NZ Bill

Thanks for that Kev. Real information! 😀 I have been making my own rope and generally avoid buying actual model supplies if at all possible. Price and pride drive this quirk. I will look for suitable fibre/string and have a go. At that size some cordage may have been double wound but I will experiment with 3 times multiple strands and see how that works out. Not today though as I am still focussed on the gun research! Bill

Hi Stevehnz, I hope your weather in Nelson was better than hours today (sailing cancelled!) My grandfather's memoir is unpublished and written in his later years so covers most of his life but his war experience is a big part of it. If you are working on a similar area of naval history I would be happy to share. I also have his brother's diary/series of letters from his signing up for the army to a bout a week before he was killed at Ypres in April 1918. They are enlightening documents. I really want to understand the construction/operation of their Hotchkiss gun., My other areas of need are less critical, like the accuracy of my anchor winch and where to obtain figures of suitable scale so I have put a request up in the Figures section here. You might be amused by my other boat, SL Branksome which at 1\;7 scale has some large figures on it and the lady (owner) in the bow will turn to you and invite you aboard or now might remind you to scan your codes to avoid another lockdown! She is popular with everyone but especially with foreign tourists as she can greet you in 50 different languages! Her voice is by Bluetooth from my phone and is a great success. Bill

Hi Malpaso - Yes it is interesting indeed. I researched those brands and a few other threads but found no definitive result. However on balance I would put money on hard scratchy sheets in a pack as hard and scratchy was mainstream at the time and packs would allow efficient storage and distribution. BUT I now doubt that there was a pack in the head! The army had a daily personal ration and so I suspect the Navy did too. Hence a sailor in a hurry had to rummage in his bunk for his pack. Hence I will probably omit paper dispensers in the forecastle head and include 2 discrete packs in the officers' head. This is a bit like China today where no public loos have paper so everyone carries a small pack of buys from the lady retailing it at the door! It is another example where I have to draw the most probable conclusion from a set of soft facts. Thanks for the input!

I am making a 1:20 model of ML167, a WW1 Coastal Patrol Boat that my grandfather served on as CPO. See 'WW1 Coastal Patrol Boats – ML167' in 'Projects in progress'. In due course I want to include the crew and I have photos of 4 of his crew and pictures of crews of other boats and I want to represent real people. The figures will be around 80 to 90mm tall. Making faces and painting figures is not a strong suit (I have tried!) so I am looking for a source of suitable figures. I will need realistic faces and body proportions but expect I could adjust the postures and assemble convincing clothing. This photo is a pencil sketch of a real crew in their forecastle and as my model includes everything below decks some crew will be in here. This is my grandfather posing with the Hotchkiss 3lb quick fire gun on an unusual high angle mounting. I want to make convincing model of this gun but hope someone can help to interpret the parts we can see in the photo.

Hi Malpaso - Yes it is interesting indeed. I researched those brands and a few other threads but found no definitive result. However on balance I would put money on hard scratchy sheets in a pack as hard and scratchy was mainstream at the time and packs would allow efficient storage and distribution. BUT I now doubt that there was a pack in the head! The army had a daily personal ration and so I suspect the Navy did too. Hence a sailor in a hurry had to rummage in his bunk for his pack. Hence I will probably omit paper dispensers in the forecastle head and include 2 discrete packs in the officers' head. This is a bit like China today where no public loos have paper so everyone carries a small pack of buys from the lady retailing it at the door! It is another example where I have to draw the most probable conclusion from a set of soft facts. Thanks for the input!

OK guys - Advice taken and finally have posted a thread under 'WW1 Coastal Patrol Boats – ML167' in 'Work in Progress - Maritime'. Now I lie in wait for someone who knows a lot about the details I seek! Thanks for your help. Keep up your good work. Bill

Thanks dnl42. At that scale the detail should be easy-ish but it is the result of a lot of trial and error, mostly error for the tricky bits. I am sure it will be a popular model at the lake where I will be able to spread more understanding of what war at sea involved which is an important goal.

