Suffering with Heller's Le Superbe

 

I've been building this old kit for over a year now, on and off, because sometimes it just really upsets me.

I glued together and painted the hull halves, then installed the lower gundeck no problem. I had to pry the hull apart just a little bit to make it fit.

Not so much luck with the upper gundeck, apparently the manufacturer did not think about space after setting up the 30-odd cannon of the lower tier. I could not manage to squish the thing in in one piece. 

Next I tried to split it in three sections lengthwise, but there was an issue of fit again - there was no good order in which to install the sections. This caused damage to the lower deck as well. Furthermore, the point of attachment of the rope/chain that secures the bottom deadeyes to the hull is level with the upper gundeck, which made it nigh impossible to fit the two together.

So in the end I removed the molded-on deck fittings, copied the outline of the deck to a piece of 1mm balsa, and remade it completely. 

I also added some crosswise beams to the construction so that the gundeck sits flush and does not sag inward. Of course in the end these just interfered with the mast holes, so I had to scrape away some, notably at the foremast.

Once the deck - in one piece - received its paintjob, I trimmed off a large part off of each side, which followed the curvature of the outer hull, and glued these in first, followed by the larger central piece. This way I could make amendments and trim off any excess - the fit is not perfect, but good enough. I just had to move the three entry points for the masts a little bit back after test fitting.

I trimmed off the sides where the ends of the rope entered the hull, and filled it with Magic Sculpt once the rest was glued in. It's not very pretty, but blends in, and is deep enough in the hull that it won't be that visible.

At this point, jut to complicate things, a cannon at the bottom tier got loose, and I had to tear out a larger swath of the already installed upper gundeck to reach it (that is the crack line visible on the picture above), and then with some CA glue managed to fix the damned thing back in its place.

Fortunately the spar deck and the stored boats will hide most of the damage, so I turned to manufacturing other pieces, leaving the gundeck as is. I may just run it over with a gloss coat before gluing the guns in to hide the dots of glue. About a dozen guns in the waits will be visible from the spar deck, so those are going to have some tackle added (skipped this for the lower tier after some deliberation).

I also have the 1/100 Soleil Royal from Heller, where the gundecks are split along the middle and one side has a 'lip' the other can sit onto, which is a way better solution, as you don't have to force the hull halves apart and it's easy to make adjustments.

Some gratification is that after dry fitting the spar deck, the thing starts to look like a real ship of the line, and I also found out just how good oil washes can be, both on smaller items and large surfaces.

Corvette WIP #2

Work continues on the corvette: I'm still adding details to the hull but it is more or less finished. Since yesterday I worked mostly on the bow and stern, adding decorations and details, plus the only piece of mast which will be fixed onto the hull. The other three will be placed in the drilled holes and secured with rigging which will also be removable. 

The first cannon is completed. When manufacturing multiple items I always build a complete first one, then mass produce the rest. 

The wheel I'm afraid is a bit too big, but the one built from paper and plastic broom bristles seemed too crude, so I picked a 1/72 cart wheel from the Heap. There is also a pole for a big flag. 

Space will be an issue with this one, so I imagine it will be a coastal vessel, or will have only a reduced crew. It wouldn't be a problem if the figures had smaller bases, maybe I can compromise somewhat... we shall see.

WIP - 1/72 scratchbuilt corvette

One of my latest purchases was a small drill and a jigsaw, and with all the very dry wooden parts lying in the back yard, I decided to build a few more ships to compliment the cutter and the ketch I had. The new ones, of course, would be something bigger, with a wooden core hull and mostly paper structures.

The first in the line, because I messed up when I cut out the shapes for an Indiaman, is this corvette. She's still part of the learning curve and I'm sure many mistakes will not be committed on the next one. I used mostly cardboard and decor card. I'm not entirely content with the bowsprit, and the bow in general is the trickiest part of the hull. 

Yesterday I glued on the paper parts, the bowsprit and the plasticard sheet at the stern. Today I filled in some more details and she's beginning to look decent now. The small thread above the gunports was just glued on with PVA right before making the photo.

I've long given up on proper modelling, at least in regards to wargames-usable ships: if I want to represent everything found on a real sailing ship and want it to look accurate, the details will always get in the way of the figures. 

For easier storage, the corvette's masts will be removable and thus only connected to the hull with a pair of ropes for each mast. The drill will be most useful for punching plasticard pieces to attach the ropes to with a peg.

I've also made the necessary amount of cannon barrels, but the carriages are, again, more complicated, and then there are nineteen Strelets figures (two can be spotted on the photo) to be varnished. I think the ship itself will serve in the Royal Navy as a captured and refurbished French vessel.

