Opinions on mini mamoli kits

[Mike Esposito]

Good quality? Instructions ok? Good for my 1st wood ship build? Was eyeing the San Rafael kit. Maybe the Yacht America?

 

Thanks 

[ccoyle]

These are highly simplified kits done at scales that are often difficult for beginners to manage. I find them to be more of a novelty than a serious project. Or something suitable for kids. As always, your smileage may vary.

[Mike Esposito]

Thanks. I'm just worried that I won't finish. I started the cutter Alert years ago. Never finished. I have been building model aircraft kits for decades. Tired of it. Always fascinated by tall ships from 15th to late 19th century. 

 

Should I build a plastic kit 1st I wonder? 

Edited January 24, 2019 by Mike Esposito

[ccoyle]

If you look through the galleries and build logs here, you will find many examples of nicely done plastic models. The two media, plastic and wood, require slightly different skill sets, though certain modeling tasks, such as tying ratlines, will be the same regardless of medium. If you feel more comfortable working with plastic, there's certainly no compelling reason to not continue working with it. Of course, wood is nice too and rewarding in its own way. There's really no correct answer to your question that applies to very person equally. Perhaps try both and see which one you like better? 

[vossiewulf]

Wooden kits have many advantages, including ease of modifications and not least being that a well-made wooden ship model has some significant intrinsic value, whereas plastic models have much less if any, despite how well they might be built. Also, the choices for plastic models of reasonable quality is much less than what is available with wood.

 

The downside with wooden ship models is the planking phase. It's quite difficult to figure out the concepts the first time around, and it's just plain repetitive; you can easily spend a couple months of evenings doing nothing but adding a couple planks an evening. And in general ship modeling calls for many repetitive tasks- you build a 74 gun ship and you're going to be building 74 cannon carriages with the only differences being size.

 

If for no other reason, it seems to be why ship modeling is dominated by older modelers, it seems like most people have to hit a certain age before they have enough patience to work through some of the tedious phases of ship builds

 

The kits that do the most hand-holding of modelers while producing good results are the Master Korabel kits from Russia- every plank is laser cut so no need to figure out planking bands and tapering and spiling planks. A good way to see if you'd like that style of kit is to buy one of their inexpensive ship's boat kits.

 

I wouldn't recommend the mini Mamoli kits. They're really not very good and will produce at best something you would be none too proud to show your friends.

[bigcreekdad]

don't waste your money