yvesvidal

Absolutely superb. Yves

Metal tube....yes, absolutely. Yves

A little update to show a lot of work. I spent my evening fabricating a compartment for the batteries. Something that looks more prototypical and that may explain how this submarine was designed and built. Only drawback, it will be hard to see once it is finished, but the satisfaction to know that all is there is priceless. Basically, we have an entire box fabricated to hold the 18 Battery blocks. Some blocks have four cells, other only have three. On each side of that battery box, fuel tanks. I am skipping the fabrication of the wasted water tanks, as it is impossible to see from outside. Here (above) we have a view of the fuel tank (lower position) with a window cut on the battery compartment, and topped by the water tank, arriving almost aligned with the top of the bunks. Below, the small window to the aft batteries room will not allow me to depict a sailor filing up electrolyte in the cells, as I did in the front batteries room. I may skip the first row of batteries as it will completely occult the inside perspective. I still have to build the pressure hull, which will be used to finish the fuel tank in the front. With the deck installed, we can say good-bye to the 18 battery modules..... Well, at least, it looks more realistic than the Trumpeter kit approach. Finally, the complete sandwich, showing the rather large volume dedicated to the fuel tank. Next, we will be cutting the front bulkhead to open the fuel tank and the ballast tanks on the side. After that, we can start painting all the walls and bulkheads, batteries and put everything together. Yves

I started working on the kit again, and realized the extent of the disaster for this particular compartment. A lot of surgery and modifications will have to be done if we want this section to have some kind of semblance to the prototype. I suspect that this section was designed during a national Chinese Holiday and that their Rice based alcohol was flowing liberally.... Anyway, the first piece to get a massive cut is the back wall. For some unknown (to me) reason, that wall protrudes outside of the pressure hull to reach the sky, right under the deck.... Go figure. As you can see below, once in place this is what it does. I assume that the ingress pipe for the engine and some air tanks are supposed to hide that mistake, but this is not very serious: And so we cut..... and we will file later on. Second crazy thing, the molding of that bulkhead. This is the forward bulkhead separating the kitchen/sub-officers section from the control room. In my world (and the world of German engineers) there is a fuel tank going through and a water tank terminating at this location. So why are we getting a bunch of big bolts? I suppose it is an artistic license from the Trumpeter. And so we file..... Third incongruity: The floor for the batteries. The kit calls for a slanted floor, giving a nice inclination for all the acid to spill. In addition, the proposed floor is flat and not staged as the forward batteries compartment was. Finally, that floor only holds half of what it should, in term of batteries. So we are going to need some surgery, de-construction and re-modelling. First, I am using the floor of the second set of parts I have to build something that resembles the drawings (go back a couple of posts earlier for details): Then I am cutting that floor in three sections, in order to create a stepped like floor with three levels: This is all glued back with styrene strips (your best friend with Trumpeter kits).... Et voila. We now have something that looks more like the blue-prints. Next, we will be butchering the bulkheads. Yves

This is from Wikipedia: Narrow Gauge[edit] Sn3½ or Sn42 gauge - 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) gauge on 16.5 mm (0.65 in) gauge track (the same as HO gauge) Sm – 1 m gauge on 16.5 mm; Continental European.[5] Sn3 - 3 ft (914 mm) gauge on 14.3 mm (0.563 in) gauge track. Sn2 gauge - 2 ft (610 mm) gauge on 10.5 mm (0.413 in) (the same as HOn3 gauge) or 9 mm (0.354 in) gauge track Actually, Sm or Sn3 may be perfect for a wharf/harbor secondary line, next to your boat. Yves

For your trains, you have to use S-Scale: - N scale is 1/160 - HO is 1/87 (this will be too small). - S Scale is 1/64 (perfect) - O scale is 1/48 (way too big). Yves

Breathtaking....!!! This is the real thing, it is not a model. Yves

WOW!!! This is coming along nicely. Very realistic model. Yves

Very interesting and lovely boat. Billing Boats has been creating quite a few kits with this half-hulls technique. It works really well. Yves

I am impressed at the quality of your painting and the vast collection of jars that you have. Truly impressive. What are the ones in the center, saying Acrylic on the glass? Yves

