Revell of Germany - HMS Beagle - How good?

What bugs me is the fact that Beagle was built as a trim 10 gun brig, with a sleek hull. Remasted and with increased accommodation, that hull remained the same; an accurate kit of the Beagle as survey ship could be modified easily into that brig.

Bounty was a collier--not trim, not sleek. It's like Lindberg taking their old LCI, putting a Y gun on the stern and selling it as a subchaser.

jtilley

A particularly remarkable aspect of this story is that the scam infected the wood ship model industry as well.  One of the HECEPOB manufacturers (HECEPOB = Hideously Expensive Continental European Plank-On-Bulkhead), Mamoli, released a kit that it labeled "Beagle" quite a few years ago (and is still selling it:  http://www.modelexpo-online.com/product.asp?ITEMNO=MV20W ).  The origins of this high-priced monstrosity are ridiculously obvious.  There's just no way that two companies could conceive, independently, the idea of turning an armed transport of 1787 into an exploration ship of 1831.  Despite the impressive looking plans (and high price), Mamoli's "research" obviously consisted of buying a Revell kit. 

Coincidently, a build of this kit has was posted today at ModelWarships.com:

http://www.modelshipgallery.com/gallery/misc/sail/beagle-64-rm/rm-index.html

P.S.

Last 5 pictures on my Beagle kit review is comparing Bounty and Beagle (darker styrene) hull and deck parts.

On next page on the same page You can find pictures of all parts of Bounty kit.

I have both Revell's kits - Bounty and from Bounty "cloned" Beagle. I have post some pictures of both kits in Lithuanian forum, You can see them here:

http://kvaksiuk.com/forum-lt/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=287&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=20

Beagle kit is'nt worth a dime...

Bondoman - it seems that what we had heeyah was a failyuh to communicate.  Now I understand.  And you're right:  the Revell Alabama and Kearsarge are significantly different - though they share a lot of parts.  (And the crew members are recycled from the Cutty Sark.)

Geoff - I tried again on that link to the "Beagle" instructions; it still didn't work.  I think the problem lies in my bargain-priced Internet service provider.  (The instructions probably would have come up if I'd waited long enough, but I figured five minutes was enough.)  I'll try again at the office on Monday.

There's little room for doubt:  the two "Beagles" are, to all intents and purposes, the same kit.

jtilley

The website has a button to click to call up a copy of the instruction sheet, but I couldn't get it to work.  That would surely resolve the issue; I'll try again this evening.  But it sure looks like the same old deceptive monstrosity to me.

 

Herem is the link. Looks the same to me too.

http://www.revell.de/manual/05458.PDF

Geoff

John, I'm sorry but I've victimized you all by a bad case of short speak. I was wandering off the rails a little and responding to Telsono, who noted that there was a Kearsarge and an Alabama in the LHS, and that they appeared to be the same kit. It is my understanding that they are not, that the CSS is derived from the former and therefore takes an accurate model and clones an inaccurate second subject from it. But having built both, quite a while back, they are different in lot's of ways, enough IMHO to make both worth building.

I don't think anywhere in my post I was making reference to the Bounty/ Beagle, which is of course the subject of the thread. Again, my apologies.

bondoman

What LHS? Wait, don't tell me! Franciscan? If it's the one with the John Steel painting, it's worth a lot of money, maybe $ 350.00.

They aren't the same kit, although it seems one is much more accurate than the other. If you want to have an evening of entertainment, get a couple of good cigars, a bottle of wine and search the topic on FSM.

I'm really curious about the basis of Bondoman's assertion that the new version from Revell Germany is different from the old 1961 kit. 

I just took another look at the photo of the finished model on the company website ( http://www.revell.de/en/products/model_kits/model_kits/products/?id=210&KGKANR=0&KGKOGP=10&KGSCHL=43&L=1&page=2&sort=0&nc=1&searchactive=&q=&SWO=&ARMAS4=&PHPSESSID=1965e1df10b7d98240e8afc86dbe7b72&KZSLPG=&offset=13&cmd=show&ARARTN=05458&sp=1 ); it sure looks like the one my mother bought me in 1961.  (I built it a couple of times after that - including one adventure, based on an article I found in a British magazine, that actually sailed.  Well, sort of.  Briefly.)  The model in the picture has the Bounty's hull (complete  with the mis-shapen head knee), the curious deck arrangement that closes up the gaps in the rails of the waist and at the bow, the raised poop deck, the bark rig, the two stands (rather than Revell's usual T-shaped one), and the boats hanging on davits at the stern.  The only differences I can see are the bizarre color scheme and, of course, the replacement of the original plastic-covered thread shrouds and ratlines with injection-molded ones.  And the "list of features" (two cannons, billowing sails, "lifeboats and davits," etc.) matches my recollection.

