lot easier than trying to scrape around deck features. Those features can be saved and used if you can't make better yourself. Life is a journey of discovery. I feel humbled to share your company. Stay well.

Late to your party and had a quick bimble through your posts. What a lovely crisp build this is with no hesitation to junk much of the sub standard kit components. In fact you've done a good job disguising it was ever a kit. Congrats; I'm following to completion now.

Meeee again. The Hackney books.....as I understand it, the three books, Victory, Cutty Sark and Mayflower titles were originally written deliberately to cover the three periods and give a representative guide for many ships that would loosely fall into those categories. My opinion (for what it's worth) is the average modeller, as intended, would have a sound guide; being a massive upgrade of information considering the very basic kit instructions. The Victory and Cutty Sark Longridge books take you that much further again. I was never tempted by the Mayflower period ships, simply because so little firm evidence of their detailed configuration exists other than conjecture. The Wassa is another story but the available kit scales are a discouragement to what detail you may want to depict. Of course much research has come to light (in the 50 years since I got interested) to correct much of this. If you remember, I suggested the Airfix Bounty as a possible next project. That to me, seems a logical progression for your learning curve. I believe that was the last sailing ship they issued. If you compare the AOS Bounty book, it is very accurate. The big advantage is the scale - 1:87. If you should wish, at that scale the rigging could be made to work. Not being festooned with guns is a big bonus, in that much repetitive labour is avoided without detriment to the pleasure derived from the build. The possibility of converting the hull into a Brig or Snow is an exciting, simple and practical proposition. Whatever you decide, I wish you much success. It's a fine hobby. My Waffle machine is ready foe a re-charge!

Yup, I get up in the morning every day and shave. This is what I call a 5 o'clock shadow.

Old Collingwood, I have something very similar; it's called an Olfa 'P-cutter'. Like any other sharp tool, if you don't give it your full attention it takes off with a mind of its own. I agree with the visible detail assessment of the 1:98 kit. I was meaning the smaller ship scales as I mentioned earlier.

Beware of the tedium of making the quantity of eye bolts (and similar details) a ship like the Victory requires. Especially at this scale. That's a doorway into a measurable level of the autism spectrum. Copper eye bolts are just cosmetic; put any sort of strain on them and they distort as if you'd used liquorice. Hard brass wire would be ok. If you can find photo etch for these in your scale, you'd be a fool not to get them. Time is precious, don't waste too much of it all at once.

I've been talking to the void for years about creating detail which would simply be invisible on small scale models. The plastic fraternity are the usual victims of this. A lot of modellers 'know' something is there, so they find ways to satisfy their need to see these details on their kits. If you look at a decent photo of a ship such as the Hood, or similar, even quite a big photo. You won't see deck rails (sometimes the stanchions are visible). In fact the 'rails' aren't rails at all, but are wire cables or chains. On a 1200, 700, 600, 500 scale model these things just wouldn't be seen. Yet our intrepid modellers spend a fortune on photo etch railings etc and festoon their pride and joy with them. The aircraft modellers go to great lengths scribing panel lines and rivet detail, again at most of the common scales they wouldn't be visible if you looked at a real aeroplane from five or six feet. All of this is a strange phenomena to me.