Carp to Gold Ep.7.: Mast Deck It Out

The bad puns are never-ending with this one. The hull varnished and (mostly) cured, it was high time to apply the main wooden deck pieces.

For this, first I made a cradle from leftover EPS foam so I wouldn't rub off anything or get nasty fingerprint marks.

Then I sliced up the deck into smaller sections, followed by a lot of dry fitting and trimming before finally placing them. The self-adhesive material was reinforced with some PVA glue at places.

Carp to Gold Ep.6.: Washed and Weathered

First, PSA: I made a separate label just for this project for easier searching.

Second, lately it has become a trait of local politicians to voice that 'we are responsible politicians, we believe in transparency, admit our mistakes and stand up to correct them.' As if that's something to be praised and not just plain normal.

So it is with a heavy heart that I must announce that when I removed the masking tape from the upper hull, it tore off a bit of paint at the waterline. But as a responsible modeller, I believe in transparency and while documenting this project, I admit my mistakes. (Here's where the audience should clap.)

Anyway, nothing a quick primer and a lick of paint don't fix.

Allies and Enemies of Zinqagur

Finished a few more 1/2000 scale scratchbuilt ships - most of these are ReReRe, which means repaired, repainted and rebased older ones.

First, the remainder of the Asansmati sea-going force, the ships which survived the defeat by the Klagimir fleet at the Battle of Tunova Atoll. Three USN pre-dreadnought battleships, one armored cruiser and a large-ish TBD force. These are all old models.

Asansmat is going the way of least resistance and would try to overcome the Zinqaguri squadron on the eastern seaboard of the Cape.

Carp to Gold Ep. 5. - Young and Boatiful

The Aurora has four pairs of boats according to my plans, including two steam launches. These are the boats that came with my kit. As you can see there's only seven of them. I washed them and scraped off the sticky glue residue, also trimming away some of the injection mould marks.

Carp to Gold, Ep. 4., Smug Assemblies

The time of painting has come on the Aurora!

I primed the hull white with MIG One Shot primer, then coated the entire thing with two layers of VMC White Grey, following up with VMC Yellow Ochre on the deck and upper works.

The upper mast trunks are left bare because they are going to require further attachments once the main bridge structure is placed.

Carp to Gold, Ep.3., The Sand(ing)s of Time

I thought I could gain no more by keeping the deck and hull halves separate, so I assembled them. Hair bands and rubber are always useful for keeping pressure at the right places.

Carp to Gold: Ep. 2., Hullduggery

Before any doubt arises, yes, I will add more bad puns to the title of this series.

Anyway, I made some progress on the Aurora, which at first seems a backwards step, but alas! not so!

I managed to separate the deck and the hull halves. For the 1903 fit these require major surgery, and it is actually better to have access to the edges of the deck and the inside of the hull halves.

So I sanded most of the tacky glue off the deck, and then removed the two midships sponsons and the rearmost one with a scalpel, we won't need those. Also the rearmost deck house and the 6" gun have to be switched up, so I chopped the deck house off and will rebuild it later.

Carp to Gold: Restoring an old Heller/Ogonek 1/400 Cruiser Aurora

My wife convinced me to create an account on the second hand marketplace app Vinted. It's mainly for clothes but there's also hobby stuff. 

Whilst browsing I found this 1/400 scale model of the cruiser Aurora. I made a bargain bid and the seller agreed, so for very little money I now have the model.

As it turns out (based on the info available on Scalemates) this is originally a Heller mould, made in the sixties and resold by various companies over the years, primarily a Russian brand named Ogonek, in multiple iterations. It's rather crude, and it was obviously built by an enthusiastic kid or someone alike. It has thick red paint on the underside of the hull which is still not completely dry, while the upper works are bare grey plastic. The parts were attached with lots and lots of superglue.

The first thing to do was separating and stowing away the parts that I could, which was a surprisingly large amount, the glue having dried and failing to adhere anymore. So I could just remove most things with my fingers. I'll sand the deck and hull anyway, so I did not really care about glue marks.

Now on to my plans with the model. I'm going to strip the paint off the bottom, sand it smooth, repair the glue marks where I can, and then... I'm going to convert the ship back to its original 1903 state and paint it in the white and ochre livery of the day.

This includes building back the bulwarks on the main deck with plasticard, filing away some of the center sponsons, and adding lots and lots of aftermarket parts. The reasoning behind this is because the model itself was very cheap, I can invest more in these.

I have already made the first purchase which includes a wooden deck, resin gun mounts for the 6" guns, and turned brass barrels. The guns are 1/350 scale, which is about 14% larger than the original scale of the model, but the original gun mounts did also look kind of out of place and lacked any detail, so I'm not very worried about that.

The next purchase will include 3" gun carriages, and photoetched ladders, rails and stairs. It's going to take a while to finish the model, but I'm looking forward to working on it.

The Royal Zinqaguri Navy in 1/2000

I might have mentioned earlier that I switched over from 1000 to 1/2000 scale for my 'Trashy Fleets' project. The decision was based on space and time constraints, in order to get a few games played over a short period.

