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I vote for no guns in those ports. I know my opinion has no value, still IMHO it looks strange: as already said, there is no space for recoil, manipulation, loading etc. To me such a configuration does not look better if it does not reflect reality. And conteporary models may be wrong too, unless we have something like Admiralty drawing for the period. I know on bigger ships with more decks those front ports, often missinterpeted as gun ports (!), were used to assist anchor manipulation and not for placing the guns. Still, even here I would close them with the lids and leave them without the guns. I seriously doubt, particularly during the sail over the high seas, they would leave these ports open, right?. And if you consider placing there the gun, how would you then move them back to close the lids? There is no space. To me such a configuration is not realistic and therefore not attractive.

Hi Jack, looks very promising. Relatively unknown company focused on local boats. Probably they will not be so popular as all those Victories and Bluenoses, but still these vessels have lot of charm. I used to sail in Croatia for one week in summer on a chartered yacht - so somehow this subject is a little bit closer to me than any other ship. And will watch your progress. Please do mention higlights but also minuses, if you find any. I would like to learn how is the kit good and possibly worthy to get. Good luck. Juraj

Okay, just few notes. I have just had a look into my copy of Admiralty plans for Williams: - One noticeable thing missing is the presence of gratings and ladder just aft the main deck opening. It is really weird that the whole boat as presented by Caldercraft has no ladder or any way how to access the lower deck from the main deck! - Different chimney / stove position. -Armament. [EDIT]: The one provided in the kit features proposed fitting from 1795. The boat was rebuilt in 1796 and has different armament (two carronades, one for, one aft). The question is, how is the Caldercraft's representation real and if the boat ever operated with such a configuration? Caldercraft's configuration comes form plan "as proposed to be built" which does not automatically mean it was also build upon it. Plans showing the boat with final configuration look different. - If you will attach the flag to the boat, use the Blue ensign (not red or white). According to rank of the Admiral to whose competence the boat (or her station) belonged The thing is that Caldercraft uses Admiralty plans as the base for the kits. But these plans are very different. Several of them depicts just ships "as proposed" , not "as fitted". If the producer takes as the base the incomplete plan which do not show really all the details of the ship, well, then it may look quite different. It is very interesting to compare Caldercraft's kits with the contemporary Admiralty plans. One will often find it is not as shiny as one would imagine just from the pure claim "built on Admiralty plans"

Good luck with William. I believe there used to be at least one build log, even finished one, but all before GMC (Great Modelshipworld Collapse ), so lost... Anyway... I am not familiar with the review you are mentioning, but I would love to!! I was planning to build this one on my own and purchased original Admiralty plans from Greenwich (luckily they do exist). They are great source of information. You will find the kit way too simplified and missing several very important features (not so difficult to add, if one knows them) but it depends how much is the historical accuracy important for you. Juraj

Danke Johann, das war meine Frage : especially in close combat, I wonder if they could use those swivels at least once (providing that the opposing site uses also grape shots). Nevertheless. Beautiful work.

Wonderful as always. To have the patience to bring the model to this level of realism, well, that is something. And the results well pays off! One question, not to the build but rather functionality of the real ship. Those two small guns aft look really strange: how were these positions accessed by the gunners? And yet, this "battle positions" look so unprotected compared with the main gun deck. I would not want to be the one standing on that opening during the fight ?

Hi Elmir I have just came accross your thread and also had a look at your Bracera - which is great in my opinion. I will gladly follow your progress on Jacinthe and wish you good luck Juraj

Thanks Gregor, I can imagine that building two siblings might prove to be challenging - wish you good luck and would watch the progress. Thanks for the link, I came across that french forum the other day, unfortunately, I cannot read it due to my language barrier Still you confirmed my thoughts: La Jacinthe as portrayed in Boudriot Monography may be the simplest choice to build, but well possible it does not reflect the real ship overall look (Those open bulwarks made me suspicious from the beginning) If possible, what is the knowledge status of La Mutine? Is the kept plan sufficient proof of her appearance or is La Topaze the only of the three that can be documented thoroughly? Thanks J.

