May 2020 Meeting - cancelled

Due to the ongoing health crisis the 05 May 2020 meeting of the Capital Marine Modellers' Guild has been cancelled. Meetings will resume when the City of Ottawa re-opens all public facilities.

Keep working in your home shipyard, and let's see a lot of finished models when this is all over.

The First Shot of the Revolution - the Cruiser AURORA

Here are a selection of photographs of the museum ship Cruiser AURORA in Petrograd, and some models of the ship as well as art.

The ship fired the blank shot which signalled the start of the final phase of the armed uprising in November 1917. Interesting fact: during the Great Patriotic War the ship was sunk to prevent it from being damaged by nazi scum invaders. After the war it was refloated and restored.

The ship is beautifully maintained and well worth a visit.

http://navalmuseum.ru/filials/cruiser_aurora

Enjoy
John Clearwater

Cruiser AURORA

Cruiser AURORA

Cruiser AURORA

Cruiser AURORA

Cruiser AURORA

Cruiser AURORA

Cruiser AURORA

Cruiser AURORA

Cruiser AURORA

Ship Models in the Central Naval Museum

This is a selection of naval ship and submarine models on display in the Central Naval Museum in St. Petersburg.

It is worth a visit to their new location at 2 Naberezhnaya Kryukova Kanala, St Petersburg 190000
http://navalmuseum.ru

Enjpy
John Clearwater

Kirov-class nuclear powered missile cruiser.

Sovetsky-Soyuz class battleship design model (ships never built due to war)

Project 949 Granit cruise missile launching nuclear submarine

667BDRM Dolphin SSBN

Project 941 тайфун (Typhoon) SSBM

Note the lower hull has been extended down to accommodate the long missile tubes which run up through the tower.

Aurora

Heavy aircraft cruiser KIEV

Large naval gun mounted on a railroad car with massive  sway braces

U.S.S. Intrepid CVA 11, aircraft carrier (1968)

This is a 1:350 scale model of the U.S.S. Intrepid, CVA 11, returning to Pearl Harbour, Hawaii, USA, after six months duty in the western Pacific during the US war against Viet Nam.

The builder, Ray Bean of Winnipeg, spent four and a half years on the model, and has added extra aircraft, boats, a Moran tug, and a lot of sailors in dress whites lining the railings. The extra boats, cradles, yellow gears, and aircraft are 3D printed by Shapeways.

Ray wants people to know that he built this after having a stroke and brain injury. If he can do it, you can do it. Just get out and build it!

As a challenge you can try to find some of the bicycles hidden in the model. 

Thanks Ray,
from John Clearwater

Ray Bean and his 4.5 years of work on the U.S.S. Intrepid in 1:350 scale

Ray Bean's 4.5 years of work on the U.S.S. Intrepid in 1:350 scale

  

Ray Bean's 4.5 years of work on the U.S.S. Intrepid in 1:350 scale

HMS VICTORY (cross section)

This HMS VICTORY model project began in early 2017 with a 1:200 scale wooden kit from an unnamed company in China. Three years later it is finally finished. Plans would have been helpful.

This is a cross-section of the famous sailing battleship commanded by Admiral Nelson and victorious at the battle of Trafalgar in 1805. It is preserved as a national treasure at the Royal Navy Yard in Portsmouth.

The hull at it's widest is a mere 80 mm across. It is 350 mm high from bottom of the keel to top of the main mast. The main yard is 175 mm across.

What made the build so very difficult is that the box mailed from China did not have the instruction sheets in it. So everything is a guess based on photos of the real thing and of professional models of the Victory. It is an all-wood kit. Only the gun barrels are brass. The kit costs about $30. There are several parts remaining and without plans I have no idea what they might be used for!

John Clearwater

April 2020 Meeting Cancelled

Due to concerns about the covid-19 virus and city closures related to it Capital Marine Modellers' Guild April 2020 meeting is cancelled.

Santa Maria

This is the rather old (1966) plastic model from The Lindberg Line of the SANTA MARIA ship used by Colombus as his flagship on the sponsored voyage to find the western route to India. The real ship had two names: the Santa Maria (Saint Mary), and La Gallega (Galicia), as was common to Spanish ships of that era.

It is a Nao-type ship with 150 tonnes displacement.

Length of hull 19 m (estimates)

Beam 5.5 m

Draught 3.2 m

Crew: 42 persons including Captain Juan de la Cosa and Admiral Christopher Colombus (original name: Cristoffa Corombo in Ligurian)

This was a very small boat.

The model hull is a mere 18 cm long, and fits neatly in my hand.

The voyage was principally financed by a syndicate of seven noble Genovese bankers resident in Seville, with funding from Lorenzo di Pier Francesco de Medici of Fiorenza.

It is not known when Santa Maria/Gallega was built, or for how many years this used ship sailed before being impressed into the expedition. What is known is that on 25 December 1492 it sailed onto what is now Haiti and was lost while the officers and crew slept.

The first (and only exploration) voyage of the Santa Maria/Gallega began in Spain on 03 August 1492; then departed the Canary islands on 06 September; and was successful when the ships reached land at either Turks and Caicos, or Bahamas, on 12 October 1492. It took about 36 days to sail the last leg of 5700 km (straight line distance). If they were on the shortest route it would have been a speed of about 6.6 km/hr.

The group sailed around the region for another two and a half months (mostly along the north-east cost of Cuba), finding and renaming islands already occupied, until the ship was grounded on the island of Hispanolia near present day Cap-Haitien. Timbers from the ship were used to build Fort Christmas near the wreck.

No one knows for certain what the ship actually looked like or how it was rigged. There are no drawings from the time - only current conjecture based on similar ships of the era.

The model is largely out-of-box, but with a lot of painting and rigging added. I replaced the plastic vacuform sails with cloth and stitching, and replaced the black rubber ratlines. The 54 year old decals worked surprisingly well. The tender (or lifeboat) was rebuilt with provisions, oars, a sail, a mast, and tie-downs. The rear mast had to be replaced in total with a metal pole. The real ship had about 6 anchors, but only two are moulded here. I built and added all deck railings and stair railings.

The rungs on the ratlines are made from solid string which is made by rubbing cyanoacrylate glue along regular string which is stretch tight. Then the rods of string are glued horizontally  onto the upright lines.

The base is a single cheap plaque from a dollar store with scribed board lines, peg holes, and weathering, and with decorative rope added around the border.

John Clearwater

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

Santa Maria / La Gallega ship used by Colombus on his first voyage to India, 1492

in the shipyard...

The 1966 model kit box

Confused Europeans claiming someone else's land for Spain and the catholic church.