The website has a button to click to call up a copy of the instruction sheet, but I couldn't get it to work.  That would surely resolve the issue; I'll try again this evening.  But it sure looks like the same old deceptive monstrosity to me.

I do remember, quite clearly, the John Steel painting on the original box.  (It probably was the best feature of the kit.)  Dr. Graham says the kit was reissued (by Revell U.S.) in 1966; I don't know what the box art for that one looked like.  In his appendix he gives both the 1961 and 1966 versions price ranges of $30-$40.  Caveat:  my copy of the book is the second edition, from 2004.  There's a third edition on the market now; presumably the prices in it have been revised.  And Dr. Graham's prices in general seem to be quite a bit lower than some that I've seen on the web.

I'm more than willing - even anxious - to be corrected.  If there is indeed another Revell "Beagle" floating around out there, nobody will be happier than I will.  But it  sure looks to me like the company is just rerunning a forty-year-old marketing scam. 

I sometimes wonder whether the people in charge of model companies (the people who make the decisions as to what kits are going to be reissued) have any real knowledge of the prototypes - or of model building.  I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, and believe that the current crop of Revell executive really don't know just how awful a piece of consumer deception that kit is. 

What LHS? Wait, don't tell me! Franciscan? If it's the one with the John Steel painting, it's worth a lot of money, maybe $ 350.00.

They aren't the same kit, although it seems one is much more accurate than the other. If you want to have an evening of entertainment, get a couple of good cigars, a bottle of wine and search the topic on FSM.

Dr. Tilley and Geoff -

thank you both for your comments. I had read comments here before on this subject and wasn't sure which ship it applied to.  I tried the search engine, but it didn't reveal the thread. My mind is now made up, not to waste my money on this item.

I saw the Kearsage and Alabama in my LHS and commented that they are both the same kit. The clerk was going to say something until he looked at the box art which is the same vessel from two different angles and of course different flags. Then he agreed with me.

Mike T.

Mike,

I agree 100% with prof Tilley!

Earilier this year I did complete the ‘Beagle’model, out of sheer stubbornness, although it was very frustrating. That was my first completed model sailing ship, it’s just a pity it is not a true representation of the ship I thought I was making. I think things started going downhill when I got a copy of Anatomy of the Ship HMS Beagle. I could no longer put my heart into it more than just finish ‘something’!

You can look at my album at the link below then decide if you really want to waste your time and money!

Geoff

Unfortunately this kit is just a reissue of one of the more notorious marketing scams in the world of modeling. 

It is in fact a modified reissue of one of Revell's first sailing ship kits, H.M.S. Bounty.  The Bounty kit was initially released in 1956; the first "Beagle" incarnation followed in 1961.  (The dates are from Dr. Thomas Graham's book, Remembering Revell Model Kits.)  The real Bounty resembled the real Beagle only in that each of them had a hull, several decks, and three masts.  In no way does Revell's "Beagle" kit constitute a scale model of Darwin's ship - or anything else.

A particularly remarkable aspect of this story is that the scam infected the wood ship model industry as well.  One of the HECEPOB manufacturers (HECEPOB = Hideously Expensive Continental European Plank-On-Bulkhead), Mamoli, released a kit that it labeled "Beagle" quite a few years ago (and is still selling it:  http://www.modelexpo-online.com/product.asp?ITEMNO=MV20W ).  The origins of this high-priced monstrosity are ridiculously obvious.  There's just no way that two companies could conceive, independently, the idea of turning an armed transport of 1787 into an exploration ship of 1831.  Despite the impressive looking plans (and high price), Mamoli's "research" obviously consisted of buying a Revell kit. 

I rarely muster up the effrontery to advise other modelers about which kits to buy, but in this case I think virtually every serious scale sailing ship modeler would agree with me:  avoid this piece of junk like the plague.

The situation is especially lamentable because the Beagle was an historically important, attractive ship - and more than enough information to build a fine model of her is available.  But so far as I know there's no kit on the market that even remotely resembles her.