HMVS Cerberus in 1/96 scale - Completed 29/4/07

[Jefgte]

Looking well with this nice paint





Jef

[Edward Pinniger]

Apologies for the lack of updates - I've been very busy lately with Christmas preparations and haven't had time to do much modelling let alone post on forums! However I've managed to complete the Nordenfelt guns (about a week ago) - here are some photos:



The Nordenfelt four-barreled 1-inch gun was intended for close-range defence against torpedo boats. It's not a true machinegun as it was operated by a lever rather than by the recoil of the gun.

The 5th, unassembled gun is a master for casting copies in metal (these guns were quite common on mid/late 19th century ships so this'll be useful for future scratchbuild projects). The guns are movable - the mount has a pin on the base which fits into a hole on the pedestal. Still to be added are etched brass handwheels, two on each mount (one for rotation, the other for elevation)



These were scratchbuilt from styrene stock, other than the pedestals which are based on spare hubcaps from a 1/35 tank kit! There are 25 bits of plastic in each gun assembly, including the pedestal and mount (not counting the 2 PE handwheels) Although I used "assembly line" methods - i.e. measured and cut the parts for all 5 guns in one go - building all 5 seemed to take nearly as long as the hull and superstructure did - this seems to be a universal rule of scratchbuilding - the smaller the parts get, the longer they take to build.

They're simplified a bit, particularly the trigger/breech area, but are good enough for their small size (2cm high, barrels 1.5cm long) - scratchbuilding these has made me realise why some modellers build in 1/48 and 1/32 scale

The next update will probably be in the New Year, although I might have time to do some more work on the Cerberus over the holidays, I probably won't have time to photograph and post anything. I've also tried out casting metal copies of some of the Cerberus fittings + parts, which has turned out fairly well - I'll post some photos when I find the time.

[Edward Pinniger]

Finally got round to posting an update:
Many more deck fittings added (all unpainted at the minute). I've also started adding the railing stanchions, from brass wire - these still need trimming + filing. The flag jacks are pins. Handwheels have been added to the deck pumps, these are PE brass items.




Bridge fittings. The ship's wheel is somewhat undersized - it is made from heavily modified railway/railroad wagon wheels. The ones I used (2mm N-gauge) were the closest I could find. It should be about 30% larger. The vent forward of the searchlight platform should also be somewhat larger and have an oval rather than round cowl - I may fix this later. Also note that the binnacle and telegraph (also the capstan and compass on the main deck) are metal parts which I cast myself - more on this later.
A 1/96 crewman from the Revell USS Kearsarge gives an idea of size.



Mast and top. The mast, flag staff and supporting bracket are brass, the yard is styrene, carved and sanded to taper the ends. The top will be painted buff (like the funnel) when complete.



Closeup of two of the Nordenfelt guns. Undercoated black but not fully painted yet. The handwheels are etched brass.



6-pounder (57mm) guns and mounts (not totally complete). These will be mounted at either end of the flying deck, between the Nordenfelts. The green barrel sections are modified spare guns from 1/72 tank kits (a very useful source of tapered gun barrels)





Still a fair amount to do - railings, searchlights, anchors and chains, davits and boats, final painting, etc. - but the Cerberus is now well on the way to completion!

[kennylibben]

wow, amazing build so far!

just curious, did she ever see action?

[Edward Pinniger]

The Cerberus never saw action, though it took part in a number of "wargaming" exercises with the other ships in the Victorian navy (which included some early torpedo boats). I have also heard of an incident where the ship apparently fired a warning shot at an unidentified vessel at night - the turret crews did not realise that their guns were trained in the wrong direction, and the shot hit a building (apparently a chemist's shop) on the shore. I'm not sure of the accuracy of this, however.
During WW1 it acted as a submarine depot ship, under the name of HMS Platypus - I don't know much about this period of the ship's history, other than that it was repainted overall grey along with the rest of the fleet.
There's much more information on the ship's history at http://www.cerberus.com.au .
I don't know if any of the RN breastwork monitors saw combat action; does anyone know more?

