Ship model

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This article is concerned primarily with static models. For operating models see model yachting or radio-controlled boat,

Ship models or model ships are scale representations of ships. They can range in size from 1/6000 scale wargaming miniatures to large vessels capable of holding people.^[1]

Ship modeling is a craft as old as shipbuilding itself, stretching back to ancient times when water transport was first developed.

Contents 1 History 1.1 Ancient Egypt 1.2 Europe 1.3 Modern era 2 Types of ship model construction 2.1 Wooden model ships 2.2 Plastic model ships 3 Wargaming models 4 Large Scale Models 4.1 Radio Control Model Ships 5 Engineering models 6 Manned models 7 Model yachts 8 Model shipwright guilds 9 References 10 See also 11 External links

[edit] History

[edit] Ancient Egypt

The Ancient Egyptians were first to carve detailed ship models that have survived to date.^[2] It was a common aspect of the Egyptian funeral practice to include highly accurate and detailed, painted, sycamore wood models of a ship and crew, intended to transport the soul of the deceased to the afterlife.

These models, which may be almost 5000 years old, are truly remarkable in their state of preservation. Since the models usually show the crew in their respective places they have been useful in understanding the actual duties of the crew members, what they wore, and how the ship would have been steered. The British Museum, the Louvre, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and many other museums worldwide, display extensive public collections of these ritual boats.

[edit] Europe

Some of the oldest surviving European ship models have been those of early craft such as galleys, galleons, and possibly carracks, dating from the 12th through the 15th centuries and found occasionally mounted in churches, where they were used in ceremonies to bless ships and those who sailed in them.^[3]

Until the early 18th century, virtually all European small craft and many larger vessels were built without formal plans being drawn. Shipwrights would construct models to show prospective customers how the full size ship would appear and to illustrate advanced building techniques.^[4]

Ship models constructed for the Royal Navy were referred to as Admiralty models and were principally constructed during the 18th and 19th centuries to depict proposed warship design.^[4] Although many of these models did not illustrate the actual timbering or framing, they did show the form of the hull and usually had great detail of the deck furnishings, masts, spars, and general configuration. Some of these grand models were decorated with carvings of great beauty and were evidently constructed by teams of artisans.

Admiralty models served to educate civilians who were involved in the financing or some other aspect of the ship, to avoid construction errors that might have evolved as the ship itself took form.^{[citation needed]}

During the Napoleonic wars French and English seamen who were taken prisoner were confined, sometimes for many years, and in their boredom sought relief by building ship models from scraps of wood and bone.^[4] This evolved into something of an art form and the models were sold to the public,^[5] which responded by supplying the prisoners with ivory so that the models would be more decorative. For the most part, the models had carved wooden hulls with rigging made from human hair, horsehair, silk, or whatever other fine material could be obtained. Bone or ivory would be used for masts and spars, and as a thin veneer over the hull.^[6]

A consequence of Britain's naval supremacy in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was wide public interest in ships and ship models. Numerous fairly crude models were built as children's toys leading to the creation of functional, as opposed to decorative, ship models. Britain also led the world in model ship sailing clubs - in 1838 the Serpentine Sailing Society was started in Hyde Park, followed by the first London Model Yacht Club in 1845.^[7] By the 1880s there were three model sailing clubs sharing the Kensington Gardens Round Pond alone.^[7]

[edit] Modern era

In the early part of the 20th Century, amateur ship model kits became available from companies such as Bassett-Lowke in Great Britain^[8][9] and Boucher's in the United States.^[10] Early 20th century models comprised a combination of wooden hulls and cast lead for anchors, deadeyes, and rigging blocks. These materials gradually gave way to plastic precast sets.

The development of tinplate and improvements in machine tools enabled significant advances in ship modelling from 1900 onwards. Thin, workable sheets of iron could be coated with tin to prevent rusting, then mass-produced as parts of ship model kits. The process was pioneered by French ship model manufacturer Radiguet, which produced a line of zinc boats with pressurised steam engines, wooden decking and brass fittings.^[11] The speed of production for tinplate vessels enabled one 1909 manufacturer to produce ship models of speedboats that had competed that year in Monaco.^[11]

Ship modelling in the United States experienced a boom in the 1930's when Popular Science magazine published an extended series of articles and plans for famous ships by modeller and former Navy officer E. Armitage McCann.^{[citation needed]}

In recent years, widespread internet access has played a major role in promoting ship modelling, offering enthusiasts the opportunity to show off their work and share techniques. Internet sites such as Modelwarships.comand Steelnavy.com are oriented to plastic model ship builders, while others such as Hyperscale focus largely on aircraft or other subjects can regularly feature plastic ship models as well.

