Model Ships... Lack of popularity?

Silver

Again yours looks very good.

 

Haha, I'm sorry but I could never build a model like that.  The builder is a well-known Swiss modeler.  His name is Pierre Greutert. The world awaits your humdinger though!

Gary

Just got my USS The Sullivans in the mail.

Which suggests that maybe they just sit too long on the shelf at the LHS and aren't worth the space.

GMorrison

Ration that man some rum!

I am building a Dragon 1/700 carrier. I have literally taken the thing back apart twice now. Can't wait to get back to my Revell yacht model.

 

Man, now you guys are making me nervous about those Dragon cruisers in my stash!

Word of friendly advice.Their is lots of assorted wiring in the wings and throughout the plumbing of the aircraft.Its measured in miles in length.All cables are coded and clamped.Many assorted colors on wiring and clamps.

Nice F4.But;I have a 1/32 scale F4E scratch build cut away way nor detailed .Also I have another F4 E Israeli completely opened up and very highly detail and it lights up.The reason l have the edge is that I flew the F4s in my younger years.Both of the aircraft models are going to be displayed at my local museum at Boeing in Seattle.I, if I decide will post photos.Again yours looks very good.If the Nationals where to be held in Seattle .You and the modeling world will see it entered.i also have a friend who will complete soon a 1/144 scale aircraft carrier w/ jets and helicopters.I will build the aircraft for him.That ship model will have a cutaway area to show the inside bays.That will be the mother of ship Models.

Silver

Another thing to add is that no aircraft model can out detail a ship model.

 

Maybe so, maybe no...

Take a look here:

http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/Fea1/501-600/Fea541-F-4-Greutert/00.shtm

http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/Fea1/601-700/Fea656-F-4-Greutert/00.shtm

Another thing to add is that no aircraft model can out detail a ship model.

I have interest in ships, WWII US aircraft carriers in particular, but to do some ships right, you need to do rigging, and I cant stand doing that. One reason I dont do WWI aircraft.

the doog

Ships just aren't really in the news at all these days. It's not like anyone thinks about them. And they're fiddly to build, and don't really have that "macho appeal" of a tank. They don't go really fast like a muscle car, and they don't have the lines of a high speed jet, nor the historical appeal of many other genres. I've built one--the USS Constitution, but have no plans to revisit the genre.

 

Well, they certainly not everybody's cup of tea. And yes they can be quite fiddly to build, especially when you start adding PE, metal gun barrels, wood decks, rigging... Some builds require the skills of a micro surgeon.

As for the rest of your points I respectfully and strongly disagree.

Macho? Hard to get more macho than a battleship. Bristling with guns in a most warlike fashion and the ability to project hurt for miles and miles while taking fire. Sounds pretty macho to me.

Historical Appeal? USS Arizona and USS Missouri. For the USA,  WWII arguably began with the Arizona, and certainly ended on the decks of the Missouri. Or USS Hornet venturing deep into Japanese controlled seas to launch the Doolittle Raid. Numerous other ships have put their mark on history. The Golden Hind, the Niña, Pinta & Santa Maria, RMS Titanic to name some non warships... And so many others.

Sleek lines? To my eye IJN cruisers such as Atago and Takao had some lines that were truly graceful and sleek. Angles and sweeping curves of design that made them look like they were at full speed even when anchored. And not even mentioning small racing craft or similar vessels. 

In the news? Well 1, that depends upon your news source, and 2, what's going on in the world. Maybe not today, although I did read of a ship in the news today. But certainly in news of the past, and certainly in news from the future, there will be ships, civil and military.

Oh that's all there and more...

Personally, I love to build ships. Tanks and airplanes are too easy, and there's no real point in building a car model.

Bill

mitsdude:

When I worked as a HVAC engineer in the Pierre hotel in NYC in the 60's there was this tennant who I had repaired her air conditioner was in her 80's at that time had about seven rooms full of ship models that her late husband built, he was the captian of the last whaling ship in the U.S. and he build all of his ships by hand made of wood, along with full sizerd ship figure heads he aquired from ship yards it was quite a museum that I visited several times as she saw I wsvery interested in her collection and like you any model ship I'd built would be a joke by comparison to this craftsman's work so I fully understand what you say.   Karl

I have 4 of them in my stash and honestly, it's the time it would take to build one that has me balking at it. I look at all the antenna wire detail I'd need to do to do it "right" and that alone has me focused on planes. Especially with the 1/350 USS Missouri.

There sure are a lot of kits out there though. Even a new USS Texas, which could fun as a few short road trips to verify real world detail, etc. could be done. A luxury I've never had before.

Ships just aren't really in the news at all these days. It's not like anyone thinks about them. And they're fiddly to build, and don't really have that "macho appeal" of a tank. They don't go really fast like a muscle car, and they don't have the lines of a high speed jet, nor the historical appeal of many other genres. I've built one--the USS Constitution, but have no plans to revisit the genre.

