Soleil Royal by EricWiberg - Heller - 1/100 - PLASTIC - started 45 years ago

[EricWiberg]

Ian, thank you for the comments, and, when I display SR 1671 down the road, I am definitely thinking of a waterline display.  When I changed the sweep of the wales I started with the lower most wale and lowered it several millimeters, so that the middle (and lowest) part of the wale would dipping into the water. Even with that, I think I still would set the hull into a base to make a "waterline display"... I have no idea yet if I would make a realistic wave panorama like Marc LaGuardia plans to do. I thought initially about sawing off the lower section like Marc did, but... twobyears ago that was way behind my skill set! Theoretically I could do it now, but... talk about opening a can of worms!

[EricWiberg]

Ian... just thinking - and talk about opening a can of worms! - theoretically at this stage, I could build out the lower hull. Meaning that I planned the upper half... I theoretically could bulk up the lower hull and plank it. That may sound crazy, but when compared to what I have done so far, it is not a stretch. The "but" is... where the heck would I get an idea of what a proper lower hull shape is for SR1671?! So it is much easier than to bury the hull and make a waterline display

[Hubac's Historian]

Personally, Eric, I would not even consider building out, or expanding the lower hull.  It could be done, but you would need to figure out the rising line of the floors and make pattern guides that faired into the maximum breadth line.  The number of difficulties in doing this without CAD are numerous, and getting one small thing wrong, or working from an erroneous assumption could compromise the whole project.  Not worth it, IMO.  Conversely, it is not too difficult to place the un-cut hull into a waterline sea.

 

As for the QG entry doors, there would definitely have been an actual door there, opening inboard.  Seaways can get awful rough, and a ship’s capacity to pump out water would be quickly overwhelmed, if she were taking water in through these large openings.

[EricWiberg]

Marc.. thanks for bringing me back to reality,  and there will be a swinging door in the QG!

[Hubac's Historian]

The other issue with a lower hull build-out is that the entire midship to bow, along the maximum breadth is just all wrong.

[Hubac's Historian]

Heller’s SR looks amazing in sheer, but you just can’t focus too much on her underwater shapes.  When you minimize the visibility of the lower hull, you vastly improve the credibility of the kit as a scale model.

[Ian_Grant]

Recall that @yancovitch built a superb SR using bits of Heller's plastic hull to "plank" a wood bulkhead hull, which looked the cat's pajamas in terms of proportions. He is a master builder. 

 

I agree with Marc about a build out at this stage being impractical but his demonstrated how SR could look.