RMS Titanic by popeye the sailor - Academy - PLASTIC - 1/400 scale

[GLakie]

I know what programs you're talking about on H2 Dennis. Watch that channel all the time myself, and the next time they pop up again, I'll yell at you. 

[Mirabell61]

Good work Denis,

 

with all those line- and wire and antena Ends and funnel backstays, that must be safely secured from below the decks I can imagine that you are constantly thinking it through, what must go next, where shall I have no more access to later on....

 

Very nice work so far, well done

 

Nils

[popeye the sailor]

I went online George and found the H2 channel website........but the videos that they have are only 2 to 5 mins long.    they have over 2,000 videos though,  but I'm going to look on xfinity {comcast cable} and see if they have access to the H2 channel.   the one I'm looking for was very recent,  so it should be on file     it talked about Mr. Bruce Ismay........a cryptic message sent to the White Star Line Office about the disaster,  and his elusiveness after rescue.   it also went into the legalities of the disaster.

 

I find it odd though,  that one of the main points of blame,  was the inadequacy of the life boats.   while there were only 22 life boats {and a number of collapsible life boats},  during the abandonment they were poorly filled..........so many more could have been saved.   so many mistakes of decision were made during the disaster.  by all means.......if you find it before I do,  please let me know .......I only saw a snippet of it at work 

 

thanks Nils.   the kit only supplies one size thread for the rigging........I'm pretty sure that there must have been different sizes that actually made up the rigging.   I have some very nice diagrams,  but at this scale,  they would be hard to do.   a build that your doing would do nicely

 

Titanic Paint and Color Reference

 

some of them might be of interest to you........take a browse through some of the sub files,  and you should find them.   I do wish I was doing a build at the scale in which your doing      such wonderful work sir! 

[GLakie]

I've seen those Titanic programs on the History and Nat Geo channels as well Dennis, and some of those were 2 hrs. long and got heavily into the structural design aspects and detailed info as to how she must have broken up. It's not on "On Demand" though. Tried to find them just now, and no cigar, but I'll keep looking, and let you know. 

 

Cheers

[BenF89]

Dennis,

 

I think I know the program you're referencing - they compared the expansion joints on Olympic and Titanic to the expansion joints on the Britannic, to see if/how the designers/builder changed the termination details. 

 

I don't recall the exact conclusions from the program, other than there was a notable detail change at the bottom of the expansion joints. The Britannic had a round 'bulb' shaped detail at the bottom, where the first two ships of the class had a 'sharp' termination. That said, I can tell you with a high degree of certainty that the expansion joints were not causal players in the breakup; the separation of the expansion joints during the break up was a symptom of the ship coming apart deep in the hull, not a starting point for the failure.

 

I happen to be connected to the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers (SNAME) Marine Forensics Committee. Several members have done extensive work on the breakup of Titanic, and I've had the opportunity to discuss it at some length with one of the members, a guy named Rich Woytowich. He's not a naval architect, per se, but he is a structural engineer, and he's really studied the different failure mechanisms that would have to have occurred to generate the damage we see on the ship, and on several major pieces of debris (notably the two large sections of the bottom of the ship that were found far away from the main sections of the ship, and the 'big piece' section of plating from the starboard side that was recovered a while back).

 

Rich has written several great papers on the breakup of the ship, and even has a guest blog post on the Scientific American website. Even the comments on the article are informative, since the objections raised are generally well thought out, AND the author responded to each one individually with well reasoned response to the objections raised. And like I said, I actually know the guy, and I think what he has to say is really well thought out.

 

Here is a link to the Scientific American blog post he wrote: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/how-did-titanic-really-break-up/

Edited July 17, 2015 by BenF89

[popeye the sailor]

interesting article Ben......but I think another question would need to be asked.   Why would the ship take a course such as that,  if it's bow wasn't modified to act as an ice breaker?   it doesn't appear that the Titanic was equipped to handle ice .......I would think that the bow would have had much thicker plating to withstand the impacts.

