Calling all MN Richelieu & Jean Bart fans

[Jean-Paul Binot]

Here is great video footage of Richelieu arriving in New York in 1943.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OoOb5WL2020

[ZALADIS]

I had no idea they were such incredible looking ships!! Ive got to build me one of these in 1/700 ....CANT WAIT!!

[Thomas E. Johnson]

So overall how bad is the Trumpy 1/350 kit?

[Felix C]

This is from the IPMSusa2.org review

"The release of this kit lit up the discussion boards in France. Here is a summary of the faults the Richelieu experts in France found:


The hull
Generally speaking, the hull is good; the dimensions are accurate to within 0.5mm. The bow is a little too vertical, making the curve at the bottom of the bow a little too high (about 1.5mm maximum). From the junction of the stern with the hole in the axis of the rudder and a distance of 20mm to the waterline, the shape of the hull is a little too strong (1mm maximum). The sternpost should be modified to about 0.8mm on the upper part.
The rudder, propellers, propeller shafts are wrong and should be replaced. It is missing the false keel.
The bilge keel can be replaced, but is far from being a priority.
The anchors and their hawses are false and really deserve to be replaced.
The porthole location on both sides of the hull are identical, they should be different.
The foc'sle is incorrect.
The superstructure
Generally speaking, the details are beautiful and dimensions are quite accurate, forms are not strictly accurate. The first deck, bunkers and the main tower are striking examples.
The funnel is a good shape, although the rear is straight instead of being curved. But it lacks 1.5mm in length.
The bridges are more or less accurate.
Equipment
The 40mm Bofors are very ugly need to be replaced. The associated gun directors are missing.
The 20mm Oerlikons are even uglier and must be replaced.
The 100mm are nice looking but wrong in dimension; plus the aft end of the shield is wrong. The underside of the 100mm platforms should be open on the sides.
The 152mm turrets are mostly correct in shape and dimension and can be used without problem. The barrels are wrong and must be replaced. The range finder of the central 152 turret should be the same as that of the other 152 mm turrets.
The 380mm turret is too small. The blast bags, their barrels and their barbettes are wrong and have to be replaced. The shape of the roof of turret 2 isn't good.
The gun directors of 380mm and 152mm are inaccurate.
Other elements
The boats are pretty, but wrong.
The rafts, projectors, ammunition boxes, paravanes, smoke screen generators are ugly and wrong.
Bofors mounts and Oerlikons bulwark' shields, cradles and cranes can be improved even perhaps replaced.
The searchlights are wrong.
The camouflage is at best representational. It wore such a camouflage from September 1943 (date of the end of its modernization at the Brooklyn Navy Yard in NY) to April 10 1944.
I will address these perceived shortcomings in my review of the kit. I do not pretend to be more knowledgeable, but can look at it with an impassionate eye.

The Kit

Like other Trumpeter kits, this box is filled with plastic, eight sprues in all in addition to the major components. It includes:
A single piece hull.
Three sections of deck.
The boat deck.
The 380mm turrets.
Sprues A, B and D, which includes hull and superstructure components.
Sprue C, which consists primarily of gun tubs.
Spruee E (x2) and F (x2) have the parts for the guns, boats and miscellaneous fittings.
The standard Trumpeter base and a nice raised-letter nameplate.
A decal sheet with only the Tri-color included."

[sirmaumau]

OMG that means TRUM's kit is hopless and helpless. My miserable project--richelieu 1940

[Jean-Paul Binot]

Well, the thing is that the Trumpeter kit is off in many areas that make it really hard to correct properly without scratch building a large portion of the kit. You see, with the hull wrong at the bow, at the stern and on the porthole location, plus all three part of the main deck inverted, elements of the superstructure off, main turrets too small, funnel too upright, plus all the light AA, the boats etc. to be discarded anyway, that makes really a lot of wrong. Still, if you can live with discrepancies, the kit will build into something that will look like a Richelieu.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Each modeller has to decide for himself whether the Trumpeter kit as acceptable or not. One element might be the price you pay for it. Because it is so much of a dog, sales have been very poor and the kit can be found at a big discount, which might compensate for the wrongness of so much of the kit. That way, one might spend more money to buy after market items (PE, AA etc.)

IMHO it would be wasting good stuff on bad stuff, but others might differ.

