Calling all American Civil War Ironclad fans

[Avery Boyer]

Alright fellows, I need some answers. Specifically, on the subject of turret roofs. First off, and this should be the easiest, what is the general consensus on Monitors turret? Was the roof iron plate? Or wooden beams, as is most often shown? What about Passaic? Is the consensus still perforated sheet metal? Canonicus? The plans I have appear to show simple metal sheets, four across, how does that fit in? What about Onondaga? I'm going through my monitor kits and making corrections, and I'd like to do a proper job of it. Thanks in advance! I'll try to post some pictures of my monitors in the near future.

[Devin]

Avery,

Just saw your post. No idea how I missed it for so long.

I'm still not totally sure how the tops of the monitors were all covered. I'm willing to bet, from my research and drawings I've seen, that they all had some sort of cross-beam support at the top of the turrets to hold the shape of the turret and support the rotation mechanism and the pilot house (as shown in the photo of my Weehawken below). On top of that, though, I am not sure. I've read everything from iron gratings, rail road ties laid side-by-side, etc. I've never read anything that suggested wood; the only reason I could see for wood to be up there was if it was a combat station, one that needed sure footing that wood would provide over steel, but the turret tops were never manned in combat.

I'd suggest poking around the Mariner's Museum website and see if there's anything there. They might have more of an idea since they have the Monitor's turret, but since that was found and raised upside-down, any grating was probably lost in the process.

Hope that's of some help.

-Devin

[Devin]

Does anyone have any info on this model?

http://www.sammlervz.biz/nwsIndex.php?a ... b171eda9fc

I had no idea there was a model company in Romania, much less one producing an ironclad kit.

[Timmy C]

Don't know if you've worked your way to this link yet, but it's a little more info if you Google translate it: http://modelism.ro/modelism-1200-dunden ... 4225fd5b1a

[ninjrk]

As an aside, has anybody heard from David Meagher recently? I've been e-mailing him for a few weeks now to buy some more plans and no response. May be traveling again but wondered if anyone knew?

Thanks,
Matt (In need of CSS Arkansas plans)

[Devin]

I spoke with him about three weeks ago. He's indeed traveling for work and once he returns he has a lot of catching up to do with personal stuff at home. I haven't heard from him since New Years, though.

[ninjrk]

I spoke with him about three weeks ago. He's indeed traveling for work and once he returns he has a lot of catching up to do with personal stuff at home. I haven't heard from him since New Years, though.

Thanks, then I will wait somewhat patiently. LOL, maybe he's even got the Passaic plans done!

Matt

[Devin]

Not sure about those. I specifically asked about the Canonicus class plans and he said he hasn't had a chance to work on them much as of late.

[mike powell]

Does anyone know how her cannon were run out? All plans and illustrations of the carriages I have found have no indication of tackle attachments or a crank.

[Timmy C]

The gentleman putting together this 3D model of the turret drive mechanism may have something that you can use:
viewtopic.php?f=27&t=66949

[mike powell]

Yes, I had reviewed that post previously and found it very informative. If he has any information on the handling of the guns I would hope he might weigh in. Thanks for your response.

[Devin]

From "The Old Steam Navy: Volume 2" by Donald L. Canney, page 31:

"Though the Dahlgrens were standard, their carriages were not. Ericsson designed the carriages with his own type of friction gear to absorb the recoil. A large hand wheel below the trunnion acted to spread two arms that applied pressure to friction plates on the inside of the gun slides. The presence of eye-bolts and the lack of any geared mechanism indicate the guns were run out by block and tackle, though Ericsson claimed that brass rollers made it possible for one man to run the gun out."

[mike powell]

Thank you very much. I wonder if those eye-bolts were set on the front cross-member of the carriage?

[Devin]

I would guess yes. That was the standard method of rigging a carriage at that time, so I imagine they would have used it the same way.

I wonder how effective the friction carriage returns were? I know the Old Ironsides had similar carriages and there were major problems with them; it took multiple reconfigurations to get them workable and even then they still weren't perfect.

[mike powell]

I took a second look at photos of the recovered carriages, taken while still upside down in the turret and at the carriages as recreated at the Maritime Museum. Plainly, in each example, an eye bolt can be seen at the very lower forward end of the carriage side, the outboard carriage side that is. Since the slides were fixed, not traversable, I would think it plausible the opposite eye bolt would have been fixed to the turret wall, though the end of the slide is possible also. Amazing what you can see when you believe something is there.

[Devin]

Yeah, I could see how the tackle could be fixed to the wood next to the slides or the turret itself. The turret wall would definitely give them more leverage, but the wood at the floor would be easier.

That's a great photo. Is that an actual shot of the turret? It looks to me like the full-scale inverted mock-up they have there in the museum.

[mike powell]

I assumed (and you know how that ends) that the photo was the real McCoy. I've seen photos of the pristine replica at the museum. Have they done one "as recovered" also?

As info, I've now been given a photo of the replica carriage which shows an eye bolt at the rear similar to that at the front.

[Devin]

Yes, they have an "as found" replica in the museum, inverted, even has the bones of the crewmen in there. I'm willing to bet that's what the photo is of, as it looks exactly as I remember it. I've never had the chance to see the actual turret and guns with the preservation tanks drained. I need to look into scheduling a trip to do that.

Bolts on the rear of the carriage would make sense. In case of a misfire or during practice runs, they'd need to be able to pull them back without use of recoil.

[btbrush]

Love the thread on the monitor class boats but is anyone out there building anything else? Love to see some WIP. I'm new to this hobby but have been building models for (too) many years. Got my interest going after watching Sahara. And reading the monitor thread it's got me wanting to scratch a boat like the Texas (read reworked Virginia) in 1/72nd scale. Let me see what'cha got.
Bruce

[btbrush]

Devin, where'd you find the figures for your Monitor. Beautiful work. Want to see more WIP, please/
Bruce