And a few more to finish. A general shot of a real engine room to show what mine should have looked like! I am not unhappy as it will still help people understand, and be impressed, by our grand parents when they went to war for us. These were petrol starting engines that then switched to a mix of petrol/kero but they were prone to fires which sunk a few of them. My grandfather had such a fire but was able to starve it of air and live to fight another day. This is the galley. I forgot to close the drawers The stove is petrol fired (3 burners) with 2 ovens below. An oven is a metal box inside a metal box and I did the same. Both doors open and there are oven racks inside! Many things are secured with magnets which you can see in the pots but they will later be covered by indigestible food if my grandfather is to believed! Then there is a tiny bench/sink/cupboard item with a califont over to make hot water for tea etc There is another bench and cupboard both sides under the side decks. On the left is both the galley and wardroom. I regret using actual mahogany even though it was probably used on the real boat but I think I will leave it and do more features instead of perfecting this one. The table just lifts out (more magnets) so I could do it later. It is a folding table made of at least 16 parts. The section of seat in the doorway hinges up for access. The wheel controls the depth and direction of a dual bulb sub-detecting stethoscope (no batteries involved.) The headset is in the black cupboard. Other cupboards store something but I have no information. If you have any ideas I would love to hear them. The Holy of Holies - 2 officers live here! I gave then made up beds instead of the ticking mattresses and bed rolls of the 'men'. The hatches in the floor are access to the prop shafts. There is a lot of detail still to add - the head lacks usual items but a BIG question is what sort of toilet paper was standard naval issue in WW1? The dresser on the left was to hang officer uniforms and I guess the drawers underneath the beds was the rest of their personal gear. My grandfather told me the wet weather gear was either on their backs or on the hooks! There are many items to add like the desk, clock, canvas shield over starboard bunk to divert spray from the companionway and things like that. Finally this is one of 3 pencil sketches done by a real ML Skipper of his crew in the forecastle! This not only provided a lot of detail info for the area it graphically shows how congested the space was for 7 or 8 men for a week! It must have been hell when a new crewmember was seasick which was common. The background has a sort of dresser and folding table where all their meals were served from a pot, sauce added to improve the taste and finally consumed. Carrying the pot of the day from galley to forecastle when there was a sea running was a dangerous gamble! IN CONCLUSION: Thankyou for taking the time to take a look at my current pride and joy. I really only know the basics about these boats and are eager to hear of anything about them including the high angle mounting of the gun, the colour of ropes, the type of toilet paper and a host of other details including colours as I have yet to do any of the final painting. Thank you Bill Radford Hamilton, New Zealand

This is the key page out of the Cinderellas of the Fleet book. Planks being applied to the plaster plug. Hull in a jig to hold shape while the ribs are inserted. A profile gauge copied hull shape to a jig where the ribs were laminated. There are 80 pars of ribs! One of the metal bulkheads can be seen. Hull with lining and bulkheads in place, start of the gun support structure, access ladder into the forecastle. The deck, charthouse, wheelhouse is designed to lift off. State of construction May 2021. The metal frame supports the decks when the interior is exposed. The gun is a rough paper mock-up while I research it. All doors, hatches,windows, drawers and cupboards open and the plan is to stock then with the appropriate contents. Anyone grown 1:20 scale carrots recently? The anchor needs to be changed to an Admiralty pattern as that is shown on an ML1167 photo. Does anyone have a clear photo of an anchor winch of this period? It will be similar to this one as it is suggested in the drawings but I had to guess details for this version! This view shows the aft view. The small boat was made of 2 metal pressings (ref my grandfather's memoir') so to make a thin hull I used 2 layers of tissue then soaked with CNZ glue. Mucky job but good result. The davits include on of my 'deliberate' mistakes! Does anyone know the colour of cordage from this period? I make my own ropes but dying can be hit and miss. I suspect that they are not jet black as here. Lettering on the depth Charges will be tricky. I can only see WW2 lettering so does anyone know what they did in WW1? These are wet boats so I have screwed the aft deck down tight and the rudder quadrant is magnetically connected to the servo under the deck. The wheelhouse is strictly ML167 but has some problems. I cannot see what should be on the starboard side (flag rack) and although photos show the signal lamp in that top central position but it is hard to see how it was operated. The compass binnacle contains a real working compass and a light. I have yet to fit the speaking tubes and the portable electric lantern as well as some notices. I regret the non-scale screws but they are necessary for operational and maintenance reasons. Just don't look at them! The grating covers a hole into the engine room to admit cooling air as brushless motors need cooling! The engine room hatch will also be open in operation. The left section is the fuel tank and water tanks under the chart house. It contains the water cooled esc's at the bottom, the LiPo batter to the right and a thermostat on the nearside. The radio and probably a second battery is not in this photo. On the right is the engine room with engines removed. You can see each train is the cooling fan, the brushless motor and the universal joint to the drive shaft. Each train sits in the crankcase of its motor. The nearside motor has a temperature sensor so when trickling about no cooling is needed and no fan noise but if it gets hot the thermostat turns on both fans to force cool the motors. I tested this and it worked! The black cylinder is compressed starting air storage. This is one of the dummy engine's outboard side which will be invisible when installed. It shows the complex external valve gear and the exhaust manifold. The aluminium crankcase contains the brushless motor and fan. In fact there is no such tunnel in the real boat as it had open cranks - some compromises had to be made to make it function. View if the engine rom so far. At right are the compressed starting air cylinders, the two engines with the black silencers either side, the battery boxes and electrical panel bottom left, companionway and then the aux engine that is also the emergency air compressor, bilge and fire pumps and generator. Close up of the Aux engine etc. I did not notice the floor plates were displaced when I took the photo, sorry, The portholes are all thin glass (ex phone protectors) and water tight. The covers do not actually hinge. Yu can see the ribs and the continuation of the aft deck beam shelf.

