robert e lee

thank's tanker builder , will have alook for rub n buff , I haven't heard of it , I got a stupid question  for you , I'll apologise in advance , as the boat is all white , do I leave the plastic natural , or paint it a white colour ? ,

steve5

I built this kit long ago when t was fairly new.  I hate to think how bad a job I did on it.  Last year I picked one up for a couple dollars at our contest and have it sitting in the garage, waiting.  My wife suggested to wait until I was retired to work on it.  The trouble is I also have the wooden model of it too.

Hit 65 next month so probably late next year I'll at least go into part itme as I can't afford to retire.  At least it wilsl give me more building itme if medical problems don't interfer too much.

ikar01

it's not a bad kit , the instuctions aren't the best , but I'm having fun . I hope this come's in handy for you . if not me at least the valuable help I'm getting .

tanker builder

is this like the colour you described , it is a fair bit darker than the picture , It's only vallejo ger. red brown primer ?

steve5

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steve5

do I leave the plastic natural , or paint it a white colour ? ,

Leaving the plastic as is, is tempting.  But, paint is a better option.  If only so that the plastic is not translucent.  A good flat white will better represent painted wood, too.

You probably want a coat of primer, too.

thank's capnmac82 , somehow I thought that was the answer , guess I was just being lazy lol .

Hi Steve5:

    Hello my friend .Hey , on the color's , Don't even think about leaving the plastic unpainted .The plastic from that era is prone to very bad yellowing over time . And from that company too !

     Painting is good , but you did make a Boo-Boo ! The boat's hull was white for at least a foot and a half or two for unladen appearance . The color is alright . If it is darker , as a result of flash whitening being lighter, you're good .     T.B.

thank's tanker , I totally misunderstood you , when you said no waterline , I read over stripe , duh!! , so the white is just under the middle of the boat ,as the deck is slightly curved up at each end. Because I'm repainting the hull , I might go to black , now that I have had a chance to look at it , think that will make it stand out more ,

as I said to capnmac , I was just being lazy , over the white ,

going into town today see if I can get some hessian looking cloth to make those bales , prof J.T. gave me a good pic of the actual size of the bale's .they look between 1.8 & 2m tall.get back to you when I get some more picture's mate .

steve5

tanker I went for a slightly beaten up look for the boiler , the bulkhead isn't that great at the moment ,but I'll keep at it , before I paint and glue the piece of plastic in front of the boiler , is this what you meant for the blow back's ?" />

does this look better for the bale's T.B. , this photo makes the mesh look way bigger , than from where we will see it" />

Hey ;

   That's alright .You can muddy color that area with a white /tan mix and no one will be the wiser .Just make sure you do a bow wave kind of line of cleaner hull just behind the Paddle-Wheels . Then you'll be fine .  T.B.

That is excellent .

   Do you have them glued in place yet ? If not  , shave some firedoors off and leave them in the open position .Take some figures ( I think the boat still has them ) and have them tossing wood in the firebox . There would be the firemen and the wood passers . 

 You can paint that piece steel /black with a slight shine from the firemen working and walking on them .Cast iron would not polish from wear like steel would so the surface color would still be dark .

 The bales are better , But , they still need to be more oblong in shape with the wrap shaping them that way .Take a small piece of thin cardboard . Make an oblong box , stuff with the cotton , so the cotton sticks out slightly , and then wrap and tie it . T.B. P.S. I love what you've done with those packing crates !

Do you have ?

 One small paper punch ? If you do , punch out eight small discs for steam guages and then two slightly for the two master guages on each side of the boiler front . Attach each disc up and slightly to the right as you look at the boiler fronts .

 You can glue guage faces from a model car guage face decal sets . as long as they are the right size .It won't matter what they say because they cannot be seen face on .But , they would be seen from a sharp angle .

  If you cannot find the beasties , get a popular car magazine for down under and cut out the guages you need .The Large guages can be large speedo guages . A little white ( school ) glue will fasten them in place .

    To do the guages nicely , Coat them with white glue and let them dry .You'll see why in a moment . Now , paint the edges of all of them with a dry-brush method on the edges .This will make them look more authentic .      T.B.