Hi Gregor, while eagerly waiting for your progress on these beautiful ships, one basic question came to my mind: If I remember correctly, originally you wanted to build La Jacinthe as one of those two. Have you abandoned this idea in favor of Mutine/Topaz for some specific reason? Did you find anything during the research that made La Jacinthe less interesting? I think you just wrote something about the research and then changing your mind, but if possible, I would be very interested in what have you found (Just a blind guess: maybe she was never really built with her bulwarks open as depicted on the plan and Mutine and Topaz are more real ships then?) Thanks Juraj

I vote for Caldercraft, at least they use Admiralty plans for design. Unfortunately the non-scale fittings etc. can be problem also here. Manufacturers just save the costs and offer "general" stuff for various models rather than providing special design for particular vessel. Still, as a kit, CC would be my choice.

Hi Gregor, thanks for the answers, I accept the one for my Question 2, but for the first question, I am confused: I do not speak French, have not read the description for the item 36 on the plans. But if you check the Monography La Jacinthe by Ancre, on p. 25, where La Mutine is described (I have purchased English version) you read : "... Modest improvements to the comfort of the crew in the form of lead-lined latrines abaft the catheads, and on the starboard side aft a seat of ease for the officers..." So if you are right, then the La Jacinthe monography is wrong (or vice - versa?) Juraj

Hi Gregor, very nice progress. 2questions: 1. how do you make the "seats of ease" located fore? I assume there shall be also some holes through the bulwarks? I cannot imagine how it shall look like - I assume that the schooner sides may had then occasionally some not so nice "decoration", while there is no "overhang" as for the officer's seat.... 2. How do you interpret this strange railing sitting on the top of the bulwark? - looks like some carved thin wooden rail tapered towards fore and aft. I cannot imagine what it was good for and why on plans it is carved only from inside! It looks like some addition to the bulwarks, but does not seem to have the same thickness juraj

Equally low together. Compared to kits from e.g Jotika, Victory Models, Model Shipways As said, if you just want to build something, does not matter which one of AL/Cons you choose. You will get what you pay for. Whether it is enough for you is up to you.

What do you mean by "quality" ? Material, instructions, historical accuracy and research behind the model? Nevertheless I would say both are equally low - may be it is better to speak of a particular kit from their range than just general talk, otherwise there is not much to recommend .

On quality of materials you have got the info. Regarding the scale, historical accuracy and the overall representation of the ship, I believe one of the worst producers. Obviously the market share, number of sells and reasonable price are the keys. So it depends what do you want from the kit. My opinion.

Hi Hennie, simply resize the photos to lower size. No need to use special tools, even basic free picture viewer (e.g. IrfanView) will do the job. Advantage is you can use there "Batch conversion", so all the photos are processed together with one click, after you preset desired properties. For the web presentation 100% sufficient. Example of the short "How to" : http://www.maximumpc.com/irfanview-batch-resize-images-2014/

Da Dallas together with Surprise should really be 52 t design, built by the same builder at the same time.

That is exactly what I mentioned in my previous post. Chapelle's books are great but also dated and some info may be inaccurate. Just like this one. I would strongly suggest to check newer researched materials before any statement of the origin is made And I will also be happy if learn something more.