Yeah Silver ;

 I have seen that too .Tis a shame but it does happen .  T.B.

I have seen a little 1/48 scale super detailed P-47m beat out a large 1/350 scale super detail Bizmark.The thunderbolt got best of show.The same person built both and entered them .

The large 1/350 German warships and Japanese ww2 made a big impact in ship modeling.It will take about five years to complete one of those to I.P.M.S. Standards.

Rick;

   You said what needed to be said as well . I see no rant here . I can safely say that the example you gave was good . For a beautiful model .The Revell ARIZONA oob.or the Buckley or Forrest Sherman begs this opinion . Just build them , they are beautiful right as they are .       T.B.            P.S. There is a terrible shortage of civilian subjects in suitable scales though .

I am more bothered by the ratio of naval vs commercial ship kits than I am the number of ship kits vs other genre.  But then, it is probably about the same as the number of civil aircraft kits vs military ones.  I like to build the stuff I see around me, not the exotic stuff only seen at a few military bases.  There are some landmark historic civil aircraft that have no decent kits available, while about every possible version of fighter planes is available.  Same thing with ships- there are ships/boats in wide everyday use that must be scratchbuilt if you want to do a model.

ikar01

Sometimes it depends on where you live.  CLosaer to the water or a naval base you might see more ship models.

 

that's funny. i live in colorado and ROCKY MOUNTAIN SHIPWRIGHTS is one of the largest ship clubs in the country. 

Rick,

I didn't say that all shipmodeling had to be held at a higher standard from the point of view of an individual modeler. That individual can be his model anyway he wants.

Shipmodels are held to higher standards than most other types of available kits, etc.

Don is correct, I believe, in saying that ship kits don't "feed" the industry as well as aircraft and vechicles precisely because building ship models take longer.  Fewer kits are sold because each project tend to be a long one.

Compromises in ship "correctness" will always be with us. Without some heavy scratch work, which maybe beyond the individual's skill level, showing that Fletcher-class at a given point in its career, may not be possible for a given build.  More often than not though, the builder, when displaying his model or posting photos will list his reasons for the differences.

It doesn't mean it HAS to be that way with ships, but the trend to explain the compromises is there. Aircraft, etc., modelers can be as detailed too, but the tradition doesn't seem to hold them to the level of detail and accuracy that ships are held to.  

Perhaps the hobby is worse off for it, but I can't deny that it is there and personally subscribe to it.

A modeler building the cruiser Newport News for a relative that served aboard the ship after the Vietnam gun turret explosion would be motivated to show the turret with the missing gun barrel.  Would the same modeler have the same motivation to model the parking lot dings on a model of the same relative's '57 Chevy? Probably not, although it maybe fun if he did.

Bottom line is for everyone to keep modeling fun.

While I build all genres of models, I consider ships to be my specialty.  But in spite of this, I build fewer ships than models of other genres.  Why?  Because ships are major projects. I have built ship models with over two thousand parts.  I can finish most models in four to six weeks, or even quicker.  But ships take me anywhere from two or three months to as much as a year.  Thus, the length of time it takes me to build a ship model means I buy fewer. If other ship modelers face the same problem, it seems reasonable that hobby shops would sell fewer kits than other genres.

While the shelf areas in my LHSs are comparable to other genres, the boxes are quite a bit bigger, so they do contain fewer kits, and fewer numbers of kits of same item.

Also, in my model clubs, I find some folks stay away from ship models due to the long build time.

All this being said, I am thrilled with the quality of modern ship kits (I have been building ship models for over sixty years), and the wide range of subjects compared with long ago.  Certainly better to be a ship modeler today than half a century ago.  The one area where I notice a decline is in scratch building of ships, especially sailing ships, reflected by difficulties in buying fittings like blocks, deadeyes, belaying pins, small eyelets, etc.

I find here in my Home Town of Brisbane Australia we have some Hobby Shops that are very well stocked with Ship Kits from most Manufacturers. They can get expensive but you pays your Money and get what you want. I look at it money well Spent versus the Time to build a Ship Kit. I usually work in 700 and 350 Scales. It is up to each individual Modeller to decide how much work they wish to put into a Kit. This could be A/M Sets and a Great Paint Scheme or simply OOB.. Agreed that they can take longer to build then some other Genres but the decision of the Builder what they want to buy and what to build is entirely up to them. I know that the % of Ship Modellers is very small in the general Model Community but I find some of the other Genre Builders come up and say that it is too difficult for them to build a Ship Kit to a great standard due to the Size and the complexity.

I recently built 1/350 Prince of Wales. It's first time I've built a ship. And I simply fell in love with ships. I'm a fan of WWII aircrafts but something just hooked me in with ships. Maybe the the size, maybe the details maybe the soul... Here take a look...

