December 1st, and December 7th are the next building dates for the predreadnought projects, pics to follow.
I am hoping to hook up with some of the locals today to look at the various ship plans that we have on-hand, so that we can get one or more new projects started. We have been seeing a lot of responses from folks that either already have plan sets, or are interested in finding them. Thanks to all that are helping out with the project. Mikey
An up-date of sorts. I have been too busy with my own projects lately to keep track of what some of the not-so-local folks have been doing on their projects. But I will up-date what I know. Or at least, think I know. We got a tremendous amount of feed-back from everyone about available plans, and ships that others were interested in obtaining, or in some cases, just seeing them on the water. Mark has his Potemkin on the water, and in combat. It has proven to be a nasty little critter that is extremely hard to hit. It also mounts my two least favorite cannons in our group. Both at weird angles. They seem to always be able to get hits on enemy ships silly enough to get anywhere near him, and trying to reply (in-kind) is almost pointless. I wish he would build something that we could hit. Matt and Phil are working together to get his (Phil) Kilkis on the water for next season. That was the first pre-dread started locally. But it got pushed to the back burner, due to other projects. Vance and I finally got the Republigue, and Danton on the water last weekend for sea trials. These also were delayed by other projects. But they will be ready early next season. Phil is also working on a Liberte kit from Mark. His interest had perhaps fallen off. But it has been renewed by the other new Frenchies on the water last weekend. So it should be ready early next season as well. Beyond that. Chris's brother over in Indiana has another of Mark's kits. The KE VII (I think). I am not sure about progress on this one. I am guessing that I am forgetting at least one other boat that is under construction already. At any rate. The project is coming along nicely, even though most of us got side-tracked by other stuff. It would seem that next season will see quite a few of these nasty little boats on the water at most of our events. Well done to all. Mikey
Lets see ... last time the Verite's balsa was changed was ... oh ... 2 or 3 years ago? Heh. The little ships tend to be hard to hit and/or do not take enough damage before sinking to warrant changing skin often.
We may need to ask Phil what he thinks about all of that. He found himself double-parked between a couple axis capitalships last weekend, and his little Frenchie went to Davey Jones locker with so much damage that he thinks it might need a new skin after just one event. Mikey
We all make mistakes in where we go at some point. I spent some quality time sandwiched between two Bismarcks many years ago and it was most entertaining. That's not to say that every time we're in a bad spot that it's the driver's fault, but more often than not we could've done something else earlier to avoid it.
more than a few times i've done something clever only to have it backfire on me, including one very embarrassing moment where I ran my ship aground high and dry while trying to come around to bring a forward gun in position on a ship stuck in the mud. ( I needed to avoid his B turret which was still in action as I recall) I was well and truly stuck, and no one wanted to come try to push me off for fear of getting themselves stuck as well
Battle with Charley....in a case like that, he'll kindly dump every magazine of bb's in his boat into you, THEN will maneuver to get you off the sandbar so you can sink properly. He's a gentleman like that.
It was one of the more miserable wadings through the mud I've had the misfortune of making, a sink anywhere closer to my side would have been a gift.
Frank was able to drop in for a little while today to work on his French pre-dread (Treaty). The pre-dread stuff is growing nicely. Mikey
So, I picked up Phil's target, err French pre dread and Mikey's Danton this last weekend. I'm hoping to have one of them on the water for the August battle. Currently I'm working to get Phil's Liberte back on the water. Mikey had me cut out some sections and reskin them. I think I'll be able to get it floating this weekend. We have a little pond where I live that I'm going to attempt to chase some ducks off of. (not with the cannons) I wish I had taken pictures, but I'll take current pictures when I get home tonight. Just need to pick up a couple batteries (I think). Thanks to Matt and Mikey for giving me a shove into getting a boat on the water!