 

the Olympic also hit an iceberg in Sept of 1911.........and the Britannic had to lay in wait,  til Titanic was finished.  this ship was only in service for about a year, when it was hit by an enemy mine or torpedo and sunk.   the Britannic only lays in 400 feet of water..........the Titanic,  in over 2 1/2 miles.

[GLakie]

They also found stress cracks in rivets, that shouldn't have had any, in the locations they  were found. Meaning they found sub-standard quality metal was used in her construction. When she hit the ice-berg, they said it didn't "tear" her open like many had thought, but rather, the scraping of it broke numerous rivets, and loosened plates enough to let massive amounts of water in. Between that and the bulkheads only stopping so much water in one compartment, and consequently, letting consecutive compartments flood beyond it, is what sank her in the end.  

[Jparsley]

Hey guys I got a great titanic for y'all

[BenF89]

Well, there is still some debate over the rivet quality. It is generally acknowledged that there were impurities in the wrought iron rivets used at the fore and aft ends, roughly the forward 25-30% of the length and the aft 25-30% of the length. The middle 30-50% used better quality steel rivets (vs wrought iron). The theory is that the slag in the wrought iron rivets resulted in stress concentrations that meant just the act of hammering the rivets to shape stressed the material to near its ultimate tensile strength. Then, when the pressure exerted on the hull by the iceberg was taken up by the rivets, a bad rivet would fail, transmitting the load it was carrying to the ones around it, which were then overloaded and failed, dumping their load, and so on until a good rivet stopped the 'unzipping' of the seam. Meanwhile, another seam would unzip, and so forth until the contact with the iceberg stopped OR the iceberg got to the better steel rivets, which didn't start to unzip at all.

 

That's the theory, and the mechanics of the unzipping seem to be mostly right. The question is how much of the initial failure can be attributed to poor material quality, and how much should be attributed to running into an essentially solid object at 23 miles an hour. 

 

As for the vessel course issue - Titanic was running a lengthier, southern course. Normally the Transatlantic liners ran a bit more north, along the 'golden circle.' But during iceberg season they adjusted course slightly south to avoid most of the pack ice coming from the waters around Greenland/northern Canada. It is even recorded the Titanic adjusted course even more south when the warnings came in (although she didn't reduce speed- but that was common among all the cruise liners of the time). 

 

And the plating was what was required by the board of trade. You're right - it wasn't designed for high speed ice impacts. But that type of side-swipe impact wasn't considered a major risk. The more common 'ship sinkers' were collisions with other vessels, hence the two compartment standard for flotation - two compartments could typically contain a T-bone type impact from another ship. And, in most cases of iceberg impacts, they were head on, but there was also more ability to take damage forward (due to hull form) - Titanic could have the first four consecutive compartments flooded and still stay afloat. A side-swipe impact is still not generally a damage condition that is given a lot of consideration, and that much damage will take out modern ships - look at the Costa Concordia. To put it bluntly, Titanic had 1/3 of the hull ripped open. A modern warship would have some difficulty compensating for that much damage (not saying they couldn't). It's remarkable the ship stayed AFLOAT as long as it did.

[popeye the sailor]

take into consideration that the crew was ill trained to handle such an emergency.   everything I've read and seen so far,  suggests that they weren't trained properly.   they had received a warning from the S.S. Californian,  and from other ships about the icebergs.   even the look out testified that his binoculars were missing from the crows nest.........had he had them,  he might have seen them sooner.   a lot that I read boasted that no expense was spared in the building of Titanic........but other accounts I've read stated otherwise.

 

Titanic was a blunder in the making.........the one saving grace,  was that she didn't have a full manifest......or the toll would have been much higher.

[popeye the sailor]

the riveted hull was a huge focal point............had the ship been more modern,  the method of welding might have taken the place of so many rivets,  although some would have had to have been used.

 

taken from wiki.......