By this time I managed to complete my imaginary Zinqaguri navy's two battle squadrons, one for the country's east and one for the west coast. They have different paint jobs because why not? 

Also each squadron has a TBD detachment, but being deployed on separate stations and not very likely to operate together, I only completed one base of TBDs in total.

The Power of the Heimudbär

These four are Heimudbär-class sea-going monitors, in 1/1000 scale, and are mostly entirely fictional. I finished them a little after the Charles Martel / ZS Lakardo.

They are sort of inspired by Norwegian/Swedish traditional monitor warships of the ironclad age, continuing to serve in various capacities well into WW1. As you can see some of them are modernized, others are not.

The small fleet will be part of the Nordsburian Navy in my imagi-nations setting, an up and coming power in the far off colonies, away from any main conflict. Their primary adversary will be the Zinqaguri Navy. At the time when Nordsbur commences a campaign of agression on Zinqaguri merchant shipping, all they have are these, a few coastal defence ships and armored cruisers. The Zinqaguri have two very capable battleships, but as Cape Zinqagrech divides the waterways between two major oceans, they have to split their forces.

The models are just pieces of 2mm balsa sanded to shape, and coated in a dark grey. Various bits of plastic offcuts were used to create the minimalistic superstructures. Most of them have short-barreled big guns, but the pair in the middle has some more modern smaller bore pieces. Were they blessed with decent speed they could be used for commerce raiding - provided there is a flat calm sea.

Trashy Fleets - When Life Gives You Lemnos...

I started working on the USS Mississippi-class pre-dreadnought battleship that later became the RHN Lemnos a while before the Hood and I managed to complete both at about the same time.

My main concern with US-made warships was, of course, modelling the lattice masts. This is not a problem at smaller scales as I just make a tapered conical rod and paint on the detail. However, in 1/1000 scale this was not feasible.

Delving into the internet somebody on some forum mentioned plastic nets in which they stored fruit in supermarkets as lattice mast material, so I first got some oranges and tried to use the net they were stored in, but it proved too big. Next I bought some garlic in a similar package albeit with smaller gaps in the netting, and it worked just fine!

So I know technically the Lemnos had her main mast switched to a traditional battle mast later, but for experimental purposes (and to make the pun in the title) I had mine retain both.

The Mighty ZS Lakardo (Not Quite Charles Martel)

As part of my ongoing 1/1000 scale Trashy Fleets exploits, I'm finally done with the almost Charles Martel, she is joining the Zinqaguri Navy, a peripheral minor power in my world of imagi-nations. Being quite fancy AND a battleship, she is going to bear the fleet admiral's flag.

Steaming alongside the Charles Martel, or as she will be known in Zinqagur, the ZS Lakardo, is the small torpedo boat destroyer TB-1 Marsal, modelled after the real world Claymore-class French ship, so they are kind of matching.

The only ahistorical element of the battleship is the fact that I left a tier of the main deck out, so the fore and aft main turrets are on the same level, while in fact the rear one should be placed a bit lower.

Trashy Fleets WIP #2

Inspired by, among other things, Archduke Piccolo's recent posting about his scratchbuilt pre-dreadnought battleships, I dug out my own work-in-progress hulls and proceeded a good deal with building them.

The Swedish coastal defence ship Äran got a full paintjob, all she needs now is a layer of gloss acrylic medium and finish on her base (and gluing the hull to said base).

The not-quite Charles Martel (forgot an extra layer of superstructure) also starts to look like herself, finished all twele turrets (the French designers just got a little bit overboard with that aspect) and installed the cabin windows, stacks and upper platform. As you can see I also did a little bit of pre-painting on hard to reach areas. Her main hull will be finished in dark grey, upper structure yellow ochre and the deck a linoleum color.

There are also a few hulls of Tordenskjold-class monitors in the background, more on them at a later time.

Trashy Fleets WIP - HSwMS Äran and MNF Charles Martel

 

I try to post regularly these days (usually on Mondays because then I would have time to gather materials durink the weekend), but these past two weeks were our - now seemingly regular - holiday to close off the summer, including a trip to Greece, and a 4 hour delay followed by a return trip through a nasty storm on our way back home.

Anyway, after making some resin galleys (see previous post) I quickly got distracted, and as I've had these two hulls lying around, I decided to do some work on them for my 1/1000 scale Trashy Fleets project.

On the left is the assembled coastal defence ship HSwMS Äran, a utilitarian Swedish Navy vessel. I like these ships a lot, as they pack quite a punch compared to their size. She and the rest of her class would supposedly play a part in an upcoming Zinqaguri-Nordsburian naval conflict set in my imagi-world in the future.

On the right is proof that I sort of managed to master creating tumblehome hulls using balsa wood, the French pre-dreadnought Charles Martel, with its main hull complete and secondary (tertiary?) turrets attached. The four larger turrets are in the making - the two main ones are complete and await attachment, pictured right next to the hull. 

I mainly used balsa wood, plastic rods and spare 1/700 bits (like the secondary battery of a Kongo class for the Äran and main barrels of a USS Arizona for the Charles Martel) to get this far. The turrets on the Charles Martel are rods of magic sculpt kneaded to shape, then sanded, as the fibers in the balsa wood would be just too rough for such intricate work. Just as with my previous pre-dreadnought, I'm going to build bases for these ships as well.

