The Ship Model Forum

Gentlemen,

today I am starting a little project hat has been around for almost a decade, but has not received the merits it well deserves.
The subject is the TRIPARTITE- Class mine sweeper in 1/350 produced by L’Arsenal.
The TRIPARTITE (threepart) co-operation program of Belgium, The Netherlands and France set out in the mid 70ties calling for a new class of mine sweeper. While the actual ship building was carried out in each country’s facilities the sweeping equipment for all was provided by France, the electronics were developed and supplied by Belgium, while the propulsion system were out of Dutch production. The building program ran through the 1980ies, in which 25 vessels were completed. Within almost 30 years of service the ships ran through a number of upgrading programs to meet new challenges and incorporate new facilities.
Most of the ships are still on active duty today serving in the navies of Belgium, France, The Netherlands, Indonesia, Bulgaria, Latvia and Pakistan. The latter did actually build one boat under license.
TRIPARTITE class mine sweepers displace a mere 605 metric tons at a length of 51.5 meters, 8.9meters beam, and 3.8 meters of standard draught. Such light weight is a result of a Polyester compound hull necessary to avoid the threat of magnetic mines.
Powered by a V-12 Diesel plant providing 1370kW the ships are designed for a top speed of 15 knots and may travel 3000 miles at 12 knots. To keep position the ships are equipped with 2 active rudders, both carrying a propulsion gondola which may be steered individually.
The complement varies in between navies from 34 to 47 officers and men.
All ships are fitted with a French 20mm Giat F2 canon on the focsle. Furthermore 2 to 3 .50cal machine guns are carried to set off mines afloat and provide close-in protection against asymmetrical threats.
The standard equipment for mine sweeping is two PAP-104 B cable guided diving vehicles equipped with active detection gear designed to carry an up to 100 kg mine disposal charge.
On an open platform abaft of the funnel housing provides space for a standard 20’ sea container that may carry special equipment such as additional/alternate sweeping gear or a decompression chamber for divers.
Latest addition to the set of tools is the Double eagle MkII and III ROV and SAROV.
(http://www.seaeye.com/doubleeagle.html)


The kit of L’Arsenal come to you in clean white, sturdy box showing a line drawing of the TRIPARTITE mine sweeper.
Firmly rolled up in bubble wrap you'll find a resin cast hull and a number of small bags holding various pouring stubs with the kit’s parts. Furthermore a decal sheet for hull numbers are supplied along with a photo etch fret.



The decals sheet provides all marking options for Dutch, French, and Belgian ships.
The PE is relief etched and very fine. The material is somewhere between the sturdiness of GMM and the softness of WEM and should be a treat to work with.





The kits parts are finely cast and show no bubbles or incomplete casting. There is a bit of flesh to be removed, but it won’t hurt. The casting stubs are quite fine resulting in a minimum of clean up. Unfortunately I seem to have lost one of the anchors upon unpacking. Otherwise the parts count is complete. The hull and superstructure are cast in one piece covered with detail over and over. A small casting stub at the bottom of the hull shouldn’t be much of a challenge to remove. The overall casting is widely flawless with only a handful of tiny pin holes on deck. Fortunately I’ll stick to building ships in seascapes, so I won’t be irritated by the come-off starboard bilge keels. The port bilges keels are complete, but I will remove them first thing in construction.





From what I can see, the kit provides all option for the early TRIPARTITE. Some of the later equipment and fittings will not be hard to scratch build. Besides paint and glue everything is there and delivered in satisfactory quality. If you have previously dealt with Jacques Druel - owner and mastermind of L’Arsenal – you’ll know that he will replace the hull without any hesitation, if asked to so due to the damage to the bilge keels. Excellent service policy is one of Jacques’ foremost marks of trade.

The only real concern I have is that my French sucks big time. In best tradition of the Le Grande Nation the multi-page instruction is fully laid out in French, which will prove to be a challenge. I would have wished for an English version, but then this kit would have proven to be no challenge at all. So I’ll take it as a good sport. I am glad that I can fall back on Jacque with all my dumb questions, which may make him consider to issue future L’Arsenal instruction sheets in English.

I’ll start right away and keep you updated with progress news as I go along.

