'Q' ship reissue

I guess I need to measure the kit I have.  If they match what is listed by the Lindberg than she does match the USS Atik at the 390 scale.  

The length matches the Atik at 1/390 scale (roughly), but the beam is way too wide. The Atik had a beam of 46 ft. The kit's beam is 1 7/8 inches. 1/390 scale would give a beam of over 60 feet.

I hate to say I told you so but I told you so.

Sounds like a project, Fred. Your math is right. I wonder what the moulded depth was. The model looks tall for a ship with the stated 21 foot draft, but who knows?

OK so I just bought two of them!

"G" just got the hull length to match the beam width.... nice.  I have to keep my eyes open for a couple of them.......

$ 13 on Hobby Link. I may go 1/350 on everything, including hull length just a little. So she'd be a little beamy (54 feet), like 'em that way

Good looking ship as a civilian.

Doing some more accurate measuring and calculations, if you want to adjust the length to the beam, you have to add 3.5 inches. The scale would change to 1/296. Yes, this would make a nice project. Colors would be a guess. The hull is most certainly black. Decks are anybody's guess, as usual. Bull Line stack livery is a red bordered white band with a blue 'B'. There is one picture on the web in which the superstructure is a shade darker than the white band on the stack. Gray? My guess would be buff.

GMorrison, do the shrouds to the masts in that picture have ratlines? It looks like it to me.

it will be 1/294.933333 scale for a 1.875" beam & 15.549" length. cut the hull once in the middle where the hull square shaped. glue some braces across the gap onto the inside of the hull on a flat surface.

A little more research shows that Carolyn had a twin sister named Evelyn, built at the same time in the same yard and also used as a Q ship. She had a funny little super peak at the bows, like the Lindberg illustration.

What a piece of junk this kit is. The well deck cut outs in the hull should each be about as long as the center part under the superstructure.

I am really looking forward to this.

I am also going for 1/296 to make the beam right.

I have no idea how many cuts in each hull this will take, but I guess two minimum.

I guess 1/350 is the closest match for PE. I don't know about the rest of you, but there is something about taking a razor saw to virgin plastic that I enjoy!

You bet!

I should get my kits soon.

Fred are the well decks flush with the sides?

On my T2 since they were, I replaced the little sections of upward curved bulwarks at the 'castles and deck house with thin plastic. A detail.

My plan is to avoid adding any plastic, and minimizing seams. As Fred notes, it's important to work in the area with a constant section. Since I don't have the kit I am guessing, but that looks to be in the middle third or so.

In principle- mark the mid point of all four pieces of hull.

Shift aft 1 3/4" on each half of one set and mark cut. Shift forward 13/4" on each half of the other set and mark cuts. Or adjust slightly if plating detail suggests otherwise.

My technique from doing this a bit on aircraft models- tape the cut line with the piece of tape in the "save" side. Spray the scrap side a contrasting color. Remove tape and cut hull about 1/16" into the paint.

Sand on a flat surface until all painted material is gone.

Mate all four of the longest pieces together with splices at once. One other tip is that I have found the thicknesses of halves of hulls to really vary a bit from kit to kit, side to side etc.

So sometimes it is worth getting the outsides flush and clamped that way before going to town pregluing inside tabs at the splice. Better to have misalignment of surfaces in the hold rather than in the water.

Probably I will then lengthen the openings at the well decks, towards the deck house.

here are some good photos.

www.digitalcommonwealth.org/.../commonwealth:cn69mf167

One of the best photos from this era I have ever seen. A great quality print.

www.digitalcommonwealth.org/.../commonwealth:0p096v323

www.digitalcommonwealth.org/.../commonwealth:0p096v34n

www.flickr.com/.../set-72157628841431295

These are of the SS Evelyn, twin sister of the SS Carolyn.

We know that the B on the funnel is red.

And cut out of plate too.

I think the deck houses are buff, like u said.

Most of the booms look buff but some look white.

AFA the deck, it looks pretty close to red.

I think red oxide might be a reasonable choice.

Those masts on the kit look to be 200 feet tall.

My kits will be at my work on Monday.

