The Ship Model Forum

Hi all,

This will be for me a project into the unknown: building a well established Heller kit of a French warship into a Dutch ship of a much lesser known sub variant.
The starting point:
The objective:
What happened before: currently Marijn van Gils is building his diorama 'Victory and Redoutable at Trafalgar.' You must surely have a look at what's happening there! http://www.shipmodels.info/mws_forum/viewtopic.php?f=59&t=167367
Through this topic I started reading about the Redoutable, finding out about the 74-gun ships and the Téméraires in particular. I was baffled finding out that:

1st - About 24 ships of this class had been built on shipyards OUTSIDE France -- and that sixteen of those were built in the Low Countries! (I avoid writing Netherlands here...)
2nd - Eight of these ships have been in service of the Dutch Navy from 1814 to 1832!

As I always have a preference for building Dutch subjects, I thought this would be a very novel project. Within the Netherlands I had never read about these particular ships, in none of the books on the Dutch Navy you read about former French ships impressed into the newly born Navy from 1814.

In my build report I will tell bit by bit the whole story of these ships, and how I attempt building a good looking and historically correct Dutch Ship of the Line from the early nineteenth century.

_________________
"I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing, and the taste of war I know so very well
Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising, their guns on fire as we sail into hell"
Roger Whittaker +9/13/2023

Maarten,

You have chosen an ambitious project! I wish you luck with it.

You should also post on the Model Ship World:

https://modelshipworld.com/

There you will find many experienced period sailing ship modelers with great knowledge of these ships. They may know something about ships of the Nederland.

If I recall correctly, there is a Dutch museum with quite a collection of ship plans available on line.

Phil

_________________
A collision at sea will ruin your entire day. Aristotle

Hi Phil,

Thank you for the encouragement! Yes, it's an ambitious project, I am truly aware of that. And I don't know whether I will finish it succesfully. Fingers crossed!

It's also a very international project: I found out these Plutons have been used by SEVEN nations: France 18, Netherlands 8, Britain 2, Danmark 2, Spain 1, Austria 3 and Lombardo-Venetia 1. I don't know whether this is another record! I have collected data already on the British, Dutch, Austrian and Danish ships, Spain is very straightforward, but Lombardo-Venetia is more difficult (the ship was Montenotte or Duquesne, or even another name?)

In fact I already had started this on Modelshipworld as well (and also on Marine Modélisme de l'Arsenal).
https://modelshipworld.com/topic/28012-plutonbor%C3%A9e-sub-class-of-the-french-t%C3%A9m%C3%A9raire-1791-class/?tab=comments#comment-802821

And you're right about good plans: in the Dutch National Archive in The Hague I found the most, but also in the Maritime Museum in Amsterdam. Even all the details of the transom, the side galleries and the beakhead statue and adornments! In the Rijksmuseum even a wooden scale model of the beakhead and statue. In Greenwich of course there are the plans of HMS Rivoli (1812) and HMS Chatham (1812), these are also from this class. And I'm also beginning to think even HMS Redoutable (1815) was a straight copy, but entirely built in the UK. No copyright protection then...

But not only there: even in the Orlogsvaerfted Museum in Copenhagen there are some plans, of the Dantzig (or Dantzick as it was called by them). This suprised me tremendously, but I already found a Danish book: 'De Danske paa Schelden 1808-1809' by O. Lütken (1885) which describes how the Danes received help from Napoleon in their war against the British, including the loan of two of these Plutons (the other one was the 'Pultusk').

Now I've been reading this book a little better: these two ships were not 'on loan' to Denmark, nor did these fly the Dannebrog -- instead these were part of the French Escadre de l'Escaut (Squadron of the Scheldt) and were only crewed by Danish crews and officers, but never did anything in the defence of Denmark. As the emotions between the French and the Danish deteriorated rapidly, the arrangement was disbanded within a year (early 1809).

_________________
"I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing, and the taste of war I know so very well
Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising, their guns on fire as we sail into hell"
Roger Whittaker +9/13/2023

Let me now share the drawings I will use for this build. I found these online in the Dutch National Archives in The Hague, these are freely available. https://www.nationaalarchief.nl/onderzoeken/archief/4.MST
The side view is from the Couronne, one of the three ships built on the Amsterdam Shipyard between 1811-1816. This ship became Zr.Ms. Prins Willem de Eerste in Dutch service. The other two were the Audacieux (which became the Wassenaar) and the Polyphème (later Zr.Ms. Holland). I can safely assume these three ships were built to the same plans.