Cheers,
Guido

_________________
AKA "Tailor"
VMF'06 - German Gamblers
Veritable Modelling Friends 2006, Germany

Never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth. - H. IBSEN

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk8zhb1sc4Pe3BRLqq3d-SQ

Gentlemen,

getting a “clean start” is always good advice. So first I remove all parts from their casting stubs and remove the flesh. Only the hull requires a bit more attention to get the stem and bottom clean. As previously mentioned I will set up a seascape display so remove the bilge keels at this point, as well. After a more than astounding 45 minutes I can start to clean up the parts using oven spray and a tooth brush. All parts are being rinsed with warm water. Finally I spray all parts with window cleaning agent that will ensure than no lime scale will encrust the parts by accelerating the evaporation process. As our tab water is quite hard, I found this quite helpful. Of cause you may use distilled water for rinsing and safe the trouble.
In a next step I paint the model all over using Revell dark grey to achieve a pre-shading effect as the plane guys usually do. With the paint on the previously mentioned handful of pin holes become evident. All of them are filled using a needle and white glue. As soon as this is dry I run a couple more passes of grey over those filled up holes. Then the deck is sealed using Revell flat coat. While this dries I demark the boot topping area in black. As soon as all paints are dry the deck and boot topping line are masked off.



I found that WEM Admiralty light grey fits the grey used by the French Navy quite well, so I quickly decided to build a French vessel. I run multiple layers of thin coats across the hull taking care to leave a cloudy pattern simulating wear and allowing the recesses to stay a tad bit darker than the flat surfaces.



WEM asks for 6 hours of drying time, which is happily granted, even though I would wish for an acrylic colour coats line of such fine naval shades and quality. However, John and Caroline have again declined any request for a WEM acrylic paint line for good economical and quality control reasons.
Anyway, six hours later the best part of the hull remains being masked off, while the bottom gets sprayed in a blend of Revell’s fiery red with a drop of black.



An hour later I have removed the masking and start to touch up and paint the windows.



The bridge area is quite big and if you should try to open the bridge fully and install all the dashboards, etc. you probably won’t find it too daunting. I however have decided to go for a bit of a quicker build this time.



The only omissions in the hull casting are the bile pump outlets, which I have added using a .4mm drill bit. By the end of the second session of the build, I have to say that this is what I call “a straight forward build”. So far writing this report has required as much time as the build itself.
I wonder if there are any tripping ropes on the way ahead.

TBC

Guido

_________________
AKA "Tailor"
VMF'06 - German Gamblers
Veritable Modelling Friends 2006, Germany

Never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth. - H. IBSEN

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk8zhb1sc4Pe3BRLqq3d-SQ

Guido,
What a great relaxing build that seems to be, your progress is looking very good indeed.
i look forward to seeing more from you.

Happy Modeling

John

_________________
Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum

Nice subject, in a good scale too. If you need any and I really mean ANY additional reference material, just let me know. I'll sort through my stuff then, I have quite some stuff on this class. Including the recently fitted mine hunting gear, the diver support container with decompression tank etc. I also have some picture of these active rudders in the yards. Just let me know if you need anything.

Looking great already, I guess that's an advantage of resin ships, you can very rapidly "start" with the build and finish parts of it.

_________________
Yard conversion to merchant shipbuilding

Hi Guido

your sentence here is quite unclear...

the CMT's indeed are equipped with two active rudders and a bow thruster installation, with two propellers in two tubes, one plant being used to go to port, the other plant used to go to starboard.

the rudders move in the same direction, port or starboard, they cannot be used separatly. The rudders rotation angle is 70° when on active electric propulsion, 35° when sailing on the main Diesel engine.

The BE & NL CMT' went through a recent CUP, the paps were removed & replaced by seafoxes, the after deck also has been adapted.

I've been chief engineer on the M924 Primula in the 90's, for two years and a half. I may say that those ships weren't the best ones I ever sailed on, they were intended to be coastal minehunters, but they are often sent to other areas, and those ships aren't good sea boats.

for more picturial infomation about the CMT's, go to the Belgian Mil site:
http://www.mil.be/navycomp/

By the way, the BE & FR CMT's have the 5 portholes on the starboard side of the hull, the dutch don't have this feature, good to know when you want to model them.

