Building SMS Vulkan (sub-rescue ship )and its tugs in 1/350

[drasticplastic]

I'll think about it, but I was waiting for a plastic, or reasonably priced resin 1/350 uboats to make a dio with.

[Maarten Sch�nfeld]

I'll think about it, but I was waiting for a plastic, or reasonably priced resin 1/350 uboats to make a dio with.

The only option you have now is apparently U35 from Yankee Modelworks: https://modelingmadness.com/review/misc ... ilyu35.htm

Hard to find but not overly expensive I would say.

[JIM BAUMANN]

back in Dec 31 2020 I said....


read below in the link what I said!!!

viewtopic.php?f=59&t=154091&start=60#p927584


well now.... the " practice run " tug worked out quite well, and I was able to learn how to do many of the things needed in tug world !
and is finished and pleasing to the eye
link--start of the project here:

viewtopic.php?f=60&t=314432



So onwards to RETTER ( German built tug 1885 )

and SCHELDE ( Dutch built tug 1906 )

not to be confused with perhaps the better known and more commonly photographed Schelde II

There are very very few images -- well x 2 actually only of RETTER
There is a pretty usable GA drawing in the ' SCHNAKE' book along with a very dark photo;
using' Fast-Stone ' ( image processing programme ) I wa able to retrieve some useful detail from this dark image, which along with a nice but not immensely helpful image of the vessel covered in Ice and Snow
( from the Thiel NDL book)
the 2 x photos mainly serve to confirm that the builders model in the Bremer-hafen museum --
(ably photographed in high res by Lars - of the German model ship site Modell-Marine ...)
( here at MW he known as Maxim )

is actually quite accurate in its dimensions and layout !!
the midships section shown here;

meanwhile...

Schelde-- this vessel benefits from a set of very lovely ' proper' plans from the Dutch towage museum,
Thank you Maarten Schoenfeld)


and a brace of on the the whole quite useful images in fair resolution

here are x 2 images of her,

at slow speed / static- note the very pronounced sheer line fwd !

when the vessel is at speed the bow goes down and the stern lifts !

as ever with a small vessel of this type--
I prefer a solid hull carved of hardwood--in this instance the wood of choice
was 150 year old Jarrah ( ex Victorian barrack room flooring)

It really is HARD-wood and I guess now will be seasoned...(!) and unlikely to move...

armed with a chunk of the wood and scaled 'actual size 'drawings

The choice of wood meant 'proper ' ( oversized! ) tools....

It made quick work of the first stages of 'roughing ' out,
with the sheerlines being hollowed on the curved ends of the belt-sander

more shortly!
JIM B

[wefalck]

Will continue watching this space ... good solid start !

[JIM BAUMANN]

Good morning!-- indeed a ' solid! ' start;

the severe sheerlines, and flare at the bow( mainly SCHELDE )
required thick bulwarks to install without 3D shaping--

followed by some hefty paring from inside to achieve an acceptable wall thickness
a piece of stainless steel PE fret edge was let into the bows to allow sanding without loss or hollowing
this gives a razor sharp and dead-straight stem!

Tomorrows batch of images should show this to good effect.

these images should be self explanatory...
( back to work!...==> )

[Maarten Sch�nfeld]

Hi Jim,

these are really starting to look GOOD...

One small note: please check the Schelde drawing: as you model the ship waterline, the stem is really canted slighty backwards, as it is perpendicular to the keel -- which runs downward to the rear.

[wefalck]

Yep, this seems to be feature of Dutch and British tugs, on German tugs of that period the stem seems to be always more or less vertical on the waterline.

[EJFoeth]

I recently bought Thomas' British Steam Tugs with plenty wonderful examples.... great modeling subjects.

[Maarten Sch�nfeld]

Yep, this seems to be feature of Dutch and British tugs, on German tugs of that period the stem seems to be always more or less vertical on the waterline.

Well, I'm not sure about British tugs, but in Dutch tugs it depends: some (mainly the Smit brothers) were built with the frames vertically (in plumb as they used to call that) and therefore not perpendicular to the keel, whilst others (Wilton's where this Schelde (I) was built) preferred to keep the frames square to the keel apparently. It seems there was no right or wrong, but more a matter of preference on construction method.

On the previous page 4 of this thread you can find the drawings of Zwarte Zee of 1906, built by Smit: in that case the stem was even canted forward by 1 degree.

[wefalck]

I gather at some stage negative rake or inward curved stems became popular, so that the stem-head would not touch a ship, when the tug pushed (in spite of the heavy fenders harbout tugs used to have around their bows). This may be less relevant for large rescue tugs.

[Maarten Sch�nfeld]

I gather at some stage negative rake or inward curved stems became popular, so that the stem-head would not touch a ship, when the tug pushed (in spite of the heavy fenders harbout tugs used to have around their bows). This may be less relevant for large rescue tugs.

That's really a good point, Wefalck. I don't know when this pushing technique started, but I have a feeling (but no confirmation) this started in the USA, Moran Harbor tugs and so, maybe in the '20 or '30 decades. Then the bow fenders came into fashion. Works nicely for nudging a large ocean vessel veeeeeeery slowly towards a quay....

But as you say, for seagoing salvage tugs it's not that relevant.

[JIM BAUMANN]

Hi Maarten ( and all all web-chums! )

Your wrote;
One small note: please check the Schelde drawing: as you model the ship waterline, the stem is really canted slightly backwards, as it is perpendicular to the keel -- which runs downward to the rear.


I thought that also , but my being a simpleton who cannot deal with a drawing for a waterline model that
is " crooked ", I had already adjusted the drawing to be level with the waterline ( in Paintshop Pro )

and then offered up the 90 degree to the water - line

see annotated screenshot-- seems the stem is 90 degrees to the waterline ( which looks more natural...! )

[marijn van gils]

A very promising start indeed!

And already very educational!
Excellent idea to use such thick plastic sheet for the bulwarks. That must indeed be the easiest way to get their complex shape exactly like you want it.

Do I see it correctly that you glue the bulwarks only on top of the wooden hull, and seal the wood of the outside of the hull with the same filler while filling any gaps between wooden hull and plastic bulwarks? Efficient!

[Maarten Sch�nfeld]

Hi Maarten ( and all all web-chums! )

Your wrote;
One small note: please check the Schelde drawing: as you model the ship waterline, the stem is really canted slightly backwards, as it is perpendicular to the keel -- which runs downward to the rear.


I thought that also , but my being a simpleton who cannot deal with a drawing for a waterline model that
is " crooked ", I had already adjusted the drawing to be level with the waterline ( in Paintshop Pro )

and then offered up the 90 degree to the water - line

see annotated screenshot-- seems the stem is 90 degrees to the waterline ( which looks more natural...! )

Hi Jim, you are super! I didn't believe my eyes, I re-did your check with a large print of the drawing... and you are totally right! The stem is perfectly perpendicular to the waterline.

My only defence is that I was optically spoofed... and you are right! The frames are indeed canted backward, but the stem isn't.

1:0 to JB!

[JIM BAUMANN]

Both of these tugs had very chunky and very distinctive rubbing strakes
the sizes of which from phptos is best gauged by the lip at the stern;

Retter

Schelde

I used some pretty fine square styrene strip, dot glued and drawn
into place along the deck sheerline, and then infill-glued.

Shaping the hull of Schelde was rather harder than Retter-- the pronounced sheer and bow flare meant that much re-filling and re-sanding was needed until it matched my templates taken off the plan!

Both of the tugs will now have the height of the bulwarks reduced slightly, ( a swipes of sandin sticks !)
and the re-pared down to acceptable finesse.

more soon!
JIM B

[Jon]

Wow, thanks for sharing. This is really neat to see come together.
Do you have any insight on the colours for down the road?

[Maarten Sch�nfeld]

Schelde-- this vessel benefits from a set of very lovely ' proper' plans from the Dutch towage museum,
Thank you Maarten Schoenfeld)

Hi Jim, by re-reading the above I noticed a glitch: the plans from 'SCHELDE (1)' were not from the Dutch Towage Museum in Maassluis, but from the Maritime Museum in Rotterdam instead. These were found using the 'Maritiem Digitaal' search tool which covers all the Dutch maritime museum collections. Very handy, as there are 20 of those in the Netherlands! https://www.maritiemdigitaal.nl/index.c ... oHistory=1

[JIM BAUMANN]

Good evening all !

well-- 1/1 scale work in real life has gone a little bit mad....-
- ergo the modelling has been few and far between sessions

A few weeks ago (!) I turned my attention to the decking; SCHELDE had wooden decks, whilst RETTER had- unusually-- painted chequer plate decking,

( this little nugget of info was not discernible from the plans or indeed the builders model--though my suspicion was aroused by the black decks
and in a period description of the vessels build features in a book,

==> so it pays to read the text in between the pictures in books !!

Making the decking templates was interesting as it highlighted any possible asymmetry in my bulwark carving--which I corrected

the template was the transferred to the generic ( bamboo) wood decking

more shortly!

[marijn van gils]

more shortly!

Looking forward to that!
Good to see you back at the bench

[JIM BAUMANN]

cheers Marijn!

So Schelde is making some progress, -the deck was installed, and the aft deck --which was steel-

- was marked, pared down with a blade to eradicate the deck planking and painted ( this will be darkened down later )

The distinctive curved sided covered walkways ( whale-gang I believe?) needed making...
on "Manzee" I used some brass sheet fot the curved sides and deck all in one.

- but this vessel has sooo much sheerline/ deckspring
I was unable to create the compound curves in metal this time
so I marked and cut some styrene tubing

and fine tuned the curve and height with a blade

.


The superstructure hat had been previously prepared was then slid in from aft to fwd

The hollowed out ends of the whale-gangs then had wire beading added along with a raised bulwark fwd,
the wire being formed in situ

the thin lightweight deck is merely the support for the wooden deck that will cover that area

==========================================================================================

Meanwhile...- - not neglecting RETTER....

This vessel has the aforementioned treadplate deck, I had been wanting to represent this without resorting to the huge over-scale PE versions.

Often I find that less is more-- and the decking I used IS very subtle--maybe too much so--but better less than more...?!?

firstly--what is it?

It is the foil from a a brand of Cigarettes, which lines the packet -- not all cigarette manufacturers use the same foil-- the raw material o this was donated to me by a ( still) smoking chum-- who uses Marlbro lights...

The foil was carefully stripped out and inspected.

close-up the texture is subtle, regular and pleasing

closer still ..it remains so!

I wanted to lay the treadplate at 45 degrees...

carefully positioning the Retter deck template on the foil piece I could just about squeeze it out without any joins from a single sheet of foil
bearing in mind that inconveniently (!) the manufacture applies a couple of glue spots that retain the foil in the Cigarette packet--
these need to be bypassed...!!

the diagonal layout of the treadplate on my piece of decking

with some pencil dusted on the pattern is pleasing.

More about how that went soon!

JIM B