Zvezda

Jray

I build the 1/72 Greek Triera.If you go to www.modelwarships.com you'll find pictures.They may have it under Rob Millard instead of Rod Millard.They misspelled my name the first ship I sent in.Oh well.It was a good kit I really enjoyed the built.You can build it full hull or waterline I choice the latter.I had to put in false decks were you looked down the gangways.It was just empty.Its been said on this forum that its not true to history,but it builds into a nice looking model.Zvezda's Roman Warship and Roman Emperor's are build off the same hull as the Greek basically.The 1/72 Medevil ship is new and can also be built full or waterline.I started the kit but didn't like my finish so I' going to re-do.Three of thier kit's the Brigentine,Sirius, and the Pouqoui Pas are old Heller molds and if you are familiar with Heller you'll no what to expect.All and all there new product line are pretty good.

Rod

Your Triera is a find build. I also looked at your Spanish galleon. It, too, is excellent. I envy your artistic abilities as well as your obvious skill.

Thanks for you reply.

I read here that their ship models are ok too, which surprised me as some of the Zvezda russian market tanks (1/35) I have bought were total junk.

Zvezda sell both their own models as well as Heller reissues.

While their own models are generally sound from a modelling point of view, they all suffer to various degrees from faulty research.

As Millard already noted, their ancient ship range is little more than a collection of Hollywoodesque movie props (not helped by Zvezda using the same basic kit for a 480BC, two 260BC and a 50AD warship). As far as the Roman Punic war warship is concerned, that's probably not too much of a problem, as we know little enough about how these looked in the first place. The "Greek Trireme" however is a more serious case of sloppy research, as we have a - not 100% accurate, but pretty close - reconstruction afloat, which would have been easy to study.

The Zvezda cog is an interesting kit and much more accurate than the ancient, well, craft; the two main issues here are the scale, which is more around 1/65 to 1/60, and the deck, which is dead wrong, the planks all going from bow to stern, while they should go from one side to the other. Again hardly to understand as there's one in fairly good shape in Bremen which is well-documented.

The "Crusaders' ship" or whatever it is called is simply a cog with some additional parts. The same comments apply - and of course it's not that appropriate for crusaders...

In all I'd say the cogs are the pick of the bunch, particularly as the Heller reissues I've seen aren't those of Heller's best efforts.

Jorit

Jorit,

That's depressing news about the Zvezda cog.  I had high hopes for it - for a couple of reasons.  First, it's rare these days for any plastic kit manufacturer to take on a sailing ship at all - let alone a subject that somebody else hasn't already done (e.g., the Trumpeter Mayflower).  Second - it srikes me as an ideal kit for newcomers.  I try (usually without success) to discourage such folks from tackling a Revell Constitution or a Heller Victory, but recommending something more basic and less time consuming has become a real problem.  Beyond the old Lindberg reissues of Pyro kits (e.g., the Harriet Lane and Gertrude L. Thebaud), there are precious few plastic sailing ships currently on the market that can produce handsome models in a few weeks of evenings.

The big question that comes to mind is - do the decks of the actual Bremen cog have camber?  If not, I don't imagine it would be difficult to replace the ones in the Zvezda kit with either wood or scribed styrene sheet.  To reproduce camber, though, would be a bit tricky for a beginner.

Are those Zvezda ancient "galleys" original kits, or reissues of somebody else's products?  I fully agree that any conscientious model company making a Greek (or Roman) galley kit today ought to take the Olympias project into account, but perhaps we should be slightly less harsh on kits that were designed before that project took place.

Out of my memory - which has to be taken with a certain amount of caution, as cogs are not my main area of interest - the Bremen cog doesn't have much of noticeable deck camber. Incidentally, the deck planks were apparently partly removable to allow access to the cargo hold, which is why these cogs didn't have large cargo hatches. Therefore it would indeed be rather easy to relay the deck with plastic sheet strips.

The cog kit definitely deserves praise for being a good starting point for a beginner, though I'd say that Nina, Pinta and the Heller fishing boats can be similarly rewarding.

As for the galleys, to the best of my knowledge these are original Zvezda kits. I don't know where they did they research, but something at the back of my mind keeps suggesting they partly took the large Andrea galley model as a prototype (which was one of a Punic war Roman warship). The Olympias is around since the late 1980s and is well published, so it should have been easy to get the relevant information.

To avoid misunderstandings - Zvezda is to be praised for putting new sailing ship kits on the market in the first place, no doubt. Then these kits are by and large well-engineered (the upper hull/lower hull construction and hard plastic sails are low points) and build up well. My main gripe is that the research they have done is inconsistent and that they also start the hull-swapping game, which in my eyes is actually quite close to fraud.

Jorit

It sounds like what we're talking about is, in essence, a large open boat with boards laid athwartships between the beams (or did a cog have beams in the usual sense?) to cover up the cargo.  Probably not difficult for a moderately-experienced modeler with a stock of sheet styrene or wood to replicate - but not the sort of thing that should be expected of the beginner.  I really wish some manufacturer would pay more attention to the intelligent newcomer.  Give him/her an accurate scale model of a prototype that didn't have many individual parts or much rigging.  It sounds like Zvezda came close, but didn't quite do it.

I agree that the old Heller Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria make good projects for newcomers. The problem, at least here in the U.S., is that they're difficult to find - not the sort of product the newbie is likely to see in the local hobby shop.

A gold star and a slap on the back to the manufacturer who gives us a scale model of the Olympias - preferably with corrections based on the most recent research and practical experience.  Plastic, wood, or otherwise.