Emphasis on "real" emergency.... Well said!! The whole thing is so ridiculous. Yves

I agree that finding a good quality kit is sometimes hard to do. There are so many of these fishing vessels around the Mediterranean Sea and the Normandy and Brittany shores, that you cannot go wrong if you decide to customize them a little bit. I know that Chris Watton is usually releasing very high quality boats, but the ones shown on your link are no-where to be found on the French coast lines. What you are building is "the" typical French fishing vessel. I have seen a lot of these when I was a kid and they are still used a lot nowadays. Artesiana Latina and Constructo released similar vessels (My brother built a couple of them) but AL is now out of business and Constructo's quality is not exactly what you want.... Below are a few examples, but honestly, the Chalutier you picked up is probably the nicest one: Marie-Ange by New Cap Maquettes Le Marsouin, one of my favorite but almost impossible to find. The Mare-Nostrum by AL....toy like when compared to your model. The Boulogne by Billing Boats. There are many more and it would take an entire thread to cover them all. I hope you do not feel like I hijacked your thread. Let em know. Thanks Yves

Your trawler is coming along very nicely. I hope you keep this one. Yves

I love your serving machine made with Meccano/Erector parts. It brings back a lot of fond memories. Yves

Beautiful hull. I like these French fishing boats. Thanks for building one of them. Yves

Very realistic. Yves

I like your research efforts to improve on the Trumpeter kit. Sounds familiar to me.... ;-) Yves

This is truly a BIG bird..... You did a superb job at painting it. Yves

Superb presentation of your beautiful gondola model. The black color of the base, depicts quite well the dark waters of Venice at night. Yves

Here is an excerpts of the U-Boot Manual, regarding Fresh, Grey/Wash and Salted waters: 1) Sea water installation. To provide sea water collection in the galley, there is a branch off the cooling water manifold in the diesel engine room, which leads to the valve and a tap in the wash sink. The warm sea water installation branches off from cooling water head tank in the conning tower casing and leads to the wash basins in both W.C.s and to the wash sink in the galley. The discharge line of the auxiliary drain and trim pump branches off to the deck wash line. A shower head can be connected to this line, attached to the net protector, and stowed again after usage. 2) Wash water installation. Wash water is stored in the following tanks: 1 wash water tank (listening room) 1 wash water daily supply tank (aft W.C.) As reserve tanks there are: Torpedo compensating tank 1 Torpedo compensating tank 2 Wash water tank and wash water daily supply tank are connected to the fresh water filling and extracting line. Tanks are filled through the intake at the upper deck. The hand fresh water pump is used for filling the wash water daily supply tank from the wash water tank. A hand wash water pump provided in the forward W.C., to which a suction line can be switched by the selector cock to the wash water tank or to torpedo compensating tank 2. Extracting the wash water from torpedo compensating tank 1 takes place by means of compressed air. 3) Fresh water installation. Fresh water is stored in 3 tanks (3.870 m³) situated in: Fresh water tank 1: Galley, port, under the floor Fresh water tank 2: Control room, port Fresh water tank 3: Officers room, stb. The fresh water tanks are connected to the filling and extracting line through the fresh water selector cock. The line leads through the hull valve at the upper deck and inside the hull branches off to the emergency drain connection. The hand fresh water pump in the galley takes suction from selected tank and discharges through the control valve either directly to the tap in wash sink or through the filter. The water supplied by the distilling unit in the control room is collected in the distillate tank and is moved through the control valve either directly or through the filter to fresh water tank 1 in the galley. All fresh and wash water tanks have sounding pipes and dip sticks.

Fantastic craftsmanship. Stunning results. Yves

Impressive. Some of the sounds are obnoxious, but I understand the excitement that such a model can create on a lake, surrounded by children. Yves

Beautiful model, exquisitely detailed and fantastic professional pictures. I had to save these two pictures in my personal folder. Way too nice. If you are too busy and eager to go back to ships building, I would not mind finishing that 1/32 scale Sleeping Car from the Orient Express that you never completed. Just saying.... 😉 Yves

So, half of the ship will be planked and the other half will show your fantastic work. I am amazed every time I look at your craftsmanship. Yves

Was it really invented or simply reverse engineered from outer terrestrial technologies? Yves