I just  lucked into your posts here Steve. I didn't know you were into riverboats. They are real fun & very little rigging. I grew up in St louis & rode on real old riverboats back in the 1930's. I have been to a lot of really good places to see the history of them. I also have built the kit you are building back in the 1950's. It was the best kit I had ever seen & I built at least 3 of them including the Natchez & the Robt. E Lee. 

    Tanker is super to give you advice. If you get real fired up on them you need to go to Marietta Ohio & Jeffersonville Ind. I knew a riverboat architect in Louisville & have his book, which I can't find, & went to see him. He was a model railroader with riverboats on his layout & I had them too.  Beware Riverboats will hook you. They are endless fun.

    One little thing that might help you is I use small, 1/8" pine branches cut up for a wood pile on my boats. HO RR detail parts are real good for things like bells & things. I have a boat, the Betsy Ann about 90% done, scratch built from plans I got from an architect in Calif. . His grandfather owned the Betsy & ran it back in the 1920's.

   For the R E Lee white is the color. I also have a ton of detail books on riverboats if you need any info. I also have a book of paintings by Bill Reed of Riverboats. 

   You are doing a great job & your work is really nice. I would like to see more.

gene

this is my first venture outside of sailing ship's ,you are very right about tanker helping me , he really get's into the minute stuff ,I don't think my imagination is that good lol .I'm trying to get picture's of the hull and water line , could you tell me how you did your's .

tanker

I'm not sure what you mean't about the hull , is it under the deck white , tape a line and the rest of the hull black ?

steve5

is this what you had in mind tanker builder , I put some cotton painted red in the boiler hole's , the figures are only for a size up at the moment .

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ended up making my own gauges

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Steve, all my riverboats are white hull & on my wood Lee I put a red waterline. I don't know why because I can't remember seeing one. I will check my pictures for hull color as I have a ton of picture's. In fact all my riverboats are white & even the Natchez was white. There were more than one of a lot of boats with the same name, because they sank fast. 

    My friend the riverboat architect designed a lot of the big current passenger boats. The Betsy Ann I am building was built in 1898 & had a steel hull, which is why she lasted so long. The man who ran & owned her in 1925 was Frederick Way & he wrote a book called Life or Days on the Betsy Ann. His grandson & wife are architects out in California, He drew a 12 sheet plan of the Betsy that you could build her by. He sent me a full set & a lot of details & I have her scratchbuilt in 1/87, HO scale, so I could use HO fittings & details. I am stopped on the photoetch railings & details. Here she is.

I used HO windows, figures, doors,Bells, & a lot more. I used Evergreen sheet & strip plastic. It is one of the few models I haven' finished.

Steve, I looked at Bill Reid's paintings & he shows a black bottom & side up to where the water level on the wheel would be.  I looked at a lot of my old pictures & they all showed the same thing, but they weren't in color. Reid's pictures are really accurate & a lot of the originals hang in the old hotel bar on the river in Marietta, Ohio.

  This is Reid's  picture of my Betsy Ann.

Gene1;

 Hey ! That looks just like one of the paintings they had on the walls of the " Edgewater Lounge " Most looked like originals . Oh ! You are dead on right . Rivercraft of any kind , Stern or Side Wheel will " Snag " you , but good ( pun intended !)  T.B.      Especially the working boats .

 Hello !

    The littler guy is just right ! T.B.

Oh , Gene1;

 You have stolen my heart ! What a gorgeous boat .WELL DONE ! ! Unlike many , who do them flat , I am glad to see those beautiful sheer lines . Awesome ! ! T.B.

Hey Steve .

  Wanna have some fun ? On your boiler casing front put two valves by each drum .One is steam flow and the other is blowdown . These would be on opposite sides of the drum .The right hand one is red the left steel color . No steam lines are necessary unless you want the boiler bleed valves which would be right on the lower front edge of the boilers in plain sight . T.B.