Fortunately, looking a bit further, also found the drawings of the transom, the beakhead figure and the side galleries for the Wassenaar. These were typically particularly designed for each individual ship, so these are very much needed to give the ship its own identity.

In the next post I will start evaluating what needs to be changed to the Superbe model to become the Wassenaar. I can already say: it's not as difficult as I first expected!

_________________
"I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing, and the taste of war I know so very well
Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising, their guns on fire as we sail into hell"
Roger Whittaker +9/13/2023

I have carefully scaled the side elevation drawing of the previous post, using the yardstick below the keel. Having ascertained this was calibrated in the then local 'Rotterdam feet' of 282.3 mm, the waterline length turns out to be exactly 54 metres. In 1:150 this comes to 36cm exactly.

This makes sense, as from 4 November 1800 this was the official measure in France, so of course Mr. Sané will have used this in 1803 as his standard, otherwise risking emprisonment. However, the Dutch drawing dates from 1808, and by then the local measurements were still official (until 1809 when the 'mètre' was introduced provisionary by King Louis Napoléon, but only officially after 1816).

When I put the Heller kit hull to the drawing, I was struck by surprise! I had expected the hull to be around 12.5mm longer, but it's not. It matches the drawing within a mm, only the shape of the stem is somewhat out of tune. This gives rise to the question: which drawing was used by Heller? Hard to tell, but in 1:150 it's about half an inch too short for a Téméraire. But for my project it's just right!

Now the details:
- the shape of the stem and the beakhead needs to be changed
- the lower two rows of gunports need to be relocated to have a pitch of exactly 22.5mm
- one gun port needs to be added to the front of the lower row
- the masts need to be slightly relocated, and therefore the holes in each of the decks
- cross beams in the large aperture of the upper deck, supporting the ship's boats
- bulwarks from scratch need to be added to the forecastle
- the beakhead construction must be built one deck higher, resulting in the side rails from scratch being much less curved
(note: the front of the forecastle is not rounded, but still has the flat cross bulkhead, so the altered beakhead is only a visual change, not a structural one)
- the figurehead needs to be sculpted from scratch according to the drawings
- the transom must be built from scratch (maybe some parts of the original can be used, I don't know yet.)
- the side galleries need to be heavily changed and detailed.

Besides these, there will be many small corrections to the kit parts, starting with the hull: the excessive wood grain will be largely filled when I relocate and putty up the gun ports. And the high line of copper plating above the waterline will be sanded away. I guess painting will also help: I intend to finish the hull as 'in use', with some weathering, the copper plates being greenish blue with a black/brown streaked patina. No copper to be seen at all.

So that must be about it! Still quite a challenge, but as the hull is in fact right for my ship, it saves me a tremendous amount of work.

_________________
"I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing, and the taste of war I know so very well
Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising, their guns on fire as we sail into hell"
Roger Whittaker +9/13/2023

Will be watching this project !

_________________
Eberhard

Former chairman Arbeitskreis historischer Schiffbau e.V. (German Association for Shipbuilding History)

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Thank you, Wefalck!
Jim Baumann asked me: what scale is this project? It is 1/150, as that's what the Heller Superbe is supposed to be -- in fact it's slightly too short, but that turned out to be a blessing in disguise!

_________________
"I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing, and the taste of war I know so very well
Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising, their guns on fire as we sail into hell"
Roger Whittaker +9/13/2023

Nice project, good continuation.

_________________
Pascal

•Battleship Bretagne 3D: https://vu.fr/FvCY
•SS Delphine 3D: https://vu.fr/NeuO
•SS Nomadic 3D: https://vu.fr/tAyL
•USS Nokomis 3D: https://vu.fr/kntC
•USS Pamanset 3D: https://vu.fr/jXGQ

Maarten, are you aware of the project of 'Schmidt' in various German fora ? He specialises in Frankenstein-like 'plastic surgery' on kits and home-cast parts, e.g. here: https://www.segelschiffsmodellbau.com/t8232f1972-De-Zwarte-Parel-holl-Fregatte-um.html

_________________
Eberhard

Former chairman Arbeitskreis historischer Schiffbau e.V. (German Association for Shipbuilding History)

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Iceman, thanks for the encouragement!


