Calling all USF Constitution (1797) "Old Ironsides" fans

[pingjockey]

I currently also use the kitchen table. I am in the process of finishing my basement and there is an area where I can set up a work bench but the missus is eying it for her scrapbooking workshop. I am trying to think of a suitable bribe to dissuade her.

[Rusty White]

Yup, kitchen table builder here too. It all has to be cleaned up by suppertime.

I had a friend who converted his hall coat closet into a work area. It was designed to have coats hanging on either side of the door with the door space as room to stand in the closet. He put a work bench on one side with a layoff (so-to-speak) space on the other where he would airbrush. The space in the middle where the door was is where he sat. Talk about a closet modeler! It was tight, but very functional. The only drawback was that he was somewhat limited on the size model he could work on.

[MichelB]

I just model on my dinnertable/main table, and I'm very sorry but not even distinguished visitors can make me clean up that lovely mess: dinner is plates on knees on couch. One has to set priorities...
btw, the dinner table is now littered with paint, glue, putty and millions of hobby knife marks, and technically it isn�t even mine!

[TWoyma]

I'm relegated to a folding card table in my room. Small, somewhat wobbly, but it does the job...mostly

[PetrOs]

I'm relegated to a folding card table in my room. Small, somewhat wobbly, but it does the job...mostly

I use a larger half of a huge corner-like table in my bed/work/whatever room. Workspace of about 130x80 cm, which is enough even for a 1/350 yamato. 6 drawers are filled with different stuff like scatchbuilding stuff, colors, tools, radioelectronic stuff like LEDs.... And my "pending" kits are stored inside of my bed, where you usually store bedcloth! ;o)

[Neptune]

In the picture you can actually see my desk. It's the desk I should normally be studying on. The workspace is very limited to about 0.8m x 0.6m. It was a hell of a job to build the 1/400 Queen Mary 2 there. I should actually be studying on it, so that's why the Constitution has to go for the moment. I also sleep in that room, so the fumes and gasses got me a nosebleed and serious head ache this morning when I woke up. Ventilation would be a good gift for X-mas.

[PetrOs]

In the picture you can actually see my desk. It's the desk I should normally be studying on. The workspace is very limited to about 0.8m x 0.6m. It was a hell of a job to build the 1/400 Queen Mary 2 there. I should actually be studying on it, so that's why the Constitution has to go for the moment. I also sleep in that room, so the fumes and gasses got me a nosebleed and serious head ache this morning when I woke up. Ventilation would be a good gift for X-mas.

Ow, nosebleed and headache is no good! I also sleep in the same room, and it was a reason for me to abandon enamels towards the acrylics- less fumes. Also, in summer holding all the windows fully open, and in winter opening the windows for 10-15 mins every 2 hours, and 20-25 mins before going to sleep.

[Thomas E. Johnson]

I do most of my modeling work in my bedroom also, but I do all major airbrush work out on the back porch, and if its winter time, I do it in the back hall facing out the porch door.

[Edward Pinniger]

The USS Constitution isn't worth a dollar and should be given to very experienced modellers with the aim of presenting them a challenge.
I have had to cut about every part on this ship to match them.
.......
Apart from that there are numerious flaws in the parts, not to mention that it isn't really a model of an existing ship but rather a "sailing ship" without a match in reality.

The small Revell Constitution kit is actually quite accurate considering its age - nowhere near as good as the big 1/96 kit, but a lot better than most non-sail plastic ship kits from the 1950s and 60s. The designers of Revell's sailing ship kits seemed to have had a different philosophy to the designers of their other kits - maybe because these kits were aimed more at the adult hobbyist market rather than kids? In any case, most Revell kits from this period are comparable in both accuracy and detail to much later kits from Heller, Airfix, Imai etc. Their 1/96 Cutty Sark (still one of the best plastic sailing ship kits available) was produced in 1959 - there certainly aren't many aircraft, armour or powered ship kits from this date worth building, and those that are require a lot of extra detail work to bring them up to a presentable standard.
If you're having problems with the kit, it's probably partly due to flash and moulding problems with recent re-issues - quite a few Revell kits have this problem, I built their 1/96 USS Kearsarge earlier this year and it took almost as much time to clean up the flash and mould lines on the parts as to assemble them.
The Constitution kit's scale is actually about 1/190, not 1/146 as listed on the box. Revell seem to have a habit of getting the scales of sailing ships wrong - their "1/146" HMS Victory is actually about 1/220.

Anyway, good work so far with your model - will be interested to see it complete!
A tip for organising workbench - I use small plastic containers (originally for photographic slides, though any small, open-topped rectangular boxes will do) to store kit parts and subassemblies - one box for each kit. This helps prevent parts from getting lost, damaged or mixed up.

