Adler IV by ccoyle - HMV - 1/250 - CARD

[ccoyle]

Hello, and welcome to another new adventure in card! This time around I will be building the Adler IV published by HMV.

 

 

A little back story: When I was an exchange student living in Aurich, West Germany, in 1980, I had the opportunity to experience a Wattwanderung -- a hike across the mudflats between the mainland and the East Frisian Islands. We hiked over to Baltrum, had lunch, and then took a ferry back to the mainland. I don't remember the name of the ferry, and sadly I no longer have the photos I took that day, but I feel fairly certain it was a small ferry much like this one, perhaps this very ship or one of her sisters -- they remain in service down to the present and do operate in the area.

 

Adler IV, launched in 1977 (courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

 

I have many HMV kits in my stash, but I have only completed a few of them. My early HMV efforts were more or less doomed from the start for one reason or another. One incorporated PE brass, which I decided I did not like working with. The other was simply "too much model" for a builder of my experience. About half of my current HMV inventory consists of civilian vessels, and a number of them are ferries and coastal excursion ships. Adler IV is the smallest of them. It seemed advisable to start small and then work through the incrementally more difficult builds.

 

Adler IV is a small ship, only 104 ft long overall, so at 1/250 she'll be a small model, about 5" in length, with a small parts count -- there are only two pages of parts.

 

 

Curiously, the 'diagrams' for this kit consist of a single one-page series of in-progress photos.

 

 

I have the laser-cut detail set as well.

 

 

Look for first cuts soon!

 

[Ronald-V]

Love how fast you can "produce" models with card   looking forward to see this project come alive!  

[ccoyle]

First batch of hull parts cut out and base plate + internal frames assembled.

 

[ccoyle]

Zipping the hull up.

 

 

 

I'm not entirely happy with the hull. These 'egg crate' style hulls are very tricky, IMO, to get just right. The best one I have done was for USS England, and that one doesn't really count, because I had a 3D-printed hull to use as a base.

[amateur]

Nice start!

Are you going to ‘upgrade’ on the windows? Those blue squares don’t look very ‘glassy’.
(although I know that all designers use this style when it comes to larger windows)

 

Jan

Edited Wednesday at 02:00 PM by amateur

[ccoyle]

40 minutes ago, amateur said:

Are you going to ‘upgrade’ on the windows?

 

Nope. There are no parts for internal structure, so unless one chooses to scratch-build, then there isn't even the option.

[ccoyle]

A bit of progress forward . . .

 

 

. . . and aft.

 

[Dave_E]

I’m in! 👍😀

[ccoyle]

I'm straying a bit off the beaten path here. The superstructure is another egg-crate structure to be placed atop the egg-crate hull. That just doesn't strike me as a sturdy building method, so I'm doing something a little different. I trimmed all of the fold tabs off the upper deck and glued it down to a 1mm piece of cardboard. This should provide very stiff edges that are less likely to produce the dreaded 'starving cow' effect, while still providing ample gluing area for the superstructure sides. Of course, I had to trim down all of the internal egg crate frames to allow for the thicker deck, and it remains to be seen whether everything will go together the way I imagine it will.

 

 

Fingers crossed!