Wefalck, thanks a lot for this reference! That project of 'Schmidt' gets me drooling! He has done with that questionable Black Pearl kit what I wish to do with another oldie: the Revell 'Wappen von Hamburg' aka 'Captain Kidd' from Lindberg. That kit portrays in fact a very passable model of the famous Dutch two-decker, only the transom is awful! Even for a Wappen von Hamburg it is best discarded and built from scratch.

I took it a step further: the hull itself is in fact scale 1:152 (not 1:130 as on the box), and I thought to bring it back to the first Dutch two-decker man-o-war, built by Jan Salomonszn. van den Tempel in 1632: the Aemilia. This was the flagship of Maarten Harpertzn. Tromp, the second-most famous Dutch admiral ( after De Ruyter). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_ship_Aemilia_(1632).
The Aemilia set the pattern for a whole range of ships maybe some 50 in total (including indeed the Wappen von Hamburg, built by a Dutch shipwright as well), so it can be regarded of one of the first 'standard' ships, all with virtually the same dimensions (but not exactly the same, because of the used shell-first method). For modelling purposes however these can be very well regarded as similar ships, only differing in detail with decoration being the most prominent.

I built a new transom, adapted the rudder, -- and then got stuck! How to re-create all that abundant decoration, statues and all? Since then my project has been dormant...
I really need to get into contact with 'Schmidt' to get my Aemilia re-floated...

_________________
"I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing, and the taste of war I know so very well
Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising, their guns on fire as we sail into hell"
Roger Whittaker +9/13/2023

Interesting project Maarten. For the detailing I'd probably use styrene for the ojtline/flat back surface and build up the rounded parts with milliput (superfine, white). Afterwards scribe further details in the milliput. Not sure if that will work though .

_________________
The merchant shipyard

'Schmidt' (I know him personally reasonably well, btw) uses commercial figures from Preiser as a basis for creating the sculptures, that are modified by cutting, carving and sculpting with MagicSculpt and similar 2K resins. They are in 1:160 (= railway N-scale), but this doesn't matter in this case. For larger-than-life sculptures, one may need to resort event to TT- or HO-scale figures.

_________________
Eberhard

Former chairman Arbeitskreis historischer Schiffbau e.V. (German Association for Shipbuilding History)

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Maarten,

I have seen some amazing details made with Sculpy - a modeling clay that can be baked to harden.

There was a woman who posted on Model Ship World who made several models with extremely complex carvings and the results were amazing. Sorry I can't find the link now.

Phil

_________________
A collision at sea will ruin your entire day. Aristotle

That lady is Czech and goes by the name of DORIS. Here is one of her beautiful projects: https://modelshipworld.com/topic/15981-hms-royal-katherine-1664-by-doris-155-card/?tab=comments#comment-497721.

Her basic structures are card, covered in some plastic foil to simulate wood (for which I have reservations), but her sculpting talent with a Czech version of temperature-hardening modelling clay is quite exceptional.

_________________
Eberhard

Former chairman Arbeitskreis historischer Schiffbau e.V. (German Association for Shipbuilding History)

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Wefalck, Neptune and Phil,

Thank you for the comments! Both the indication for using Preiser or other plastic figures already caught on with me: for the figurehead of the Wassenaar I will have to resort to 25mm (1/72) or 37,5mm (1/48) figures, I should have enough of those to provide me a set of limbs for the basic statue.

Then the dressing up: Magic Sculp or similar is probably the best idea, Marijn van Gils also recommended that. The good news is: this early 19th century ship requires more moderate decoration than the 17th century Man-o-War Aemilia. So a good learning project for me to finish first this moderate sculpting exercise. I hope it will give me enough confidence to tackle then the Aemilia!

But now back to the structure: I checked the hull against the drawing printed to 1:150 exactly. The difference in the bow contour became obvious. On the lower deck I marked the exact positions of the gunports and the masts.

Next I copied the correct bow contour ontio the stem of the model:
And after I removed the surplus from the right half, joined the two hull halves. You can see the required shift of the forward gunports already indicated.
After this I removed the corresponding part from the left half. Next: the relocation of all the gunports.