I think the 'B' is blue. Do you have any reference for red? I'm going by the ship house flag site.

http://www.crwflags.com/fotw/flags/us~hfbl.html#ahbull

Fred

( the hot link feature never seems to work on my Mac )

Interesting side note ( OK maybe not that interesting ). In the early 60s the new container shipping company, Sea-Land, bought some ships from Bull Line, which was going out of business. Bull Line was trying to get into container shipping to Puerto Rico. They had bought some C4 troopship hulls from the government and had converted the midship section for containers, with an onboard crane on rails for loading/unloading. Other hatches were still break bulk. It was one of these, renamed Anchorage that made the first winter run to Anchorage, Alaska in 1964. Later Sea-Land made them into all container carriage. The other one was named Seattle.

Fred

Blue, true.

Looks to be a hold between the pilot house and the one with the funnel. That's what those two derricks amidship are for?

I was reading a book on Great Lakes ships, and one chapter talked about a series of merchant ships made during WW1 on the Great Lakes, as the Allies needed every shipyard they could to be part of the building program.  There was a series of ships that looks very much like that Q-ship, but I do not have drawing sets of both to compare them.  Anyway, it sure looks like I could convert the kit to one of those.  They were usually referred to as Lakers, because they were made on the lakes.  A number were sold surplus and returned to the lakes to handle package freight.  Wonder if I can find one of the kits.

I had no idea what a hog islander is but spent a lot of time last night reading.

Thanks as always for the new paths of travel.

Don I bought two kits from Tower Hobbies. They had a good price- one for $ 13, two for $ 25 etc.

I got two including shipping for about $ 28.

That being said, well it looks to be a really basic kit.

But I think I'll probably be only using the hull, and will have hull scraps if anyone wants to try the plug method.

I'm going with the splice method- 62% of original plus 62% of original equals 125%.

I think some of you folks are reinventing the wheel on this one. Long accepted the Lindberg kit is a Hog Islander.

Respectfully, not so clear. She sort of looks like a Hog Islander, and she sort of resembles the Bull ships Evelyn and Carolyn.

She also resembles many small break cargo steamers of the time.

There's an article suggesting that Lindberg lifted the plans from a 1942 Mechanix Illustrated article, in which there's no clear provenance given in that article other than "authentic Q ship" which only the Bull ships were in that general appearance.

But AFAIK no Hog Islanders were Q ships, and both Bulls were.

I'm sticking with plan A

How do you build an authentic model of a ship that was picked for having a generic appearance? Take the 80% solution. Build it and wash it with rusty wash and call it a build.

Exactly. In the absence of evidence to the contrary, enjoy.

From oldmodelkits.com ($ 225.00!)

"Very rare hardbox issue from the late 1950s. Classic kit with Ray Gaedke artwork. This is the Lindberg Q Ship, which has an unknown prototype but is suppose to be a WWI style Q-Ship submarine trap. The ship appears to be a WWI British Q Ship by the title, yet looks a little modern and has US numbers of 171, which apparently mean nothing. The Lindberg model actually has the layout of the AK-101 USS ATIK, which was formerly the SS-CAROLYN, built in 1912. The CAROLYN was recommissioned as the USS ATIK and at the start of WWI which was a real US Q-ship. The box is in fantastic 'near mint' condition with like-new color and gloss, four solid corners and very little wear. This kit has never been started. It has been inventoried 100% complete with all parts, decals and instructions."

I'd wanna kill myself if I'd paid anything like that. And of course it's WW2, not WW1 so the description means nothing. I got my kits today, too. They look like stupid toys, nothing much like either a Hog Islander or the Bull ships. Those derricks are there amidship, even though there's basically no space between the deck houses and certainly no hold or hatch.

Well that is a marketing blurb and take it for what it is worth. I recall a few years ago the kit was dissected and a Hog Islander came up as the most likely suspect since so many were built and plans were freely available in the 1940s or so.

Found my kit- from Tower.  Also started grabbing images online and found a bunch.  The Laker class seems to be very close- very little effort needed to convert, if any.  Since the Lakers and several builds around Allied countries were government large contracts to a design approved by both the US and GB, I suppose several series of ships could have come from same design.  Maybe not used as Q-ships, but I don't care- I want to fashion it as one converted to civilian service after war.