[edit] Types of ship model construction

The most common materials used for ship models are:

• Wood—commonly solid wood, two pieces of wood with a vertical seam or slabs of wood placed one on top of each other.
• Plastic—including both injected styrene and cast resin models. In larger scales (1/192 and larger), fiberglass is often used for hull shells.
• Metal—usually cast lead or other alloys. Steel, sheet tin and aluminum brass are used less frequently for hull construction, but are used extensively for adding details.
• Paper—preprinted paper construction kits are common in Europe, and are available in a variety of scales.

[edit] Wooden model ships

Main article: Wooden ship models

Wooden ship model hulls can be constructed in several ways. The simplest is a solid wood hull sawn and carved from a single block of wood. This method requires the greatest skill to achieve accurate results.

A variant of this technique, sometimes known as bread and butter construction( the wood is the "bread" and glue the "butter") is a hull built up from thin blocks of wood glued together with either a vertical seam which can be incorporated into deck design, or a horizontal seam. This reduces the amount of carving required, but still requires skill and the use of templates to achieve and accurate hull form.

Modelling precision and lightweight design can be achieved by creating a hollow hull. The plank on bulkhead technique inserts a series of shaped bulkheads along the keel to form a shaped stage which will be covered with planks to form the hull of the model . Plank on frame designs build the model just as the full size wooden ship is constructed. The keel is laid down in a manner which keeps it straight and true. The sternpost and stem are erected, deadwood and strengthening pieces inserted, and a series of shaped frames are built and erected along the keel to form the internal framework of the model. The planks are then applied over the frame to form the external covering.

A wooden hull can be used for operating models if properly sealed.

[edit] Plastic model ships

In the decades since World War Two injection-molded polystyrene plastic model ships have become increasingly popular. Consisting of preformed plastic parts which can be bonded together with plastic cement, these models are much simpler to construct than the more labor-intensive traditional wooden models. The inexpensive plastic kits were initially targeted to the post war generation^[12] who could glue them together and produce passable replicas in a single afternoon. Plastic models are available in both full hull and waterline versions for a wide variety of vessels.

A more recent addition has been a variety of kits in cold cure resin marketed by various small companies as part of a cottage industry. These often cover more obscure subjects than mainstream manufacturers.^[13]

Scales vary as well, with many kits from the early days being "box scale"; that is, scaled to fit into a uniform sized box designed to fit conveniently on hobby shop shelves. Scales have since become more standardized to enable modelers to construct consistent scale collections, but there are still many to choose from. In Europe 1/400 scale remains popular, while in the United States and Japan the most popular scales are 1/700 (making a World War Two aircraft carrier about a foot long) and 1/350 (twice as long as 1/700). Nevertheless, mainstream plastic kit manufacturers continue to produce kits as small as 1/1200 and as large as 1/72, with a few even larger.

The early plastic model kit producers such as Airfix, Revell, Frog and Pyro have since been joined by Tamiya, Hasegawa, Skywave/Pit-Road, Trumpeter, Dragon Model Limited and many others in producing a wide array of model subjects. The plastic model kit market has shifted over the years to a focus on adult hobbyists willing to pay for more elaborate, higher quality kits.

Another recent development has been the advent of aftermarket parts to enhance the basic kits. Decals, specialized paints and turned metal replacement gun barrels are available to make plastic models more accurate. The introduction of flat photoetched metal sets, usually stainless steel or brass, also provide much more realistic lifelines, cranes, and other details than are possible with the injection molded plastic kits.^[13] These photoetch sets have transformed the hobby, enabling the finescale modeler to reproduce very delicate details with much less effort.

[edit] Wargaming models

Main article: Naval wargaming

Model ships have been used for war gaming since antiquity, but the introduction of elaborate rules made the practice more popular in the early 20th Century. Small miniature ships, often in 1:1200 scale and 1:1250 scale were maneuvered on large playing surfaces to either recreate a historical battle, or in the case of governments, plan for future encounters. These models were basic representations of ship types, with enough detail to make them recognizable. Bassett-Lowke marketed these to the public in England, along with more detailed versions that appealed to collectors.

Prior to World War II, the German company Wiking became a leader in the field^[14] but the war ended its dominance.

