R.M.S Olympic - 1:700 Revell

[Julien]

R.M.S Olympic

1:700 Revell

The Royal Mail Ship (RMS) Olympic was designed and built by Belfast Shipbuilders Harland and Wolff. She was the lead ship of three ships, the others being The RMS Titanic; and HMHS (His Majesties Hospital Ship) Britannic.

The Olympic in a rather sad way has always been eclipsed by her sisters' tragic careers. Perhaps the most famous was the sinking of the Titanic with the loss of 1502 people when she hit an Iceberg and sank on her maiden voyage. The Britannic was also to suffer being sunk when she hit a mine off the Greek island of Kea in WWI, thankfully with a loss of only 30 lives, as she had 1066 people embarked at the time.

The Olympic was launched for The White Star line in 1910 and commenced her first voyage on 31st May 1911 in a publicity stunt timed to coincide with the launch of The Titanic. Olympic continued with her service on the North Atlantic route until WWI.

In may 1915 she was requisitioned by the British Admiralty to be used as a troop ship. She was striped of her peacetime fittings and armed with a mix of 12 Pounder and 4.7" guns. She had the capacity to transport 6000 troops, no doubt in no where near the luxury afforded her previous paying guests! She made various trooping voyages, initially to Greece for the Gallipoli campaign. Then later on charter to the Canadian Govt she transported troops from Canada to the UK. It was thought that she would be able to transport troops to India via the Cape, however the ship did not have enough coal capacity being designed for the trans Atlantic route. Late on in WWI she was fitted with larger 6" guns and gained a dazzle camouflage which must have looked quite something on a vessel her size.

In 1918 in the only know incident in WWI (of a merchant ship sinking a U Boat) the Olympic rammed and sank U-103. It is estimated the over 200,000 troops were moved by the Olympic in WWI.

Following WWI the vessel was returned to civilian service and she was modernised. 38,000 passengers were transported in 1921 which would to prove the pinnacle of her career. Following changes to US immigration laws, and the great depression trans Atlantic passenger trade began to dwindle. In 1934 at the instigation of the UK government, Cunard merged with The White Star line to form Cunard White Star. This lead to the new company being able to build two new ships RMS Queen Mary and RMS Queen Elizabeth. The Olympic was then laid up in 1935 and subsequently scrapped by 1937. In addition to the 200,00 troops of WWI the Olympic made 257 round trip crossing of the Atlantic carrying 430,00 passengers whilst travelling an estimated 1.8 million miles. In spite of these facts it is still sad her main claim to fame still seems to be as the Sister to the ill fated Titanic.

The Kit
The R.M.S Olympic arrives in one of Revells standard opened ended boxes. Inside we find two hull halfs, 6 sprues of white plastic, one small clear sprue and one feel of rigging thread. The parts all look well moulded with no flash or any other problems evident. The details are mainly raised and probably a little overdone for this scale, but should look good under a coat good under a coat or two of paint.

Construction starts with gluing the two halfs of the hull together and inserting two spacers which help keep them apart and hold the main deck up. Once this has dried the main deck can be attached. Revell advise doing the rudder and base at this point, though I suspect most modellers will leave this until later on.

Following on from this the bridge and various deck houses are assembled and attached. This sequence is then followed for the rest of the upper decks. If using Revells thread for rigging be careful to follow where it is attached under the upper deck before it is attached to the model (3 each side for each of the funnels and two at each end for the masts). After the upper deck is attached the funnels need to be made and attached.

After all of the decks and funnels are in place a multitude of deck equipment, ventilators and life boats will need to be attached. Finally the fore and aft masts are placed on. Colour call outs are given for all parts in Revell colours only (No change there!)

Conclusion
Overall this kit should provide no real challenges to the modeller. The instructions are easy to follow and the parts look good. This should make into a nice model of the Olympic. If any modellers are up for a challenge then a conversion to the Troopship with Her multi colour dazzle camouflage and 6 guns could be made.

Revell model kits are available from all good toy and model retailers. For further information visit

[Panzer Vor!!!]

Good review however the kit is only good for the ship up to 1912. After the Titanic loss she had double lifeboats on top of each other fitted at the stern with some hefty davits to lift them off.

[garryrussell]

In a bizarre twist, the Olympic has not existed for many, many years, yet the other two still do exist albeit in a modified form

Is it the Titanic with the hull sides modified or have they done all the deck house differences??.

[Julien]

Is it the Titanic with the hull sides modified or have they done all the deck house differences??.

I don't have a Titanic kit to compare the two, so cant say.

Julien

[Andre B]

What I can find out it is the Titanic kit just with new decals...

[MikeR]

The hull sides of the two kits are different - this model has promenade deck open for it's full length whilst the Titanic kit correctly has the forward section enclosed. It was the main distinguishing feature of the two sisters. As for the rest of the kit I'm not surprised that Revell haven't accounted for the minor differences between the two ships.

 

Mike.

[Guest]

The bridge area should be different  - Olympic should have a more rounded frontal aspect.

 

On a related note, I was in the White Swan at Alnwick for a meal a few weeks back and ate in their Olympic lounge. This is decked out with the fittings from the First Class Lounge from Olympic herself, bought when the ship was broken up on the Tyne.