 

The 2,000 hull plates were single pieces of rolled steel, mostly up to 6 feet (1.8 m) wide and 30 feet (9.1 m) long and weighing between 2.5 and 3 tons.^[69] Their thickness varied from 1 inch (2.5 cm) to 1.5 inches (3.8 cm).^[40] The plates were laid in a clinkered (overlapping) fashion from the keel to the bilge. Above that point they were laid in the "in and out" fashion, where strake plating was applied in bands (the "in strakes") with the gaps covered by the "out strakes", overlapping on the edges. Steel welding was still in its infancy so the structure had to be held together with over three million iron and steel rivets which by themselves weighed over 1,200 tons. They were fitted using hydraulic machines or were hammered in by hand.^[70] In the 1990s some material scientists concluded^[71] that the steel used for the ship was subject to being especially brittle when cold, and that this brittleness exacerbated the impact damage and hastened the sinking. It is believed that, by the standards of the time, the steel's quality was good, not faulty, but that it was inferior to what would be used for shipbuilding purposes in later decades, owing to advances in the metallurgy of steelmaking.^[71]

[BenF89]

Certainly the crew was unprepared, and several important ice warnings were either ignored, or not received.

 

For example, around 11:00pm on Sunday the 14th, there was a radio message attempted to be sent from the liner Californian, probably 20-30 miles away to the northwest, saying she was stopped in ice (i.e. they were surrounded by bergs, and the master didn't feel safe to proceed in the dark). The Marconi radio employees on Titanic were just that - employees of Marconi, not the ship. Their fiscal responsibility was to passenger messages first, and ship-to-ship messages second. The wireless telegraph on Titanic had been out of commision for 24 hours because of some malfunction, so the operators had a backlog of passenger messages, and they had just got in range of the Marconi station at Cape Race. They were working with that station trying to clear all the passenger messages when the (very, very loud) signal from the Californian came blasting in. Before the message could be completed, the radio operator on Titanic replied "Shut up, Shut Up, I'm working Cape Race." The operator on the Californian ceased his message, listened to the passenger mail from Titanic for a bit, then shut down and went to bed at 11:30 pm. (Ships weren't required to have 24-7 radio operations at the time). Titanic hit the iceberg ten minutes later, at 11:40. The Californian would be criticized for being so close yet not hearing or having any indication of the Titanic's situation.

 

It really goes to show that human error can override a lot of good design. To reinforce that point, the sister ship of Titanic, the Britannic, was redesigned with a complete double skin, higher bulkheads (she could have the first 6 compartments flooded, vs the first 4), and many (many) more lifeboats. She hit a mine in the Mediterranean working as a hospital ship during World War 1. The combination of blast and shock damage resulted in the first 6 watertight compartments being compromised - the limit at which she should have been able to stay afloat and limp back to port. She sank in less than half the time Titanic did. Why? The nursing staff on board had opened all the portholes in the hull to air out the ship in preparation of taking on wounded soldiers from Gallipoli. As the bow settled, water rushed into the portholes along the ship, and compromised the rest of the compartmentation. 

 

You can't fix stupid (even well intended stupid), and you can't really design it away either.

Edited July 20, 2015 by BenF89

[FatFingers]

An article that might be of interest. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Nomadic_(1911)

The Nomadic is the only remaining White Star Line steamship, she was built in 1911 as tender for Olympic. She has recently been restored, including an attempt at the ever problematic White Star tan for the funnel.

 

Excellent work you're doing.

Edited July 22, 2015 by FatFingers

[popeye the sailor]

sorry for my absence Ben.....I had a rather bad case of the  'busies'..   even my vacation didn't pan out the way I wanted it to.   I'm planning another one for August.......and of course,  taking my birthday off too.  a lot of the info I've uncovered sheds light on the same points......but there was a lot of human error and ill fate mixed in there as well.

