So I am about to start cutting wood on my Sverige class on some scaled up plans. The George Goff set has a ram bow. To get the beam right, the LOA is 1" too much, but the only Sweedish drawings I have seen depict a more "vertical" bow. www.riksarkivet.se/default.aspx As does the only picture I have been able to find of one of these ships in drydock commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HMS...rapped.jpg Overall, the deck is concave from bow to stern, so it looks like I wil be building from the keel up. If I drop the ram bow and re-draw it I can save 1/2" and fall within scale tolerance. The only period reference to a ram bow is the 1923 Brassey's. My question is should I shorten the keel a bit so I have some breathing room, and/or keep the bow on the Goff plans?
The Sverige class were all refitted/rebuilt numerous times according to Conways 1905-1921 and 1922-1946. This page here: http://www.navypedia.org/ships/sweden/sw_bb_sverige.htm states that the Sverige was built with a ram bow while Gustaf V and Drottning Victoria were built with a straight stem. The swedish plans you posted has the curved fore funnel which was done in a 1933 refit. It is possible that during one of her yard periods that they removed the ram bow.
Thanks for the information, I am building the Gustav V. Looking at the bow in the first picture on that website, it looks more like the bow shown on this line drawing. z11.invisionfree.com/shipbucket/ar/t117.htm It also states that the two latter ships only had two shafts, so that will make things a bit easier construction wise. I also found these two images that support the "undercut bow": www.ha-bo.se/modellbatarSalu.php www.worldnavalships.com/directory/shipinfo.php
That bow is correct for the Gustaf V and Drottning Victoria as they were built as icebreakers. Most icebreakers have that type of bow, designed to run up on top of the ice and using the weight of the ship to push down and break the ice. Interesting as that model you linked to has the icebreaker bow but also 4 shafts. It really is hard to find accurate information for some ships.
Good catch, I missed the shafts on the model. Well, now that I have information about the bow, I will start re-working the plans to adjust. I was hoping to have the hull framed this weekend (a big plus to being single is lots of shop time can be worked into the schedule), but it looks like that might not happen.
