The Ship Model Forum

I think the kit does depict her original configuration, not 100% sure though. And no I don't have that book, must keep an eye out for a copy. Ah I have plenty on the to-do list before I get to Dreadnought so no major panic.

This is my first post. I am currently building a Trumpeter Dreadnought 1918 kit.

For me this is the ship's final combat configuration following her July-August 1917 refit and after she had rejoined the 4BS at Scapa Flow from May 1918.

So far I have identified a number of issues with the kit as compared with AOTS Dreadnought including suggested colour scheme (Tamiya XF 54 too dark so using XF 50), too many 12lb on flying deck and signal deck(only 18 by 1918), only one 6 lb HA AA supplied instead of two 3 " AA, too many 36" searchlights on the signal/flying decks and no provision for black on the tripod mast from mid fore funnel up (and the foremast has not been reduced in height, retaining only the upper yards).

More fundamentally appearance wise is that there is no provision for deflection scales on A and Y turrets. That they were present on Dreadnought from late 1917 is clear from photos including those in the AOTS. I think I have worked out the graduations and how to mark them accurately on the turrets (although the smallness of the numbers will defeat me). What I cannot identify however is the colour of A and Y turrets. Can anyone help? On Dreadnought and the other British capital ships of the period the turret colour is clearly darker than the ship itself but is it dark grey or black? Instinct says it would have been dark grey but the two photographs of HMAS Australia in Roberts British Battlecruisers 1905-1920 at pp 85 and 118 suggest it could have been black

Any thoughts? and any other suggested mods to the 1918 version gratefully accepted.

Cheers

Grant

Have registered but appear to have mistakenly posted as a guest.

Cheers

Grant

Akula,

I seem to recall that there is a model of an unidentified capital ship with one of its gun-house shields painted with a deflection scale on it. The impression remaining is that the base colour was black: it would certainly have made the scale and numbers stand out better than they would have done if the base colour had been a grey. However, someone else may know better.

81542

I don't think you could go wrong with an off-black or very dark grey. Here's Agincourt in 1917-1918(ish), according to the caption (I don't recall where I downloaded this picture from).

_________________
Martin

"Tomorrow is the most important thing in life. Comes into us at midnight very clean. It's perfect when it arrives and it puts itself in our hands. It hopes we've learned something from yesterday." John Wayne

Ship Model Gallery

Thanks for your comments. There are six turrets with the kit so will try both a dark grey and a black and see how they look.

The photo of Australia in Jabberwock's 6 July 2016 post is one of the photos I referred to and, like the photo of Agincourt, looks pretty dark if not actually black.

In very belated answer to Jabberwock's question the numbers are 10 degree increments from the centre of the barbette, with 0 at the front of A turret (which normally faced forward when not in use) and 180 at the rear and the reverse on Y turret (which faced aft when not in use - 180 at rear of turret and 0 between guns). This enabled observers in vessels ahead and astern to ascertain immediately the bearing on which the guns were firing so the other ships could fire on same bearing. The range clocks worked on a similar principle. As the photo of Agincourt showed where there were superimposed mountings the deflection scales were painted on the higher turret, presumably because easier to see from the accompanying ships.

Interestingly, while obsessing about the deflection scales and looking at the photographs of turrets of the period I realised that the turrets of the Trumpeter kit do not include the rangefinders that had been fitted to the rear of all five turrets by June 1915. These are shown in the side elevations in AOTS (and are visible in several photos) but there is no detailed drawing as far as I can see. From the photos the rangefinders appear to extend across approximately two thirds of the flat section of the turret and offset to the left-hand side. This was presumably so as not to interfere with the hatch at the right rear of the turret roof. Am constructing with some leftover sprue.

You might contact Simon Percival at Micro Master about your 1918 turrets. He very graciously produced a set to accommodate my o/c fixation on Dreadnought during her trials. You'll be blown away as well by the detail on his 12 pounders. An errant seagull told me funnels are in the works, so he seems to have a soft spot for this ship (and we who labor over hyper accurate models of her).