 

to be honest,  I haven't seen too much info on that ship fatfingers.   as far as the White Star buff goes,  it would still be hard to nail down a definite color,  as all paints were mixed on site.  this suggests that the paint color might not match between ships.  I settled on British Gulf LT Stone as the paint of choice.  the way it allows the orange hue of the parts show through,  it adds to the color.    they were going to study the Britanic,  since she was a close resemblance to the Titanic........I haven't read anything that tells how it worked out for them.  historians.......gotta love'm 

 

I do know one thing though.......I 'm beginning to miss working on wood.  I had hoped I could resume one of my other builds,  once this build was under way.....there still may be hope for that happening yet!     to pass some time,  I brought out this one special project,  that I've been chomping at the bit to start.  I had to disassemble the hull,  due to it becoming damaged in transit.  during the larger part of the dis assembly,  I began to dream of an even larger picture.....something just too delicious to pass up.  but.........it gave me a chance to play in some sawdust for a little while,  I need to repair the keel and clean up the ribs.........l'll shut up now 

 

I will have an update very soon 

[popeye the sailor]

I've managed to put something together......wonders never cease!    I actually had the day for myself today......the only thing I needed to do,  was repair a Christmas ornament that had broken over the holidays....and of course,  I offered to fix it  {I found it stuffed in a drawer......I had no more room under the carpet  }

 

there were a couple of pictures from a week ago.......like this one,  where I had glued on the two little wall pieces and the forward roof......after adding the back stay for the fore mast.

 

 

during another opportunity to play at the table,  I painted one of the funnels.  this is the British Gulf LT Stone......I think it was more the color of the parts than anything else......the paint didn't cover very well.

 

 

I also managed to paint the railing sprues,  and the vent parts with flat white.  there are a lot of parts here.

 

 

 

still a bit befuddled concerning the funnel order,  I set'em up again.........now the one I thought was first,  is last

 

 

I had painted that one,  because the ladder was cemented in place.  there are other parts that need to go onto them,  but there are no locator tabs,  and a couple of the parts are associated with other parts,  that are cemented to the structures.

    three words best describe this hobby......goesinta,   goesonta,  and goesova..........just thought I'd share that with you,  just in case I ever use these words.  don't wantcha ta think I went hip-hop or something 

 

today.......I got to think'in........those funnels are such a small job.  it t'would be a chore to crank the Craftsman compressor up.........what can I do..Hmmmmmmmm.   I remembered that I had the Spray craft outfit......this is comprised of the airbrush,  which is a gravity feed,  a holder,  hose,  and a three speed compressor.   I didn't want to change over the Testors airbrush I had set up for the Craftsman,  so I got the old one that I had set aside a while ago.

 

 

to hook up the hose,  I cut a small piece of the hose from the gravity feed,  and used it as a connector,  seeing that the Testors hose is smaller in size.

 

 

after checking the airbrush out,  I found that it wasn't the airbrush itself that was bad.....it was the cap.  the cap and siphon tube screws onto the testors 1/4 oz bottles.......naturally,  these caps are prone to wearing out.   I used another cap.....and it worked just fine.   I sent testors an e-mail today,  asking where I can get new caps and siphon tubes.  I hope to get an answer soon........I have two caps left.   so far I've bought two of these kits   TES4030 & TES4034....here are the numbers in case you want to do a search on the testors website.

 

Testors » Airbrushes » Airbrushes

 

I have been spraying out on the porch.........here is my spray booth

 

 

here are the funnels with a coat of paint on them

 

 

 

some ghosting did occur,  but I think it has a little to do with the color of the plastic........orange is such a transparent color to work with....it's as bad as white.   I gave the first pair the second coat.......they look much better

 

 

I also have an Aztek A320 spray outfit too........that is a siphon feed.   I have never used it.......these testors airbrushes have worked so well,  I haven't had to resort to it

 

 

[Omega1234]

Hi Dennis

The funnel's came out beautifully and the airbrush certainly worked a treat.

I also liked your new words 'goesinta, goesonta, goesova"....I'll definitely remember those ones!

Cheers and all the best!

Patrick

Edited July 24, 2015 by Omega1234

[GLakie]

That second coat made the difference Dennis. They look fine now. A nice bit of diagnostic work in getting the air-brush working again.   

[mtaylor]

I'm glad you got some shipyard time, Popeye.   I was beginning to worry.   By the way, you forgot the "goesunda" pieces.

