The Ship Model Forum

The Ship Modelers Source
It is currently Thu Mar 28, 2024 6:13 pm

All times are UTC - 6 hours [ DST ]




Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 377 posts ]  Go to page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 ... 19  Next
Author Message
PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 6:33 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Wed Jan 19, 2005 11:48 am
Posts: 544
Location: La Rochelle, France
Hello Folks :wave_1:

One year ago a friend and I started a mammoth project of designing and building the famous Mare Island Navy Yard as in 1944.
The scale : 1:700 (this was to "host" our numerous USN ships of the period, as we're both long time USN fans)
The model : we planned to use nearly 100% custom made photo etching :woo_hoo:

My friend Jean carefully designed and drew more than 12 sheets (25cm x 10cm) with hundreds of parts.
He used the huge NavSource collection of period pictures... and today's Google space views to get correct dimensions for the piers.

The whole set includes the three West side "finger piers" (piers + related buildings and equipment), four big cranes, a dozen barges (workshop, power, litter, dredge, LCVP), various equipment (floating scaffoldings, etc.) and a bunch of vehicles, from a tiny Harley to caterpillars and rail road stuff. Not to forget some working figures.

I helped him in designing the masters (from my own experience in photo etching), then I did the entire etching in .2mm brass and .1mm steel. Jean started to assemble the prototype in late October.

Below are some pics of the "prototype", i.e. the first assembly and painting

The piers (relief photo etched in brass : later models will be cast in resin from those masters to keep costs down)
Image

A "finger pier" after painting with some equipment in place
Image

To build the piers we were helped by a "micro" caterpillar
Image

Here's a view of an almost finished pier with a Niko Model San Francisco hull
Image

Now the four big cranes. 100% photo etching :
Image
Image

Then some buildings on each pier :
Image
Image

Now the rail road equipment :
Image

One of the four tiny Harleys (3mm long, note the relief etching of the engine)
Image

More equipment (Look Dad : no hands !):
Image
Here an LCVP :
Image

And there comes our master piece : the dredge USS Endicott
Image
Image
Image
Image

At last (for the moment)... sorry... we couldn't resist :big_grin:
Image
Image

More pics are to come, as Jean is completing the other sub assemblies.

Enjoy.
We wish you an Happy New Year

Jean (Toulouse, France)
Bruno (Bordeaux, France)

_________________
A day spent without laughing is a wasted day!


Last edited by bgire on Sun Jul 25, 2010 2:07 am, edited 3 times in total.

Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 6:44 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Tue Nov 20, 2007 4:02 am
Posts: 423
Location: Augsburg Bavaria Germany Europe Earth
Pouh.....speechless .... :worship_1:

_________________
Image
www.uschivdr.com


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 6:49 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Mon Jan 10, 2005 10:46 am
Posts: 2409
Location: Hoboken, NJ
That has to be one of the most impressive things I've ever seen modeling-wise, and you haven't even put the ships in yet!

_________________
We like our history sanitized and theme-parked and self-congratulatory, not bloody and angry and unflattering. - Jonathan Yardley


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 7:10 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2007 7:08 am
Posts: 119
Location: Nebraska, USA
OMG! Amazing job, as said before, it already looks impressive and the ships arent even in it yet! Cant wait to see more pictures of this build!!

_________________
How do you tell a communist? Well, it's someone who reads Marx and Lenin. How do you tell an anti-Communist? It's someone who understands Marx and Lenin. - Ronald Reagan


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 7:11 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Sun Apr 03, 2005 2:07 pm
Posts: 105
Location: south jersey
HOLY CRAP! Very impressive!!!!!!!!!


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 8:32 pm 
Offline
Site Admin
Site Admin
User avatar

Joined: Sat Jan 08, 2005 4:31 pm
Posts: 3569
Location: Plattsburg, Missouri
This is awesome work. Please keep us updated.

_________________
Timothy Dike
Owner & Administrator
ModelWarships.com


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 8:49 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Mon Apr 24, 2006 4:56 pm
Posts: 934
Location: Berks County, Pennsylvania
Holy...........that has got to be one of the most amazing things I have seen....ever....

_________________
"It is best to remain silent and let others assume you are dumb than to speak up and remove all doubt"

http://nssavannah.wordpress.com/


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 8:59 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Fri Apr 08, 2005 9:41 am
Posts: 2207
Location: Monson, MA.
Infinite thumbs up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1:









Bob Pink.


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 9:44 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Tue Jan 11, 2005 1:40 pm
Posts: 8159
Location: New Jersey
That is OUTSTANDING!!

_________________
Martin

"Tomorrow is the most important thing in life. Comes into us at midnight very clean. It's perfect when it arrives and it puts itself in our hands. It hopes we've learned something from yesterday." John Wayne

Ship Model Gallery


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 10:33 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Fri Dec 02, 2005 9:28 am
Posts: 379
Location: Peoria AZ
Fantastic idea and execution. One request if I may be so bold. A 1/700 figure has to be posted on top of one of the cranes with his CAMERA, shooting those marvelous Mare Island pics.

