Last Sunday was the San Francisco Model Yacht Club's Wooden Boat Parade. It was also the first real storm of the year here in California, so most people spent the event inside the SF Model Yacht Club's famous clubhouse. Not me, though. I wanted to see how my ships handled in heavy weather, so out I went in the pouring rain and howling wind. I set sail with battleship Prinz Eugen on the windward side of the pond, with 2" swells extending up to 4" or so when the wind gusted. PE was unrepaired from the Last Man Standing battle, but had a fresh pump battery. One pump was running continuously while the other occasionally kicked on to help out after a nasty swell. Looking deceptively calm: The photos really don't do this storm justice. PE was actually catching air beneath her pointy ram bow at times, and her casemates were swamped most of the time. Some of the larger waves knocked loose an 8-oz lead weight, which moved from the starboard side to port. Hence the list. Combine the list with the wind, and things get very interesting. Good thing I had a fully-charged battery for my pumps! Later, I headed over to the leeward side of the pond, where waves were reaching 10" during gusts. I didn't want to carry a 20lb+ battleship and radio the whole way, so I brought my destroyer Z-25 instead. Z-25 has very well-sealed decks, but in weather like this, all things are relative. When I first put her in the water, Z-25 was bobbing like a cork. 50 feet later, there was an inch of water in her bilges and she was no longer so bouncy. first setting sail. Look at the size of those waves, they're up to the bridge! bouncing too much for the camera to focus. Water leaking in through the torpedo tubes: both bow and stern submerged: 50 feet later, good thing shore is close by: A number of other WWCCers were sailing as well. One actually lost signal, drifted across the lake, and foundered 20 feet from the lee shore. Fortunately our courageous diver Gascan was able to retrieve the wreck on his very first attempt, in shoulder-deep water. Here is the USS San Francisco, "taking it green" :
Very nice. We used to battle at a pond down in Decatur Alabama that would have some waves like that. If you didn't have a really good deck-seal, you were going swimming. Mikey
Nice shots - love the head on shot of the PE. Side question: Have those casemate guns tore holes in anybody getting too close yet, or is paint trading not a common occurrence in your battles?
With the scale speeds and heavier armor of Big Gun warships, it's very rare that even a T-bone collision causes ram damage. So we have no problems scraping sides or even pushing each other around, so long as it doesn't sink the other guy.
Brings back memories of rough weather battling and when I took bis and Yamato out this past june for rough water sailing.
Looks like the directory name got changed, likely a spelling correction. I've taken the liberty of quoting Carl's post and correcting the img links within the quote.
