Want information on a model kit.

[Bill Hudson]

La Toulonnaise by Artesania Latina kit.  I think it might be out of production because it is not listed in their kits now.  A neighbor hashes kit that his wife bought over twenty years ago.  He has no interest in building it. Although the kit has been opened everything is still in sealed plastic trays. He was not able to find the plans. There is only an instruction manual in several languages. I brought it home to research it.  I did fine 1 1/ 2 pages in English. Once I removed the trays with materials from the box I found the plans for both the ship and sails. The kit seems to be of fairly good quality. some of the sheet stock is warped but I am not sure it will hinder construction. Same for the strips and dowels which were contained with rubber bands on the ends. I believe they too are salvageable. They have offered it to me yesterday but today whenI went to pick it up they kind of backed off giving it to me. They have no idea what price they want to charge me for it. Any one familiar with this kit.  What would its value be. His wife paid $100 for it from a hobby store back then. 

[Bill Hudson]

[Oldsalt1950]

The question is, what is the kit worth to you? The kit is a paperweight to them at the moment regardless of what they paid for it 20 years ago.

 

Jim

[Gregory]

If you want to build it, I think $75 would be a fair offer.  You might mention the the wood is probably dry and brittle and may need to be replaced to be able to build the kit.

[Jaager]

I do not believe that the situation where  AAMM has a monograph of this vessel is a coincidence.

My guess is that the AAMM plans were used to develop the kit and that royalties were paid.

Now almost all wooden sail AAMM monographs are drawn with a eye toward laminated carved hull.

They have a Body plan, so POB is easy enough to derive from it.

Once you get beyond hull fabrication, the monograph contains more than enough detail and is probably better than the plans that come with the kit.  The scale is 1:75  The data is on a large and crowded sheet.  It is all "What".  There is no "How".   Besides this site, there are more than a few books, and three journals available as CDs here that more than cover the "How".

 

We have wooden houses and many other wooden objects that are at least hundreds of years old.  There are trees that are hundreds of years old.  Wood is a polymer, but unlike man-made synthetic polymers, it does not get all that brittle with age. Too much moisture or direct UV over time will degrade it, but if the wood in an old kit is brittle or fragile, then this probably is because the species of wood and plywood quality supplied was crap to begin with.

Edited July 3, 2022 by Jaager

[allanyed]

Were their kits any better back then than they are now?  If they were just as bad back then as they are now, why pay anything?

Allan 

Edited July 3, 2022 by allanyed

[Gregory]

9 hours ago, Jaager said:

We have wooden houses and many other wooden objects that are at least hundreds of years old.

Most of the wood in those houses and objects is not on the order of .5 - 1.5mm thick

[Roger Pellett]

Bill,

 With a few notable exceptions, most of us building ship models are old enough where time is more precious than money.  A related concern is “What am I going to do with my models when I am no longer able to house and care for them?”  For many, the dumpster awaits.

 

If I were considering this kit, I would ask myself a few questions:

 

Does the subject matter really excite me?

Do I want to commit time to building this model that could be spent building something else?

Is the quality of the kit such that it will produce a model that I will be proud of?

Do I have space to display it, or do I know someone else who would like it?

 

If the answer to any one of these questions is no, I would advise them to list it on eBay.

 

Roger

[Bill Hudson]

2 hours ago, Roger Pellett said:

Bill,

 With a few notable exceptions, most of us building ship models are old enough where time is more precious than money.  A related concern is “What am I going to do with my models when I am no longer able to house and care for them?”  For many, the dumpster awaits.

 

If I were considering this kit, I would ask myself a few questions:

 

Does the subject matter really excite me?

Do I want to commit time to building this model that could be spent building something else?

Is the quality of the kit such that it will produce a model that I will be proud of?

Do I have space to display it, or do I know someone else who would like it?

 

If the answer to any one of these questions is no, I would advise them to list it on eBay.

 

Roger

Thank you Roger,  You make some good points. However at 90 1/2 years old there is always the possibility that anything I start may not be completed. However I do not think sitting and looking out a window till death comes is an alternative for me. I have to be building something with my hands even though they to aren't working as well for me as in the past. Since 1975 the majority of my income was from making miniatures and model horse drawn vehicles, tin ware and furniture from scratch. Each time I started a project I build extra bodies etc. in case I need to make another one. I just dumped a whole box of unfinished projects. I do not become attached to them when I build them. Scratch building would be my preference but researching, gathering material and accessories would be very time consuming. There are other ship mode kits I would rather build but the prices are way beyond my pocketbook. I  will buy the kit if the price is reasonable.  I see this kit as a basic platform to start from. Just from looking through the plans I can see lots of room for improving much of the detail. 

Edited July 3, 2022 by Bill Hudson

[catopower]

Hello Bill, 

 

I say, if you like the kit, buy it, build it, make your neighbor jealous that he didn't build it when he sees your completed model!

 

My first kits were Artesania Latina. The same is true for many others here. Kits all have their issues, none are perfect, but that doesn't have to keep you from having a great time building it. I find that Artesania Latina kits actually go together quite well, though I have no information on that particular one.

 

If you have any questions as you're building it, you can always ask for advice on this forum.

 

Good luck with whatever you decide!

Edited July 3, 2022 by catopower

[Bill Hudson]

I now own this kit.  Cost $0.00. They just gave it to me.  Not sure if or when I will build it. .

[Oldsalt1950]

Congratulations. Give the kit a try Bill. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

[Nirvana]

Bill, here is the link from AL with the plans for download.

There are four of them.
You need to download the jpg's and save to a thumb drive, then take it to a print shop.

They will be able to print them at 100% as the pre-view are at approx. 30% 

 

Good luck with the build.

[Roger Pellett]

Congratulations, Bill

 

I hope that you do build it.  I’m sure that you will do a great job.

[Bill Hudson]

Thank you all for the good and welcomed feedback. I m not jumping right on this kit. I  want to do  more research on this ship. Not finding much especially picture of it. The castings are fairly good. But metal castings were made to use in place of wood for simplicity. I will remake those in wood. The cannon carriages are a joke. Very flimsy.  I will build proper gun carriages from wood. The blocks appear to be plastic but are good castings so I (at this point in time) will not try to replace them by making them all from wood. I will put the kit on a shelf in a closet and ponder it some before starting the building. I still have the the Amazon (Marie Celeste) on my work bench to finish. I think I will do minimum rigging on it.  My son says he is not interested in having it soI don't see a reason to get too far into the rigging. Maybe I can sellout air a garage sale. I also have several orders for miniature tin ware to fill. (can use the income). 

[Bill Hudson]

       

I believe this might be the Corel version of this ship. You might want to mute the music.

Edited July 6, 2022 by Bill Hudson

[Bill Hudson]

I have started research on the ship's guns. It was equipped with screw type elevating rather than a wedge type as shown here.