Jim

_________________
jim

aux viewtopic.php?f=59&t=40896

CV-3 viewtopic.php?t=39515&p=263120#p263120

CV-6 viewtopic.php?t=33201&p=201342#p201342


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 3:35 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Tue Jan 11, 2005 10:26 am
Posts: 1689
Location: The Netherlands
This is sooo ridicilously impressive. It must be one of the greatest 1:700 modelling projects I've ever seen.

I also think you'd get rather rich if you were to make those etched items commercially available.

_________________
If all else fails, a complete pig-headed refusal to see facts in the face will see us through. - General Melchett


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 7:44 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Sun Mar 13, 2005 11:51 am
Posts: 2406
Location: Belgium
Congratulations Bruno, looks fantastique!!!!
How many and which ships will go into this dio?

_________________
The merchant shipyard


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 8:24 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Thu Jan 13, 2005 5:21 pm
Posts: 591
Location: Sarina, Nth Queensland
From what I see so-far, absolutely floors me. Going to be the diorama of the decade

_________________
Image


I was depressed last night, so I rang lifeline. Got a call centre in
Afghanistan and told them I was suicidal.

They got all excited and asked if I could drive a truck.


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 11:48 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Wed Jan 19, 2005 11:48 am
Posts: 544
Location: La Rochelle, France
Neptune wrote:
How many and which ships will go into this dio?


Well : this should differ between both of us :
As the pictures show, Jean is building the dio as a whole. The port will "host" his 1:700 kits for a time when he finishes them. The ships will not be glued in place.
He opted for a mid-high tide level to have both visible hulls for DDs and not too much height for cruisers.

As for me (Bruno), I plan to built the whole too with extension to the East (right) to include the submarine slip, but as a modular diorama, i.e. with separate piers. My future dio(s) will be presented either separately or assembled as I lack room in my tiny flat.

From the early stage we designed the whole set to be modular, so, in case of commercialization, one could buy and build one pier only, two or the three, with optional barge set, rail road set, buildings set and so on. The whole stuff costed us about 200-250 euros ($290 to 360)

Generaly speaking we can have one cruiser moored on each pier side, making a maximum of seven. Of course, some of them can be replaced by two to four DDs each, making a maximum of 28 DD size vessels !
During the War, Mare Island was responsible for Cruisers, Destroyers, Auxiliaries and subs : this make a laaaarge choice.

Jean tried to place some of his kits to give an idea during the early stage of assembly :
Here you can see a Cleveland class CL, an Atlanta CL, a Baltimore CA hull and a Sumner DD.
Image

Mare Island "finger piers" have a complex understructure. Here is one of them upside down to show the 50 pilotis below. This is the only major exception to our 100% photo etch project : Jean's is made of wood, mine is Evergreen (for the master) and resin (for production models):
(the barges on left come from Battlefleet models, that on the right is ours)
Image

Another barge (a workshop barge) :
Image

A floating crane barge :
Image

Last view of our "beloved" Endicott dredge (lot of design work on this complex vessel):
Image

Detail of a pier with Niko Model San Francisco hull and boat :
Image

Stay tuned for future pics...

Bruno

_________________
A day spent without laughing is a wasted day!


Last edited by bgire on Sun Jul 25, 2010 2:08 am, edited 1 time in total.

Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 1:50 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Mon Feb 14, 2005 4:09 pm
Posts: 1868
Location: Athens Greece
Simply outstanding. :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1:

_________________
On the workbench:

Various 1/700 aircraft.
Juan Carlos I LHD 1/700.
HMAS Canbera LHD 1/700.
FGS Type 122 class FFG 1/700.
LSD-41 class LPD 1/700.


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 4:14 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Sun Dec 03, 2006 5:36 pm
Posts: 2160
Location: About 50 miles away from the Gulf of Mexico ( traveling W is you do so :)
Amazing !!:big_eyes:


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 9:02 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Sat Jan 22, 2005 6:54 am
Posts: 273
Location: Connecticut
Simply Awesome :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: :thumbs_up_1: Can't wait to see the finished product.

_________________
Scott


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 1:58 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Wed Jan 19, 2005 11:48 am
Posts: 544
Location: La Rochelle, France
JimRussell wrote:
One request if I may be so bold. A 1/700 figure has to be posted on top of one of the cranes with his CAMERA, shooting those marvellous Mare Island pics.

Jim


DONE ! :woo_hoo:

Image

_________________
A day spent without laughing is a wasted day!


Last edited by bgire on Sun Jul 25, 2010 2:09 am, edited 1 time in total.

Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 5:02 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Mon Jan 10, 2005 3:39 pm
Posts: 1016
Location: Newcastle Upon Tyne, England
STUNNING

John


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
PostPosted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 6:16 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Tue Jan 11, 2005 12:17 am
Posts: 723
Location: Dinslaken, Germany
Very inspiring!
Tahnk you for sharing!
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


Report this post
Top
 Profile  
Reply with quote  
Display posts from previous:  Sort by  
Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 377 posts ]  Go to page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 ... 19  Next

All times are UTC - 6 hours [ DST ]


Who is online

Users browsing this forum: Bing [Bot] and 56 guests


You can post new topics in this forum
You can reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot post attachments in this forum

Jump to:  
Powered by phpBB® Forum Software © phpBB Group