? Battleship Bretagne - France - Design & 3D printing 1:200

[Iceman 29]

....

[DrPR]

Pascal,

Nice work!

However, I count four rectangular windows in the sides of the rear cabin in the picture, and you have five in your model. Maybe the rear (fifth) one is the window with the round port.

Phil

[Iceman 29]

Yes, it�s � choie, I made a mix of the diagram and the picture, they are not exactly the same boat. I wanted to keep the ratio length / width of the windows.

[wefalck]

I don't know about the French navy, but in Germany the navy looked on for a while how the merchant navy, particularly the fishing industry slowly developed and adopted small marine engines. The Danish and the Dutch were the avantgarde in marinising the petrol and in particularly the diesel engines. The latter in particularly proved difficult initially, as it required a high-pressure fuel-injection pump, compressor and compressed air cylinders to start and reverse. A Dutch gentleman named Brons came up with a sort of semi-diesel engine that was suitable for installation in small (fishing) boats. The other route were engines with a glow-cap that worked with lower compression.

Destillation products from crude oil were not yet widely available in the early years of the 20th century and the navies experimented with different fuels, also with a view to have control over their supply chains. Thus, engines running on alcohol (a 'biofuel' in the modern sense) seems to have been in use right to the end of WW1. Petroleum was used, but not very popular, due the soot formation in the engine and the strong smell. Benzol, a distillation product from coal-tar was common too. Petrol in the modern sense was not common until the years running up to WW1.

Some boats also used two types of fuel, something easier to ignite to start up the engine, particularly for the glow-cap engines, and when the engine was warmed up switched to heavier oils and even semi-liquid fuels with pre-heating of a reservoir to reduce viscosity.

[Iceman 29]

Tks Wefalck, I didn't know this development.

Photo of the Bretagne at anchor in 1915, we can clearly see this type of boat with the typical keel drop, but with 4 ports instead of 5, as I drew, and a fender on the bow.



Looking at the picture of the Bretagne 2 days before she sank, I noticed this still different canoe with a 3 ports cabin with a different line on the water, more modern, normal for the time (1940):



Addition of a deck girder between the two cabins



Drawing of the stairs and I stop here.



The launch boat fleet is complete.

I made a quick plan of the little 3,5 mts clinthed pram. The hull is 0,25 mm thick.

[wefalck]

Interesting that the French navy used nordic 'prams'. What were they used for, for outboard paint jobs, like the British painting-punts?

What surprised me a bit in your design was, that you drew battens over the clinker-seams. Was it done this way in the French navy? Otherwise, it is not very common and technically not needed.

[Fliger747]

Speaking of Battleships, today is the Cuban Holiday "Sinko de Maino".

Back to the real world of model warship construction, this is quite a tour de force of printed technique and construction. As a beginner in this field, I can testify that considerable judgment and experience are necessary for Pascal to make it look easy!

Regards: Tom

[Iceman 29]

Thanks!

Work resumed on the Bretagne a few days ago.

I started drawing this battleship almost a year ago...

Painting of the dinghies is almost complete.

Installation of the stern railings is also almost complete.

[Iceman 29]

A lot of work has gone into rigging the spars for the port anti-torpedo net.

I'm becoming a pro at using stretched plastic sprues, which I'm going to have to do because all the rigging will be made using this technique, which I really like.

I still have two davits to make for the small mooring boats on the bow of the boat. They will only be on the port side of this model.

[BB62vet]

Excellent work, Pascal...Well Done!

Hank

[Iceman 29]

Tks Hank!

I've had too many problems with elastic thread, it pulls a lot on the plastic masts, plus it's too straight, there's always a curve on a long cable, so it's not very realistic.

The advantage of stretched wire is that you can give it a shape, but it's very fragile.

But my models are in display cases whenever possible (the size of the ship). This prevents admirers from touching them, which is almost always the case... Like the children we always are...

I now systematically warn people when I have visitors, explaining that even I break things when I handle the model being assembled with a thousand precautions.

I've found some metric draught scales, I'll see if I like them, if I don't I'll do something else, I'm not a fan of decals...

They also exist in black.
https://www.modelbouwshopnederland.nl/e ... escription

[Iceman 29]

Drawing of the forecastle davits for the service boats to help them moor to the mooring boy and to anchor.

Then printing.

Installation of the rigging.

[wefalck]

Looking very good!

[setori]

trop beau !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[MartinJQuinn]

Magnificent work!

[Iceman 29]

trop beau !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Merci � toi! Je suis avec attention ton projet.

Tks Martin and Welalck

[Iceman 29]

The forecastle is almost finished.

I've fitted the railing and the masts for the sun awning. Quite a few other accessories on the port side too.

The rigging is tricky to fit on the masts. It has to be lazy and taut without distorting the masts.

These masts are curved at the top, which wasn't always the case, especially when the ship was launched. On the Courbet class, they are straight, for example. I prefer this version, as seen in 1916, which is more elegant, and also allows the canvas to overhang the planking, so there's less rain/sun on the deck?

I've still got the droppable anchor chain fittings to fit. It secures the anchors to the sea.

You can see the port anchor in this photo, disconnected from the chain, the ship is at anchor here (on the roadstead, no natural deep-water port at Saint-Quai), the port anchor is ready to anchor in case of a problem, you can see its chain swivel indicating that it is in the up position:



The masts in question:









Advances:

[wefalck]

How thick/thin are these awning-stanchions? They must be incredibly flimsy and break easily!

I shied away from showing them on my current project, claiming that they were stowed when under way. I still have to make them and 'stow' them, but there they will be a lot less vulnerable to bending or breaking.

[Iceman 29]

0.6 to 0.4 mm , it's conical.

I don't UV-treat parts any more, so they stay supple and less brittle.

There were two types of Blast bag on the 340 mm guns of the Bretagne battleship: the "square" skeleton later found on the Richelieu, which of course has many more folds, and the oval following the opening for the turret gun.

The modification may have been made during the 1st redesign, when the 340 guns were raised from 12� to 18� to increase their range in 1919.

I've shown the 1916 oval version.

The "square" Blast bag model:





Without Blast bag:



Oval Blast bag :



Here on the Battleship Provence:



1915-16:







Two of my favorite reference photos that I use all the time for what I want to represent in 1916. These two photos are probably very close in time, but we can see small differences in maturity, as a warship is in perpetual transformation.





Little progress yesterday:

[Iceman 29]

The white may need to be toned down further.

Evolution of the position of the forward draft scale:

Aft and forward draught, 1915:

Here it clearly reads 98 and above 100, i.e. 9m80 and 10 meters, which is consistent;

Technical specifications
Length 166 m
Main beam 27 m
Draught 9.80 m (full load probably, coal, water, oil, ammunition)

1915











After recasting, the forward draft scale is moved aft of the port anchor. No photo for starboard.



1926





1929





I can't conceive of assembling a ship without taking a close interest in its history.

It's often fascinating

I've received the vinyl decals, and they're not bad. I reinforced the gluing with extra fluid glue, which I apply after gluing around the vinyl. But it'll be varnished later anyway.

I "rusted" the numbers. White is too white. But pictures increase the white effect.