Regarding the model, I've finished the boat davits (not installed yet) and am working on the two searchlights and their mounts. The 6-pounder guns are installed on the flying deck - they still need shields, as do the Nordenfelts. I've also painted most of the deck fittings.

[Dave Wooley]

I very much like your Nordenfelt anti TB guns . I remember doing a piece on the Nordenfelt multi barrel guns when researching HMS Fearless and having the pleasure of rooting around for hours in the Patent office .A wonderfull place for research. Super job
Dave Wooley

[Edward Pinniger]

A final update showing some of the fittings I've added. The model is now virtually complete, so it should hopefully be finished other than boats and crew figures (which I'll add later) within a week. I'm currently in the middle of painting the fittings and retouching the paint on the deck, superstructure and hull, so many things look rather unfinished/rough at the minute.

Searchlights. These may not be totally accurate as the only reference I have is two photographs, one of which isn't very clear. Handwheels are the same etched-brass items used on the Nordenfelt guns. The painted bridge fittings are also visible in this photo.



Davits. As far as I can tell from contemporary photographs and drawings, the fore and aft sets of davits were moved to the main deck when the flying deck was shortened. As built, all 6 pairs were on the breastwork deck, the fore and aft ones were on brackets to keep them clear of the turrets.



Navigation lights (painting not complete) and ladder handrails.



The railings on the main deck and breastwork deck are also nearly complete, the flying deck railings are still incomplete.
As far as I can see from photos, the railings on the flying deck and searchlight platforms are solid metal rails, whilst those on the main deck are chains. I don't have any chain anywhere near fine enough, so I made these railings by "rigging" fine metal wire (tinned copper electrical wire) around the stanchions and securing it with drops of CA. This gives a reasonably convincing "sagging" appearance.
The railings on the flying deck are made by gluing fine brass wire onto the stanchions. One length per stanchion, as it's hard to keep the wire straight with longer lengths.

6-pounder guns and mounts. These have shields (as do the Nordenfelts) which I haven't added yet.



Painted deck fittings. You can also see the oil wash added to the deck to highlight the planking (I drybrushed the deck colour on afterwards to tone down the effect of the wash). Anchors and anchor chains still need to be added.

[ARH]

Very nice,

[Dave Wooley]

Superb job. Have you built the ships boats yet?
Dave Wooley

[Edward Pinniger]

Superb job. Have you built the ships boats yet?
Dave Wooley

Not yet, I'm currently concentrating on finishing the ship itself - once this is done I'll work on the boats and crew figures (I'll use figures from the Revell 1/96 Kearsarge and Cutty Sark, modified in some cases)
I may use aftermarket boats from Billings or similar if I can get some in approximately the right shape and size. I do have 3 spare boats from the Revell Kearsarge, but they are completely the wrong design. Do any manufacturers produce 1/96 ship's boats suitable for 19th century RN ships? (is there anything like this in the Dean's Marine fittings catalogue?)

I also need some anchors- I'll look out for suitable parts for both these and the boats at the London model engineering exhibition this Friday.
One final question; I know the ship usually carried the Victoria state flag (a number of photos show this on the aft flag jack) but did it usually carry any other flags (such as the RN white ensign) during the 1880s-1890s period?

Anyway, thanks for all the comments and help/advice - I should hopefully have some photos of the (more or less) completed model by the end of this week or next week at the latest.

[Laurent]

Hi mister "E" ,

nice model you've built there ...

about the boats , I presume they will be clinker built , I guess ?

if they are , I have the solution to build them out of paper & card ...

like this :




full equipped & painted :


I'll explain it , if you wish ...

See you ,

Laurent

[Richard J OMalley]

Your boats look very good . Could you elaborate on there build please.
Very nice !