Hi Eric, you may be confused easily. W. Doughty designed three categories of these ships for the purpose of the revenue service, ~31ton, ~52ton and ~75 tons. They look indeed very similar, but if you check closely, you will find differences in proportions etc. Alabama class were 2 vessels built on midsized Doughty's plans. So either you have a kit representing 31 ton cutter or 52t Alabama class, cannot be both at the same time! If you are searching for the particular vessel built on 31 ton design, you may be disappointed. I spent some time trying to get this but was not successful. So if you find any, please let me know! That does not mean no such vessel was ever built, just there is no evidence. The problem is, we have only preserved all three Doughty's plans, but not the list of vessels built. Some of them are known, some with doubts, but none is referred as the 31 ton cutter, sorry. You may find one reference to "possible" 31t cutter in one of the older Chapelle's book, but this was proved to be incorrect. Probably best sources for you would be the book "U.S. Coast Guard and Revenue Cutters by D.L.Canney, but as said, do not expect to find any 31t vessel built upon Doughty's plan we are talking about. It may well be possible, no such was ever built? One idea, but this is just my thought, nothing more: If you check the all three plans, the smallest one of 31 tons is the only one housing carronade pivot instead of the long gun. Obviously because of the lower weight. But if you think practically, these vessels were no true fighters (although some of them fought quite often I must say) and I would expect long pivot gun with higher range and accuracy would suit its purpose much better. If I were you I would just build the ship as 31t cutter - IF the kit is REALLY based on Doughty's smallest plan, you will have a nice period ship model based on real historic plans, unlike many fictitious ships from other producers. If you will try to connect it with any real vessel, you may easily be only more and more frustrated and that is not the aim I guess . For the start I would check the calculated kit dimmensions compared to plans

Hi Eric, may be it was lost in the posts here, but if it is (as stated above by MrBlueJacket) 31t schooner, then it CANNOT be Alabama class! Alabama class ships (Louisiana , Alabama) belongs to larger Doughty's 52t plans.

Thanks Gregor for an answer, I have sent you a PM...

Hi Charlie, I have no experience with all of these models, but from what I can see they seem to follow the above described pattern: they do resemble Doughty's design somehow, but do not care too much which one (31, 52, 75 tons?), all have just fictitious names and are probably all based on the same set of inaccurate italian plans (you can clearly see there key similarities, despite the different scale). If you buy them and try to measure and find the match with original, you may be dissappointed . I really hope this latest BlueJacket kit is another league.

Jotika does not produce this kit. They offer Alert in 1/24 made by Krick,German company. Quite old but impressive model due to its size, but 100% true what I wrote about particularly for this one. Sorry.

Hi Gregor, am back home and would like to make my points regarding the La Mutine deck. I have made a photo of the for view and marked with red dots what I believe looks like a deck step. I do not think this is any rigging related bar - it looks like a full beam, not the bar. Moreover, please have a look at the cathead stanchions, marked in my pic by red arrows. They do not go to the deck, but end exactly at the top of the mentioned beam (Or are hidden behind it?). If this is not the deck step, what is it? Just some massive beam laid across the deck? I do not understand . It is also visible on the deck plan, but it is too narow for any wooden beam, to me it looks more like a deck step, for the iron bar for attaching the rigging it is too low positioned, I think Regarding the aft section, I believe there is a clear step or how to call that from where also the rudder wheel axle protrude?:

As now we know, that the kit presented here depict the smallest of the Doughty's design, some comparison can be made: While it seems all the other producers (European like Mamoli, Corel, AL,....) are offering the same line of kits just roughly scalled, their biggest problem is, they are all using the plans originated somwhere in late 60' I believe, coming from Italy with many errors - most critical are the hull lines, the hull then look a bit flat, not enough curved towards the dec with wrong angles.similarly the keel andle etc. The kits of course do resemble Doughty's 1815 design, but look a bit weird I think. For comparison, see this picture I prepared, at the top Italian plans of typical Alert / Ranger atc. kit, below original Doughty's plan for 31t cutter. Do they look like the same ship? I am by no means technical expert, but I doubt. This are my conclusions and observations, whoever is welcome to correct me! I hope Eric does not mind these my posts, just because this particular ship is of some interest for me, I was brave enough to post something, hoping it may help . I am looking forward to seeing more of the BlueJacket Revenue cutter build and I hope it will be a faithfull representation of this: