The Ship Model Forum

Hi Guys,
I was hoping to see if someone started this thread first, but noone has. Yesterday was a fun and interesting day to be sure. The meeting of 1/96 scale modeler's and models was to be from mid morning to mid afternoon at a big lake in Huntington Beach, CA. I don't remember the name of the lake, but it was a busy place. We found our own spot(s), and started to share, socialize and get our models into the lake. Each person has a similar but personalized procedure; get there, get settled, shoot the , and get the models into the water. Usually in that order. I just want to say that GrimmReaper from Indiana traveled the furthest! Chad, I hope you had fun! You are a good man!
There were many shore fisherman, people walking their dogs, some curious passersby stopping to see some very big, impressive models. Great Guys and Gals, great models, some bad luck and some good fortune. Overall an interesting day.
The group came from far and near. Some of us traveled a couple hours from San Diego way. I don't know where everyone that showed up lives, but I would say that only a few were very close.
Here are some of the models......
Dave's soon to be a kit...IJN DD...and one of his currently available sub kits..


Z Class DD... a new acquisition for Joe P!


Joe P's Cargo Ship...unique and cool!


Chuck's CGN-9 and his lovely wife, (on the right)...always a favorite!


Kevins BB getting ready....

Kevins BB interior...lots of room!


subs......!! diving? you bet!



Now...into the water!
Tony's FRAM Fletcher...oh yeh..that's me!


Lee's BB62..big!


The Early BB's from Pre WWII...two of them! Aint they sweet!!


Here's Mike in front and Chad from Indiana! Thanks for coming!


Here are a few of the BB guys goofing off..well one of them is for sure!


Then, disaster struck! My brothers Brand New DD got out of control and capsized. I thought my brother was going to cry!! Fortunately. the DD was brought back to shore, but without all of the deck houses!



to the rescue..........comes Joe P!!
Every picture tells a story.......Joe P is our hero! He went home, got his wetsuit, came back, got into the cold lake, searched around... and found all of the missing pieces...2 deck house assemblies, all of the 5" mounts. What fortune!!!





Special thanks to Lee for providing a large multi puropse salvage ship!! Once again proving the Iowa Class's capabilities!!
There were some other nice models there, but I spent time playing with my DD and not clicking the shutter!!
I had fun and what a great bunch of guys and gals!!
Can't wait till March 25th at Santee Lakes. That's a 5 minute drive for me!!!
faithfully submitted, Tony Bunch
ps My brothers' DD will be up and running again.... ASAP!

Wow! The radar and rigging weren't even wrecked!! Amazing! Thanks for the photos, Tony!

Next time I'm home on vacation, I'll have to visit you guys. Looks like you all had too much fun! I've gotta find a club in my area here now.

The New Jersey has been many things, usually not a barge though.

I have never seen a model flip over so fast as to not sink and with a rather small amount of water in the hull even. It was great of Joe to go and get his wetsuit and recover the superstructure and gun mounts, with this and the advice that I gave Marty, he should have that model running successfully in no time. The Kidd is a great looking model and she will be out there escorting the Battleships again real soon.

I had a great time, after being cooped up in the house for 4 weeks following my emergency eye surgery, it was nice to get out, and even to run my models was even a greater treat, but this was not with out cost, that little fall I had has put my recovery back some, I need to be much more careful, and hopefully I will be more able to do things at Santee next month.

I will be spending time on replanking New Jersey's deck and a bit of paint, I really hate painting over all the beutiful brass work on the bridge. I have found my Optivisor to be a great asset with my eyesight messed up, this thing really helps see things up close.

Nice show guys.

ah! my favorite picture is the one of the flipped ship...and who needs a wetsuit...honestly! heck, we just take our cell phones and wallets out of our pockets and dive in! nice to see some other people get soggy shorts for once (other than us crazy battlers).

your pics REALLY make me want to leave combat and find a simple r/c club..... looks like alot less work and better ships..... but i dont think those clubs exist around here. Perhaps next time i'm out in san diego there will be a meet i can come and watch....possibly whip out a bb cannon and show you guys how to tango!

Tony, what a great post! All those fine models, some folks having a great time, and a dramatic and successful ship rescue. Reading this post was better than watching Fox news.

Who said it Capsized? Let me tell you what really happen.

It was an amazing morning on the high seas when my look out yelled. "Schiff gesichtet links vom Bug" (ship off the Port bow). I was called to the bridge and could just make out the top of a ship coming over the horizon. "Mannschaf auf Gefechtsstation! Volle Fahrt voraus! (Crew to battle stations! All ahead flank!) I turned the Z-13 to port 5 degrees and took course 218. We could see soon it was a Flecher class. Hmmm strange to have one way over here? But she did not see us so she was a sitting duck. I closed to 5,000 meters and let go with all Eight torpedos. The Flecher saw them coming and she tryed to turn. First she turned hard to port. Then hard to starboard. I turned Z-13 hard to starboard at this point and orderd."Alle Geschuetze Feuer frei!"(open fire all mounts!) Z-13 shook with the shock as all five mounts fired as one. The Flecher was in a hard to stardboard turn when all five rounds slamed her just above the water line. The skipper of the Flecher then made his second mistake. He turned again hard to port causing the holes I just put in his ship to now be below water. It was to much flodding and she turned turtel.

Well that is how I remember it. Look at the Video I think you will see that is what happen. You can also see the picture above taking from a spotter plane with the flecher up side down and my ship in the background coming around to pick up survivors.