I think the main problem with the model builders is that they stay away from building ship for many reasons. It's different to build, it's a challange in mind. I think ships must be more encouraged, that's why I like Finescale better when a ship is on cover.

Never really cared for HobbyTown, sure they have some nice stuff but I don't know about the stores.

Mike & TB,
I'm not buying it.  While there are a few (let's say hypothetically a thousand) builders who want to get the color exact to match the rig - correct bulges, aa guns, radars, cranes, etc, we are a drop in the bucket.  For a hobby to go on healthily, we need to support all the guys that build the Arizona straight out of the Revell box without worrying about grey/blue or correct rurret top colors.

Manufacturers are not doing a public service, they are trying to make a profit.  Every time.  If we can correct the "glaring inaccuracies" and use the exact colors, then we are safely above the norm.  But if we tell every guy who wants to make a model of the aircraft carrier his uncle served on that "no, there isn't any kit you can use to make that.  You would need to do major surgery to get a Wisconsin kit from that Iowa.  You can't build your Dad's FRAM because the only kit available has a wildly incorrect bilge keel, etc, etc", then we are not serving the hobby well. 

Or were you only discussing the hobby in the way that this small group of accuracy-driven modelers lives?  I believe that the way we build our models is very special and the ship-modeling hobby doesn't really need us as much as we need it.

Ship modelers include guys who say "gosh look at all the guns and airplanes on that painting on the boxtop."  And then while they are building it (straight from the box), they learn that there was a really big war 60 years ago and on and on.  Those guys are the bread and butter that keep Revell and Trumpeter and all the rest churning out kits where we can work our magic.

Sorry - this was not supposed to be a rant.

Rick

So very well said T.B.!

Thank You Mike :

      So few folks understand that ship - modeling is held to a very high standard . Now there's the rub , many would build just for the pleasure , and should . I have always felt that ships have a character all their own .

     it's this character that we must bring out .Then there's the Scratch - Build . Like many other things it can go all the way . Now that means working features . Ships can have so much more in that department .  that's reserved for the larger scales , but , it's still possible to have some features that work in 1/700 if you're so inclined .

      Research is paramount in this field too .Thing is , Unlike , say the aforementioned F-6-F there are thousands of variants . The Square Bridge Fletchers had many gunnery suites changed from the time of launch till they got to theater . Sometimes two or three ! Before ! they got past inclination tests .

 There are five iterations of the North Carolina that I know of .There may be more , but , that's all I found at the time !

    Think about the U.S.S. Constitution . She's changed many times since she was built of the finest Oak , America had to offer . It is a fact she is probably Not more than 20% original now . This is all part of keeping the old girl in seaworthy shape and is the nature of all wooden craft .

 We have ships that are made of iron and steel .These now are showing the burden of time . Sometimes changes are made to some fits that can be used to lighten ship to preserve their ability to even stay afloat .  And still be accurate in total appearance and historical rig .       Now there is the  rub . But when you do a ship you have to have a raft of research , photos ( if possible ) and plans in the scale you're working in and Patience , lot's of it .

 This covers everything from plastic to wood and everything in between .     T.B.

The bar is very high for shipmodel builders, because even though they are building plastic kits, the build quaility can (and often will) be compared to something the model viewer has seen in a museum. The detail standards, etc., are set very high and can demand a time and effort beyond many modeler's pain thresholds.

The only work log I've kept on a build was for the Revell big Constitution I constructed 30+ years ago.  It took 500+ hours over almost two years to finish it. At the time I was hanging around with a bunch of shipmodel builders which included Dr. Tilley, so my motivation was high.  Everybody's models took a long time, so by their standards no one was in a rush.

I believe the one thing that makes ships somewhat different than other model subjects and the details required is that a ship model represents a unique one of a kind thing.  Yes, there are ships of the same class that look superficially the same, but as a shipmodeler can tell you, no two ships are identical.

I can build a F6F Hellcat fighter, make sure I have the canopy and a couple of other points correct for a -3 or -5 variant, apply some decals and representative weathering and I'm done.  

To do a shipmodel justice, that type of build may not be considered enough. A WW II aircraft carrier went through rapid changes during the war. What paint scheme did it have at what time, what was the antenna suite like during the spring or fall of 1944?  Did the air group have SBDs or SBC-5s?

While that amount of research could be applied to a Hellcat fighter model project, few modelers would expect it.  Did Campbell's F6F-5 fighter have heavy exhaust stains during the "Turkey Shoot?"  It could make a challenging project, because details like that may be hard to track down.

Many ship modelers would believe that level of research is expected of them for a project. It is the nature of the beast.

Is it necessary? No. Everyone should build their projects they way they want to.  No modeler should be surprised though, if building a shipmodel, that tradition requires a higher order of work than other projects. It comes with the deal.