_________________
"I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing, and the taste of war I know so very well
Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising, their guns on fire as we sail into hell"
Roger Whittaker +9/13/2023

Hi all,

Time for an update! From the plans of Couronne I had learned the gunports were positioned slightly further apart. Not much, but sufficient to be noticeable.

As the gun ports sit in the white painted band (up to Trafalgar these were usually yellow/buff, but the fashion changed to white around that time) these are very prominent, and the slightly increased intervals create a more 'elongated' impression.

First I added carefully calculated inserts:
Then filed the outer edges of the gunports to the correct width, using a small square insert rod caliber to get them all equal:
I also got to the rudder: the kit rudder has a somewhat different shape and six hinges. Changing the shape was not difficult, adding new hinges in the right locations was an accurate but pleasant task. As the sternpost runs up right to the helm port (hennegat in Dutch and German) I also added the lower part of the transom.

Next the rear bulwarks will get my attention: the gunports there need to be completely revised. I will also build bulwarks for the forecastle, which are completely absent in the kit.

The decks don't satisfy my need: they lack the camber and the planking is much too wide: 2.5mm, which means 37.5cm in reality. About half of that should be right. I will therefore use Evergreen 4050 with planks of 1.3mm to make new decks, which allows me also to position all the deck details exactly where I need them. Painting them wil assure a convincing worn wood image.

_________________
"I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing, and the taste of war I know so very well
Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising, their guns on fire as we sail into hell"
Roger Whittaker +9/13/2023

Good progress !

Why don't you make the deck from a sheet of styrene and engrave the planks ? Personally, I am not so fond of styrene sheet for this, as it is a bit soft, but there is a variety of engraving tools that can be used for the purpose, either re-purposed dental tools or speciality tools for modellers.

You can computer-generate a template for the planks on which you affix the deck blank and then clamp down a steel ruler at the right positions in order to achieve equal spacing. Only light engraving is needed.

_________________
Eberhard

Former chairman Arbeitskreis historischer Schiffbau e.V. (German Association for Shipbuilding History)

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Thank you, Wefalck!

Yes, polystyrene is a bit soft indeed, but so is the rest of the kit. I'm quite used working with the material. Scribing lines at an equal distance is awfully difficult, the slightest deviation immediately catches the eye. The only way is having a mechanical support like a milling machine table with vernacular adjustments. Even then the slightest error is unforgiving...

For that reason I'm so happy Evergreen exists! They provide a whole range of scribed plates with fine V-Groove lines, the closest having a 0.5mm pitch (stock number 2020), up to 6.3mm at increasing intervals. Their stock number 4050 has them at 1.3mm intervals. I cannot compete with their quality.

_________________
"I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing, and the taste of war I know so very well
Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising, their guns on fire as we sail into hell"
Roger Whittaker +9/13/2023

I agree, it is difficult to do the spacing precisely. My concern with these V-grroved sheets is that the grooves are too wide and deep.

Recently, I made some wooden and metla-plated decking from engraved Bakelite (Hartpapier in German). OK, this was much shorter than yours, but I stuck the Bakelite to a print-out of the deck and then was able to trace the lines, because the thin Bakelite is translucent. It came out quite well, but needed a lot of patience. I used a graver for this as used by e.g. copper-plate engravers. Rubbing the Bakelite with fine steel-wool afterwards let very fine clean lines behind.

A few weeks ago I bid on an old draughting tool that was designed to draw equally spaced lines, but someone beat me in the auction. Basically it was a metal frame with a ruler in between that was moved by a 'lead-screw' on one side and held perpendicular by a sliding bearing on the other side. I have no immediate need, but thought of building something along these lines for my next project.

_________________
Eberhard

Former chairman Arbeitskreis historischer Schiffbau e.V. (German Association for Shipbuilding History)

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Thank you Wefalck! It seems to be a superior way to create a finely grooved deck.

In this case however, the Heller kit itself has its crude details, in my view the Evergreen deck will already be relatively finely engaved. Everything is relative.

First my next step: the gun ports at the upper deck: these needed to be considerably repositioned, more than the two lower decks.
Now I will first turn my attention to the masts (slightly relocated) and the decks. Once these are in place I will add the bulwarks to the forecastle, which were not present in the kit.

_________________
"I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing, and the taste of war I know so very well
Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising, their guns on fire as we sail into hell"
Roger Whittaker +9/13/2023