[Dave Wooley]

I agree with Richard. can you explain in more detail as to how you built up the hull . This may require another thread?
Dave Wooley

[Laurent]

Hi all ,

will do , in the "tips & tricks" section

Regards ,

laurent

[RickF]

Laurent,

I will be very interested to read about your method. Your ships' boats look good and I have several to build. Look forward to your article.

Rick

[vedro]

Hi,

this looks very nice. Great job.
Considering tips & tricks I'm looking forward to see them. It could be very helpful

[Roger T]

Love how well the Cerberus is coming on, EP, and those boats of Laurent's are excellent!

[Edward Pinniger]

Apologies for the lack of photographs of the completed ship! I've finally (after several years of using an outdated camera with a broken flash) got a new digital camera today, which has much better close-up detail resolution and can can cope much better with poor lighting conditions, so will photograph the virtually-complete Cerberus soon and post the pictures here.

All it's currently missing is ship's boats (already mentioned), anchors (haven't done these yet as I'm not sure the plans in the card kit are accurate - I need to check some of the photos of the real ship) and crew (I was going to use modified
Revell 1/96 figures, but they're not really right for late 19th century naval crew - I'll probably buy some Deans Marine metal figures)

[Edward Pinniger]

An update at last (this model was getting as neglected as the real ship). After several months, I've finally got started on the three missing areas - anchors, boats and crew. All of these were things I put off for one reason or other whilst building the model (I wasn't sure how to make the anchors, and couldn't find a cheap source of suitable boats and crew figures) and when it was finished I inevitably got sidetracked by other projects.

Here is a photo of Cerberus in its current state (taken in January at the local IPMS club meeting)


There are three main anchors (two fore, one aft) and a smaller sheet anchor. These will be attached with copper chain which I've blackened using metal blackener solution. I've made an extra one of each type of anchor, to use as a master for casting metal or resin copies - as these are unpainted you can see how I constructed them.



The anchors are made entirely from styrene stock, the shaft is 2mm square rod and the end is made from 1.5mm thick styrene sheet cut, filed and sanded to shape - the splayed ends are wedges of styrene sheet glued at right-angles and then sanded down. The ring is a thin slice of tube (I should really have used copper/brass ones but didn't have any to hand).
They are painted with matt black, lightly drybrushed with graphite to give a "cast-iron" look, then drybrushed with rusty red-brown. When fitted to the ship they'll receive a final wash of burnt umber to add to the rusty look.

I based these on the ones in the card model - I later found that these are probably not right for the ship in the 1880s as they do not look much like photos of the preserved anchors taken from the Cerberus. (I assume they're an earlier type fitted to the ship when it was built - the card model, which appears to be very well researched, represents the ship "as built" in 1870). Still, they look OK to me.



For the crew I bought some Slaters 1/100 model railway (3mm/TT scale) figures. Their uniforms and caps are a fairly good match for naval sailors from this era, at least in this relatively small scale. Unfortunately the figures are significantly underscale (a problem with all of Slaters' railway figures) - they're more like 1/110. (Compare them to the Revell 1/96 Kearsarge crewmen on the right). It looks like I will have to look elsewhere for a source of crew for the Cerberus!


The ship's boats (two cutters and a dinghy) were bought for 50p each at a collector's fair (I've modified and repainted them) - they're from a plastic kit somewhere around 1/96 to 1/120 scale but I don't know what one, possibly the Revell Constitution. The oars are from the spares box, left over from building the Airfix 1/170 Victory - wrong scale but OK for representing smaller oars in 1/96! They boats are painted with Revell and Tamiya acrylics and weathered lightly on the lower hull. Eye bolts have not been added yet.
There are only 3 boats, whilst Cerberus has 6 davits, but if the ship is moored in harbour then the others could be in use or on a boat boom.


Hopefully in the next update, the boats and anchors should be in place on the ship, but I still need to find some crew!

[Dave Wooley]

Cerberus is looking rather good and I like the idea of making use of parts , ships boats, figures , etc from other models . Will you be mounting the model in a case?
Dave Wooley