Trashy Fleets - 1/1000 Royal Navy pre-dreadnought

By popular demand (that is, the Mad Padre has mentioned in the previous post that he would like to see some ships), here is the first Trashy battleship.

Now I cheated with this one a little, as the hull was completed some time ago, I just added touch-ups and the base. The model is roughly 1/1000 scale, so about 10cm/4" long, with emphasis on the proportions and general features.

This ship represents the epitome of RN pre-dreadnoughts (not counting the Lord Nelsons), with two pairs of 12" guns in hooded barbettes, and funnels abeam of each other. The ship's got no name yet, as most likely she will not be part of a historical representation of the Royal Navy.

Trashy Fleets - The Trashy Fleet Spirit

Here's the motto of the Trashy Fleets Pre-Dreadnought project, explained in detail.

Make It Free

Ordinary household items like cardboard, corkboard, plastic tubes etc. are perfect material for some trashy ship modelling.

One can also use leftovers from model kits for secondary armament, conning towers, railings, masts etc., the possibilities are limitless.

If It's Not Free, Make It Cheap

Junkyards, online trading groups and flea markets are the favoured hunting ground of the scratchbuilder, and he will use anything and everything he can get for cheap.

Make It Good Lookin'

Of course the above does not exempt one from historical examples such as well-proportioned and functional vessels. Everybody likes trash-bashing, but there should be a standard. Trashy Fleets aren't made up of scale models, but one can keep close.

...And Justice for All

The title is not extremely correct, as these are the six Republique/Liberté-class French pre-dreadnought battleships, accidentally including one that is named Justice, but suits the theme well.

I've used up my last bit of 2mm balsa, so the hull of the ships is made from corrugated cardboard, and covered in paper. The upper half where the superstructure sits is a piece of 1mm balsa. Cardboard is a rather difficult material to sand, so the ships are a bit over-sized, especially at their beam, but this is actually somewhat beneficial: they look like stocky little things, just like they supposed to.

Construction was otherwise problem-free: lately I prefer to show my ships in a state of battle readiness, deck clutter, including boats removed, which eases the building process. 

Once I finished the German battlecruisers, I felt that although in true WW1 terms the Kaiserliche Marine does not really overwhelm the Entente fleets, in my imaginary world there is a huge advantage to the Jackewlinese - Frieglander axis. This is mainly because I made Jackewline proprietor of both the Royal and US Navy ships. It is only reasonable that without proper allies on the continent, Jackewline attempts to out-build her enemies, the Island Kingdoms (IJN) and Veuden (Imperial Russian Navy). 

The tables are turning on the Frieglander side of things though, as they have 'built' all four large battleship classes sans the Bayerns now, which means 17 ships at full fighting capacity, plus the very capable armoured cruiser Blücher and seven battlecruisers. Facing them, the Cartelucian fleet (Italy) counts five dreadnoughts, the Quisobians (Spain and South American countries) another six, four of which are the Espana-class ships of dubious quality, and the Crontaineville fleet (France) can only put five Danton-class pre-dreadnoughts to sea, sixteen ships in total. This should be somewhat remedied by the pre-dreadnought spam which these six ships here are only a forebear of.

Looking for suitable materials to replace balsa, I came across a piece of dense corkboard, and now I'm using it to build the Minas Geraes-class and a pair of Dante Alighieris (I know, there has been only one, but this is why playing with imagi-nations is sometimes better than the real world), to have at least a semblance of fair play between Friegland and her enemies. They should either be followed by the Edgar Quinets or the Italian armored cruisers (Pisa and San Giorgo-classes).

Test Naval Battle

I've come up with a set of rules to play out naval engagements. Previously I've been using Inter Arma d8 Naval (I think it's available in the Rules page), but the time has come to make something new.

Anyway, the Jackewlinese Royal Navy, after the previous tactical victory over the Veudeni Navy, became aware of more Veudeni troop movements and moved to intercept.

They had a pair of dreadnought battleships and three semi-dreadnoughts. The Veudeni fleet also consisted of a dreadnought battleship, a battlecruiser and three semi-dreadnoughts. Both fleets were therefore limited by the lower speed of the non-turbine driven ships.

Pre-Dreadnoughts, Dreadnoughts, Super-Dreadnoughts

I've completed four more ships besides those featured in the previous post - four generic (probably London-class) pre-dreadnought battleships were added to the list. These are a lot easier to churn out than later period large battleships, so I might fill my navies up with them. 

More 1/2000 musings

The naval-themed posts continue with two classes of ships - first the Austro-Hungarian Radetzky-class semi-dreadnoughts - after building large later-period ships, these seemed very small.

Then all five members of the French Danton-class were completed (this was the only salvageable picture so there's only four of them present) with a slightly different green-grey paint. This class is for funnel lovers only.

And here's a photo of the shipyard, with four members of the Russian Gangut-class dreadnoughts (also very nice looking ships in their early iteration) assembled and placed on painting stands.