Just off the slipway and about to join the Чёрное море эскадра - Black Sea Squadron - is the protected Cruiser IZN Aurora.
Let's add the recent additions to coastal defence:
A masonry riverine or coastal fort. Some packaging that seemed to have a certain fortifiable capability. The guns within I've had for several years already. But the two others are recent builds - within the last month. I've probably already got something I can use as emplacements...
Some nice modelling going on chez Ion!
ReplyDeleteNeil
Neil -
DeleteIt is sometime surprising to what use household junk may be put. This is what I call 'recycling'. I have a notion that some Turcowaz coastal sea ports might be requiring some such protection, as certainly the major Izumrud-Zeleniyan naval base of Sebastianopol will have.
I rather like the look of that little cruiser - but then, I'm generally a bit that way with my newest creations...
Cheers,
Ion
Your crafting is impressive. I was surprised that the ship is 4" long, it must look substantial in the 'flesh'. Is that a big ship compared to some of your other stuff?
ReplyDeleteNorm -
DeleteThe crafting is pretty hit-or-miss, but, in general, I like the end results. This one turned out to be quite a pretty ship, I thought.
The odd thing about naval architecture in the late 19th century is that the type of ship doesn't seem to be much of an indicator of size. This cruiser is, as I mentioned, larger than the other - armoured - cruiser in the same fleet. Since building the Hellenic (Greek) and Turcowaz (Ottoman) navies, I have tried to keep to the 1200 length/ 1:600 beam scales - minimising any Procrustian adjustments to fit the 10cm hex grid cells.
Whilst taking the pictures I did consider taking one with Aurora and Radetzky together. The battleship is a shade longer than 10cm (11, I think), certainly beamier, and looks gigantic compared with the cruiser.
I think I will do a post listing my Chubby Marine naval inventories. I 've built at least four ships since I finished the fleets over a year ago...
Cheers,
Ion
I'm totally in love with that ship, it's a wonderful marvel and all the more so for being scratch built. It looks terrific. I wonder if 3D printing has spoiled me and others to the inspiration that can come from just looking at some packing material and using one's imagination. Cheers, Michael
ReplyDeletePadre -
DeleteYou do flatter me, and no mistake! I made that thing off and on over a couple of evenings. My one regret is that I couldn't find a place for a steam pinnace.
But I admit to liking the end result myself - a pretty vessel, though only approximately similar to its original. We'll just have to discover how she performs in action... Come to think of it, the Izumrud-Zeleniya has on the whole the prettiest of all my Chubby Marine fleets...
Cheers,
Ion
Cheers,
Ion
Great looking ship. I have no talent for scratch building, so admire the work of those that do. Nice looking artillery too.
ReplyDeleteWEK 3
DeleteI think one develops the skill with practice. Maybe. Unlike my brothers, I have little skill (or interest) in carpentry, but came to this kind of modelling because I 'needed' to acquire this or that item. It began over 40 years ago with USS 'Watusi' - a fictitious US riverine ironclad gunboat to go with my ACW armies. That was at a time when acquiring such items from commercial sources was, for me, living at the end of the world New Zealand, problematic. I still have that model, and a number of other ACW craft that I eventually put together. I don't know how many scratch-built ships and boats of various sizes I have made over the years. It might be interesting to do a count!
Cheers,
Ion
A wonderful looking ship you have made to add to your collection.
ReplyDeleteCheers, Peter -
ReplyDeleteI've been thinking - the collection is continually growing, even when I draw a line underneath. My Chubby Marine - from torpedo boats to battleships and including the merchants comes to something over 80 vessels now.
Bally good thing I didn't set out to make 80 ships! - would never have got started.
Cheers,
Ion
A good looking ship, the Aurora, and your rendition is very fine. After being up-gunned, she also became quite a potent weapons platform.
ReplyDeleteI'm currently building the 1903 version of her using an old plastic model, with the 76mm broadside guns. Not so powerful, but I hope it will look fancy with the white and ochre livery.
Andrew -
DeleteI've seen many of your own naval scratch-builds; now they are real model making! So any praise from you is praise indeed. My thanks.
The green livery serves to identify the vessel as belonging to the GREEN nation, tne Czarate of Izumrud-Zeleniya. I don't know what the Russian peacetime naval livery was - and I prefer to stay with them instead of the wartime livery. It just makes the navies distinctive.
I went with more or less the 1903 version myself, though with certain ... erm ... abbreviations. My 'Aurora' carries just 8 x 1 x 6-inch guns.
CHeers,
Ion
Nice ship - there's a certain character about this type of model, hard to say what gives them their charm, possibly just the fact that they seem to be larger than life, with everything compressed.
ReplyDeleteRob -
DeleteI think you have put your finger on it. It's like having a large scale ship with the convenience of a small scale. I have also built even more considerable navies - my Mini Chubby Marine - with much smaller vessels, generic, and to a prescribed 'scale'. The battleships in those navies are just 6cm long, with a 1.5cm beam. These were built for a whole different project, a fantasy world whose technology is c.1943.
The thing about these vessels is that they seem more - I don't know - 'visible', shall we say, than real models of 1:c4000 scale. They were quite fun to make. The three navies (very disparate in size) total 90-odd ships. I did not include anything smaller than destroyers.
You might be interested (if you haven't seen it already) in an action I played out a couple of years back, based very loosely on the Battle of the Coral Sea.
https://archdukepiccolo.blogspot.com/2024/10/battle-of-laroc-sea-big-playtest.html
Cheers,
Ion
Great looking cruiser. It packs a lot of detail in. I also really like the coastal defenses. That is next on my building agenda.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Chris -
ReplyDeleteThe trouble with kind of modelling, one tends to get more and more ambitious. My early Turcowaz (Turkish) naval builds were a deal simpler. I omit some details (notably air scoops(?)) because I have no satisfactory method of making them. I've considered using brads.
The coastal fort - a kind of smaller, simpler Ft Sumter, kinda - was just some packing that looked likely. I'm trying to decide whether it protects Trebizond or Sebastianopol - maybe it will be both.
Cheers,
Ion