I am making a 1:20 radio controlled model of ML167 that my grandfather served on in WW1 and have completed the basics and now are doing the details and have a lot of questions. The model reproduces both the exterior and below deck spaces to accurately represent the work and conditions the crew endured. A week in coastal waters of the Irish Sea in winter was a nasty experience even before you factor in submarines and mines. The RN commissioned ELCO to build 550 of these boats in double quick time as they are basically identical but the weaponry and things like the wheelhouse varied between boats and over time. They also carried different equipment according to role so I will focus on ML167. It is entirely scratch built with very basic tools. The hull was planked onto a plug and the 80 sets of frames etc inserted. All wood parts of hull and deck are sized as on the real boat. All the detailed interior modules are removable to allow maintenance of what is an operating model. All the batteries, radio and control gear is contained within the fuel tank which will be made 'pretty' at a later time. I have started this model 20 years too late as my eyesight and dexterity are degrading by the day so I need to hurry and finish this in the next 2 years for a total of 7 years! A large part of this time is research and fixing the cockups made along the way which is a penalty of scratch building I guess! : )) I am interested in finding folk who are knowledgeable in the smaller WW1 naval craft. I have questions of colour, rope types, anchor handling, and a lot of similar details that come up as I try to decide how to fill the gaps not covered by the relatively few (around a couple of dozen and most are blurry) photos that are my limited source of information. My current challenge is interpreting a photo of the Hotchkiss 3lb QF gun in an unusual high angle mount. - first photo included below. Comments and questions are welcome. Bill Radford in NZ I have made 2 other notable boats that I might cover another time. They are : 3rd rate ship of the line 1690 - adapted from a Billings kit of the Vasa- done in 1977 SL Branksome ex Lake Windermere -1:7 scale (2 metres long) full rc including 2 animated figures and voice. Now electrically driven. More to follow once I check this is working!

OK guys - I have been crawling all over this site and have yet to find HOW TO START MY OWN THREAD! I must be a bit dim but the magic door eludes me. Any suggestions - Clarity of instruction is valued! Thanks in anticipation. Bill

I am working on it! Maybe later today (NZ time) : ))

Thank you for your kind comments. So my own thread is my next challenge! I have spent 2 days getting stuff on this site so far. My intuition is obviously digitally incompatible with these complex sites so I have to brute force my way in but it is a bit clearer now. Hopefully it will catch the attention ofWW1 small boat naval specialists who can answer my many questions as I go along. Can you see my Flickr account as I will only use it for boats and it is all public. I have put up a video of my other signature boat which is a bit different as well. Bill

I know this site is mainly for static models and high detail but I thought there may be members who knew about the details I seek like the gun, the colour of ropes and the like. Bill

This is what happens if I use the BBCode setting in Flickr and then trim off everything before the 2nd htpps! I don't know if there is a difference for the site between pasting the URL into the text as I did above or using the 'Insert image from URL' function as I did here. It is a pity it does not bring across the label and text with the photo but I will add it here. Port aft end of the engine room showing the aux engine (power, compressed ait bilge and fire pumping) .Also the telegraph, water manifold, engine silencer and he port engine. I am annoyed I did not see the floor plates are displaced to starboard but you get the idea. General view of the engine room with the compressed starting air cylinders on the right. I have the brushless motors and cooling fans in the crank cases and the geometry resulted in a reduction of the space between the engines. Grrr. The boxes bottom left are the batteries. View from the bow. The gum is a paper mock up as I try to figure how it works. The frame on the right will support the deck when it is removed to view the interior. There are drawers in the charthouse with navigation instruments and later on, with charts. The anchor is wrong for ML167. I have a photo with an admiralty pattern anchor which I have just made. I have to also make a thinner and tighter rope for the anchor and that one is too thick. View from aft. The boat is made of pressed metal (ref my grandfather memoir) so the hull mus be thin. I used 2 layers of tissue paper and CNA glue and the result is great although it was a messy task. What colour should WW1 cordage be? Here I have used black but it does not look right and photos suggest a lighter colour. The compass binnacle has a real working compass and light! The non-scale screws are required for practical operation/maintenance - Don't look at them! : )) Photos show the port side interior but I am still looking for starboard side detail. I do not know for sure if they carried a full set of signal flags but I think they must have. Later boats like yours have them on the starboard side. The signal lamp on ML167 seems to be on the top centre of the roof but there is no sign of internal operation. It would be a pain to operate but I stayed with the photo. RIGHT is the Forecastle and magazine. The detail for this area is from some pencil sketches done by an ML skipper. Note there was no place for a fixed ladder down from the hatch so I assumed it would swing up to the deckhead! There is substantial structure to support the gun which I had to split at those 2 white pads but you can see the brackets and 2of the 4 support columns 6-8 men in here for 6 days of winter seas does not bear thinking about! This is one of tI havehe 2 sketches of the forecastle that were so useful. I have photos of the galley,wardroom and Officer digs as well but it is dinner time! I hope this has not broken any photo rules here. Bill