Hey. Just got a free set of plans from Profile Morskie for this neat-o looking little cruiser hybrid. I'm thinking of keeping the plans in a hip pocket as a convoy escort something in the future. From the guns and the tonnage, it looks like it'd fall under a 3 unit light cruiser. Bit, with the back half of the hull being "not cruiser", what's the score on this thing? 11,500 Tons standard, 12-something full load. 6 X 5.9 inch guns, 25 aircraft *or* 22 tanks, 630 soldiers, and requisite ammo/supplies. it apparently was a Jack of all trades ship, high speed transport on the tokyo express, minelayer, midget sub mother ship, and the obvious Coors Light of Aircraft Carriers. Secondly, what would you guys do with a goofy little thing like this? High speed transport for convoy? convoy escort? weird unconventional cruiser for regular battles?
It would be classed as a 1-unit "Other" since CVS or Seaplane Carrier/tender is not defined in the rules.
Nisshin is on my short list of comvoy hulls to build if there is enough interest. It's about the size of a County Class heavy cruiser and has high freeboard so lots of reserve buoyancy. The two molds I still have are for hulls that can be used as convoy or combat ships: the 37" long HMAS/HMS Albatross is a 1.5 unit Class 1 'other' or a convoy ship in it's last configuration as a fleet repair ship. The 50" long Hawkins Class heavy cruiser hull can be built as the disarmed HMS Vindictive, used as a repair and depot ship in WWII. If there was enough interest I'd build the Nisshin mold next summer after my next 3 cruiser molds.
I have plans for the Nisshin and have added it to my list of molds to make over the next few months. I've been looking for plans for a British destroyer tender of similar size and appearance (HMS Woolwich) so the Allies will have an equivalent convoy ship hull. No luck so far but the hull was similar to a London/Dorsetshire Class heavy cruiser's and is almost the same size so I'll probably modify the Dorchester plans. Freeboard and draft are almost the same but the plan needs to be shortened 1" and narrowed 1/6".
You can Kitbash a Suffren hull that's what I did with mine, cut the stern and graft on some glass to get the right shape.
I've got a detailed set of lines for Dorsetshire so can modify those slightly to make the Woolwich. I'd rather make a mold than a 'one off'' hull. Now that I'm back to working part-time I can make 3-4 hull molds per year. The current list is: 1) Java/Sumatra - ready to start the plug this weekend with the hull plan deepened 1/4" 2) Tre Kronor - the side and top view drawings did not enlarge well but are usable; the cross sections I was going to modify from the 'Anatomy of the Ship: HMS Belfast' book are oddly spaced with large gaps between the bow and stern sections. This one will be delayed several weeks while I work out approximate cross-sections for the gaps. 3) IJN Nisshin - convoy ship hull; almost ready to start the plug. 4) HMS Woolwich - convoy ship hull, spring or early summer project.
Hey Bob, be sure to ask Ralph about the weird email I accidentally sent him the next time you see him. I mixed his email address up with another Ralph. the results were comical.
I'll probably see Ralph this weekend for our ~bi-weekly RC hull/mold construction progress report. Two weeks ago he dropped off Tre Kronor plans blown up more than 10x to 1/144 but the lines are too thick and they need a lot of work; there were no cross-sections. He told me he'd sold his Tirpitz mold to Modelshipsahoy and an early US battleship mold (the class pre-Florida?) to someone else. He had a tentative buyer for the Indefatigable mold.