Model Expo "Phantom" Pilot boat question.

  Some time back, a friend at the local library was able to direct me to a site where I found several photos of New York Pilot Schooners. I was researching Phantom and this was part of the research. In this one photo, there is a small boat lashed to the deck, starboard side, by the fore shrouds. The photo was identified as "pilot boat #2", and is barely clear enough to make out some detail.

Model-Expo also has about the same deal on the Sultana, for $99.99, also an entry level kit.  Try:

http://www.modelexpo-online.com/cgi-bin/sgin0101.exe?FNM=06&T1=MS2016CB&UID=2008041707462635&UREQA=1&TRAN85=N&GENP=

or Item #: MS2016CB@ modelexpo-online.com

Both of these are great deals. There is alot of help out there also, I know of several people at:

http://shipmodeling.net/vb_forum/

who are documenting each step with pictures and tips from people who have already completed them.

Gunner

Use this link. Its the "first time ship builders" advertisement on the front page of the Model Expo website.

In this link, click on the Phantom "MS2027BT" link to get to the page where its offered with all the tools etc for $69.99.

http://www.modelexpo-online.com/cgi-bin/sgdynamo.exe?CODIV=0110?HTNAME=_starter.html&UID=2008041513465488

Russ 

Gunner1 wrote:

I'm working on this kit now.  The Model Expo @ $69.00 is a good deal for new wood ship modelers, it comes with a small set of tools and all the paint you'll need.  The copper tape for the bottom is a little hard to work on but looks great when done.  You can down load a practorum by Chuck Passarro that really helps.  The best part is that if you finish within 6 months they give you a store credit for the 69bucks. Gunner

I tried to look this up and only found them for $89 and there was no mention of the store credit. I'm interested in this so if you could, post a link to where you're looking. many thanks,

I'm working on this kit now.  The Model Expo @ $69.00 is a good deal for new wood ship modelers, it comes with a small set of tools and all the paint you'll need.  The copper tape for the bottom is a little hard to work on but looks great when done.  You can down load a practorum by Chuck Passarro that really helps.  The best part is that if you finish within 6 months they give you a store credit for the 69bucks.

Gunner

Many thanks, philo426.  It's a nice little kit, with good plans - of a remarkably attractive ship.

To repeat a comment I made on another thread:  my one serious criticism of the kit is that it makes no reference to any small boat.  I pilot schooner had to have at least one; otherwise the pilot had no means of getting between the schooner and the ships he was piloting.  Most of the illustrations I've seen suggest that the boat (which traditionally was called a "pilot canoe," though it bore no resemblance to anything we normally associate with that word) was stowed upside down on simple chocks amidships and handled with a pair of very simple tackles rigged to the lower mastheads.  The schooner carried at least one young, strong-backed apprentice, whose responsibility was to muscle the canoe over the side and row the pilot(s) back and forth to and from the big ships.

I thought for quite a while about making a "canoe" for my Phantom, but didn't - for several reasons.  One - by that time I was ready to move on to some other model.  Two - I couldn't find any drawings of a New York pilot canoe.  (I didn't try very hard, I admit; I think there may be such a drawing somewhere among the treasures of the Nautical Research Journal DC-ROMs.)  Three - she's such a pretty ship as she is, and the boat would look - if authentic - decidedly clumsy.  Four - it's the sort of thing that, if I ever change my mind about it, I can always add the boat without dismantling the rest of the model.

I guess a lot of other modelers have felt the same way.  I've seen quite a few photos of built-up (and scratchbuilt) Phantoms, but never one with a pilot canoe.

Good luck.

Here, courtesy of our good Forum friend Michelvrtg, a link to some photos of the three sailing ship models I currently have in my possession:  http://www.hmsvictoryscalemodels.be/johntilleygallery.htm

Click on the "Phantom" box near the lower left; the "gallery" contains three pictures.

If you do a Forum search on the word "Phantom" (in the "Ships" section - for heaven's sake don't try it in the whole Forum, or you'll be bombarded by F-4s), you'll find quite a few useful posts relevant to this model.

Good luck.

I built one of these a few years ago - from the short-lived resin hull version of the same kit.  There were no decals; I don't think the kit's ever had them. 

I made up the name and port of hail using a lettering decal sheet from the railroad department of the local hobby shop.  Another possibility would be dry-transfer lettering - available from the same source.

It's a nice little kit and a beautiful ship.  Good luck.