If you have any question about them, just ask

Regards,

Laurent

_________________
Scared of Nothing , Always Thirsty

Just call me the "Cereals Box Killer" , I guess

Gentlemen,

Thank you for checking in on my blog and for your offers for suppot an information.

It's is quite good to have the feedback of someone who actually served on the boat one wants to build. Given the height/draught ratio one could have guesses that these boats are a bit "unconfortable" riding in deep water.

Concerning the individually steered rudders, of cause I have taken my information from research off the net. Since he majority of the information is from Dutch, French and Belgian sites, you may guess that these are languages mostly used. Now neither my French, Flamish or Dutch are good enough to make a definite translation free of mistakes. I understood that the stern rudders could be manouvered indivdually both by rpm, thrust direction and steering direction. Anyway, I gladly stand corrected. I am very certain that you will find it necessary to correct me a couple more times while the build will be progressing.
Thanks for the advice on the portholes, too. I am glad that I decided to decal-mark the ship M649 "Persee" of the French Naval Forces this very morning and thus having by pure luck avoided to go at correcting the hull again.

I find that there is a lot of reference material to be found on the net and I tought that I will add the challenge to rig the boat with the MkII ROV. I understand that the big boom at the starboard stern is for the guidance able of the ROV and is lowered after the ROV is deployed. Do you have a picture of what is underneath the canvass?


TIA for your help

_________________
AKA "Tailor"
VMF'06 - German Gamblers
Veritable Modelling Friends 2006, Germany

Never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth. - H. IBSEN

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk8zhb1sc4Pe3BRLqq3d-SQ

Guido,

Interesting project and some nice work mate,

Cheers,

Rob

_________________
IPMS Fine Waterline Special Interest Group

Hello Guido!

Your model looks so cool!
Good work, Guido!

Joe

_________________
Planning for next:

1:350 USS Arizona 1931 version
1:200 USS Arizona Pearl Harbor version

Gentlemen,

I have been continuing the build by cleaning and painting all parts and details this week. Among the more prominent and evident developments are the foremast



the PAP and the Falcon (ROV)



and the decals on the hull.




The mast turned out to be a bit on the fiddly side, but finally I managed to understand the instruction sketch. A couple of small parts “pinged” into kingdom come so I replaced them by scratch built parts and added a few “instruments” myself. If you turn down the pressure of your airbrush enough they even stay where they are supposed to be.

The PAP are supplied by the kit and have very nice PE fins. These took a bit of holding my breath, but in the end worked out fine. The Falcon is scratch build after some photos on the net.

The decaling was surprisingly painless: I added a thick layer of gloss coat (Revell) and let it dry overnight. The decals are in good register and the film is pretty thin, but wouldn’t break even under my decal-hating hands. A bit of Mr. Decal-Setter made them snuggle down nicely. I let them dry for 24 hours before adding a thick layer of matt clear coat No bobbles no silvering no visible film edge: It seems I am finally making my peace with decals.

I have taken shots of all the prepared parts, but you can’t see a lot of detail so I safe the effort at this time and post later progress shots that will illustrate these parts a lot nicer.

I have selected a fitting board for the base and will start the base within the next couple of days.

Questions for the experts:
1. Where does the French navy run her colours while being underway?
2. Which flag signal will indicate “ongoing work with explosives”?
3. Which flag signal will indicate “divers in the water”?
4. Will the boats be sent out to secure a perimeter when an explosive devise is about to be set off? I seem to remember having seen in a TV report that the Germany navy does so. Can anyone confirm?


Cheers,

Guido

_________________
AKA "Tailor"
VMF'06 - German Gamblers
Veritable Modelling Friends 2006, Germany

Never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth. - H. IBSEN

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk8zhb1sc4Pe3BRLqq3d-SQ

Hallo Guido

Nice work, as usual
Answer to question 3: Alpha Flag, although when divers are on small boats the "Four Flag" is usually seen (scuba divers)

Cheers,
Rui

_________________
Ship Modelers of the World UNITE

Tip-Top!!

clean and sharp!!

