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Airfix 1/180 HMS Victory...

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  • Member since
    December 2002
  • From: Harrisburg, PA
Airfix 1/180 HMS Victory...
Posted by Lufbery on Friday, June 18, 2004 1:38 PM
Has anyone ever built it? I've been looking for a review on-line, and I'm not finding anything. I'd like to know what's in the box and how well the ship kit builds.

Does anyone here have any experience with that kit?

Regards,

-Drew

Build what you like; like what you build.

  • Member since
    May 2003
  • From: Greenville, NC
Posted by jtilley on Sunday, June 20, 2004 10:51 PM
I don't have the kit in front of me, but I built it a long, long time ago. The following is based on the 30-year-old recollections of a 53-year-old brain. So take it with a large grain of salt.

In general it's a reasonably good kit - certainly not bad for its age. (It came out, I believe, sometime around 1970.) The figurehead and stern ornamentation are particularly nice, and the deck fittings, including the guns on the weather decks, aren't bad at all.

It does have one major problem in terms of accuracy: the shape of the bow is seriously distorted. To put it as simply as possible without having pictures available, the knee of the head is too short. There's far too much space between the bowsprit and the figurehead; the figurehead sits almost a full deck lower than it should. The problem would be hard to fix, because all the pieces that are keyed to the knee of the head - especially the complex headrail assemblies on either side - are distorted too. If you compare those shapes to a decent set of plans the difference will be obvious. It really upsets the aesthetics of the ship.

One other feature may or may not be troubling. The gun barrels below the weather decks consist of stubs that plug into small holes in the sides of the hull. Whether this is an acceptable approach on this scale will be a personal decision. (In its later sailing ship kits - most noticably the beautiful Wasa - Airfix used the same basic trick, but made the depressions for the ports a good bit deeper. Those of the Victory kit, if I remember right, are only recessed by about 1/32".) One could conceal that compromise of authenticity by cementing all the gunport lids closed.

In terms of accuracy and finesse the old Revell kit, on a slightly smaller scale, is actually better. It dates from one of Revell's golden ages, the early to mid-sixties. Most of its lower- and middle-deck gunports are molded shut, but some of them (rather arbitrarily selected) are open and have guns with carriages sticking through them. The deck details are really remarkable for the scale. One warning. I have a sample that I bought quite a few years back, and it seems the mold for one of the hull halves was damaged. The steps running up to the entry port on that side are crude and blobby compared to their counterparts on the other side.

I'm not sure how widely available the Revell kit is, but (by coincidence) I saw one in a Revell Germany box for sale in a hobby shop in Raleigh, North Carolina yesterday.

The ultimate plastic Victory is, of course, the 1/100 Heller kit. But the Revell one has a great deal of potential. Nicely-executed sailing ship models of that size (about 18" long) can be quite exquisite.

If your taste runs to really small sailing ships, you might want to check out the waterline white metal Victory from Skytrex in 1/700 scale. It's quite well detailed, and very accurate.

Hope this helps. Good luck.

Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery.

  • Member since
    December 2002
  • From: Harrisburg, PA
Posted by Lufbery on Monday, June 21, 2004 8:26 AM
Thanks for the review! I'll have to check out the Revell kit as well.

The shallow gunports of the Airfix Victory don't bother me as I'd probably cement them shut, but the distorted bow would be a problem.

Thanks again,

-Drew

Build what you like; like what you build.

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