Le Superbe

On my quest to "field" ships in a 6mm battle, I had found this 1/500 scale model produced by Heller. It is a simplified version of their large scale 18th century ship of the line. It sadly comes with a moderately useful brush, some pots of useless acrylic paint and super (st)icky superglue, all in a big plastic box next to the kit, increasing the price. But a price of one ship would not hurt, am I right?

1/4800 ships of the line

Fifteen more ships, bringing the number of my ships of the line to 21. They are from Tumbling Dice. I've had some experience with their kind with the previous batch, but I have painted more small scale figures since, so I had a better approach. 

The ships had a grey primer, were blocked in, shaded, and then I highlighted the stripes on the hulls. Most of the information during a battle would come from the individual data sheets anyway.

There are three types of hull color, white, red and yellow. The lot contains six three- and nine two-deckers.

I've changed the queue of posts so I wouldn't spoil their presentation here with the battle they fought on the seas of the imaginary Schultze-Böhnstadt world. 

Sailing ships

While the pre-dreads were halted for a while, I've still had a good amount of 6mm and 8mm thick balsa wood, so I started experimenting and built a bunch of larger scale ships. The small metal ships are excellent for fleet actions, while these will be more useful for smaller engagements like duels and convoy raids.

All of them were built in the same spirit: a multi-part hull for the big ones, paper gun ports, a piece of thread along the hull; plasticard and GS bow decorations, wooden masts and paper sails. When all the painting was done, I added a little bit of rigging so the masts wouldn't look bare. 

The Cutter 'Archangelus'

Looking for suitable options for some sailing/swashbuckling/pirate gaming, I realized I had no ships around, but a ton of scratch and other crap to build from. Thus was born the cutter 'Archangelus', pride of the fleet. 

Flea market finds

This is a wooden model ship and a metal cast Prussian SYW grenadier I found on the local flea market. The two cost about 2$. I intend to restore the ship, build it a full sail clipper. First I need to remove the ugly old finish without further damaging the wood. 

Merry Christmas from aboard the Judgement's Scream!

Christmas is tomorrow but I thought I would just let my readers know I'm still alive and quite eager to see the Essex figs I'll have got under the tree. And honestly, I wish the same for all who reads this weblog. 

Well it would be hypocrite to say it's the expectation that matters and not the moment when you rip the wrappings apart like a hungry Berserk and put your dirty, Christmas-tree-leaves-pierced, decoration-wire-stabbed, possibly not yet electrocuted hands on the shiny things that await you.

All in all, a merry Christmas to you. 

Gave in to temptation and bought a plastic ship kit, Revell's 1/450 'Spanish Galleon'. Now the mould is extra super terrible: imagine all the flash you can, and double it, now you have what I had to face. Fortunately I didn't have to bother with the underwater parts and cut them right off, wishing to make a waterline model. Assembly was also very painful and included a lot of swearing (my roommate bears witness, I think I just invented some new, cool sounding curses). There are no pegs and holes in the hull and if there are, the mould is old and pours plastic into them or leaves them right off. Then I encountered more flash. As bad as it was assembling it, painting the thing was a joy. Really, a neat little model. 

I removed the oars and replaced them with a gun deck and added some primitive rigging as the masts looked really bare. 

Have a little more back story: the ship was built by Halbard Dun of Waterburg, who has originally been a shrimping captain (obvious Forrest Gump reference), and made his fortune bargaining with the Lesser Folk who occupied the sunken parts of the city. He dealt with Crabmen, Sharkmen and all what you can imagine. They got legit Imperial coins which they could use 'Upwaters', and Halbard got a cheap workforce who were very much eager to be occupied. And Halbard Dun did it all for one thing: to be a pirate.

Now these are perilous times we're talking about, and the Galleys of Ódensbarad are pretty much an opponent to anyone willing to be a 'free sailor'. So the Judgement's Scream (ol'Captain Dun had something for bizarre names) has been equipped with more cannons any galley could bear, and more sails any smaller vessel or rower could use.

After unsuccessful raids on Kingdom, Waterburg and Fjördstiri waters, the crew set sail to the southwest, into the heart of the archipelagos, and setting up a base in the free port of Nolisium. There they met a bard and an Elven woman who've changed the course of their story... Together they were tasked by the Golden Prince to reclaim the Claymore of Omens, the last relic known to the world forged by the Nine Phoenixes etc. etc., more lore thing. So the Judgement's Scream is a key to the story and a very trusty vessel. 

And she looks oh-so good!

More Lego goodness + sailing ship experiment

Didn't do much again this weekend, here are some old and less old pics of the sailing ship MKH Derpy Hooves project and a steam-engine lego frigate.

First things first, I just put this one together to see if I remember the ways (and then bombed it to destruction).

Welcome to DeanM from WAB Corner, a regular reader again! Thanks for following.