Good to see you building again-- we shall see a Guido fleet at Telford...??!!
JIM B

_________________
....I buy them at three times the speed I build 'em.... will I live long enough to empty my stash...?
http://www.modelshipgallery.com/gallery ... index.html

IPMS UK SIG (special interest group) www.finewaterline.com

2010 will be a Gambler year! We'll be there and hopefully rock the Show once more.
Clearly all the VMF-'06 are bent on going. In 2010 the show will be on 13th/14th November so it won't collide with SWMBO's and my son's birthday.

Thanks Rui and Jim, Jonne and Rob for your kind comments and replies

Cheers,
Guido

_________________
AKA "Tailor"
VMF'06 - German Gamblers
Veritable Modelling Friends 2006, Germany

Never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth. - H. IBSEN

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk8zhb1sc4Pe3BRLqq3d-SQ

Gentlemen –

In with the last week I have been taking care of the water display. This time I used a Silicone method which is basically modified Ilse-Water.



After being half-way satisfied with the result, I continued to add detail. Most of it is parts of the kit some is added according to the reference found for the Persee on the net.










All the assembly was so painless I hardly know what I should write.
Now I had decided to add the latest sweeping gear which necessitates the construction of the fitting equipment container, which is to be placed aft of the funnel house. I drew it on Photoshop and printed it on 120gr/m² paper. After building the basic container I infused highly liquid superglue for stability and added surface detail such as doors, hatches and a ladder.



Then I went on to building the guidance cable rig for the Falcon ROV.





TBC


Guido

_________________
AKA "Tailor"
VMF'06 - German Gamblers
Veritable Modelling Friends 2006, Germany

Never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth. - H. IBSEN

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk8zhb1sc4Pe3BRLqq3d-SQ

Hi Guido, a good job you doing with the "tupperware".
I never would know about the complexity of the kit fm L'Arsenal, and for the nick of the class.
The kit itself and decals and PE set are great, and hope you can finish with luck, and you'll have a nice model.
Thanks for letting me know about your kit in the CASF for minesweeper, your model is a kind of choice.
Congratulations and nice regards:
Jimmy

_________________
Make your influence positive!

"Oh Lord thy sea is so great and my boat is so small."
Breton Fisherman's Prayer

Nice equipment container mate!

Paper is a great medium for making structures--and CA lends them permanence!



JIM B

_________________
....I buy them at three times the speed I build 'em.... will I live long enough to empty my stash...?
http://www.modelshipgallery.com/gallery ... index.html

IPMS UK SIG (special interest group) www.finewaterline.com

Gentlemen-

Thank you guys!

With a little tweaking I was able to finish and paint the Falcon ROV rig and the container within about an hour. Unfortunately, I can’t make my own PE, as the rig would be a great item to be done in that medium. Anyway, .5mm square rod would have to make do in my case. Surely, quite a bit of detail got lost on the way.



With the rig and container the aft decks got a lot more crowded instantly.



The only things left now were to add railings, antennae, crew, rigging and a bit of weathering.
I was able to reconfirm “Reply/Papa/Bravo” flag signal for ongoing mine sweeping manoeuvres. I followed David Griffith’s tip to use cigarette paper as flags. I did use crayons instead of acrylic paint. However, I should try acrylics next time around.



I have submitted photos for the front page news. Please expect them in the near future.

Cheers,
Guido

_________________
AKA "Tailor"
VMF'06 - German Gamblers
Veritable Modelling Friends 2006, Germany

Never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth. - H. IBSEN

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk8zhb1sc4Pe3BRLqq3d-SQ

Hi Guido I have had the opportunity over the years to go aboard the a number of the Tripartite class and you a producing results just like the real ship.
Dave Wooley

Thanks, Dave!
It was certainly a most relaxing build and good modellig fun!
Cheers,
Guido

_________________
AKA "Tailor"
VMF'06 - German Gamblers
Veritable Modelling Friends 2006, Germany

Never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth. - H. IBSEN

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk8zhb1sc4Pe3BRLqq3d-SQ

Fantastic work Guido. I like it so much that I ordered a ship from L'Arsenal for myself to have a go with the help of your step by step building.

_________________
Best Regards
Skiper

Way to go, Skiper!
I'll be glad to help, if you should need assistance!
Cheers,
Guido

_________________
AKA "Tailor"
VMF'06 - German Gamblers
Veritable Modelling Friends 2006, Germany

Never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth. - H. IBSEN

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk8zhb1sc4Pe3BRLqq3d-SQ