[Thomas E. Johnson]

I can live with a few errors or discrepancies in models as long as they arn't major, and the model is 90% close to the actual subject matter. From what it sounds like, Trumpeter's kit is so far off that its a pointless waste of plastic and money. I'm not fascinated by the ship enough to justify having to scratch build 75% of it. Its a subject matter that would be nice to have a 1/350 model of to go along with my growing collection of famous ships, but I won't be heart broken if its not. I'll wait for another manufacturer to make a proper 1/350 kit of it, or maybe Trumpeter will break down and retool the thing.

[Cliffy B]

How accurate is the 1/700 Trumpy hull? Was thinking of messing around with some conversions of her in later years and would only need the hull and maybe the basic superstructure. Just wondering.

[JasonW]

How accurate is the 1/700 Trumpy hull? Was thinking of messing around with some conversions of her in later years and would only need the hull and maybe the basic superstructure. Just wondering.

I've been reading through this thread in an effort to get similar info related to my thread in the What If forum and from some of the replies here it would seem that there are major issues with the hull and it would be major effort to fix. That being said, it looks like the Richelieu to me and will definitely work for a whiff. I bought the IHP Jean Bart resin replacement hull for $20 to try to correct some of the issues with Trumps Jean Bart. Maybe IHP will take a shot at a replacement hull for Richelieu as well.

[Jean-Paul Binot]

Well, 20 USD sounds like a very good deal for a replacement hull that would correct the inaccuracies of the Trumpeter kit, but how accurate is it really? IHP say they added the bulges and corrected the porthole pattern, which are the most horrible goofs, but what about the rest? The stem shape, the breakwater, the mirror image of all deck features? I would imagine (or at least hope) that a competent master maker intent at making a replacement hull would pay extra attention to fixing ALL spotted errors. But is it so? I do not have access to the IHP kit and it is hard to say from the small photos. I hope that they did a bit more than just taking a stock Trumpy hull, smoothing the hull, drilling new portholes and adding bulges, something that any competent modeller could do easily enough.

Anyhow, the IHP offering, welcome as it is, does nothing to fix the issues with the Trumpeter superstructure parts (undersize turrets, etc.). I have zero experience with 1/700 modelling, but I would advise modellers motivated enough to scratch build their own way to make a Jean Bart or Richelieu at that scale, as it is probably much easier than in the larger scales. After all, there are parts in the Trumpeter kit that should be useable .

[able]

Gascogne

[Sr. Gopher]

When are we gonna ever see a close to flawless model?!?!?!?!

[Jean-Paul Binot]

I have come across the web pages of Alain Moitrot, a renowned French ship modeller, who is building a 1/200 waterline model of Jean Bart.

http://laroyale.forum0.net/dans-nos-ate ... n-t545.htm

Well worth a visit for the craftmanship and the resourcefulness of using sometimes unexpected materials in order to achieve great results. The build so far might not have the crispness of some other examples seen recently on modelwarships.com, but the pursuit of accuracy is worthy of praise and might be very useful for any modeller wanting to build an exact replica of Jean Bart in her last state.

[Rob]

Does anyone know what the dark colour on Richelieu's turrets and funnel was in 1945? I am assuming other colours being G45, B20 and US deck blue.

Thanks,

Rob

[John Snyder]

Probably G10.

[Rob]

Cheers mate,

R

[Atma]

On the book "British, Soviet, French and Dutch Battleships of WWII" by William H. Garzke Jr. and Robert O. Dulin Jr. in page 97 it states that Richelieu during her stay at UK at February 1944 they whare added eleven single 40mm bofors and nine single Oerlikons removed. Anyone knows the postion of the single 40mm bofors and wich exactly single Oerlikons removed ?

[Atma]

Btw anyone cna name the radars that Jean Bart is "wearing" ?
http://img508.imageshack.us/img508/5043/skan078.jpg

[Laurent]

Hi Guys,

we have had a club meeting this weekend, this is what I saw there


















Michel, the builder of the wonderful model at scale 1/100 comes from planet Mars , uses zinc plates to build this superstructure, has never heard of any model shops, nor PE parts. We all were in awe, as you may imagine. He took 5 months to build the 40mm bofors you see on one of the pics, no plastic here, just metal...

Regards,

Laurent

[Sr. Gopher]