Is there enough gun port "kits" or "pieces" for each of her guns on the sides? I would like my dummy ports/guns to have the same gun port appearance as the working ones.
There are 12 sets of gun ports, so just what is allowed for total number of guns. I didn't plan to provide more because I believe the rules state that gun ports without guns must be painted on. Using frames for every gun port would give a lot of additional hard area.
Should you follow with CSS Stonewall / IJN Kotetsu (Azuma), you can count on me buying one of your future kits since I've been modeling Civil War ironclads & always interested in building her as part of my collection. Besides, I couldn't think of any better subject for RC naval combat with that big armored ram & 300 pound rifle on the bow.
I can easily make some more.. I think we may need to look at that a little. Some captains build just what they need to battle, IE anything in superstructure that is 1" or more. Not much detail. Others like to detail out their ship. Both types are fine... We need to re think the "painted gun ports". That would drive me crazy on my ship... We should allow the captain to decide if they are painted or actually built in, just like we do with casement guns now. Just change the hard area around the gun port to 1/4". They are not much different than casement guns on a battleship, at least in our hobby... the casements do not have any purpose other than decorative but yet we allow them to have added impenetrable area for them... If you build a 120 gun monster, you should be allowed the added "hard" areas... besides, none of these gun ports are even close to being below the waterline.
An idea I was thinking about was cutting out the port in the skin, then putting a square patch that just overlaps the opening. That would give the illusion of closed gun ports and break up the flat painted port look.
Money sent, money accepted. Now the wait begins, I have enjoyed my other kit from Mark as it is like a lego model. Who will be the first to start a build log...
Pressure... too... great... to... withstand... I had a side discussion with some friends about this, and there was concern that so many Constitutions would be boring. If anyone else has a concern about this, ponder... Many, many variables will come into play. Beyond builder skill (we can't all be Mike Mangus ), differences in rig setup and paint schemes, decoration, etc can make the basic hull look VERY different. Count on me having an interesting rig. Already got the cloth, got to bribe my dear mother to sew the sails; I'm positive she needs holes for more blueberry bushes dug...
You have to laugh at your own concern when you think of past history. Iron dukes (how many on the water right now), everyone (including myself) in the '43 QE - still dont see that many. We all buy and start builds, but very few complete and battle. Heck, if you (or anyone) is worried about too many of the same, it would not be hard to paint different colors. I'll bet these ships will be a bear to battle (wind and all that).
Not mention the ability to sail..... :blink: Square riggers tack differently.. and maneuvering them takes a lot of practice. ...and yes there will be a lot of different rigging and paint schemes... but it might also be good to have several of the same type because we are still in the testing phase, we have a level base line, if that makes sense. It would be hard to test a rule if a 24 gun brig was fighting a 132 gun SOL.... I am buying two to build so Jeff and I can beat each other up till we get more captains around here. I do have plans on building the Brig Syren and a larger SOL. I have already looked at getting my thread to make the rope, ect... also I have my Mother In Law to make my sails for me.... I am still looking for some good Napoleonic style figures for the gun crews and the captain.
Wo0t! Great idea with the adjustable gun decks. Now I need some kind of roll-feedback mechanism to automatically depress the high-side guns as the ship heels. I already have a few ideas in mind... On the whole safety-above-horizontal thing, we have had this discussion before. The general conclusion was to try the "don't fire when pointed above horizontal" method in combat, and consider alternatives if the first method proves insufficient. @VVaholic, Gascan and I have fought plenty of practice battles with 1:96 plastic kits of Constitution and Victory. Combat under sail is entirely practical, provided winds are both present and consistent. Sailing will require practice, however, since wind propulsion is naturally more complicated than electric motors.
I played around a little with a heading hold gyro, hoping that it would be able to keep the deck level. But it is not set up to hold a constant input - when it sees a rate change it sends a correction and then goes back to neutral. So we are going to need an accelerometer that always knows which side is down and can hold the servo position where it is needed. I did buy a nice 3 axis accelerometer breakout board from Sparkfun for $10. Coupled with a Picaxe or other programmable micro controller it should be able to do what we need. I even worked out the math to eliminate acceleration from turning, although that may be making it too complicated. Doing Sin and Cos functions with integer math is not trivial. I think we could control the angle of the gun deck with around +- 5 degree accuracy, which will at least keep the BBs pointed down.
McSpuds & I looked at doing RC Ironclad combat. Worked out what scale would be best and started putting together a shiplist. Then realized if we wanted to make it realistic, we'd have to arm them w/ bb guns and make the hulls out of aluminum....WITHOUT WINDOWS. Not to mention the problem of designs that were barely seaworthy in full scale would sink instantly in scale & most of those that didn't would not have enough propulsion to be able to manuever.
propulsion, seaworthiness, and armor issues aside, some ironclad-era warships have serious hull-shape issues. Specifically, several ships have little to no penetrable area. Some have curved decks that extend down into the water, others have severely under-cut underwater hulls, and still others have both. I looked into it too, and could not figure out a way to balance those ships with the more traditionally shaped ones, so I abandoned the project in favor of the Age of Sail. Mark, take a look at some of the technology used in FPV/drone RC planes. heading-hold gyros are old news there, now they have automatic-leveling systems and even return-to-home functionality. Although personally I was going to try a simple servo hack, first. Take out the potentiometer and place it on the gun deck, with its rotational axis parallel to the gun-deck's rotational axis. Hang a weighted pendulum from the potentiometer, and voila, the servo knows which way is down. From there, any signal from your radio tells the servo what position you want your guns relative to that pendulum. Place physical stops on the pendulum to match the physical limits of the gun deck, and you've got a simple feedback mechanism that compensates for the roll and heel of the ship. I'd whip up a demonstration rig and take a few photos, but it'll be months before I come home and can work something up.
I will use a servo and a radio channel to control the gun deck elevation... Just like a turret rotate.
McSpuds, lets move the discussion about elevation control and safety to another thread, and keep this thread focused on the Constitution.