Edited July 24, 2015 by mtaylor

[Jim Lad]

Glad to see that you managed some shipyard time, Popeye!  That funnel colour looks good - a lovely British Merchant Navy buff.

 

John

[Greg the peg leg sailor]

Great job on the funnels mate. Nice to have a spray gun.

Havagooday

Greg

[popeye the sailor]

thank you everyone for the good word!   I've had these spray outfits for quite a while now.......strange that I never thought of trying out the spraycraft compressor sooner.   I got a conformation e-mail from the Rustoleum people.......just waiting now for an actual answer.   I never knew that testors was affiliated with rustoleum....learn something new every day.   gave the funnels another coat....and sprayed the pipe work parts while I was at it.     the funnel color is suggested by the TRMA........can't believe that I had some on hand 

 

you are right Mark....I forgot that one   

[popeye the sailor]

hi all...........just me      got a bit off track,  as you can see.........I was part auto mechanic,  landscaper,  and a bunch of other small sub titles for a little while.   I had some pictures to post, but even that got side tracked.   some pictures never even got taken......so all that I have done will have to be all bunched together.

 

the funnels are now painted.......I had to cement the ladders on them,  which are the only parts I'm sure are in the right location......the other parts I speak of have no locator tabs at all.....I will have to guess at their exact location.  for the half raised decks,  with the fore and aft ends having major {and ugly} gaps in them,  I was going to use one of the deck pieces from the United States build.  I noticed that there was a part number on the underside of the part.  I may use something else though.......something a bit thinner......still in the planning stage on this. 

 

this is not a flattering picture........to look at it,  you might think that not all the funnels are at the same slant.....but they are.

 

 

still a bit more painting to go,  but the roofs at the aft section are now painted.  I started to do the railings for the lower deck,  but they are a collection of tiny sections.......a real pain to assemble.

 

 

more was added to the mid section........again,  more paint work needs to be done

 

 

same with the fore section.......

 

 

I saw the layout shot tonight.......I was in a hurry when I imported them to my computer.......yea,  I wasn't pleased with it,  due to the slant issue.   I took another one tonight........but now I'm thinking that this might not be the correct lineup for the funnels.   here's a better picture.

 

 

there..........four little indians,  all in a row.  but something still seems off.   here is a different arrangement of the funnels.  I took the last one and made it first........the third one is now the second one........the first one is now the third one.......and the second one is now the fourth one.  I like this better.........your thoughts?

 

[GLakie]

Good to see you're making progress on her Dennis. I know all about "life" popping up and delaying the best-laid plans, but it's just something we have to deal with. 

 

Cheers

[Blue Pilot]

Looking Good. I will enjoy following along with your build. Its nice to take a look at a plastic build.

[Jim Lad]

Looking good, Popeye.  So long as all the funnels are at exactly the same rake in reality, you're right on track.  The black tops go on separately, I take it?

 

John

[dgbot]

Popeye you are bringing back memories from my youth.  My parents bought me the Revell kit for Christmas.  I am relearning how to work with plastic.  Since the gallery is filling up I will be in the gallery with a pair of binoculars.  Casey, I was informed that Vallejo was designed for airbrushing so needs to be thinned down.  Used straight from the bottle a basic brush but not cheap.  

David B

[UpstateNY]

Hi Popeye,

 

She continues to look better and better as each detail is added. You and Nils together are making me want to try building a liner one day!

 

You asked so my two cents is I like the the second arrangement better as well for some reason. Hard to pin down why, but there looks to be an even progression in the stack heights from bow to stern.  How about doing a test mount of this deck on the hull to see if you still like that way the best?

 

Cheers,

 

Nigel.

[donrobinson]

Looks to me as you have it right now, good work

[S.Coleman]

The black bands that go onto the top of the funnel? Are the all the correct height or some of them different?

[Greg the peg leg sailor]

G'day Denis

You have changed my mind about plastics. Your log and work is fantastic. Maybe, just maybe, I might do a plastic for myself. Keep the log coming mate.

Havagooday

Greg