[Neptune]

I wouldn't exactly say so. Flash is indeed a big problem, although i don't clean it off that frantically as at this scale you can hardly see it. The ship is cluttered by itself, so no one will actually notice the flash it were still there. I do remove it.

Accurate? I don't know about other kits of that age, and I can believe they were inaccurate, but this one is really terrible! You know there's even a male figure with a hat on the bow??? in the pictures of the real ship, I haven't seen that! Neither are the details they have molded into this kit anywhere near accurate. The bow detail is there, but very inaccurate, the stern is more or less ok.
As mentioned before, it's a nice sailing ship for sure, and with the paint it somewhat looks like Constitution but nothing more than the really...
I'm now near finishing, have to do the rigging and hope the masts stay up. I have to cut the base off because otherwise the masts were all facing starboard instead of forward. So I cut off the base, glued it inside the provided hole (to give more gluing surface to the mast afterwards) and afterwards glued the mast on top of that.

I'll now paint the small blocks on the base of the standing rigging and afterwards put the other rigging in place. I won't use the sails as I can't work with plastic sails...

[Devin]

Accurate? I don't know about other kits of that age, and I can believe they were inaccurate, but this one is really terrible! You know there's even a male figure with a hat on the bow???

Yes, that's Andrew Jackson. Completely accurate. You can read about it here.

I can't remember exactly what time frame that kit represents, but it is very accurate for that period. There's a guy who hangs out in the ship forum on the Fine Scale Modeler site that knows every in and out and the history of the American frigate plastic kits.

-Devin

[Neptune]

Don't know what the guy looks like, but I painted him black.

Here's the finished result.





With the 1/144 A-50 and 1/144 Kilo SSK







And for once I used my modelling stuff to make something for the CiC, that makes sure that she allows me to build in the future (to develop techniques for new gifts is what she thinks).

[PetrOs]

A very nice Constitution! And a very sweet present for a CiC ;o)

[Timmy C]

She's a sax player? Me too ^^ And I hope my Connie will turn out just as good!

[Anonymous]

Steve Hawley passed on these photos of the famous "Hull Model".
The Peabody Museum is the custodian of the model. As stated above, the
Hull Model was presented to Isaac Hull by the ship's crew shortly after the
War of 1812 and is believed to be the best reference of Old
Ironside's actual War of 1812 appearance.

These photos were provided courtesy of Dave "Uhu" who hosts this terrific
website: http://www.prinzeugen.com

[Devin]

What's interesting about the Hull model is that it has a white gundeck stripe. It's been well documented that her colors changed quite a bit during the war. I've been reading this book which mentions them painting out that stripe in yellow ochre to better impersonate British warships. (Yes, I know I'm always saying I don't believe eyewitness accounts, but this book is transcribed from the man's daily journal).

Something else that's interesting is that in this book they mention painting her out in a "lead" color, that the crew member goes on to describe as a shade of white that reflects the hot summer sun. That was in 1844 and they're already experimenting with white camo!

In order to make the Revell kit into the 1812 appearance, you have some modifications to do. The most obvious is the removal of the gun port lids; they were removeable during the war and not hinged and most of the time stored below deck. The transom looked different (no name inscribed), the figurehead was different, and many other things.

-Devin

[Sean Hert]

Does anyone know of the (or any) differences in rig betweens Hull and
Bainbridge's commands?

Also, of any obvious differences in appearance between Constitution and United States in 1812?

Thanks,

[Devin]

Does anyone know of the (or any) differences in rig betweens Hull and
Bainbridge's commands?

Also, of any obvious differences in appearance between Constitution and United States in 1812?

Thanks,

The rig during both times should be very close.

The United States had an extra structure on the aft deck. Not sure of size or location, but it's always mentioned when people ask about converting the Constitution to the United States.

There are a lot of Constitution questions and answers up on the Fine Scale Modeler forum with a lot of people who know more about this than I do.

-Devin

[Sean Hert]

I thought I remembered hearing once that either Hull or Bainbridge really liked to over-spar, even more than the normal US tendency.


I'll check over @ FSM sometime.

[Devin]

I thought I remembered hearing once that either Hull or Bainbridge really liked to over-spar, even more than the normal US tendency.


I'll check over @ FSM sometime.

I'm currently reading Six Frigates by Ian W. Toll. So far it's a great piece of history about the first days of the Navy in 1797 and the political reasons and costs of founding said Navy. It reminds me a lot of "1776", but is much more detailed.

I just finished the section where the author spoke of the fitting-out of the Constellation, United States and Constitution. He makes specific remarks about how the captains themselves were responsible for the fitting of the spars and sail rig. I don't know if it gets into that detail later in the book for the 1812 era, though. He also mentions that the structure I mentioned above on the United States' quarter deck was a wheel house.

Overall a great book I highly recommend to any U.S. frigate fan.

-Devin