Kapitaen Joe P

I hope the builder of this kit learns something from this potential disaster. Thanks again guys
MB

YER, TRY PUTTING IT IN REVERSE,

Is that a Jolly Roger on the sunken Fletcher? Hehe, pirates, even with a Fletcher they can't win!!
Nice builds, all of them!!
The cargo ship, is it a Graupner Neptune? I collegue of mine will be building one real soon!


Greetz from Belgium, Johan

It was a good day for running the fleet, my new 1/96 scale Hatsuzuki ran very well and all the ships had plenty of lake to run in as the water level was very high!
It is always great to see all my friends from the Los Angelis area!
Im afraid it was me at the con of Marty�s new USS Kid when it rolled over, I have a 1/96 USS Johnston myself and it has been running well for over 15 years now so I was not prepared for such a non seaworthy model!
The boat was built to look good and was worth the price paid by Marty but absolutely no attempt was made to make the model stable.
Here is a list of wrongs in the models construction�

1. 2 big r/c car 540 size motors were used making the model too fast and limiting the runtime to only 30 min, this model should run for at least 2 hrs on the batteries we have available to us these days!
I recommend two 380-400 size motors in the 5000 rpm range not the 15000-rpm range of the r/c car motors!

2. A �� or 6mm thick plywood deck was used in the hull making the hull it self a bit top heavy! (I really hate wood on models that go in the water!)
I recommend 1/16� Perspex or polycarbonate or fiberglass or abs plastic deck for replacement, did I mention I hate wood on models that go in water?

3. A fiberglass superstructure was used for the deckhouses and it weighed a ton! About three times as much as you would want and then it very nicely skinned in styrene sheet.

I would both cut out all the walls, decks in the fiberglass, and then cover it in thin sheet or I would just toss the heavy fiberglass and make the structure out of plastics like ABS or polycarbonate sheet.

4. The final and most painful addition of weight to the model was the addition of solid resin cast stacks and 5� gun mounts.
For these things you must do your best to remove as much material as possible from the core of each casting trying to create a 2-3 mm wall thickness, this hard work will be rewarded with a stable model!

The builder of this model is a super nice guy and a very promising ship modeler, I belive that this will be a learning experience for him and in the future, his models will not just look good but will run very well too!
I look forward to sailing with his fleet someday!

Dave

P.S. I do like wood plainking on the decks of warships just not as the deck or any structure for that matter.

There,s nothing wrong with wood in models, built enough of them over the years , Never had a sinking yet, yes theres always a first time, but if its built right , ballasted right, there should never be a problem, from what you discribe that model was an accident waiting to happen. ARH

ARH wrote:Nice show guys.

We will have to give the Americans a taste of our Warship Sailing on July2nd Ron, with a pair of Dukes. What do you say?

Victorious wrote:

ARH wrote:Nice show guys.

We will have to give the Americans a taste of our Warship Sailing on July2nd Ron, with a pair of Dukes. What do you say?

THEY WILL CATCH UP ONE DAY GEOFF,

yes, he was a VERY nice guy and he went way out of his way to help but......As you said Dave; there were many things wrong and Im the one that paid the price. This will be a sore spot for awhile but I will get over it, it only cost me 1100 dollars and his lack of experience cost me. I paid for a running ship and got the Posiden Advneture....
MB

Hi Guys,
Tim,
Thanks, and you're quite welcome!
MechTech,
I hope you find what/whom you're looking for. Without the folks that love this stuff as much as I do, "this hobby would not be much fun"!
Lee,
Get well, and we'll see you in March!
ARH,
It was fun!
Kenny,
There is indeed more than one way to have fun with RC ship models, and I might be tempted your way. For now, this will do, (including my static "small scale" projects), and that's the way..uh huh, uh huh I like it!
Steve,
Thanks! Good to hear from you.
Kapitan Joe,
That's the enemy for you! Always stretching the truth! But seriously, you are a very pleasant and accomodating person. A true modeler's friend! Thanks once more for getting me into some dry clothes! I was hoping to get my DDG going for the March 25th run, but I don't see how; with my current TamiyaCon project. Maybe....but...
Klein,
Jolly roger? Roger!

So, There I was 4 feet deep in very murky water. Couldn't see down 2 feet. I was in my shorts, no socks, but with borrowed sandals, (from Kevin), and my favorite BB shirt. I did'nt want to remove it; just because. Each person coaching me from the shore said, "No! It's over there more!", and they'd point six feet to my right, and then 8 feet to my left. I was soaked, and determined, but had no luck. Enter Joe...you know the rest.
Marty e-mailed a motion picture file taken from his cell phone of the Kidd's roll-over. In this 28 second motion picture, there she was maneuvering with a heavy list, then to the opposite heading she would turn...then heel...then more and more...then....over. There was sound with this, "moving picture e-mail", but decorum prohibits the posting of this colorful, but expletive scarred live action, "action scene". After watching this thing over and over, I actually started to laugh histerically. The action was one thing, but the dialog in the background was sooo soo funny. The ship starts heeling hard over, and you hears this, "NASCAR", in the background and then..."Whoa...Oh"......."get it, get it, get it"...and then...F xx!
We'll get back out on the water again. We have to! Like Lee said, they need escorts!
faithfully submitted, Tony Bunch

Sorry for your misfortune. But, I'm a firm believer of static models. If it flys, it will crash. If it floats, it will sink. But, have fun guys!

Sorry Les but I have to comment on what you say?. My reaction would be if its got wings then it's ment to fly , if it's got a hull then it's ment to sail.
It's like owning a car with no wheels . you can still tinker with it but it aint going anywere.
Dave Wooley

Agree with Dave, a reason why I'm getting away from the 1/700 and looking for R/C stuff now!

Looks like you guys had fun there!