TB, I have loved riverboats sice I was a little kid & rode on the President in St louis back in about 1936. Also my most memorable model was building the Pyro Robt. E Lee. My old great grma got my Yankee mom to name my older brother Robert Lee. She wanted the E Lee for mom's maiden name Evans, but mom stopped there.

   Steve is doing a great job on his Lee & it will look super. I painted most all of my paddle wheels Red. It goes nice with white & tan deck. I have got to go back & read all your & steve's posts on this site again. I just found it last night. If any of you all know where I can get PE railngs & stack caps done, please let me know. 

   I will go & look at some of my other riverboat books on color. I just looked at Way's Packet Directory & everything in there is white on passenger boats. I have been to a lot of riverboat towns, St louis, Marietta O, Louisville & Jefferson ville Ind. The museum at Jeffersoville is great. It is the old mansion of the boat builders of the R E Lee & many other famous ones. It is above the falls of the Ohio, I believe.

   Tanker, I would like to hear more on what you did.

Hi Gene1;

   Well where do you want me to start ? I am a proffessional , retired , and Steam Packets were my specialty . Now that said , I also specialized in Museum Grade restorations of sailing ships and motor yachts  ( real and models ).

     I have done seven foot containerships for a Model RailRoad shop and 1/48 scale oil spill cleanup boats and ships for Clean Bay and Clean Seas of Ventura and Concord California .

 my most memorable resto was a sailing ship that fell off a shelf and landed rigging down on the floor .When cleaning it up to rebuild  it, I washed away years of grime and repaint to come to the original paint from many years ago . Seems the modelers Great - Grandfather had built it during the " AMISTAD " Trial and that's what it was . A very correct model of the ship by that name .

 I engineered and built Homes, Bridges and Hospitals . Now I try to stay out of trouble and build odd Planes ( if it floats ,all the better ) , Cars and Riverboats as well as well as H.O scale inland river oil tankers ! Plus I build the odd LEGO building of my own design too .I spend time at our Local Rail Museum where I am on the board , as well as a liaason and  member to the  San Antonio L.U.G. ( LEGO users group ) and spend one day a month running the Friends of the library bookstore at our city's ( New Braunfels ) library .

 I like to come here and share Whatever, wherever and whenever I can, and derive great pleasure from it .  T.B.

Steve 5;

 I hope you didn't glue those in place .They go next to the boiler , not on the end of the drum .  T.B.

sorry tanker builder , they were only glued on with elmers school glue , a bit of water they came off . so they go to the right of the boiler door's . see if I can come up with some smaller ones

steve5

Hey Steve, I thought I'd pop in. This is a very cool project and one that I am following. You are making some great progress, and man, you are doing some really nice work. Way to go sir. 

nice to know you are watching steve , but I have to say , I am getting some excellent help from tanker builder , and now gene1 is their too . I love learning !

Bakster, I never got back wwith you on your question on my great grandma & the battle of Nashville. She did see some of the battle from a hill above. I will send more. 

TB your history sounds great, why don't you send us some picture's? You built the real things & then got into fine model restoration. You also built houses too. So did I, design & build for 40 years. I stuck to houses & some apts. & stores & didn't fool with anything that had to work like boats & motors.

 Steve5, I did some more color looking & every boat I saw, even in a group, were all white. I can still remember building your Pyro Lee & even nearly bought another one on ebay in the last month. It was a good kit & with what you are doing, it should look great.

Gene1;

    I wish I could on the pictures .Just can't seem to get it right . Now , building sailcraft was fun . But , without a doubt restoring a 4-6-2 steam engine from the late forties was the Best challenge .

Sure glad I had part in it .No , didn't do the mechanicals .I painted her ! Now doing the Oil Spill boats was fun too . Why ? well they were in the gamut from twenty footers all the way to 180 footers . Riverboats , indeed were mostly white .They looked more like palaces that way .

 By the way Did you know that the J.M. Whites ( I don't remember how many there were ) were considered the most beautiful and ornate of the genre. I saw a photo of J.M.White number four and wow! they were right .

     They didn't carry a number on the sides or anything .Just J.M.White ! T.B.