Have you ever noticed . . .

Hi :

   Another short Note. Have you ever spent time in Newport? Best month I ever spent on Vacation. You Oregon folks know how to make someone feel at home.T.B.

Oh Boy!

   Now the first thing I did was modernize the deckhouse area.This means a remodeled wheelhouse with lotsa windows and a cab in the aft wall for the arch crane for the submersibles. The stack gets split and comes up as two squared mast looking structures aft of the new deckhouse.

     The aft deck gets modified by cutting off the deck Forward of the stack. Almost even with the aft end of the original wheelhouse. New cabin structure on the main deck with a cut-out for the Containers used for the control areas for the R.O.Vs.

    Go aft. Lengthen the hull one and a half inches and square it off. Now from the deck to about a 1/16" cut a notch. You must cut an area in the deck to match, to create the Launch ramp for the Big Submersible. The arch Crane mounts at the new transom corners.

 If you want you also can Enclose more of the bow and move the remodeled Wheelhouse/Deckhouse forward. Cut off the rectangular piece on both sides and the small rise at the bow. Replace this with .010 Sheet cut in a strip wide enough to go down into the flared area of the bow. A little filler and sanding and you have a rebuuilt modernized bow as well. No Taller than 1/2" though

     You can move the lower level of the deckhouse forward to where the spray shield for the forward gun was. This will give you a lot of area for building your vessel. I will try to post some Photos of mine but don't hold your breath. Can you do facetime or just phone me? Message me if you would be interested. Or phone me at 830-214-3123 

    Just a note.I have found that this little model is a good base for many unique conversions. There was one around Bethel Island,Ca for a long time that was a Live-Aboard.

Hey, I've got a friend who works for the Maritime Museum up in Astoria. I'd like to get up there one day.

Those are pretty little ships. I know what you mean and I can't help you much, but one thing is that you can usually fudge scales if you need to. For instance a 1/200 scale 180 foot minesweeper hull can be a 1/96 100 foot work boat hull. 

Love to see what you do with this project.

Hi;

 Well, I used one that was a command and crane boat. It did not in any way resemble the way it started. New deckhouse and all. Including a small one man Depth Tank.