[edit] Large Scale Models

Larger ship models have been used in museums to document historical ships, in companies for decoration and public relations. These are typically built by commercial firms, or, in the past, model departments of large shipyards. One famous builder of ship models for the United States Navy was the firm of Gibbs and Cox.;a 1/48 scale model of the USS Missouri, which is on display at the Washington Navy Yard museum, required an estimated 77,000 man hours to construct.^[15] Commercial ship models are usually built to rigorous standards; for example the US Navy has an exacting set of specifications regarding the use of materials and methods with the aim of ensuring a model "lifespan" of one hundred years.^[16]

[edit] Radio Control Model Ships

Main article: Radio-controlled boat

Some hobbyists build and operate scale model ships utilizing radio control equipment. These can range from small models that can be operated in aquariums to vessels capable of navigating large bodies of water. Further expanding the concept is model warship combat, in which scale models fire projectiles at each other in combat.

[edit] Engineering models

Model ships are important in the field of engineering, where analytical modeling of a new design needs to be verified. Principals of similitude are used to apply measured data from a scaled model to the full scale design. Models are often tested in special facilities known as model basins.

[edit] Manned models

Manned models are model ships that can carry and be handled by at least one person on an open expanse of water. They must behave just like real ships, giving the shiphandler the same sensations. Physical conditions such as wind, currents, waves, water depths, channels and berths must be reproduced realistically.

Manned models are used for research (e.g. ship behaviour), engineering (e.g. port layout) and for training in shiphandling (e.g. maritime pilots, masters and officers). They are usually at 1:25 scale.

The aim of training on manned models is to enable seamen to acquire or to develop manoeuvring skills through a better understanding of a ship’s behaviour as it sails in restricted water conditions at manoeuvring speed. Manned models are considered by maritime pilots as the next best thing to a full-scale prototype for understanding a ship's behaviour.^[17]. Those who have trained on both claim that scale models are complementary to computer simulators. While manoeuvres with currents, waves, tugs, anchors, bank effects, etc. are reproduced more accurately on scale models, numerical simulators are more realistic when it comes to the bridge environment.

The Port Revel Shiphandling Training Centre is a French maritime pilotage school specializing in training for pilots, masters, and officers on large ships like supertankers, container ships, LNG carriers and cruise ships . The facility uses manned models at a 1:25 scale on a man-made lake designed to simulate natural conditions in harbours, canals, and open seas. It was the first such facility in the world. The Centre was originally created in 1967 near Grenoble by Laboratoire Dauphinois d'Hydraulique.

[edit] Model yachts

Main article: model yachting

Model yachts are operating craft, which may be sail, steam, engine or electric motor powered, typically resembling pleasure power craft, although the hobby also includes the construction and operation of models of working ships such as tugboats and other craft shown in this article as static models.

[edit] Model shipwright guilds

Model shipwright guilds are social groupings intended to allow more experienced ship modellers the opportunity to pass on their knowledge to new members; to allow members of all levels of expertise to exchange new ideas, as well as serving as social function.

Some model shipwright guilds have been incorporated into government and Naval facilities, achieving a semi-official status as a clearinghouse for information on naval history and ship design. The USS Constitution Museum operates a model shipwright guild from the Charlestown Navy Yard, adjacent to the berth for the vessel itself.

Model ship made with non-traditional materials: rolled-up tubes of paper, Express Mail labels, and duct tape.	Model ships in a model town	Detail of a model that shows men operating a capstan	John F. Kennedy's PT-109 has been a popular a subject for plastic and radio controlled models since the 1960s. Here is a 1/72 Revell kit positioned against a 1/700 Japanese destroyer.
4-year-old boy painting a Revell plastic model of the South Goodwin Lightship	A Revell "box scale" plastic model kit of the USCG Taney. Originally issued in 1956, it was among the earliest injection molded plastic ship model kits.	Completed Revell Taney model

[edit] References

[edit] See also

• Model yachting
• Model warship combat
• Radio-controlled boat
• Wooden Ship Models

[edit] External links

• Model Shipwrights Model Ship Building Community
• ModelWarships.com Plastic ship models
• Steel Navy Plastic ship models of the modern era
• Ship Modeling FAQ
• Model Boat Links
• Model Ship Builder - A website dedicated to preserving the art of model ship building.
• The Ship Modeler's Association of California has an extensive web site.
• The Maritime History Virtual Archives
• The Nautical Research Guild
• 1250 Home Page devoted to 1/1200 and 1/1250 scale models
• Models Used to Train Maritime Officers
• The Nautical Research Guild - a model shipwright association
• Ship Modeler's Association of California

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